Sitting of 2 May 1873

MINUTES.
SuppLy—considered in Committee—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES.
PUBLIC BILLs—Committee—Report—Agricultural Children [8].
Third Reading—Australian Colonies (Customs Duties)* [106], and passed.

ARMY—MAJORS OF ARTILLERY.

  QUESTION.
  SIR DAVID WEDDERBURNasked the Under Secretary of State for India, If he would explain to the House why the Majors of Artillery actually in command of batteries in India draw only the same amount of pay as was accorded to them as Captains prior to the Royal Warrant of 5th July 1872, while those holding the same rank and position in England draw, under that Warrant, the same pay as Majors of Infantry of the Line; and, whether, under existing arrangements, many Majors of Artillery are not in a very inferior position as regards pay to that occupied by Majors of Infantry, the former drawing 433 rupees 10 annas per mensem, while the latter draw 789 rupees 9 annas per mensem; and when it is proposed to place Majors of Artillery in India in the position as regards pay, apparently contemplated in the Royal Warrant above referred to?
  MR. GRANT DUFF: In reply, Sir, to my hon. Friend's first Question, I have to say that the regimental pay drawn by majors of Artillery in England is not the same as that drawn by majors of the Line, and further, that majors of Artillery in India receive more in pay and allowances than they do in any part of the Empire, and as much as it is considered that their services entitle them to receive. In reply to his second Question, I have to say that some majors of Artillery serving in India are and some are not in an inferior position to majors of Infantry also serving in that Country. Those commanding field batteries, who form the snore numerous class, receive more in some cases, and, at least, as much in all as Line majors. Those commanding garrison batteries, who have much smaller responsibilities, receive less. In reply to his third Question, I have to say that it is not intended to alter the position as regards pay of majors of Artillery in India.

THE TICHBORNE TRIAL.

  QUESTION.
  MR. M. GUESTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether, considering the difficulty of approaching the House of Commons, on account of the mob which daily congregates to witness the departure of the Claimant in the Tichborne trial from the Court of Queen's Bench, any additional measures can be taken to secure a more easy access to Members of Parliament to and from the House? In putting the Question the hon. Member said, he had been struck that day by the great impediment which had taken place in the approach to the House. He had been talking to one of the Inspectors of police, who had told him that it was found necessary to employ no less than 100 constables in keeping the approach.
  MR. BRUCE: Sir, the difficulty of keeping order arises at the moment when the defendant appears at the door of Westminster Hall, up to which time I think it will be found that the ways have been kept tolerably clear. There is then a great rush, and I am bound, in the interests of truth and justice, to say that the police report that their difficulties at that moment are much aggravated by the presence of a considerable number of Members of the House of Commons, whose presence on the scene of action prevents that vigour on the part of the police which they might otherwise display. No doubt, the number of spectators has increased very largely, and to-day there has been an increase in the number of police. It is a matter of very considerable inconvenience that so large a body of police, no fewer than 150 in number, should be taken from the performance of their ordinary duties. An application was made to the Judges of the Court of Queen's Bench to allow the defendant to leave by the Judges' entrance, as he did during the civil trial; but I believe that is contrary to the etiquette of the Court; and, on that account, I am informed, the arrangement has not been permitted, although it would enable a smaller number of policemen to keep order, and prevent inconvenience to the public.

BOARD OF EDUCATION (SCOTLAND.)

  QUESTION.
  MR. GORDONsaid, that the Board of Education for Scotland having prepared and submitted for the consideration of the Scotch Education Department of the Privy Council the conditions according to which in the opinion of the Board of Education Parliamentary Grants may be most advantageously distributed in Scotland, asked, Whether the Vice President of the Privy Council will lay upon the Table of this House these conditions, in order that the School Boards and others interested in education in Scotland may have opportunities of making representations to the Scotch Education Department in reference to the conditions?
  MR. W. E. FORSTERSir, the section of the Act to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman refers says that it shall be the duty of the Scotch Board of Education to submit to the Education Department the conditions of the Education Code for Scotland; but it also imposes on the Education Department the duty and responsibility of the final settlement of those conditions. We are, therefore of opinion that, while on the one hand we should invite Parliamentary discussion on the Code when we have finally settled it, yet it was not contemplated by the Act that we should call in the aid of Parliament by raising a preliminary discussion by putting on the Table the Minutes which have been received and. the Correspondence with the Scotch Board.
  MR. GORDONsaid, he did not ask the Question with the view of raising a Parliamentary discussion; but merely for the information of the public, so that they might have an opportunity of correcting any erroneous views.

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

HARBOURS OF REFUGE.

  MOTION FOR A SELECT COMMITTEE.
  LORD CLAUD JOHN HAMILTON,in rising to move for a Select Committee to inquire into the loss of life on the North East Coast, and report on the best

  1407
  means of averting the same, said, that two years ago he had called attention to the great annual loss of life and property on that coast in consequence of its unprotected state. The Motion was opposed by Her Majesty's Government, and he was defeated by a majority of 35. Last year, owing to the pressure of Public Business, he was unable to find an opportunity for renewing his Motion; but this year he had been more fortunate. He feared that he should have to travel over some ground which was not unfamiliar to the House, but he was fortified by the knowledge of the very great evils arising from the unprotected state of the coast, and the saving of life which would have resulted if, two years ago, his Motion had been carried. It was not until the commencement of the present century that public attention began to be seriously directed to the annual loss of life and property on the north east coast of England, and it was not until recent years that any practical mode of dealing with these great calamities was suggested by any hon. Member of that House. In 1857 Mr. Wilson, then Secretary to the Treasury, moved for a Select Committee to inquire into the loss of life upon our coasts, and to devise the best remedy. That Committee sat for two years, and reported in favour of a grant of money for constructing harbours of refuge at certain points of the coast, and recommending loans to improve the navigation of particular ports. A Royal Commission was next appointed by Sir John Pakington during the Administration of Lord Derby, and, after duo investigation, they made a Report. The Government of Lord Palmerston, however, which had by this time returned to office, took no notice of the Report. Two years afterwards the then hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Lindsay) moved an Address to the Crown to carry into effect the recommendations of the Royal Commissioners. The Motion was opposed by the Government, but it was, nevertheless, carried by a majority of 17. He had reason to believe that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone), who was then Chancellor of the Exchequer, persuaded Lord Palmerston to ignore the vote of the House of Commons; and the recommendations of the Royal Commissioners, which contemplated the construction of a harbour of refuge in Filey
  1408
  Bay, had remained a dead letter. That Government, however, gave effect to one of the recommendations of the Select Committee of 1857, for they passed the Piers and Harbours Act, which enabled local bodies to borrow money from the Government for the improvement of the rivers, and which had conferred enormous benefits upon the shipping interest and the public; but he denied that a safe and available harbour of refuge on the north east coast had thereby been established, for the fact was, no safe and commodious harbour could be found between Fern Islands and the Humber. The want had been felt from time immemorial, and unless Parliament interfered that want would continue to exist. Upon the present occasion he had somewhat varied the terms of his Motion from that of the preceding one and he now asked the House to appoint a Select Committee to inquire into the state of that coast, and the annual average loss of life and property, and to empower the Committee to report on the best means of averting those great scandals. At the same time, he would intimate that although he only asked for a Select Committee, he did not conceal his agreement with the Royal Commissioners in their recommendation of a harbour of refuge at Filey. The River Tyne had been greatly improved, but, from its position to the northward, it could not fulfil the conditions demanded by the shipping interest. There remained 200 miles of seaboard of a very wild and inhospitable character, and destitute of a harbour of refuge. Having quoted statistics to show the large proportion of ships and tonnage from the north-east seaports, which might be said to represent one-quarter of the whole shipping trade of the United Kingdom, the noble Lord said, that along those 200 miles of coast there was not a single harbour that was not a bar-harbour except the Tyne, and that was in a condition far from safe. The loss of life and property on the coast occurred in a manner that had now become familiar. The sailing colliers usually left the north-eastern ports in large fleets, and invariably made for Flamborough Head northwest of which lay Filey Bay, where they awaited a favourable opportunity for continuing their voyage. But the neighbourhood of Flamborough Head was very liable to sudden changes of wind, and

  1409
  while the colliers were working round Flamborough Head for shelter, a change of wind often drove them back to the ports from which they came, all of which had bar harbours. Now, those bars were impassable to the great majority of the vessels except at high water, and the result was that deplorable calamities occurred as the vessels were trying to re-enter their harbours. Nearly four-fifths of the vessels lost on the north eastern coast were laden vessels, and that fact conclusively proved that in addition to the loss which occurred to life there was an immense loss to the trade of the country, owing to laden vessels being obliged in bad weather to put back to the ports which they had loft, because there was no harbour of refuge between their ports of departure and destination. When he last brought forward this Motion two years ago, it was said and no doubt it would to-day be repeated, that sailing colliers were being fast superseded by steam colliers. Such, however, was not the case. In the great storm of February, 1871, no less than 1,000 sailing colliers were scattered and driven back, and of these 53 foundered, with a loss of from 80 to 100 lives. The fact really was that sailing vessels had increased, for while the number in 1855 was only 8,333, in 1861 it had risen to 11,060, and in 1870 to 11,598. But the accommodation for which he contended was also necessary for steam vessels, for from a Return which he held in his hand, and which had been carefully compiled by The Shipping and Mercantile Gazette, it appeared that between Fern Islands and the Humber there had been in 1871–2, exclusive of 13 collisions, with which a harbour of refuge had, of course, nothing to do, 34 minor casualties to steamers; 6 had foundered, 5 had been totally wrecked, and 13 had been stranded. As the value of one of these steamers was about equal to the value of 15 ordinary sailing colliers, the loss of these steamers which had foundered and were totally wrecked was equal to the loss of 125 sailing vessels. In 1870 the total casualties to the shipping trade generally on the 200 miles of seaboard referred to in his Motion were 67 collisions, 191 minor casualties, 23 vessels foundered, 34 totally wrecked, and 47 stranded, 75 lives being lost. In 1871, a year distinguished for its storms, the list was heavier—110 collisions, 86 vessels
  1410
  stranded, 143vessels foundered, stranded, and wrecked, these casualties being accompanied by a loss of 120 lives. With such lists he thought that no hon. Member would rise in his place and deny that it was our duty to do what we could to mitigate if we could not avert such calamities, and this he believed could be done if his Motion were adopted. The peculiar position of Filey, lying as it did to the north of Flamborough Head, induced the Commissioners to select it for the purpose of a harbour of refuge, while the fact that it was merely a small fishing village was sufficient to show that it had been selected from no improper motive. The Prime Minister on a former occasion had characterized his then Motion as "isolated and local." Isolated it no doubt was, but in making it he felt that after so long a time from the date when the Commissioners reported, it would have been ridiculous to propose the adoption of all their recommendations, or to suggest so large an advance of public money after the expenses incurred under the Piers and Harbours Act. Again, all the places recommended by the Commissioners, except Filey, had local influence and local resources at their command, and the only inducement which could have led to the selection of Filey was its qualifications as a natural harbour. It would form an admirable harbour of refuge, not only for merchantmen, but for iron-clads and men-of-war, and the execution of the work would only cost, according to the Commissioners, £860,000; but the Prime Minister, in the former debate, had stated that this was only the first expenditure, and that practical experience had shown that in such cases the original estimate was generally doubled before the completion of the work. Fortunately, however, these debates were read, and sometimes by persons whose knowledge and memory had during the past four years been called into requisition to correct the flights of fancy of Her Majesty's Ministers. On authority which could be relied upon it appeared that Mr. Milner Gibson, when President of the Board of Trade, commissioned the assistant secretary of the marine department to write a Report, throwing as much discredit upon the recommendations of the Commissioners as possible, in order to influence Parliament adversely, and those instructions were car-

  1411
  ried out. He (Lord Claud Hamilton) had received a letter from Admiral Sir Bartholomew Sullivan, mentioning that one of the most eminent of the harbour contractors had gone into the estimates, and had expressed his willingness to take the construction of the harbour for the sum named by the Commissioners, and to give guarantees for the completion of the work. But what course had Mr. Milner Gibson adopted? He had thrown discredit on the Report of the Commission, and up to the present time his view had been accepted as the authoritative opinion of the Board of Trade on the subject. With regard to that, Admiral Sir Bartholomew Sullivan asked if it was fair or just to throw discredit on the fitness of the Commissioners for their work, and whether it was just to compare the estimates of the Commissioners with the cost of harbours which had greatly exceeded the estimates? That showed how the work of our public Departments was conducted with a view to suit political exigencies, or to confirm Ministerial crotchets. He hoped, therefore, he should not be considered as bringing forward a Motion which would tend to entail enlarged and indefinite expenditure upon the House of Commons. As he was now on the subject of expenditure, he would allude briefly to the large outlay of money by the Tyne Commissioners—a body appointed in 1852, mainly for the purpose of improving the approaches of the River Tyne, and to secure a harbour of refuge there available for all classes of vessels in stress of weather. Plans for two great piers were drawn and were submitted to Mr. Walker, an eminent civil engineer, since deceased, and accepted. Twenty years had since elapsed, and still the piers were far from being completed. Indeed, it was reported that the Commissioners now proposed to relinquish them altogether, or, at all events, to curtail them considerably. The public had heard of the enormous expenditure of these Commissioners and, of the glorious approach which they were making to Newcastle and Gateshead up their river. But that money was being spent on objects very different from those which were contemplated by Parliament when they obtained their powers. Parliament, when it granted them powers, contemplated that they should so improve the entrance to the river as to
  1412
  make it available for all vessels in stress of weather from whatever point the wind might be blowing. They had, however, instead of carrying out that great work rendered the approaches to the river far more dangerous, owing to those half-completed piers, than before. In fact, to enter the river now in bad weather was a matter of the greatest difficulty. In the year 1864 the screw steamer Stanley was wrecked inside the piers, with the loss of all hands. On the 17th of December last a barque was wrecked also inside the piers, and seven of her crew were drowned. A Danish ship very narrowly escaped, and on the same day a smaller vessel was totally wrecked. On the same occasion, the lifeboat from South Shields ran great risk; seven of her crew were washed overboard and two of them drowned, not with standing that two other lifeboats were at hand. A nice harbour of refuge this, that required three lifeboats to be rowing about inside it! But where had the money been really spent? The Commissioners numbered 18 persons, 10 of whom represented Newcastle and Gateshead—that was to say, the inland interest, as against seven representing Shields and Tyne-mouth, and one the Admiralty—that was to say, the harbour of refuge interest. The inland interest had, therefore, an absolute majority of two over the representation of Tynemouth, Shields, and the Admiralty taken together. The result of that state of things was abundantly shown by the proceedings of the Commissioners. The contract for the piers was, through the influence of the present town clerk of Newcastle, then a member of the Commission, given to a gentleman to whom he was solicitor, although eminent contractors elsewhere proposed to complete the works for the same cost and in much less time. Some suspicion was aroused, but though ship-owners in South Shields and elsewhere required the contract in question to be made public, the Commissioners refused to comply with the request. The real fact, however, was that the money which ought to have been expended in the formation of piers which should have proved a complete protection to both life and property, was being expended in useless inland works above Newcastle, by which it was hoped that masted vessels would be able to reach certain villages situated on the banks of the

