Sitting of 29 February 1876

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Second Reading—Valuation of Property (Metropolis) Act (1869) Amendment [74] [House counted out].
Select Committee—Epping Forest* [66], nominated.
Committee—Report—County Palatine of Lancaster (Clerk of the Peace [53].
Withdrawn—Borough Franchise (Ireland) * [17].

METROPOLITAN RAILWAY BILL.

  NOTICE.
  SIR EDWARD WATKIN: Sir, I beg to give Notice that on Monday next I will ask the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Claud John Hamilton), whether he is a Director and Deputy Chairman of the Great Eastern Railway Company; whether the Company was concerned or interested in preventing the second reading of the Bill promoted by the Metropolitan Railway Company for the extension of the line from Aldgate to Whitechapel, and from Hammersmith to Walham Green and Fulham; whether, under the circumstances, he issued to large numbers of Members of this House private circulars asking them to attend the House, and to support the Motion for rejection of the second reading of the Bill; whether in this circular the name of a Member of this House was mentioned as the Mover of the second reading; and whether the names of the Members at the back of the Bill were also given? Should the noble Lord reply in the affirmative, I shall ask
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  the highest authority in this House the following Question:—Whether the practice of rejecting Private Bills on the second reading, by a majority in this House, through the private solicitation of Members, will or will not tend to restore the evils which this House proposed to redress when it abolished Committees of the Whole House and established Select Committees; and further, whether a Deputy Chairman of a Railway Company interested in the question is acting in accordance with the spirit of the Rules and Orders 435, 436, and 437, by privately soliciting Members to refuse a hearing for petitioners for a Private Bill?
  MR. SPEAKER: I must put it to the hon. Member that the Question proposed to be put to the noble Lord goes far beyond the limits of a Question, and should it be submitted to the House, it should assume the form of a substantive Motion.
  SIR EDWARD WATKIN: Of course, Sir, I bow to your decision; but I beg to give Notice that on Thursday next I shall repeat the Question in another form.

  THE SUEZ CANAL SHARES—COMMISSIONS.—QUESTION.
  MR. WILSONasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer Whether he can inform the House whether the Khedive of Egypt paid a commission to agents in Egypt on the sale of the Canal shares to the English Government; and, if so, the amount of the commission?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, in reply, said, he had no information on that subject; but he would be exceedingly surprised if anything of the kind stated in the Question had occurred.

  THE CHANNEL ISLANDS—ROYAL COURT OF JERSEY.—QUESTIONS.
  MR. LOCKEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Government intend to give their sanction to the Election of any more Jurats of the Royal Court of Jersey?
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in reply, said, he had been in communication with the Lieutenant Governor of Jersey, but had not received a final answer from him. As far, however, as he understood the matter, the Jurats were elected

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  for life by the ratepayers of the island, and the Secretary of State, therefore, had nothing to do with their appointment.
  MR. LOCKEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Government intend to fill up the appointment of Viscount of the Royal Court of Jersey?
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in reply, said, he believed that the Government were bound to fill up the appointment of Viscount of the Royal Court of Jersey. The delay in doing so had arisen because the office had hitherto been generally performed by deputy; and he was endeavouring to see that the person to be appointed should be one who would do the duty, and not leave it to a deputy.
  MR. LOCKEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the officers of the Royal Court of Jersey are not all paid by fees, and consequently have a direct interest in cases being postponed from time to time?
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in reply, said, he could only refer the hon. Member to the Report of the Commission which sat on that subject, from which he found that the Procurator General's salary was £100 annually, besides official fees, which might amount to much more. The Secretary and another officer had smaller salaries. Neither of those persons received any fees for conducting criminal cases; but each of them might act for private parties in civil cases.