  1413
  river some 15 miles above the sea; and at a cost that it was thought would reach £250,000 they were reconstructing the bridge at Newcastle, the estimate for which work, submitted to Parliament amounted to £50,000 only. They were too, he was informed, doing those works themselves, instead of submitting them to open competition, and thereby losing money. To secure the necessary funds, they put into force powers which the Act gave them of levying 2d. per ton on ships in the foreign trade, and 1d. per ton register on coasting vessels, so that, in fact, foreign vessels contributed the funds for the completion of a work from which they could not possibly derive any benefit, while the works by which they might be benefited were neglected. On the other hand, Newcastle and Gateshead, which would have all the advantage of the works in question, did not, he was informed, contribute a farthing towards their construction. The Commissioners had also power to collect coal dues, and to place many other imposts on the shipping interest. Public feeling had been at length aroused, and the Chambers of Commerce of Newcastle, Gateshead, and South Shields had petitioned Parliament to appoint auditors to investigate the accounts of the Commissioners, so that the amounts expended and the purposes to which the money was devoted might be ascertained. He must, in this place, state that it was the existence of that public feeling, which he could assure the House was very strong, that had led him to adopt the course he had taken, for he thought the Committee might inquire into the con-stitution of the Commission, and the expenditure of its funds, and might offer suggestions for the improvement of that body. It contained only one representative of the Government, though the Mersey Commission had four such representatives, and the whole power was vested in the town council of Newcastle, a body which, being many miles up the river, did not care about harbours of refuge. It might be asked why the question should not be referred to the recently-appointed Royal Commission on loss of life at sea, but that Commission had enough on its hands, and it was sitting with closed doors—a mode of inquiry which would not be satisfactory in this case. Moreover, it was not likely that the Prime Minister, who, when
  1414
  Chancellor of the Exchequer, persuaded his Colleagues to disregard the recommendations of Royal Commissions for the construction of harbours of refuge at the public expense, would now pay greater attention to the Report of such a body, and that more especially, when as in the case of the Commission on Officers' Grievances, the Government instructed them to make no Report involving any Vote of public money, though that was the only step which could meet the necessities of the case, and involved the fact, that the whole inquiry was evidently a sham. From a Select Committee he augured a different result, and its appointment would not bind the House to the selection of Filey or to any outlay. It would show that Parliament was impressed by the calamities which happened on the coast; and surely in times of prosperity, a deserving class of men, whose lives were spent in peril, and to whom the country in the hour of danger always looked for aid, should not be neglected. The noble Lord concluded by moving for the Select Committee of which he had given Notice.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the loss of life and property on the North East coast, and report on the best means of averting the samc,"—(Lord Claud John Hamilton,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, that on first seeing the Notice of his noble Friend the Member for Lynn Regis (Lord Claud John Hamilton), at the beginning of the Session, he thought it an interesting and reasonable one, calling for the consideration of the House and the Government. There had, however, been little connection between the noble Lord's Motion and his speech, and though the noble Lord had described the former as one which he brought forward two years ago, his proposal then was the construction of a harbour of refuge at Filey. Even had no other mode of inquiry been provided since the Notice was given, the House, if convinced that an investigation was necessary, could not have limited it to the

  1415
  north east coast; but there had been such discussions on the loss of life and property at sea, resulting in the appointment of a competent and distinguished Commission, that there could be no reason for nominating a Committee to traverse the same ground. He had been unable to find any reason for singling out the north-east coast. No doubt that part of the coast represented a number of casualties, and he believed an amount of loss of property out of proportion to the number of miles to which it extended; but that could easily be accounted for by the nature and. the amount of the trade, the natural dangers of the coast, and so forth. The mere loss of property, however, was not the ground on which the noble Lord could proceed. He could hardly call upon Parliament to lay out he (Mr. Chichester Fortescue) knew not how many millions of public money for the sole purpose of saving a certain amount of property on that part of the coast. Those interested in that property were bound to find the means of doing that; but they had never shown that they thought it worth while, for the protection of their property, to contribute, by a system of passing tolls, or out of the Mercantile Marine Fund, or in any other way, to the expense of constructing a harbour of refuge between the Fern Islands and Flamborough Head. They did not appear to think that a single harbour of refuge on that coast would save anything like an amount of property commensurate with the outlay upon its construction. The national interest in that matter was not so much the preservation of property as the saving of life, and on that point he would give the House a few facts taken from the last official Wreck Register. It appeared that, during the 10 years ending in 1871, the number of lives lost on the part of the coast referred to by the noble Lord, from all causes, was 285. Going northwards, from the Fern Islands to Buchan Ness, the lives lost in the same period were 258; and from Buchan Ness to Cape Wrath 253. Coming southwards, between Flamborough Head and the North Foreland, 930 lives were lost in the same 10 years. That was not a portion of the coast destitute of harbours of refuge if they could be used to save a ship in distress, but possessing the refuges of the Humber, Yarmouth Roads, and the Thames. Going round
  1416
  the coast, between the North Foreland and Land's End—of course, including the harbour of Portland, and others—734 lives were lost in the same period. From Land's End to St. David's Head—between which there was the Bristol Channel, a natural place of refuge—the lives lost were 981. Then proceeding to that part of the coast which was really proved to be the most dangerous to life—namely, the kind of quadrilateral formed by the coast of England and Ireland, between St. David's Head and Carnsore Point, and between the Mull of Cantire and Fair Head, the number of lives lost was 1,148. Why, with these facts before them, were they to single out the 200 miles of coast between the Fern Islands and Flam borough Head, as requiring special care and special expenditure at the hands of Parliament? The question of how far harbours of refuge had contributed to save life had been carefully considered some years ago under the auspices of the right hon. Gentleman the then Member for Ashton (Mr. Milner Gibson), and he himself had had it looked into since; and here he must protest against the language used by the noble Lord in reference to the Memorandum of the Board of Trade on that subject, presented in 1864. That Memorandum—a very able and careful one, founded on great knowledge and research—was no doubt drawn up by the Permanent Secretary of that Department, an eminent man, and very competent to consider and analyze those facts, with the advice and assistance of a post-captain of the Navy and a captain of the Mercantile Marine, who were the professional officers of the Board of Trade, and also under the orders and constant supervision of Mr. Milner Gibson, than whom no Minister who had filled the same office for many years past was better qualified to deal with the details of such a matter, or felt a greater interest in and sympathy with the cause of the sailor. No doubt the Memorandum severely criticized the Report of the Royal Commission on Harbours of Refuge, and it conclusively showed that the Select Committee on that subject, and the Royal Commission which followed it, having unfortunately had their attention directed exclusively, and with peculiar enthusiasm, to the question of harbours of refuge, and not looking into

  1417
  any of the other causes of loss of life at sea, or the means of preventing it, as was now being done, had been led to inadequate and one-sided conclusions. The analysis made in that Paper of the facts given by the Royal Commission, and also contained in the Annual Wreck Registers of the Board of Trade, went to show that the saving of life that could have been effected under any conceivable circumstances by a harbour of refuge at Filey, or anywhere on that coast, would have been so insignificant as not to make it worth while, with a view to prevent it, to incur the great and uncertain expenditure of public money which was proposed. Assuming not that one harbour of refuge, but that three had been in existence on that coast, it was found at that time, after a minute and careful examination of every case of wreck and casualty other than collision, that something like an annual average of 15 lives and £28,000 worth of property might have been saved. Lately, the professional adviser of the Board of Trade had carefully examined into the casualties which had occurred on the coast in question from 1862 to 1872, and he gave, as his opinion, that out of the total number of lives lost during that period, between Flam borough Head and Fern Islands, in only three cases, so far as an opinion could be formed, could the loss have been prevented by the construction of a harbour of refuge at Filey. The fact was that harbours of refuge could be made available only for vessels in a certain position, and under certain conditions of wind, and that the greater proportion of ships were unable to avail themselves of the protection which the very best harbours afforded. Among the measures, therefore, which the Government might deem it necessary to adopt for the protection of life at sea, harbours of refuge were not likely to form a very important feature. The hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Plimsoll) even with all his zeal in dealing with the subject, had not said a single word with reference to the establishment of harbours of refuge, and had shown them that the loss of life at sea was attributable to a very different cause—the condition of the ships themselves. Since the question had been inquired into by a Royal Commission, and a Select Committee, the House
  1418
  of Commons had over and over again declined to bind the Government to lay out large sums of money on mere harbours of refuge. Indeed, the original Committee never intended that the Government should lay out a large sum in the construction of harbours of refuge; but what was intended was that the shipping interest should contribute two-thirds of the cost. The shipping interest, however, repudiated the proposal, and they had consistently declined from that time to this to lay out money for the purpose. If, therefore, a great national harbour were to be established on the north-east coast of England, it would be necessary to start from a totally different point of view—that of national safety. Personally, he thought there was much to be said in favour of the erection of a great naval station on that coast, but if we were ever to have a Portland there, it must originate from the point of view of national defence mainly, though it might be made to serve incidentally for the advantage of the Mercantile Marine. He could not, he might add, understand why the noble Lord should have made so animated an attack on the Commissioners of the Tyne, who, he was bound to say, had done wonders in the improvement of that important river. The Commissioners themselves stated that during the year 1871–72 over 1,000 vessels had found refuge within it, and there could be no doubt that it presented the most noteworthy example of river improvement within the bounds of the United Kingdom. It was said that there were nothing but bar-harbours on the north east coast, and this was the main foundation on which the demand for an east coast harbour had been rested, but he was assured that now almost at all times large vessels could get into the Tyne and the Tees. It had been truly said, that if harbours of refuge were wanted at all, they were wanted for bad ships; whilst now they were doing their best to diminish the number of bad ships, for through the exertions of the hon. Member for Derby, the mind of the country was now strongly directed to the question whether they could by legislation diminish the number of bad ships at sea, and consequently diminish the loss of life. No doubt, the hon. Member had occasionally done great injustice in his remarks to people who had

  1419
  his cause much at heart, and he seemed determined to make a sort of enemy of the Board of Trade, though they desired to contribute all that they could towards the end which he had in view. The noble Lord said that because he had given Notice of his intention to move for a Select Committee, he must persist in doing so, not with standing the appointment of the Commission; and he treated Commissions as shams. [Lord CLAUD JOHN HAMILTON: Only under the present Government.] That probably meant, that if the Commission recommended large expenditure for problematical objects, the Government would resist such expenditure as it had done before; but he had not the slightest conception that they would do anything of the kind. If the noble Lord had not confidence in them, there were few who would share his distrust. But the Royal Commission was actually at work at the present time, inquiring not merely into the state of the north east coast of England, but into the whole coast. If the noble Lord obtained the Committee he asked for he would have to examine the same witnesses and analyze the same Returns as the Duke of Somerset and his Colleagues of the Royal Commission had done, and were now doing. It appeared to him (Mr. Chichester Fortescue) that that would be worse than loss of time and labour, because it would have the effect of introducing great confusion into the inquiries that were being pursued. He confessed that he had made a great strategical mistake in not nominating the noble Lord a Member of the Royal Commission. If he had been so fortunate as to have secured his assistance, the noble Lord would have found it impossible to bring forward that Motion. He hoped, however, the House would think that the Government had done everything they could for the purpose of inquiring into the loss of life at sea and around our coasts, and would be content with the inquiry by the Royal Commission. If the noble Lord should be dissatisfied with the Report of that Commission, it would be in his power to take further action, and he would then have the additional advantage of the information which they had obtained.
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, he had heard the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade with no feeling of surprise,
  1420
  because he had been accustomed to hear a similar speech for some years past on the same subject, but he confessed to having heard it with great regret. He (Sir John Pakington) had always taken a great interest in the subject, and he had just heard with great pleasure the effective speech of his noble Friend behind him. He thought his noble Friend had acted judiciously by altering his Motion of last year for the establishment of harbours of refuge to that of a Select Committee of Inquiry regarding the north east coast of England. It appeared to him (Sir John Pakington) that the result of the dealing with this question by the Government from year to year, was not so much the necessity of saving human life as it was a question of finance. It was true that a harbour on the north east coast of England, or at any other part, could not be constructed without great expense; but surely any expenditure of money that would result in the saving of human life and property would be freely and unanimously assented to. The late Mr. James Wilson was not the man to recommend any extravagant or unnecessary expenditure; nevertheless he had brought forward a Motion similar to that of his noble Friend. When the right hon. Gentleman opposite asked his noble Friend why he confined his Motion to the north east coast of England, he might be told that it was because it was the most unprotected part of the whole coast. [MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUE: The figures are against you.] At all events, in 10 years 8,000 lives had been lost, which was at the rate of 800 a-year, and it was idle to say one harbour of refuge would not save them. The north east coast stood most in need of protection, for the south had Portland, and the west Holy head, in which hundreds of vessels took refuge in stormy weather. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade had said that very few lives were lost on the east coast, but he could not attach the slightest importance to that portion of the right hon. Gentleman's argument. Then, with regard to the argument that a Royal Commission to inquire into the loss of life at sea had been appointed on the Motion of the hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Plimsoll), it should not be forgotten that the subject of harbours of refuge was not referred to that Commission. His

  1421
  belief was, that this was mainly a money question, and in that view, no doubt, it would be very costly to erect a harbour of refuge on the east coast of England, but no one, he thought, could seriously contend that such a harbour if erected would not be the means of saving numerous vessels and lives on that coast, as Portland and Holy head did on the south and west coasts. It was because the question had not been referred to the Royal Commission, that the Motion was brought forward, and he felt it his duty to give it his support.
  SIR HARCOURT JOHNSTONE,in supporting the Motion, disclaimed being actuated by any motive of a local nature, and did not wish specially to indicate Filey as the proper place for a harbour of refuge. He had studied the Blue Books on the subject from 1836 to the present time, and he had an hereditary prepossession in favour of a harbour of refuge on the east coast. Indeed, he thought it would not have been unworthy of the Government to have dedicated a portion of their surplus revenue to the construction of them on those parts of the Coast where they were most needed. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Board of Trade had taken good security for the safety of passengers by railway, for which the public were much indebted to him. He would ask him whether he did not think our Merchant Service and the lives of our seamen of as great importance as the safety of railways, and of the lives of those who travelled by those railways? It was notorious that when our mercantile ships were nearly worn out and had passed their proper work, they were put into the coaling trade in a condition but ill calculated to weather the winter's storms. The necessity of doing something in the way of harbours of refuge being generally admitted, he was at a loss to know why the Government took so much pains year after year to throw difficulties in the way of every attempt to effect that object. The Royal Commissioners of 1844 reported that no pecuniary considerations ought to be allowed to impede the accomplishment of a scheme of such vast importance, but nevertheless the recommendation then made had not yet been acted upon. He was on board the vessel which was ordered at that period to survey the coast, and he, of course, thought something would come of it,
  1422
  but he had since arrived at the conclusion that inquiries and surveys were often employed by Governments in order to shunt difficult questions. The general opinion of naval officers was, that there was no safe harbour of refuge between the Thames and the Tees, and that one ought to be established somewhere between those two great rivers, for the purpose of protecting the merchant shipping of this country, which had certainly quadrupled since the Commission made its Report in 1844, and now surpassed the commercial shipping of the United States, France, and Russia combined. He wished to say, in conclusion that he had taken up this question as one of general interest and national importance, and not as one of selfish or local advantage. He feared, however, after what occurred last night, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be invulnerable to any appeal of the kind.
  MR. STEVENSON,as one of the members of the Tyne Commission from its origin, traced the history and defended the action of the Commission. Their works for the improvement of the river had been of the greatest benefit. They represented the whole commercial interest of the Tyne, and although last year an attempt had been made to overturn the Commission, yet it had failed. There was as great a length of tidal river above Newcastle as between that town and the sea, and one of the duties of the Commissioners had been to open the Upper Tyne to the passage of masted ships. Besides that they had spent on the Pier Works £630,000, of which £250,000 had been borrowed on ample security from the Public Works Loan Commissioners. In that and other purposes they had expended altogether about £1,350,000, only a small portion of which, and that amply secured, had been raised by way of loan from the Government. With regard to the statement made by the noble Lord the Member for Lynn Regis (Lord Claud John Hamilton) respecting the unfinished state of the piers, it was very important and also extremely difficult to ascertain what ought to be the width of the entrance, and consequently the Commissioners had resolved to wait instead of completing at once the operations which had been commenced. With regard to the present Motion, he wished to point out that since the Com-

  1423
  missioners on Harbours of Refuge made their Report, the circumstances of the coasting trade had entirely changed. At that time ships accumulated in fleets while waiting for a favourable wind, and after they had all left port together a gale would often spring up suddenly, so that the whole coast was strewn with wrecks. At present, however, vessels did not accumulate in fleets. Again, a great change had been effected by the substitution of screw steamers for sailing vessels. Since 1859 the number of vessels engaged in the coasting trade had actually diminished, while the tonnage had largely increased. The proportion of sailing ships as compared with steamers was 85 per cent to 14 per cent in 1859; 49 per cent to 51 per cent in 1869; and only 39 per cent to 61 per cent at the present time. In addition to that the number of ships which did the work was smaller than it was formerly. The noble Lord had brought forward the number of wrecks on a much larger extent of coast than could possibly be benefited by a harbour at Filey, and the inhabitants of Bridlington thought Bridlington Bay would be a better place for constructing a harbour of refuge. Filey Harbour could never be made a successful one, as the water was km the most part shallow, and there would be a danger of the harbour silting up, especially as it would not be subjected to a scouring tide. He believed that Filey Harbour, if made, would never realize all that was expected from it, or do for the shipping of the north-eastern ports what had been done by the Tyne. In conclusion, the hon. Member expressed his opinion that the Government ought to give aid to local efforts for the improvement of commercial harbours, and to abstain from such speculative enterprises as had been advocated in the course of that evening's discussion.
  MR. STEPHEN CAVEexpressed his regret that the management of the Tyne should have been mixed up with this Motion, because it was a pity that a great national question should be mixed up in any way with the conduct of any particular public body, and knowing who drew up the Report issued by the Board of Trade upon the Report of the Commissioners, he felt certain nothing had been done which was not in accordance with usage in that respect. He was also sorry that the Government had
  1424
  thought proper to refuse the inquiry now asked for. The question was one of considerable importance. When, a few years since, he supported a Motion brought forward by the noble Lord referring to Filey Bay, he felt the difficulty of the subject from the many arguments that might be used against that particular place. All that had been stated in the course of the debate pointed to the advantage of a fresh inquiry into the subject. The President of the Board of Trade seemed to prove too much when he tried to induce the House to believe that harbours of refuge were bad things, because the greatest loss of life occurred in their neighbourhood, and that the north-east coast could not be so dangerous as had been described because so small a loss of life took place there. The same argument was used by Mr. Milner Gibson, but it was shown at the time that there was then, as now, a fallacy lurking in the argument. It did not follow because there was a small loss of life on a dangerous coast that it was not dangerous or that it was not the cause of the loss of life. Hundreds of colliers and other vessels had been driven out to sea and lost even as far off as the coast of Scotland and the Shetlands, and yet from the want of a harbour of refuge on this coast. The question before the House was not so much whether there should be a harbour of refuge at Filey as whether there should be a further inquiry by a Committee of this House. It was a pity that the Government had refused the appointment of a Committee, which might well supplement the labours of the Commission, for the President of the Board of Trade admitted that this subject was not within their order of reference, and, which, at all events, if it had done nothing more, would have shown the maritime class that their interests were not overlooked in that House.
  MR. PEASEsaid, although the noble Lord the Member for Lynn Regis (Lord Claud John Hamilton) was more moderate then than on a former occasion, yet he must oppose the Motion, on the ground that the appointment of a Committee could serve no practical purpose. He denied that those who opposed the inquiry were weighing the difference between pounds, shillings, and pence, and the loss of life which annually occurred on our coasts. He thought the policy

  1425
  which had been adopted by the Government was a very wise one, and one from which they could not recede, having regard to public economy. Instead of spending upwards of £3,000,000 as recommended by the Commissioners of 1868, in the construction of harbours of refuge, under the Act of 1861 they had lent upwards of £2,000,000 for the improvement of existing harbours, and that money was being repaid without any expense being imposed upon the general taxpayer. Not only that, but the money had been expended with the best results in improving the entrances to the rivers on the coast in question, the funds having been obtained at a low rate of interest under the Act of 1871 from the Exchequer Loan Commissioners. Not only had the interest on those loans been regularly paid, but a fund was provided whereby the principal sums due were being annually reduced, and these harbours had been wonderfully improved. In 1860, the time of the Report of the Harbours of Refuge Commission, there were 3 to 6 feet of water at low water on the Tyne Bar; in 1872 there were 20 to 24 feet of water; and in Shields Harbour 34 to 35 feet, with 15 feet rise of tide. In 1861 there were 246 ships between 500 and 1,000 tons, and upwards, entering the Tyne—of these 8 only were above 1,000 tons. In 1871 there were 2,542 ships of this class, and of these 232 were above 1,000 tons. In 2 years 1,000 vessels had used the Tyne as a harbour of refuge. In 1866, 194 ships took refuge; in 1867, 255; in 1868, 322; in 1869, 402; in 1870, 558. At Sunderland Dock there were 11 feet of water at low water spring tides, and 15 feet rise of tide, and further improvements were in hand. Hartlepool had recently received an Exchequer Loan of £50,000, which was being spent with most favourable results. On the Tees, between 1858 and 1871, about £250,000 had been spent. The revenue in 1858 was £5,900; in 1871, £21,765. In 1859 there were 3 to 4 feet of water on the Bar; in 1872 10 to 11 feet, and constant improvement going forward. Some of the rivers and harbours, however, were burdened with prior loans at high rates of interest, borrowed from the public prior to the Act of 1861. Owing to this circumstance, the loans of these harbours were divided into two classes—those
  1426
  contracted before 1861, and those contracted since that date. On the first of these classes interest at 4 to 5 per cent was paid, but there was no sinking fund. The purpose to which they were applied being equally important, nationally, as that to which the Exchequer Loans were applied. The loans borrowed from the State were repaid at a rate which did not exceed that on the private loans, and which would, however, extinguish the loans in the course of a few years. If the same principle could be applied to the loans before 1861, and Parliament would allow that Act to have a retrospective action, great good would be done, and these great harbours, already national, would be free harbours. He hoped the Government would take this into their serious consideration.
  MR. WARD JACKSONsupported the Motion. It had been said that the tidal rivers on the north-east coast formed natural harbours of refuge, and no doubt it was true that at certain times such rivers as the Tyne, the Wear, or the Tees, did serve as harbours of refuge, but in a strong ebb tide, and a northeast wind, no ship could get through the tremendous sea that was to be found at the mouth of such a river as the Tyne. The loans of money which had been made for the improvement of harbours since 1861, were not at all commensurate with the requirements of the coasts, and could by no means be said to obviate the necessity of forming a harbour of refuge on the coast such as was desired. He deeply regretted that the Government had seemed to throw cold water upon the construction of harbours of refuge, on the ground that rivers supplied the place of such harbours. Never could any rivers supply the place of a harbour of refuge.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 109; Noes 95: Majority 14.

  TREATY OF WASHINGTON—THE SAN JUAN AWARD.—OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD GEORGE HAMILTON,in rising to call attention to the nature of the reference to the Treaty of 1846, which, under the Washington Treaty, was submitted together with the North West Water Boundary Question to the Emperor of Germany for decision, regretted that the forms of the House

  1427
  would not permit him to move the Resolution which stood in his name, still he had the power to call the attention of the House to the Motion of which he had given Notice—
  "That this House, whilst approving of the principle of arbitration, regrets that Her Majesty's Government allowed, upon that part of the Oregon Treaty referred to the Emperor of Germany for decision, a limited interpretation to be placed which was fatal to the just claims of the British Empire."
  His Resolution was couched in strong terms—firstly, because he had grounds to justify such terms; and secondly, because he had been rebuked last night by the Prime Minister for shutting the door of repentance upon Members of Her Majesty's Government. He admitted that the rebuke was justified, but by this Motion he had given the opportunity for political penance, and had made the best reparation it was in his power to offer, for it opened the door sufficiently wide to take in the Prime Minister and the whole of his Cabinet. He wished to call attention to that part of the Washington Treaty which had never yet been discussed, by which a certain part of the Oregon Treaty was referred to the Emperor of Germany, with the result of handing over islands, the right to which had been disputed for upwards of 25 years. He did not question the decision of the Emperor, for with Papers laid before him he did not think it was possible for His Majesty to have come to any other decision, and the course which the Emperor had pursued in giving his decision without reasons was a course which might have been adopted with advantage by his brother Arbitrators at Geneva. He did not wish to blame either the American or English Commissioners, for the American Commissioners had done the best they could for their country, while the English Government had throughout directed the English Commissioners, and were evidently satisfied with the Treaty by the honours they had showered upon them. There had been long disputes concerning the proper boundary west of the Rocky Mountains, and various attempts were made to settle it, but without success. The question became somewhat pressing, as disputes were constantly taking place between the settlers of the two nations. In 1841 the British Government were anxious to have the question settled, and
  1428
  in 1843 began a negotiation which lasted three years, till in 1846 the Oregon Treaty was signed. That Treaty contained an Article to the effect that the Boundary
  "Should be continued westward along the said forty-ninth parallel of north latitude to the middle of the Channel which separated the Continent from Vancouver's Island, and thence southerly, through the middle of the said Channel and of Fuca's Straits to the Pacific Ocean; provided, however, that the navigation of the whole of the said Channel and Straits south of the forty-ninth parallel of north latitude remain free and open to both parties."
  That Treaty had not been very long in existence, however, before it became evident that there was an ambiguity in part of the description of the Water Boundary, and that a dispute would arise as to the interpretation of the term "middle of the channel," there being three between Vancouver's Island and the Continent. In the Case laid before the Emperor of Germany there was, perhaps, an insinuation, and it would be something more than an insinuation, that Her Majesty's Government had not behaved in good faith; that they had, at the time the Treaty was negotiated, accepted that interpretation of the Treaty which was held by the American Government; that they allowed that interpretation to pass unchallenged for two years, and when they asserted that the Rosario Straits was the true channel indicated by the Treaty, the American Government was taken by surprise. But it was beyond all doubt that in 1846, the year when the Treaty was signed, the ambiguity in the Treaty had been discovered; and in 1848 Lord Palmerston, having succeeded Lord Aberdeen at the Foreign Office, wrote to the English Minister at Washington to lay before the American Government the views of Her Majesty's Government regarding the disputed point. Indeed, in 1846, Mr. Bancroft wrote to Mr. Buchanan that he had caused a traced copy of Wilkes's Chart of the Straits of Haro to be made, because it had been intimated to him that questions might arise with regard to the islands east of the Strait, and he asked for authority to meet such a claim on the threshold by the assertion that the central channel of the Straits of Haro was the main channel intended by the Treaty. Nothing further was done until 1856, when a joint Commission to thoroughly survey the region was ap-