  PUBLIC-HOUSES (IRELAND)—LEGISLATION.—QUESTION.
  MR. SULLIVANasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, If it be true, as reported in the Irish newspapers, that the police force has been employed in Dublin, Belfast, Cork, Derry, and other places, counting the number of people who went into the public houses in those cities and towns on certain Sundays; and, if so, whether this course has been adopted with a view to any legislation this Session, by Her Majesty's Government, on the subject of the sale of intoxicating liquors on Sundays in Ireland?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH, in reply, said, he had thought it would be an important addition to the information on that subject already in possession of the Government if they were aware, as far as it could be accurately ascertained,
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  how far any shortening of the hours during which public-houses were open on Sunday or the total closing of public-houses on that day would interfere with the convenience of the public in Ireland, and therefore he had directed that information should be obtained by the police in certain towns in Ireland as to the number of persons who were in the habit of frequenting public-houses in those towns on Sunday. He had no doubt this information was obtained in the way mentioned by the hon. Member. It was not obtained with a view to legislation by the Government this Session, but that the Government might have before it all possible information in considering the proposals on that matter which had been introduced by the hon. Member for the county of Londonderry (Mr. E. Smyth).

  PRIMARY EDUCATION (IRELAND)—LEGISLATION.—QUESTION.
  DR WARDasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether Her Majesty's Government intend this Session giving effect to the following recommendations of the Commissioners on Primary Education in Ireland issued in 1870, viz.:—
  "That the existing Provincial Model Schools should be gradually discontinued."
  "That all existing Provincial Model Schools which cannot be carried on by Local Committees as Elementary Schools on the present system, receiving only such sums as may be earned by their scholars or may be due to teachers, may be granted on lease to any body applying for them as Training Schools on easy terms, such as will provide for their maintenance and repair?"
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH, in reply, said, he had no intention of making any proposal this Session.
  DR WARDgave Notice that he would on an early day call attention to the subject and move a Resolution.

  LOCAL FINANCE.—QUESTION.
  MR. PAGETasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, If he is prepared to present to the House, during the present Session, any Annual Statement of Local Finance; and, if so, when he proposes to do so?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, in reply, said, he had been in communication with the President of the Local Government Board, but he was not at present able to say in what form

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  it would be most convenient that the statement should be made. He hoped, however, that it would be made before the Budget.

  MERCHANT SHIPPING ACTS—OVER-LOADING.—QUESTION.
  MR. ANDERSONasked the President of the Board of Trade, If he has any objection to extend the Return granted to the honourable Member for Sheffield, on the 24th February, by including in it all vessels detained for alleged overloading, and specifying the cases where they were lightened, and in all cases, whether of unseaworthiness or overloading, stating the name of the surveyor at whose instance the vessel was detained?
  SIR CHARLES ADDERLEY: There is no objection to the hon. Member moving for the addition to the Return; but there would be an objection to the surveyor's name being published, as no good, but only mischief to the public service could ensue from such publication.

  LOCAL TAXATION.—QUESTIONS.
  MR. PELLasked, Whether it is the intention of the Government to introduce the measure as to local burdens which was promised in the Speech from the Throne?
  MR. ASSHETON CROSS, in reply, said, that it was the intention of the Government to introduce the measure relating to prisons which was promised in the Queen's Speech, and he hoped that it would be introduced about the time that the Budget was brought forward.
  MR. BEACHasked the hon. Member, Whether he would not think it advisable to postpone his Motion as to Local Taxation, in view of the statement just made, until after the Government had had an opportunity of announcing their intentions upon the subject?
  MR. PELLsaid, that in consequence of the announcement just made, he believed that he should consult the wishes of those who had usually acted with him upon this question by postponing the Motion of which he had given Notice until after they had heard the statement of the Government.

CIVIL BILL COURTS (IRELAND) BILL.

  QUESTION.
  In reply to Mr. M'CARTHY DOWNING,
  THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. PLUNKET)said, the second reading of the Civil Bill Courts (Ireland) Bill would not be taken until the 23rd of March, as that day he believed would suit the convenience of Irish Members on both sides of the House; but he hoped there would be no objection to proceeding with the subsequent stages of the Bill as soon as possible, so that by Easter they might have made some substantial progress in Committee.