  1429
  pointed, and it was in consequence of their labours that we now had the information regarding the district which we now possessed. In 1859 Lord John Russell, who was then at the head of the Foreign Office, endeavoured to settle the dispute as to the true channel. Lord John Russell wrote to Lord Lyons at Washington, but previous to doing so he consulted Lord Aberdeen and Sir Richard Pakenham, the two negotiators of the Treaty, and they had a distinct recollection of the tenor of the conversation during the negotiation, and declared that it was the intention of the Treaty to adopt the mid-channel of the straits. Lord John Russell, having obtained the opinion of these two distinguished men, wrote to Lord Lyons, our representative at Washington, to the effect that it was the intention of the Treaty to adopt the mid-channel of the Straits as the line of demarcation, without any reference to islands, the position and indeed the very existence of which had scarcely, at that time, been accurately ascertained. Particular importance was attached at that time to one island of the group, San Juan, and Lord John Russell in his despatch to Washington stated the interests involved in its retention by the British Crown to be so important that no settlement would be accepted which did not reserve it to England. Lord Granville, speaking after we had lost the island, had declared its importance enormously overrated; but he believed Lord John Russell's view was the accurate one. Lord John Russell's proposal to refer the construction of the Treaty to an Arbitrator, who, if unable to ascertain the precise line intended, should lay down an equitable boundary, was not successful. In 1869 a similar proposal formed part of the Clarendon-Johnson Convention, but the American Senate refused to ratify that Convention, although they did not object to the San Juan Convention contained in it. It was thus plain that Lord John Russell, Lord Palmerston, Lord Aberdeen, Lord Clarendon, and Lord Stanley had all suggested one mode of dealing with the dispute, and that was that the dispute should be referred in its entirety to arbitration, and that the Arbitrator should be allowed to place upon the clause his own interpretation. At the time of the Treaty the Rosario Straits alone was the navi-
  1430
  gable channel between Vancouver's Island and the main land. In 1871 Her Majesty's Government appointed the Commission, who proceeded to Washington to settle this, amongst other differences, between England and America. There were three questions which would have to be decided by the Arbitrator. The first was—Did the word "channel," as stated by Lord Aberdeen and Sir Richard Pakenham, mean the whole intervening space between Vancouver's Island and the main land? second—If the answer was in the negative, what specific channel did the Treaty indicate? and third—Was the navigation of the whole of the space between Vancouver's Island and the main land to be free and navigable to both parties, or only the navigation of that specific channel down which the boundary line might be drawn? The American Commissioners and the English Commissioners had several skirmishes in the Conferences, and the American Commissioners suggested at last that it should be referred to arbitration to determine whether the line of demarcation should pass through the Rosario Straits or Haro Straits. The British Commissioners then proposed that the Arbitrator should have the right to draw the Boundary through the intermediate channel, but the American Commissioners objected, and the objection was accepted. The English Commissioners next proposed that all channels were to be open. The American Commissioners objected, and their objection was accepted. Thus, out of the three questions which had to be referred to arbitration, the American Commissioners were allowed to place their own interpretation upon two. He now came to the essence of the whole question—What were the chances of the Rosario Channel as against the Hare Channel? He thought it was an absolute certainty on the Ham Channel. In almost every dispute there was some one point upon which the disputants agreed. The English and American negotiators agreed upon one point—namely, that the Rosario Channel was not the channel indicated by the Treaty. That it was the channel indicated by the Treaty was the one point which the ingenuity of the Government selected to refer to arbitration, and upon which to base the English case, and with what success

  1431
  might be imagined. But that was not all. There was only one man in England who, by his official action, had admitted that the claim to the Rosario Straits could not be substantiated. That man was Admiral Prevost, and he was selected to lay our case, which he had himself repudiated, before the Arbitrator. He was a living protest to every argument he offered. That having been so, the state of things was this—that the British Government asked the Arbitrator to adopt a channel, when their own Commissioner had agreed that the claim to that channel could not be supported. He quite agreed that concessions should be made where necessary, but then they should be made in the form of concessions; but the Government acted upon the give-all and take-nothing principle, which for the sake of euphemism they called arbitration. They referred the one untenable point, having abandoned the other at the dictation of the American Commissioners. Were the Government really in earnest in urging our claims? He should be sorry to say that they were not, but really the whole transaction exhibited a wonderful incapacity to negotiate. He believed that our loss of these islands was caused by this—that the Government was determined to have a Treaty, and the Americans very soon found out that determination, and the more anxious the Government were for a Treaty, the more determined the Americans were to have from us as much as they could get. The consequence was, that the unfortunate British Commissioners sent to Washington became the shuttlecocks between two battledores; where as, if they had been properly backed up in the first instance, a different result might have been obtained. But the transaction was finished, and we had lost these islands. He might be told that the Government had a very difficult case to deal with, and had made the best of a bad job, but he did not believe they could possibly have lost more than they had lost; and indeed, if they had accepted the proposals of the American Commissioners themselves, this country would have been in a better position. It might be said that the Government of 1846 or Lord Aberdeen was in fault, but, unfortunately, the Government did not accept the opinion of Lord Aberdeen, who negotiated the Treaty. It might be wrong to negotiate a Boun-
  1432
  dary Treaty where they were unacquainted with the country through which the Boundary was to run; but if that were so, was it right on the part of the Government to negotiate the Central Asian Treaty? He might be asked what was the object of his Motion, when the thing had been already done; but his reply was, that the object which he sought was to elicit the expression of a strong opinion from the House and the country, such as would render it impossible for any Government to negotiate such another Boundary Treaty. It would have been infinitely better, if we had no claim to those islands, to have plainly and honourably said, like Englishmen, that their predecessors had advanced pretensions which could not be sustained, and they would therefore abandon them. If it was necessary to make concessions, the Government ought to have taken the responsibility of making them; but he objected to questions being referred to arbitration which those who referred them knew must be decided against them. By the action of the Government the Dominion of Canada, with its great possessions upon the Pacific, would have only one channel by which they could have access to these territories, and that a channel commanded by a foreign Power who if they chose to fortify it, could render it impassable to merchant vessels in time of war. It might be said that arbitration would conciliate, but the Treaty had failed to conciliate the American people, or that portion of them who were always hostile to England, and it appeared that the first act of the United States after obtaining these islands was to fortify them. The hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt) had pointed out recently that international law was to a certain extent based upon precedent, and if these transactions were allowed to pass without comment, they would form precedents for the future. He did not believe that if the affairs of England were properly conducted, a war with America was at all probable; but if anything could bring about such a collision it was a negotiation such as he had described, which was calculated to produce nothing but contempt on the one hand, and indignation on the other. That being so, his object was, by his Resolution, which, owing to the Rules of the House he was unable to place formally before it, to prevent the possibility

  1433
  of any English statesman appealing to such a transaction as that to which he had called attention as a precedent. He asked the House to consider fairly and impartially the statement which he had made. A proposal had been made to limit the power of the Crown to negotiate Treaties without the sanction of Parliament and the only answer to that was, that the Government of the day negotiated Treaties upon their own responsibility, and that the House of Commons would not permit national interests to be sacrificed by them. If he should succeed in eliciting so strong an expression of opinion as effectually to deter this or any other Government, who either from incapacity or from opinions inconsistent with the duties they had to perform, might feel inclined to enter into negotiations such as he had described, from doing so, then he hoped that the House would consider that the time which he had occupied had not been wasted.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, he was very glad his noble Friend the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton) had brought forward the question, not only because he had made a most interesting and able statement on a very important matter, but because it gave them another opportunity of reviewing the foreign policy of the Government. It was much to be lamented that the House of Commons had so seldom an opportunity of discussing the foreign policy of Ministers until it was too late to do any good. It was so in this instance. The noble Lord the Under Secretary of State would tell them that night, it was a fait accompli; that there was nothing more to be done, the matter having been settled by arbitration; while if they attempted to bring a question forward before negotiations were concluded, they would be told it was objectionable to do so, and might cause serious obstruction in the way of a satisfactory settlement. That was the case in the dispute in the matter of the Suez Canal which he had brought under the notice of the House, upon which he was told that when the negotiations were concluded the Papers would be presented, and that they could discuss the whole subject. The foreign policy of the Government since Lord Granville had been appointed Foreign Minister had been entirely opposed to that pursued by Lord Aberdeen, Lord John
  1434
  Russell, Lord Palmerston, and Lord Stanley. It was a policy of concession and humiliation, distinguished by the absence of all generous and noble principles. Two years since Lord Granville had sacrificed all the advantages we derived front our terrible war with Russia by giving up the Black Sea; and now, contrary to the whole course of our foreign policy, Russia was permitted to advance her frontier in the East some 400 or 500 miles. With reference to the question before the House, the Protocols showed that the British Commissioners were sensible of the importance not of the Haro Channel, but of the middle channel, and proposed its adoption; and yet in the face of that the Government, in referring the question to the Emperor of Germany, put out of view the middle channel, and limited his power to deciding between the Rosario Channel and the Haro Channel. After the principles which the Government had laid down for the interpretation of Treaties, it was incredible how they could have referred this matter on the terms they did to the Emperor of Germany. He was sorry to repeat that the foreign policy of the Government since Lord Granville came into office had been a policy of concession and humiliation. That House might be indifferent to it, but out-of-doors nothing had tended to render the Government more unpopular than the foreign policy which they had pursued. They felt that for the sake of preserving peace, this country, as represented by Lord Granville, would submit to any amount of humiliation. He never could read the language in which the Washington Treaty was drawn without feeling indignant and humiliated that their policy had been guided by such an absence of generous and noble principle. When the Emperor of Germany gave a decision adverse to them, one would have imagined that Lord Granville would have felt something of humiliation and regret. But the more Lord Granville was ill-treated the more it appeared that Lord Granville in his foreign policy resembled those people who were said to like those who ill-treated them. In the case of some English ships sunk in the Seine, Lord Granville wrote to the German Government, acknowledging with the most intense gratitude their condescension in paying compensation to the owners, and with regard to this ques-

  1435
  tion of the San Juan Arbitration, the Foreign Secretary wrote to Lord Odo Russell to convey to His Imperial Majesty the thanks of Her Majesty's Government for the friendly motives which had induced him to undertake the task of Arbitrator, and they added their sincere regret for the labour entailed upon His Majesty. If the decision had been in their favour Lord Granville could not have evinced more gratitude. They gained nothing by all this humiliation, and he had heard an American very recently say—"We can kick you now as much as we like; you will never fight." And then the noble Lord opposite, no doubt in obedience to instructions, wrote out to America urging that there should be no delay in withdrawing our troops from San Juan. It never occurred to Lord Granville that we had been done in the matter. Mr. Dallas, who was Governor in 1860, when the United States' General attempted to take possession of the Island of San Juan, wrote as follows:—
  "It was reasonable for us to propose to the American Government to settle the matter by proposing the middle channel as the boundary, and it was quite open to the latter to decline it, as was done. It is, however, inexplicable why, when the Americans refused to entertain the idea of the middle channel at all, we agreed to exclude its consideration, thus virtually abandoning the Treaty by which we both were bound. We could not have played our cards better to play the American game, and we have been be-fooled to our heart's content. It is to be regretted that our Government in such matters does not ask the advice of leading merchants. Neither I, nor any of my acquaintances have been asked to give an opinion on a subject we know so well, nor was Admiral Richards, the hydrographer to the Admiralty, consulted."
  Now, he wanted to know, if we were right and wise in maintaining our position in 1846, why had we changed our policy? He hoped the House of Commons would be more in accord with the country for the future than it had been by paying more attention to these questions. He was certain that the policy of Her Majesty's Government with regard to them was thoroughly unpopular, and when the General Election came, he believed the opinion of the country, adverse to the Government as it was at present, would be rendered still more adverse in consequence of their foreign policy.
  VISCOUNT ENFIELDsaid; before he came to the question immediately before the House, he must make a few obser-
  1436
  vations in reply to the strictures of his hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. Baillie Cochrane). His hon. Friend, referring to the Suez Canal, told the House that if a discussion on the subject were raised he (Viscount Enfield) might say that the time was gone by and that it was now too late. But his hon. Friend should remember that about three weeks ago he offered the best explanation he could give to the House, and his hon. Friend paid him the compliment of saying that those explanations were far more satisfactory than he had expected.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, the noble Lord had then stated that the question would be decided, and the Papers presented immediately, but they had not yet been produced.
  VISCOUNT ENFIELDsaid, he could not possibly have said that the Papers would be ready immediately, because negotiations of much delicacy were proceeding at the time, and until they were completed the necessary information could not be given to Parliament. His hon. Friend attacked Lord Granville for what he had done in the case of some ships that had been sunk in the Seine. What were the facts? As soon as the circumstances of the case were brought to the notice of the German Government, they expressed their regret for what had been done, and promised any compensation which might be considered satisfactory, and they kept their word. His hon. Friend thought it very extraordinary that a letter should have been written by the Foreign Office to the German Government expressing our thanks for what they had done but in writing the letter we had done nothing but what was usual according to the comity observed among nations. Then with respect to the German Emperor, we had done nothing but what we were bound in duty to do, when we expressed thanks to His Majesty for having undertaken and discharged so laborious a task, and a precedent would be found in a previous case in which the late King of the Belgians had acted as arbiter, and had received the thanks of this country for undertaking such duties. But surely there was no humiliation whatever in returning thanks where, as in this case, they were justly due? Referring to the matter more immediately before the House, he regretted that his noble Friend

  1437
  and Colleague (Lord George Hamilton) in the latter part of his speech had so entirely denounced the principle of arbitration as a means of settling disputes between nations. He had hoped, from the wording of his Motion, that the noble Lord was of opinion that arbitration was in certain cases wise. He could have understood exception being taken to the terms of reference, but thought the desirability of arbitration was now beyond question. Still, no one could have listened to the noble Lord with more pleasure than he had, considering the terms of friendship subsisting between them. He was afraid it would be necessary to follow the noble Lord in the history of the case, and even to go a little further back than he had, because he wished to show that this north-western boundary question had always been a subject of great difficulty and intricacy. Nothing could be more protracted and intricate than the negotiations relating to Oregon Territory; they dated from the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, by which France restored to England the Hudson's Bay Territory. The Treaty between England, France, and Spain in 1763 further defined boundaries between French and British possessions; and the Treaty between Great Britain and the United States of 1783 agreed that the Western Boundary of the United States should be defined by a line
  "Drawn from the most North-Western point of the Lake of the Woods, and from thence on a due west course to the River Mississippi, until it should intersect the northernmost part of the 31st degree of north latitude."
  By another Treaty in 1764, France ceded to Spain the Colony of Louisiana; Spain retroceded that Colony to France in 1800, and France sold it in 1803 to the United States for 60,000 francs. The boundary question now began between Great Britain and the United States. Up to that time, they had not been contiguous in the north-west; but in 1806 a Convention was signed recognizing the 49th parallel as the boundary west from the Lake of the Woods
  "As far as the territories of the United States extend in that quarter, provided that nothing in the present Article shall be construed to extend to the North-west Coast of America, or to the territories belonging to or claimed by either party on the Continent of America to the west of the Stony Mountains."
  1438
  That Convention was not ratified, but it showed the origin of the boundary of the 49th parallel. The Oregon country was at that time almost unknown, and the boundaries between Louisiana and the Hudson's Bay Company had never been defined. The British Government held that America could not claim north of the 40th parallel, and Americans contended that they might draw a line from the most north-western point on the Lake of the Woods claimed to be on the 50th parallel. The Treaty of Peace of 1814 appointed Commissioners to settle the position of the Lake of the Woods, but to decide nothing about territory westward. The Treaty of 1818, however, accomplished that. By Article III. it was agreed that any country that might be claimed by either party on the north-west coast of America, westward of the Stony Mountains, should, together with its harbours, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all rivers within the same, be free and open for the term of ten years without prejudice. That term of ten years was extended indefinitely by the Treaty of 1827, but each party had power to close the arrangement by giving 12 months' notice. In 1819 Spain ceded Florida to the United States, thereby ceding all her "rights, claims, and pretensions" to the territories lying north of the 42nd parallel. By the Treaty of 1790 Great Britain and Spain had agreed that the Pacific Fisheries should be open to both parties, and that settlements made on unoccupied territories should be respected. This Treaty of 1819 introduced a further question. America contended that under it they were entitled to all territory north of the 49th parallel up to the parallel 54·40 degrees of the Russian frontier on the west coast. He would not weary the House by quoting subsequent negotiations, which were to be found described in the second British statement at Berlin, presented to Parliament this year. Taking up the thread of the narrative in 1845, he stated that the British Government then proposed arbitration, which was refused, and Lord Aberdeen's despatch showed how dangerously near war the discussion approached on that occasion. The United States offered to agree to the 49th parallel, with free ports to Great Britain south of it in Vancouver's Island. That was not accepted, and the offer was withdrawn. In 1846 Congress

  1439
  gave notice for the termination of the Treaties of 1818 and 1827, but before that Lord Aberdeen had instructed Mr. (afterwards Sir Richard) Pakenham, at Washington, to accept the principle of the 49th parallel; he also sent out a draft Treaty. On the 18th of May, 1846, Mr. M'Lane, the American minister here, reported a conversation with Lord Aberdeen, and understood him to say that instructions would be sent out to our Minister at Washington, but his Report differed from the actual instructions. But, unfortunately, two days after this Sir Henry Pelly, Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, reported to Lord Aberdeen in favour of the route of Vancouver in 1792 as the boundary. In December, 1846, Mr. Buchanan reported in the same sense to Mr. Bancroft, and in 1848 the British Government proposed a line to be drawn through a channel marked in Vancouver's chart as one though which he had sailed, but that was demurred to. In July, 1848, Mr. Bancroft wrote to Lord Palmerston naming the Canal de Arro, and in November, 1848, that was again repeated. In 1856 the proposal for the Vancouver route was renewed by the British Government and declined, but a Commission was proposed, which, however, did not meet till 1857. Admiral Prevost was of opinion that the Rosario Strait must be the channel through which the boundary line should pass; but seeing that there was no probability of its being accepted, he made a counter proposition of the Douglas Channel. In 1859 Lord Russell, writing to Lord Lyons, who was at that time our Minister at Washington, said—
  "It may be proper, however, that you should make the Government of the United States understand that this proposal of compromise that you are thus instructed to lay before them is made without prejudice to the claim which Her Majesty's Government consider themselves justified in maintaining to the Rosario Channel as the true boundary between Her Majesty's Possessions and those of the United States. They offer this compromise in the hope that its acceptance by the Government of the United States may obviate any further discussion on the subject; but if it is rejected they reserve to themselves the right to fall back on their original claim to its full extent."
  Lord Russell in his despatch used certain expressions which were not very palatable to the United States' Government, and nothing came of his proposal.
  1440
  General Harney's descent on the island in 1859 led to a joint occupation, and to further delay in the settlement of the question. In November, 1870, arbitration was mooted, and Lord Russell wrote to Lord Lyons—
  "It appears to Her Majesty's Government that the argument on both sides being nearly exhausted, and neither party having succeeded in producing conviction in the other, the question can only be settled by arbitration. Three questions would arise thereupon:—1. What is to be the subject-matter of arbitration? 2. Who is to be the arbiter? 3. What is to be the result of the decision of the arbiter? With regard to the first point, Her Majesty's Government are of opinion that the question or questions to be referred should be—What is the true meaning of the words relating to the Water Boundary contained in Article I. of the Treaty of June 15, 1846? Or, if the precise line intended cannot be ascertained, is there any line which will furnish an equitable solution of the difficulty; and which is the nearest approximation that can be made to an accurate construction of the words of the Treaty?"
  It would be seen that Lord Russell never abandoned what he conceived to be the just claim of England to the Rosario Channel. The President referred his proposal to the Senate, and the Committee of Foreign Relations proposed a reference of the existing dispute "to the arbitration of a friendly Power, with authority to determine the line according to the provisions of the Treaty of June 15, 1846, but without authority to establish any line but that provided for in the Treaty." Nothing, however, was done. The Civil War absorbed attention. In the Protocol signed by Lord Stanley with Mr. Reverdy-Johnson in October, 1868, and in the Clarendon-Johnson Treaty of January, 1869, the question was again mooted; but the Treaty never obtained the sanction of the Senate, and matters remained in abeyance till 1871, when the Commissioners met at Washington. The noble Lord and the hon. Member (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) were somewhat severe upon the Commissioners, and the noble Lord had spoken disparagingly of their ability.
  LORD GEORGE HAMILTONdenied that he had reflected in the least upon their ability. What he had said was that the Commissioners were guided by the Government.
  VISCOUNT ENFIELDat once accepted with pleasure the noble Lord's assurance with regard to the Commissioners. From the first they had pressed for the same end, as had been sought for by all our

  1441
  other negotiators. They always maintained that Great Britain was fairly entitled to the Rosario Channel. The British Commissioners proposed that the Arbitrator should have the right to draw the boundary through an intermediate channel. The American Commissioners declined this proposal, stating that they desired a decision, not a compromise. It might be stated that no channel should have been mentioned; but in that case the Arbitrator might have drawn the line still further west, in the South Channel, close to Vancouver Island. If the whole Water Boundary had been left open, the Oregon question would have been re-opened, and we might, possibly, have lost the harbour of Esquimalt, one of the finest in the Pacific. It was said that scant justice had been done to Canada, but Sir John Macdonald had strongly supported the reference to an impartial arbitration, and in the division which took place in the Dominion Parliament the six representatives of British Columbia and Vancouver's Island voted for the Treaty. To sum up—Great Britain had always upheld the Rosario Channel, and the United States the Haro Channel. The British Commission in 1857, though maintaining our right to the Rosario Channel, proposed a middle channel as a compromise. The United States' Commissioner refused to accept a compromise. The American Senate, to whom the "veto" belonged, never formally agreed to it, though it had once been not unfavourably considered by the Government. And at Washington in 1871 the United States' High Commission distinctly refused the "compromise," pressing for a decision. To the party against whom a decision was given, whether in an ordinary Court of Law or in an International Court of Law, there must, of course, be much disappointment; but he very much mistook the feelings of the constituencies of this country and the opinion of the House, if admitting that the principle of arbitration was a sound, just, and good one, there was any question better calculated for Arbitration than this, which for so ninny years had been a cause of great jealousy, great dissension, and much heart-burning between this country and the United States. Though of course as Englishmen we regretted the decision arrived at, still, as Englishmen, we
  1442
  should ungrudgingly and without hesitation accept it.
  MR. PERCY WYNDHAMsaid, he would not support the Motion of his noble Friend the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton) if it could be construed as a censure on the Imperial Arbitrator, because he believed it could be shown most clearly that the decision was most natural, and the only decision the Imperial Arbitrator could have come to under the circumstances that were laid before him. The opinion of the majority of Statesmen who were most competent to give an opinion upon the subject, was against the claim as presented by America; and he blamed Her Majesty's Government for not having insisted on the Rosario Channel, and for having taken a course which enabled the American lawyers at Berlin to show conclusively to the advisers of the Imperial Arbitrator that whatever channel was the right channel, it was perfectly impossible that the Rosario Channel could be the right channel.
  Mr. EASTWICKsaid, that in the matter of the San Juan Arbitration the Americans had obtained all they had asked for, and that we had lost all that we had contended for; but that nevertheless as all cause of discontent on the part of the former had been removed by the decision of the Arbitrator in that matter, we were fully compensated for the loss to us of territory which had resulted from that adverse judgment. That, however, did not at all prevent them from criticizing the way in which the negotiations had been carried on, and the truth was that our Government had made a mistake in the matter which they ought to have foreseen and guarded against. Under the Treaty of 1846 it was clear that the Douglas Channel, and not the Hare Channel, was intended to form the Boundary line. The expression used in the Treaty of 1842 was over and over again "Mid-channel," and there was no allusion to Rosario and Haro; and he was astonished that we should have given up the vital point of Douglas Channel. By giving it up, they had surrendered the whole matter, and it was absolute carelessness on the part of the Government to have given up that vital point. We ought never to have made any concession at all on the subject, and what the Government had done amounted to a complete aban-

  1443
  donment of the rights of this country in reference to it. They should have stood firm on the exact words of the 1st Article of the Treaty of June, 1846, in which there was no question about either the Rosario Channel or the Haro Channel. The matter, however, was a thing of the past; and there was no occasion further to recur to it. He wished, however, to inform the House that we were adopting almost a precisely similar course with reference to the channels at the mouth of the St. Clare River, which the Americans were seeking to obtain the right to, although they belonged of right to Canada. It would be wise, in order to prevent future complications on the boundary question, were we at once to have the boundary between our North-American territory, and the territory which America had recently purchased from Russia definitely ascertained and fixed.
  VISCOUNT BURYsaid, the deserted appearance of the House was an indication that it was not at all anxious to discuss another Motion condemnatory of the Ministry. He deprecated Votes of Censure on the Government being moved daily. It was rather too much that, after the course that had been taken yesterday, a fresh Vote of Censure should be brought forward that evening, when it was found impossible to express any decisive opinion upon it. It was trifling with the House, and, moreover, such a course was calculated to bring Votes of Censure into ridicule. The previous speaker had, without cause, seemed to find fault with the Imperial Arbitrator; but we had gone to arbitration on the subject of the San Juan Boundary of our own free will, and we ought to be grateful to the Emperor of Germany for having removed a cause of disagreement between this country and America. After complimenting his noble Friend (Viscount Enfield) on the clearness with which he had explained an intricate chain of negotiations, the noble Lord related the history of the Oregon Territory, with a view to show that prior to the Treaty of 1816, by which England agreed to a joint occupation, the Americans had no claim to it, and that their Treaties with France and Spain for the acquisition of Louisiana and Florida did not affect Oregon. Coming down to the Treaty of 1846, he remarked that the boundary, if laid down, admitted four
  1444
  constructions—the Haro Channel, the Middle or Dundas Channel, the Rosario Channel, or a line down the middle of the strait dividing Vancouver's Island from the main land, disregarding the archipelago of islands altogether. Only two constructions were, however, contended for—the Rosario Channel by ourselves, and the Haro Channel by the Americans. He thought this country should have insisted on putting the whole Treaty before the Arbitrator, and regretted that our negotiators gave up the free navigation of all the channels except that to be determined by the Emperor of Germany; but though the military future of Vancouver's Island had suffered a great blow from the decision, it was useless now to re-open the matter and endeavour to throw dirt at one another. For many years all negotiations with the Americans had ended in our receding and in their obtaining what they wanted. The reason was, that they had always been in earnest and we had not. They had been ready to go to war if we did not give way; while the English people—for it was not merely the Government and the negotiators—would not think of going to war. He thought it was Sir Robert Peel who said it was better to yield the Americans a few million acres than to go to war with them. Hence in the dispute as to the boundary of Maine, we gave way after considerable negotiation. On the last occasion we might, perhaps, have carried our point if we had shown that we were in earnest, and that we cared less about what was called friendship towards America than about retaining what might be the rights of England. He himself doubted whether a great nation could with safety yield any part of its rights in order to purchase the favour of another country. In the future we ought to be wise in time. As to the San Juan Boundary Line, the question was now finally closed, and it was too late to bring any accusation against the Government with respect to it; but the boundary between Alaska and our northwestern Possessions in America still remain unsettled, and was referred to only the other day in the Message of the President of the United States. There would be no great difficulty if the matter were dealt with at once, but if we waited until the Americans had settled over our border, their angry passions would arise,

  1445
  and we should find that the boundary between Alaska and our Territory would present much the same aspect as that presented by the San Juan Boundary question. If public attention were directed to that and other important questions which were "looming in the future" the noble Lord would not have raised the present discussion in vain.
  LORD JOHN MANNERSsaid, in his opinion, the noble Lord the Member for Berwick (Viscount Bury) had evinced great inconsistency in first censuring the noble Lord the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton) for having brought forward the question, and in subsequently pointing out that the importance of the events "looming in the future" fully justified him in submitting it to the notice of the House. It was, indeed, through Motions of that kind, which justly criticized the conduct of the Government in regard to important Treaties, that we must hope to see the prospect of more satisfactory diplomatic action in the future; and, therefore, instead of deserving censure, he maintained that his noble Friend had performed an important public duty in bringing the matter forward. The noble Lord opposite (Viscount Enfield), had made a most careful and clear statement in vindication of the course taken by Her Majesty's Government with respect to that portion of the Treaty of Washington. He (Lord John Manners) thought however, that in his historical summary the noble Lord had laid rather too much stress on the supposed fact that all the English statesmen concerned in this matter had pressed the claim of the Rosario Channel. Surely the noble Lord could not have forgotten that the Earl of Aberdeen did not mention that channel, and that in writing years afterwards to Earl Russell he stated that this particular channel was not in his mind at the time. The noble Lord opposite had therefore broken clown in the most important part of his statement.
  MR. GLADSTONE: Where did the Earl of Aberdeen say that?
  LORD JOHN MANNERSpointed out the passage in the Blue Book, and remarked that Lord Aberdeen referred to the Mid-channel. Now no human being could say that the Rosario Channel was a mid-channel.
  MR. GLADSTONE: I beg your pardon.
  LORD JOHN MANNERSwent on to say that there was no idea of fixing on the Rosario Channel under the Treaty of 1846. The Treaty of 1846 required that, in Sir Richard Pakenham's words, "a line should be traced along the middle of the channel," meaning the whole intervening space that separated the Continent from Vancouver's Island. Lord Aberdeen and Sir Richard Pakenham communicated their opinion on this point to Lord Palmerston. Lord John Russell, in 1859, adopted the same line. The one point now at issue was, whether the English Government were wise in 1871 in receding from the position they had taken up, and in not pressing for an open instead of a restricted reference. With great respect to the noble Lord the Tinder Secretary for Foreign Affairs, he had not shown that the conduct of Her Majesty's Government in yielding at the instance of the American Government the point of an open reference was either wise or justifiable, and his noble Friend the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton) had done good service in calling attention to that most material branch of the subject. Point after point had been yielded by Her Majesty's Government to the American view of the case; and so long as an impression prevailed that our Government in negotiating with the United States put forward claims in order that they might be withdrawn on the slightest show of opposition, the result was most unfortunate for the best interests of the country. He knew no course so likely to prevent a repetition of such transactions as the discussion so usefully introduced by the speech of his noble Friend the Member for Middlesex.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, he would not enter into the question of the North-Western Boundary between Great Britain and the United States—not because it was not a proper subject for discussion in Parliament—but because he did not think that any advantage would arise from his entering into that discussion. He would look to the main proposition of the noble Lord the Member for Middlesex (Lord George Hamilton), and then state his views upon it. When they looked at the Motion of the noble Lord, it was obvious that a question would arise upon it, and that those who were opposed to it would challenge the Motion on its foundation. It had been said that

  1447
  the time had passed when the Treaty of Washington could be usefully handled in the way of criticism upon the proceedings of Her Majesty's Government, but that was a matter on which it did not behove the Government to dwell. He regarded that and every other part of the Treaty of Washington as a legitimate subject of criticism and objection. It would, moreover, have been difficult to criticize the negotiations on this point at a much earlier period, because the tendency of some of the criticisms heard that night would have been far from advantageous to the public interests if they had been made before the Arbitration at Berlin came to an end. The noble Lord the Member for Middlesex said that in a recent debate, he (Mr. Gladstone) complained that he had shut the door of repentance against the Government, whereupon he claimed credit that by the Motion he was now making he intended to enable the Government to do penance for themselves and set themselves right in the Court of Conscience. What, however, the noble Lord did on a former occasion was to deny the Government the privilege of leaving what he (Mr. Gladstone) declared to be the path of vice for that of virtue, and now the noble Lord wanted the Government, when they were walking in the paths of virtue, to travel over to the paths of vice. The noble Lord had therefore appeared to-night in the character of a corrupter of the morals of Her Majesty's Government. The Motion of the noble Lord impugned the conduct of the Government in allowing a limited interpretation to be placed on that part of the Oregon Treaty which was referred to the decision of the Emperor of Germany. The noble Lord objected to the limited reference, but he ought first to have shown that it was in the power of Her Majesty's Government to obtain an unlimited reference. If it were not, then the question arose, first, whether the limited reference to which the Government consented was the most legitimate and reasonable that could be chosen, and, next, was it one which the Government were wise in choosing, rather than not to have any reference at all? He (Mr. Gladstone) held that it was wise to have a limited reference rather than have no reference at all. We had four or five controversies open with the United States, and were on the point of closing
  1448
  them all, with one exception. Those questions were—with regard to Canada, with regard to the Fisheries, with regard to the United States claims upon England for occurrences during the war, and with regard to British claims upon the United States for occurrences during the war. When these controversies were—excepting one—apparently on the point of being brought to a satisfactory issue, then the question arose whether all that had been done in respect to them was to be nullified because they would accept no reference in respect to the Oregon Treaty, except a reference which would be in the nature of a commission to the Emperor of Germany to settle the whole matter as he thought fit; an unlimited reference which would have released the Arbitrator from having regard to the general words of the Treaty and thrown him back on the general principles of equity. Why, the Government would have done despite to the general feeling of the country, and met with universal condemnation from every quarter of the House, if they had taken a course so unwise and imprudent as to decline to admit any reference of the Oregon Boundary and the San Juan Channel to peaceful arbitration, and the only reference possible was one conceived in such terms as to make the Emperor of Germany master of the whole subject to decide it as he pleased. Was, then, the particular reference an unwise and injudicious one? The noble Lord's line of argument, too, was against the Government accepting the limited reference, and there was no doubt he would have had a very good case, if he could have established his basis on facts. He (Mr. Gladstone), however, denied his main proposition, for the noble Lord said the Government should have placed before the Emperor of Germany a reasonable alternative, and that whereas the Government had never contended that the Rosario Strait was that which best fulfilled the conditions of the Treaty the Government marched to certain defeat. Instead, however, of never setting up the Rosario strait as the true and legitimate interpretation of the Treaty, he asserted that the Government had never set up any other strait from the time when they knew enough of the subject to set up any strait or boundary at all. The language of Sir Richard Pakenham in 1859, and of Lord Russell

  1449
  in his despatch, had been quoted to show that Lord Aberdeen in giving his recollection of what occurred in 1846—and no man's memory was more trustworthy, no man's habit of mind was more cautious and circumspect in any matter of business—declared it to be the intention of the Treaty to adopt the Mid-channel straits as the line of demarcation, without any reference to islands, the very existence of which at that time had hardly been accurately ascertained. Upon that statement was founded the extraordinary inference that the British Government had never contended for the Rosario straits. Now, what Lord Aberdeen said was, that at the time the Treaty was made, not being acquainted with the precise topography, a reservation was made in general terms on behalf of the Mid-channel, though referring to no channel in particular. When, however, in process of time fuller information was obtained with respect to the distribution of land and islands and the course of waters in that region, the British Government contended, steadily to the end, that the Rosario channel was that which best corresponded with the terms of the Treaty, and, therefore, for the fulfilment of the Treaty, ought to be definitely adopted as the boundary. He could not suppose that the noble Lord was prepared to question that proposition. It was so plain upon the face of the whole documents, it was so entirely without plausible ground of objection, that he did not know whether he was justified in dwelling upon it in any detail. But the extraordinary course of argument which had been adopted compelled some reference to what had been said. The hon. Member (Mr. Percy Wyndham) quoted from the speech of the American counsel at Berlin, who, following the practice of counsel on this side of the water, did not, indeed, misquote the words of the person whose authority he desired to enlist, but attached to those words an interpretation which was not the true sense or meaning, but was his own construction of the meaning.
  MR. PERCY WYNDHAMsaid, he had quoted the very words of Sir Richard Pakenham as they were cited by the American counsel.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid that those words did not in the least serve the purpose of the hon. Member. Sir Richard Pakenham said—
  1450
  "The conditions of the Treaty, according to their literal tenour, would require the line to be traced along the middle of the channel, meaning the whole intervening space which separated the Continent from Vancouver's Island."
  Sir Richard Pakenham did not commit himself to anything with respect to the Rosario Channel; But the American counsel, who must have poisoned the mind of the hon. Member, ingeniously and boldly went on to say—
  "Thus Sir Richard Pakenham rejects entirely the so-called Rosario channel as the channel of the Treaty."
  Now, Sir Richard Pakenham signed the Treaty, but did not negotiate it, and as the negotiator of the Treaty, he would necessarily have been the person most conversant with its terms; but the Treaty was drawn in this country, and signed in America by Sir Richard Pakenham simply as the agent of the British Government. Those who were concerned in the matter at home did not know the minute topography of the region with which they were dealing and he thought they had made a mistake; but he was far from blaming them for what they did, indeed, he was one of the persons who were jointly responsible. He, however, believed it was the best settlement of which the circumstances admitted, for the American Government would not consent to an unlimited reference; but at the same time, he would admit that it would have been for the interest of this country to have obtained such a reference. Nor did he think our case for the Rosario Channel a very strong case. But our Commissioners used every effort to obtain an unlimited reference, and such a reference was opposed from the first, with one exception, by the American Government, and that was in 1857, when the Douglas Channel was proposed as a compromise by the English Government, the American Government refusing to accept it. The exception was when the Reverdy Johnson and Clarendon Treaty with reference to the San Juan Water Boundary was recommended to the Senate by the Foreign Affairs Committee. The Senate, however, did not adopt that Treaty, and the American Government at once resumed its old position, refusing an unlimited reference, and leaving us to choose between a limited reference and no reference at all. Having that alternative, Her Majesty's Government determined that a limited

  1451
  reference was better than none at all; and the question arose what the limited reference should be. The noble Lord seemed to think the Douglas Channel should have been taken as our reference. But the Douglas Channel had only been proposed by us as a compromise. It was stated by Her Majesty's Government that that offer was caused by no change of opinion on their part, but by their desire to settle the question, and Lord Russell, in 1859, expressly declared that the offer was made without prejudice to the claim, which the British Government considered themselves justified in maintaining, to the Rosario Channel as the true boundary. The contention of the British Government having thus been in favour of the Rosario Channel, were there any natural features in the case of the Douglas Channel which would have justified the British Government in saying it answered the terms of the Treaty? Whatever else the Treaty meant, it meant the principal channel between the Continent and Vancouver's Island—the channel which was most suitable for navigation. Consequently, in the British Argument stress was laid upon the depth of water, the breadth of the channel, the convenience of access and egress—upon all those natural features, in short, which, as the British Government thought, recommended the Rosario Channel as satisfying the description in the Treaty; but the Douglas Channel was greatly inferior either to the Rosario or the Haro Channel. It might have been taken for the sake of compromise; but it entirely failed to satisfy the main idea of the Treaty of 1846—namely, that it should be the principal channel marked out for the course of navigation. In Admiral Richards' Report upon the Douglas Channel, he said—"The middle channel, though inferior in capacity to the Rosario and Haro Channel, was perfectly safe for steamers." Admiral Richards went on to say that the channel was open to the same objection for sailing vessels, and in a greater degree, in consequence of its width, which was not more than a mile. Then he pointed out that on the eastern shore there was a rock to be avoided, called the Reed Rock—"a dangerous patch with 12 feet of water on it." The gallant Admiral proceeded with his agreeable description of this navigable channel—"The tide sets rapidly over
  1452
  these rocks." [Lord GEORGE HAMILTON: The word "navigable" does not occur in the Treaty.] True, but the Treaty evidently meant the Channel which, from its natural features, was the safest for navigation; and this was a channel having rocks covered with water, with the tide setting rapidly over them, with its "southern entrance only three-quarters of a mile wide," its "tides strong" and "its bottom very irregular." His (Mr. Gladstone's) contention was that when the Treaty spoke of the middle of the channel it meant the main channel, and assumed that there was but one principal channel. Yet that narrow, rocky, dangerous, insidious, comparatively insignificant channel was that for which the noble Lord said we should most stoutly have contended as satisfying the conditions of the Treaty, which was framed avowedly in ignorance of the geographical details. Why, any Government pursuing such a course would have made itself little short of ridiculous, and would not only have incurred defeat before the Arbitrator—a thing which might happen to anyone, however just his cause might be, but something like disgrace in the face of any Arbitrator who really knew what he was about. He regretted that the question could not be more fully discussed, but he fully agreed with the noble Lord the Member for Berwick (Viscount Bury) that it would not be fair to estimate the importance of the subject by the number of hon. Members to be found on the benches when the debate was going on. The labours of that House were such that a very large number of its Members were compelled to find relief and relaxation when they could, and many things were allowed to pass in their absence which they would dignify with their notice and personal presence, but for the extreme pressure of their personal labours. He did not deny the importance of the question or complain of the criticism which had been indulged in upon the conduct of the Government; but the noble Lord himself could not venture to contend that we should have been right in breaking off with America on the whole of this great negotiation, rather than admit the limited reference—and a limited reference only America was willing to accede—and in choosing the ground of that limited reference, Government had chosen the only ground which it could select with

  1453
  prudence and honour. When it was their duty to go before an Arbitrator with two alternatives, and two alternatives alone, Government had no course before it in prudence except to assume the argument which had been the Argument of the British side from the commencement of the controversy, and to refer to the German Emperor that point, upon which he had come to a perfectly legitimate decision, between the Haro Channel, for which America had contended, and the Rosario Channel, which had been the object of the desire of the British Government. He did not believe that the Argument on the British side could possibly have been better maintained than it had been, and that desire had been pursued with all the seriousness and earnestness and force at their command. If they lamented the chances of Arbitration, at all events they were better than the chances of war. They could not but acknowledge, however, that in this instance the natural mortification of disappointment was not aggravated in the slightest degree by any mistrust of the perfect good faith of the German Emperor, or by anything like astonishment or surprise at the conclusion to which, at the end of a difficult inquiry, he had, with perfect honesty and with every instrument of careful investigation, been led to arrive.
  Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put and agreed to.

SUPPLY.—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES.

  SUPPLY—considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  (1.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £5,247, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1874, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of the Queen's and Lord Treasurer's Remembrancer in the Exchequer, Scotland, of certain Officers in Scotland, and other charges formerly paid from the Hereditary Revenue."
  MR. BOWRINGmoved the omission of the item £197 13 s. for Queen's Plates. He believed the vast majority of the population of Scotland objected to the continuance of this Vote. In 1869 it was carried by a majority of 191 to 73; but the following year a great change took place in the views of Scotch Mem-
  1454
  bers on the subject, and owing to their almost unanimous opposition, the vote was withdrawn. It was not proposed at all in 1871, but was restored to the Estimates in 1872, in consequence of a round-robin to the Government, said to have been drawn up by the hon. Member for Berwickshire (Mr. Robertson). On that occasion the vote was carried by only 116 to 78, and that mainly because the Government were supported by hon. Members from Ireland who were afraid lest they should lose the similar vote for that country. Queen's Plates in England were paid for out of the Civil List, but in Scotland and Ireland they were not Queen's Plates at all, but Parliamentary grants which ought to be struck off the Vote if for no other reason than this, that instead of tending to improve the breed of horses, they acted precisely in a contrary manner; for, as a rule, nothing but second-rate animals contended for them. In addition to this he objected to a Parliamentary recognition of horse racing and the betting and gambling which always accompanied it. He should certainly take the sense of the Committee against the item.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Item of £217 13 s. for Queen's Plates, be reduced by the sum of £197 13 s."—(Mr. Bowring.)
  MR. ALDERMAN LUSKsaid, he had no desire to find fault with racing, or say that it was immoral; but he thought the money was thrown away in a paltry and miserable manner, and that they should either give a proper prize to be competed for, or none at all. In four races in England last year there was not a single horse found to run for the Queen's Plates; and at the same time, in the case of the Scotch Queen's Plates, only two or three horses ran for each; and not a good horse in the lot.
  MR. J. C. HAMILTONhoped the Vote would not be rejected, because England and Ireland had their Queen's Plates voted without objection.
  MR. MACFIEsaid, the withdrawal of such grants from Scotland had caused much remark in the part of the country with which he was connected. As a Scotch Member he objected to his country being singled out for withdrawal.
  MR. DILLWYN,while thinking the question ought not to be viewed as a national one, said, he did not think the

  1455
  money was required, and should therefore support the hon. Member for Exeter's proposal.
  SIR PATRICK O'BRIEN,who spoke amidst considerable interruption, said, that when hon. Members below the gangway talked of economy, it reminded him of an excellent saying he had read in The Morning Post about 20 years ago, that "time was a public common, on which every man turned out his own donkey to graze." He maintained that the question should be regarded in relation to the whole United Kingdom, and not to any single portion of it merely. He should therefore vote in favour of granting the Queen's Plates to Scotland, the people of which appeared to desire their continuance, although their representatives on a former occasion had advocated their withdrawal.
  SIR ROBERT ANSTRUTHERsaid, he did not object to the hon. Gentleman grazing his own donkey, but he did object to him grazing it upon Scotch grass. He believed that those Plates, so far from encouraging an improved breed of horses, encouraged a breed of wretched animals that were a disgrace to the country.
  MR. R. N. FOWLERobjected to the Vote, on the ground that great evil resulted from the extent to which racing and betting were carried in this country, which had resulted in the ruin of many men in high position.
  MR. PEASEalso objected to the Vote, because it was absurd to suppose that the vote of this small sum could encourage the breed of horses in this country.
  Question put.
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 52; Noes 63: Majority 11.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (2.) £10,512, to complete the sum for the Fishery Board, Scotland.
  (3.) £6,054, to complete the sum for the Department of the Registrar General of Births, &c., Scotland.
  (4.) £4,945, to complete the sum for the Board of Lunacy, Scotland.
  (5.) £15,192, to complete the sum for the Board of Supervision, Scotland.
  MR. RYLANDSasked for some explanation of the functions of the Bible Board.
  THE LORD ADVOCATEsaid, the question was a very reasonable one, but the name "Bible Board" was a misnomer. The Board consisted of several gentlemen who had got by patent the exclusive right and privilege of printing the Bible and Prayer Books in Scotland. Formerly the printing of Bibles was a monopoly in Scotland as in England, the monopoly being given to the Queen's printers by Royal patent. With a view to put an end to the monopoly in Scotland some 30 years ago, the system was hit upon of giving a patent to certain Commissioners, on the condition that they should grant licences to all publishers upon their complying with certain conditions which the Royal Warrant specified in order to secure the purity of the text. The Bibles were now printed by very respectable publishers, and he signed from 40 to 60 licences every year. All the expenses connected with the Commissioners' work was a salary of £600 to a secretary, and the salary of the law agent who had to prepare the licences.
  Vote agreed to.
  (6,) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £5,791, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1874, for the Salaries of the Officers and Attendants of the Household of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and other Expenses."
  MR. TREVELYANmoved that the Vote be reduced by the sum of £1,562 for Queen's Plates for Ireland.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Item of £1,562 for Queen's Plates, be omitted from the proposed Vote."—(Mr. Trevelyan.)
  SIR PATRICK O'BRIENdefended the Vote, and suggested that the whole amount should be handed over to the Turf Club to distribute as they might think fit.
  MR. WHALLEYsaid, that this money might be most usefully applied in the form of prizes for horses at agricultural shows.
  SIR HENRY STORKSwas of opinion that these Plates did a great deal of good in Ireland by encouraging the breed of horses on the part of gentlemen who encouraged racing. The Committee

  1457
  would appreciate the interest which the Government had in the horses produced in Ireland when he stated that every regiment of cavalry in the service, except one, was mounted in Ireland; and he attributed the excellent horses they got from that country in a great degree to the stallions which ran for these Plates.
  SIR DAVID WEDDERBURNsupported the Motion of the hon. Member for the Border Burghs (Mr. Trevelyan).
  MR. MUNTZthought the money might be better applied in some such matter as suggested by the hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr. Whalley), but as the Scotch Vote had been agreed to, he must reluctantly vote for the Irish Queen's Plates.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONexpressed his belief that the breed of horses had been and was being greatly improved by the practice of horse racing; he should be sorry, therefore, to see Queen's Plates abolished, as they were a national recognition of the sport. He thought, however, that they might perhaps be appropriated in a more satisfactory manner among the four Provinces than they were at present.
  Question put.
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 43; Noes 65: Majority 22.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (7.) £24,215, to complete the sum for the Offices of the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.
  (8.) £250, to complete the sum for the Boundary Survey, Ireland.
  (9.) £1,985, to complete the sum for the Office of Commissioners of Charitable Donations and Bequests, Ireland.
  (10.) £23,096, to complete the sum for the Department of the Registrar General of Births, &c., Ireland.
  (11.) £91,200, to complete the sum for the Local Government Board, Ireland.
  (12.) £4,394, to complete the sum for the Public Record Office, Ireland.
  (13.) £22,326, to complete the sum for the Office of Public Works, Ireland.
  House resumed.
  Resolutions to be reported upon Monday next;
  Committee to sit again upon Monday next.

AGRICULTURAL CHILDREN BILL.

  [BILL 8.] COMMITTEE.
  (Mr. Clare Read, Mr. Pell, Mr. Akroyd, Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth. Mr. Kennaway.)
  Bill considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  Clauses 1 to 3 inclusive, agreed to.
  Clause 4 (Interpretation.)
  COLONEL BARTTELOTmoved an Amendment, to the effect that the age under which children could not be employed should be 10 instead of 12 years.
  Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 16, to leave out the word "twelve," in order to insert the word "ten."—(Colonel Barttelot.)
  MR. BRAND,in opposing the Amendment, said, he gave it his most unqualified dissent. Indeed, he should rather have increased than decreased the age, for he should move an Amendment that 14 was the proper time to fix. He also wished to increase the age for carter's boys from eight to ten years of age.
  MR. CLARE READbelieved the provision in the Bill hit the happy medium, and therefore supported the clause as it stood.
  MR. BRUCEsaid, he approved of the proposed Amendment of the hon. Member for Herts (Mr. Brand), on the ground that if education was to take any hold of the children, it was desirable that the age should be increased instead of being diminished, as it would be by the proposition of the hon. and gallant Member for West Sussex (Colonel Barttelot).
  Question put, "That the word 'twelve' stand part of the Clause."
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 38; Noes 48: Majority 10.
  On the Motion of Mr. ASSHETON CROSS, Amendment made, by inserting the word "thirteen," in place of the word "twelve," just struck out.
  Clause, as amended, agreed to.
  Clauses 5 to 10, inclusive, agreed to.
  Clause 11 (Penalty on offences against Act.)
  On the Motion of Colonel BARTTELOT, Amendments made in page 3, line 39, by striking out five pounds and inserting

  1459
  "two pounds;" and in line 41 by striking out one pound, and inserting "five shillings."
  Clause, as amended, agreed to.
  Remaining clauses and Schedule agreed to.
  Bill reported; as amended, to be considered upon Monday next.

  MARRIED WOMEN'S PROPERTY ACT (1870) AMENDMENT BILL.— [BILL 7.]
  (Mr. Hinde Palmer, Mr. Amphlett, Mr. Osborne Morgan, Mr. Jacob Bright.)

  COMMITTEE. [Progress 25th April.]
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the House do now go into Committee upon the said Bill."
  Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
  House adjourned at a quarter before Two o'clock till Monday next.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Second Reading—Elementary Education Provisional Order Confirmation (No. 3)* (78).
Report—Supreme Court of Judicature* (73–89).
Third Reading—Marriages (Ireland)* (75), and passed.

AFRICA—WEST COAST SETTLEMENTS—THE ASHANTEE INVASION.

  QUESTION.
  THE EARL OF LAUDERDALEsaid, that since he brought the subject of the Ashantee incursion under their Lordships' notice there had been, according to reports in the public newspapers, a serious engagement between the Ashantees and our protected tribes. As to the exportation of arms to Africa, he had seen a statistical paper, which gave 10,000 as the number of arms exported from this country to the West Coast in the month of April last; and that there had been exported during the months ending 31st March 4,000,000 lbs. of gunpowder, and 89,000, stand of arms. Those arms and a very large quantity of powder were consigned to various points, such as the Bonny River, Old Calabar, and other places, all south of the Gambia, and north of the Line. There was a very great trade in arms and ammunition along that coast, and it was of very great importance at the present crisis that

  1393
  every precaution should be taken to prevent them from getting into the hands of the Ashantees. On the other hand, it was reported that our own men had been obliged to give way before the enemy for want of ammunition, and that the ladies at Cape Coast Castle were subscribing money to supply them with powder. It was further stated that no fewer than 30,000 Ashantees were within six hours' march of Cape Coast Castle, and that the only re-inforcements that had been sent were 120 troops and 150 Coolies. Now be thought that wherever we hoisted the British flag we ought to have a sufficient force of native or other troops to resist any attack that might be made on it. The forts which we had to protect on this West Coast extended along a line of coast 60 miles in extent; and to send out European troops was out of the question—they would die as soon as they landed. He wished to ask the noble Earl the Secretary for the Colonies—What measures have been taken to prevent the Ashantees getting supplies of arms and munitions of war; What number of troops we have on the spot to defend and hold the various forts under the British flag, eight or ten in number; And if any of the Colonial troops were engaged in the battle, an account of which has been received at the Colonial Office?
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, he would take the Questions of the noble and gallant Earl seriatim. With regard to the first of them—whether any steps had been taken to prevent the Ashantees from obtaining supplies of ammunition—before he answered it, he would like to explain that as to some of the points to which the noble and gallant Earl had referred as those to which a very large number of arms and great supplies of ammunition had been sent, the Ashantees had no more access to them than they had to the Cape of Good Hope. Those places were not in the neighbourhood of the country of the Ashantees. Of course it was of the last importance that measures should be taken to prevent the Ashantees, whose territory lay at the back of the Protected Territories on the Gold Coast, getting supplies of arms and ammunition, and instructions on the subject had been sent out from the Colonial Office; but it was not necessary that he should read them, because they had been anticipated on the spot by the Adminis-
  1394
  trator, Colonel Harley. On the 8th of February the gallant Colonel issued a Proclamation forbidding all persons within the Settlements and Protected Territories on the Gold Coast, and on the waters, rivers, and estuaries thereof, to sell, barter, give, or transfer, directly or indirectly, any arms, ammunition, or warlike stores to the Ashantees or their allies, or to other enemies of the Protectorate. He also prohibited the importation of arms, ammunition, and warlike stores, excepting at Cape Coast, Elmina, and Accra, and such other ports as the importer might be especially authorized to land them at under a licence obtained from the Collector of Customs. The next question of the noble and gallant Earl was as to the number of troops we had on the spot to defend and hold the various forts under the British flag. Now, in order that their Lordships should understand the position of affairs in that part of the country, he ought to state that this was not British Territory, but British-protected Territory, and he could not do better than quote to their Lordships, Instructions sent out by Mr. Cardwell, which, though dated in June, 1864, were quite applicable to the present occasion. Writing to Governor Pine, Mr. Cardwell said:—
  "The duty of defending the extensive territory included in the Protectorate can only be satisfactorily discharged if the chiefs to whom it belongs are united and resolute in their own defence. If they are not united, and will not take upon themselves the principal part of the exertions necessary, it will not be possible to defend them without exposing the Queen's forces to the risks of a deadly climate, and to the hazard of being virtually defeated by the disastrous consequences of that climate, before they have been able to bring the native enemy to the issue of arms. The proper course, therefore, is to take every possible means for bringing the chiefs to an united and decided system of defence, and for this purpose to give them advice, to supply them judiciously with military stores, and, in concert with the officer in command of the forces, to furnish them with such assistance as he may be able to afford, without exposing his officers and men to any protracted residence in the interior, especially at the unhealthy season, and without weakening his force upon the coast so as to endanger the safety of the settlements themselves."
  The same steps as Mr. Cardwell advised to be taken had been taken by the present Administrator, Colonel Harley, and, from all the accounts which had been received, the chiefs were quite able to

  1395
  defend the territory if they were willing to do so. Of course, if they were not so disposed, they could not be forced to resist the Ashantees. In a despatch recently received from the Administrator, he stated that the published accounts much exaggerated the number of Ashantees engaged in the incursion. Colonel Harley did not believe it exceeded 4,000—though doubtless it was in the power of the Ashantees to bring up re-inforcements. The tribes under our protection must be at least 10 times as numerous as the Ashantee army, and if they acted with energy there could be no question about their being able to repel the enemy. But there was a difficulty in the way of keeping them properly supplied with ammunition. Unfortunately, they had a foolish habit of firing off an unlimited number of blank charges before they came in sight of the enemy. It was, therefore, impossible to undertake to supply them with an unlimited quantity of ammunition; but a great deal had been sent to them, and also a great number of arms. In addition to the forces which the tribes themselves might be expected to supply, we had on the spot 270 troops of the West India Regiment, 220 armed Houssas, 200 Volunteers, and 150 Native Police, making in all an armed force under the Administrator of 840 men. Then, besides that force, there were at the latest date four vessels of war on the coast. They could not go up the interior, but the men on board would be useful in case of an attack near the coast or on the forts. By the latest ad-vices there was another war ship on her way to the Coast; and since then a larger ship had been sent in the same direction. Writing on the 8th of April, Colonel Harley said:—
  "I may add that a feeling of complete security is felt here and along the coast, which the presence of four of Her Majesty's ships at present in the roads no doubt strengthens."
  He thought that when the Military Administrator spoke in those terms there could be no doubt that confidence was felt in the resources at hand. The attack was serious, but there had been much exaggeration both as to what had occurred and the strength of the enemy. In answer to his noble and gallant Friend's last Question, none of the British troops were engaged in the recent engagement. They had not been
  1396
  sent into the interior, nor was it intended to send them.
  THE EARL OF CARNARVONsaid, that the statement of the noble Earl the Secretary for the Colonies was, as far as he understood it, on the whole, a satisfactory one. But he understood that we were supplying arms and ammunition to a great number of semi-barbarous tribes. He did not know what degree of confidence was to be placed in these tribes, and he wished to know whether any security had been taken that we should get our arms back.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYcould not say that any security had been asked or given. It was not probable that at a moment of such emergency a bargain could have been made with those tribes for the return of the arms; but arms had been supplied on former occasions, and no difficulty had arisen. We never had had any dissension with the tribes whom we were now arming, and there was no reason to think they would turn against us.

APPELLATE JURISDICTION OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
  SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE BILL.

    RESOLUTIONS.
    LORD REDESDALErose to move Resolutions respecting the jurisdiction of their Lordships' House as the ultimate tribunal of Appeal for the United Kingdom, of which he had given Notice. The noble Lord said, that in these Resolutions his reasons for being opposed to the abolition of the Appellate Jurisdiction of their Lordships' House were pretty fully stated. He thought that the constitution of one Tribunal of Ultimate Appeal for disputed suits from the Courts of all the three Kingdoms was more advantageous than the creation of separate jurisdictions for such appeals. If the principle of having only one such tribunal was departed from, and a claim should arise to property in more than one kingdom on a doubtful point of law, on which their respective Courts of Ultimate Appeal should differ, a legal and social scandal would follow, which could not occur if the last appeal had been to one Supreme Court as at present. Their Lordships' House had long supplied, and was alone capable of satisfactorily supplying, such a tribunal, from which, under the provisions of the Supreme

    1397
    Court of Judicature Bill, it was proposed to separate England, at a time when its efficiency had been generally acknowledged, and its jurisdiction retained for Scotland and Ireland as especially satisfactory to those countries. As regarded their Lordships' House, the retention of this jurisdiction was most important, not only on high constitutional grounds, but for reasons connected with the succession to Peerages, which were legal rights; for in the event of a disputed succession to estates in more than one kingdom on a question of legitimacy dependent on a point of law such as might arise on a question of foreign marriage, the heir to which would also be entitled to a Peerage in each of those kingdoms, if the decision as to the right to the estates should be different in the respective Courts of Ultimate Appeal, their Lordships' House, although deprived of its status as a Court of Law, must decide as to the Peerages against the finding of one of those Courts, and a person who might by such decision be declared illegitimate would, nevertheless, continue to hold the estate to which, if illegitimate, he would have no claim, and the person to whom the Peerage should be awarded by this House would hold the same in defiance of the law of the kingdom to which the Peerage belonged, as declared by the Courts of that kingdom. Again, if the principle of the Judicature Bill were extended to Scotland and Ireland, three Courts of Ultimate Appeal would be established in the United Kingdom, and as it was acknowledged that both those kingdoms preferred the Appellate Jurisdiction of the House of Lords to that proposed to be constituted for England under the Bill, and on that account were not brought under it, and as provision was made in the Bill for the rehearing of an appeal, if the Court of Appeal thought fit so to order, and as such cases were likely to be few, and of a character particularly requiring the decision of one Supreme Court, it would be desirable that such appeals should be referred to the House of Lords in like manner as appeals from Scotland and Ireland. He heard with much pleasure last evening the argument of his noble and learned Friend (Lord Cairns) on the injury which the severance of the Lord Chancellor from the Court of Chancery would be calculated to inflict on the office of Lord
    1398
    Chancellor itself. He thought a similar argument applied in the case of the proposal to deprive their Lordships' House of its Appellate Jurisdiction. He believed that the dignity, prestige, and influence of the House itself would suffer by such a measure. He would not submit his Resolutions in one Motion; but would now move the first of them—
    Moved to resolve,
    1st. That one tribunal of ultimate appeal for disputed suits from the courts of all the three kingdoms is more advantageous than separate tribunals for such appeals (The Lord Redesdale).
    LORD DENMANsaid, he should support the Resolution of the noble Lord. From the first he had opposed the proposition to abolish the Appellate Jurisdiction of their Lordships' House. He desired to impress upon their Lordships that their Appellate Jurisdiction had gradually declined through want of sufficient attendance of their Lordships at the hearing of appeals. The opinions of his lamented father, of Lord Brougham, and of other authorities strengthened his convictions in respect to the proposals contained in the Bill of the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack.
    THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, he felt he ought not to omit stating to their Lordships the view he took of the propositions of the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees, which, he thought, were really open to answer, both as to matters of fact and of principle. As to the matter of fact, his noble Friend was quite in error. The noble Lord assumed that this House had long supplied, and could alone supply, a satisfactory Tribunal which, being an Ultimate Court of Appeal for disputed suits from the Courts of all the three Kingdoms, prevented the possibility of any divergence in the principles on which their decisions were given. The noble Lord was mistaken. That House had never down to the present time stood precisely in the position which the noble Lord's propositions assumed. It had never been the solo Tribunal of Ultimate Appeal from all the Courts of the three Kingdoms. Until very recently, it was not so in appeals from the Probate Court, which determined all questions arising upon wills and intestacies. Appeals from the Admiralty Court still went to the Privy Council; and quite recently there had been a conflict of jurisdiction in one

    1399
    of those very Admiralty cases, which showed that the inconvenience which the noble Lord supposed could never occur under the present system could and did occur. It was also an error to suppose that the possibility of conflict would be confined to questions arising within the three Kingdoms, because the cases which arose in many of our dependencies would have to be decided by the same law as if they had arisen here. In questions of English law arising in India, the West Indies, Upper Canada, and the Australian Colonies, the Privy Council alone had ultimate Appellate Jurisdiction, and its decisions on all such points were received as authority in all the Courts of the Kingdom. The idea that that species of possible conflict was effectually precluded by the present state of things was, so far, not borne out by fact. Then, with regard to the argument founded on the authority of the House of Lords in matters of Peerage and Impeachment, the House did not sit as a Court of Law in questions of Peerage. A Committee of Privileges was an entirely different tribunal from the House exercising its Appellate Jurisdiction—in fact it was not a legal tribunal at all, because it was consistent with principle and usage for lay Peers to take part in its proceedings. In Impeachments their Lordships acted as the Grand Inquest of the nation; each noble Lord was then entitled to take his place and vote. Under this Bill conflict was not likely to arise on questions of law; if it did, it might be cured by legislation. As to questions of fact, everything depended on the estimate juries might form of the evidence submitted to them in each particular case. If they were in Committee of Privileges to decide on the right to a Peerage in favour of a claimant where a question of legitimacy was involved, there being largo estates depending on the same question in Ireland, he apprehended there was nothing to prevent the possibility of those estates being decided in Ireland to go to the person whom their Lordships held not to be entitled to the Peerage. It was, therefore, not accurate to suggest that every sort of conceivable variation in the result could be absolutely precluded. Of all plans hitherto suggested or tried, that of this Bill, by bringing into one focus, with the greatest authority, all the elements of Appellate
    1400
    Jurisdiction in this country, was, he thought, most likely to preclude accidents of that kind. It was of the very essence of the Bill that the best possible Court of Appeal should be constituted under it, and in order to obtain such a Court it was most important to have in it most of the illustrious men who, having attained the highest position in the legal profession, had become Members of their Lordships' House. But, suppose this Bill to be accompanied by a provision that the very important cases mentioned by the noble Lord might be re-heard by the House of Lords, that very class of persons whose presence was so much wanted would not be available in the Court of Appeal created under the Bill. Impediments would be thrown in their way, because they would also be wanted in their Lordships' House to decide the same questions if brought up from the Court of Appeal. Therefore, by adopting the proposition of the noble Lord, their Lordships would be cutting off a most important element from the Court of Appeal to be constituted under the Bill The noble Lord did not on that occasion put the matter on political, but on judicial grounds; and that being so, the inevitable effect of his proposition would be to embarrass our Supreme Court of Appeal without any adequate compensation in the administration of justice.
    LORD CAIRNSsaid, his noble Friend the Chairman of the Committees was so justly jealous of the honour of their Lordships' House, his mind was so stored with the knowledge of its constitutional history, and his noble Friend himself added so much lustre to the House by the way in which he discharged those very important duties which came under his care, that he felt great pain whenever he was unable to support any proposition presented to the House by him. But as regarded this particular Motion he should have very great difficulty in supporting it. The proposition was an abstract one. It was this—
    "That one tribunal of ultimate appeal for disputed suits from the courts of all the three kingdoms is more advantageous than separate tribunals for such appeals."
    As an abstract proposition, he entirely agreed with that. It represented a state of things which in the abstract would be more desirable than separate tribunals. But, in the first place, if that proposition were affirmed, consequences might

    1401
    flow from it which his noble Friend did not intend. It might be said, "the best thing you can do is to take the Bill now before the House and extend it beyond its present scope, so that the Court of Appeal shall be not only for England, but also for Scotland and Ireland." That would be the logical conclusion from this proposition, but it was one which he would not be disposed to adopt. The proposition was based upon an assumption which he believed to be erroneous. The Resolution of his noble Friend proposed an ultimate appeal from the Courts of the three Kingdoms. Now, although it was true that this House had heard Appeals from England, Scotland, and Ireland, it was also a fact which should be borne in mind that their Lordships in appeals from each of these countries did not sit as one Court to administer one uniform law which applied to all the three Kingdoms. On the contrary, when the appeal was from an English Court, their Lordships sat as an English Court of Appeal, when from a Scotch Court they sat as a Scotch Court of Appeal, and when from Ireland as an Irish Court of Appeal. They had again and again put a construction upon the words of a Scotch will quite different from what would be done in the case of an English one, and had been obliged to say—
    "If these words had occurred in an English will, we should have put a certain construction upon them as sitting in an English Court of Appeal, but, occurring as they do in a Scotch will, where the words receive a different construction, we are obliged to consider the form of words in a different manner."
    Their Lordships, therefore, did not form one Court of Appeal, but three Courts of Appeal, and, therefore, the objection of his noble Friend applied to the present constitution of things. At the present moment anomalies did occur, and he could not give a better example of them than he had done. Therefore, though in the abstract he should say it was better to have one Appellate Tribunal for the United Kingdom than several, we never had it. But if we were to have regard to abstract Resolutions, he would say it would be much more desirable that we should have one law for the three Kingdoms. Such Resolutions, however, expressed what we never had and never would have. If, after all the efforts which had been made to add strength and dignity to the Court of Ap-
    1402
    peal to be created by the Bill, they were to adopt the course which his noble Friend proposed, they would have thrown away all their trouble, and the new Court of Appeal would be neither one thing nor the other. We could not have two powerful Courts of Appeal one over the other. If they strengthened the Appellate Court as the Bill proposed to strengthen it, then there should be no appeal from that Court. As to cases of importance on which the Court of Appeal under the Bill might entertain different opinions, he would remind his noble Friend that an appeal to that House would be open to the same objection. For these and other reasons he regretted that he could not support the proposition of his noble Friend, and he hoped his noble Friend would see the inexpediency of Dividing the House upon an abstract Resolution.
    LORD REDESDALE,in reply, said, he was so fully convinced of the justice of his propositions, that he felt bound to take the sense of the House upon the Question.
    On Question? their Lordships divided:—Contents 13; Not-Contents 38: Majority 25.

    CONTENTS.

    Bathurst, E.

    Headley, L.

    Beauchamp, E.

    Northwick, L.

    Bradford, E.

    Oranmore and Browne,

    Lauderdale, E.

    L.

    Redesdale, L. [Teller.]

    Denman, L.

    Sheffield, L. (E. Shef-

    Egerton, L.

    field.) [Teller.]

    Ellenborough, L.

    Stanley of Alderley, L.

    NOT-CONTENTS.

    Selborne, L. (L. Chan-

    Gloucester and Bristol,

    cellor.)

    Bp.

    London, Bp.

    Saint Albans, D.

    [Teller.]

    Belper, L.

    Boyle, L. (E. Cork and

    Lansdowne, M.

    Orrery.) [Teller.]

    Ripon, M.

    Brodrick, L. (V. Midle-

    ton.)

    Camperdown, E.

    Carysfort, L. (E. Carys-

    Dartrey, E.

    fort.)

    Fortescue, E.

    Castletown, L.

    Granville, E.

    Crewe, L.

    Kimberley, E.

    Ettrick, L. (L. Napier.)

    Morley, E.

    Foley, L.

    Stanhope, E.

    Foxford, L. (E. Lime

    Waldegrave, E.

    rick.)

    Greville, L.

    Gwydir, L.

    Eversley, V.

    Hanmer, L.

    Halifax, V.

    Hatherley, L.

    Sydney, V.

    Lawrence, L.

    1403

    Lisgar, L.

    Romilly, L.

    Lyveden, L.

    Sundridge, L. (D. Ar-

    Methuen, L.

    gyll.)

    Ponsonby, L. (E. Bess-

    Wrottesley, L.

    borough.)

    Moved to resolve,
    2d. That this House has long supplied and can alone satisfactorily supply such tribunal, from which, under the provisions of the Supreme Court of Judicature Bill now before the House, it is proposed to separate England at a time when its general efficiency is acknowledged, and its jurisdiction retained for Scotland and Ireland as especially satisfactory to those countries:
    3rd. That if the principle of having only one such tribunal is departed from, and a claim shall arise to property in more than one kingdom founded on a point of law on which their respective courts of ultimate appeal shall differ, a legal and social scandal will follow, which could not occur if the ultimate appeal had been to one supreme court, as at present:
    4th. That as regards this House, the retention of this jurisdiction is most important, not only on high constitutional grounds, but for reasons connected with the succession to peerages, which are legal rights; for in the event of a disputed succession to estates in more than one kingdom on a question of legitimacy dependent on a point of law (such as may arise on a question of a foreign marriage), the heir to which would also be entitled to a peerage in each of those kingdoms held under similar limitations, if the decision as to the right to the estates should be different in the respective courts of ultimate appeal, this House, although deprived of its status as a court of law, must decide as to the peerages against the finding of one of those courts, and thus a person who may by such decision be declared illegitimate will nevertheless continue to hold the estate to which, if illegitimate, he would have no claim, and the person to whom the peerage shall be awarded by this House will hold the same in defiance of the law of the kingdom to which the peerage belongs, as declared by the courts of that kingdom:
    5th. That if the principle of the Judicature Bill is extended to Scotland and Ireland, three courts of ultimate appeal will be established in the United Kingdom, and as it is acknowledged that both those kingdoms prefer the appellate jurisdiction of the House of Lords to that proposed to be constituted for England under the Bill, and on that account are not brought under it, and as provision is made in the Bill for the re-hearing of an appeal if the Court of Appeal think fit so to order, and as cases which it is desirable should be re-heard are likely to be few, and of a character particularly requiring the decision of one supreme court, it will be desirable that such cases shall be particularly determined and referred to the House of Lords in like manner as appeals from Scotland and Ireland (The Lord Redesdale).
    SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE BILL [H.L.]—Amendments reported (according to order); further amendments made; Bill to be read 3a on Monday next; and to be printed as amended. (No. 89.)
    House adjourned at Seven o'clock, to Monday next, Eleven o'clock,