  PUBLIC BUSINESS—ASH WEDNESDAY.
  MR. DISRAELImoved, "That this House do meet To-morrow at Two of the clock."
  MR. P. A. TAYLORsaid, he ventured very respectfully to express a hope that the Motion would not be pressed. Wednesday was always a very short business day, and was much more convenient than the days when the House sat till a late hour; and to-morrow a very important Irish Bill, in which he was sure the Government would take much interest, was on the Paper. He would not interfere between the Government and the Order of Business, were it not that he thought that the First Lord of the Treasury felt himself compelled by long-established custom and his love of precedents to make the Motion; but really there would be no person better pleased than himself if independent Members would support him, and show that there was no necessity for wasting two hours on Wednesday. It was time that they left off coming down with solemn faces and virtuous airs to cut off two hours from business on a Wednesday afternoon, while they knew very well that hon. Members could not speak on the subject to each other in the Lobby without putting on the attitude that was assumed by Roman Augurs towards the decline of the Roman Empire. If they were right in keeping from work for two hours, it was clearly wrong for them to meet at all, and therefore he thought that if there was to be any interruption at all they should get a whole holiday.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he hoped before this Motion was put that they might be informed what was the intention of the Government with regard to the Business on Thursday. He understood that the Army Estimates would be the First Order on that day; but, as he saw that the Commons Bill stood first upon the Orders at present, he wished to ask whether it was intended to proceed with the Committee upon the Bill on that day? As the debate upon the second reading was taken at rather a late hour at night, and there was not then a very full discussion, as he understood that there were a very considerable number of Amendments to be moved in Committee, and as the matter was looked upon with great interest both in Parliament and in the country, he hoped that the Committee would be taken at a time when the subject could be fully discussed. He also wished to know when the second reading of the Royal Titles Bill would be taken?
  MR. BUTTsaid, his hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor General for Ireland had already postponed the second reading of an important Irish Bill to the 23rd. Between this and the 23rd of March many Irish Members would be obliged to be absent, and what he wished to ask was that the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government would not allow any Irish business to be taken for the next fortnight or three weeks. [Laugher.] He could not understand the laughter of hon. Members opposite, who might think it unreasonable if Irish Members asked them to come over to Ireland during the English Assizes, and who never seemed to consider any Irish subject except in the light of a bore.
  MR. DISRAELI: The Army Estimates will come on on Thursday, and I thought it was clearly understood by the House that such had been decided upon. In case the Estimates occupied the whole evening, we should not ordinarily think of going on with the Commons Inclosure Bill. However, we feel there has not been sufficient time for the House to put down Amendments, and therefore we will not proceed on Thursday with it. With regard to the Royal Titles Bill, I propose to take that on Thursday week. As to the appeal just made to me by the hon. and learned Member, of course it would be very
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  agreeable to me to meet his wishes and prevent the prosecution of any Irish business at this moment; but I do not think my duty to the country would justify that course. I should always be happy to meet the convenience of individual Members; but, at the same time, we must proceed with Business according to the regular routine. I hope we shall have the pleasure of the presence of the hon. and learned Member and his Friends when the Irish Votes are before the House, and I shall be sorry if we have not. In regard to the observations of the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. P. A. Taylor), what he says as to the decline of the Roman Empire does not agree with my memory. I thought the Augurs who made the observation lived before the commencement of the Roman Empire. Cicero was one of those Augurs. I assure the hon. Member for Leicester that he only does me justice when he thinks it is gratifying to me to respect and reverence old-established customs. I cannot agree with him in this instance, that in reducing the hours of our attendance here to-morrow, we should be acting logically in not coming at all. The reason why we do not meet to-morrow till 2 o'clock is in order that we should attend Divine service; and after having fulfilled that solemn duty, there is no reason at all why we should not give our renovated energies to the transaction of Public Business.
  MR. W. E. FORSTERasked the Secretary to the Treasury, what Business would be taken on Thursday next after the Army Estimates?
  MR. W. H. SMITHsaid, that if time permitted the Civil Service Estimates would be taken after the Army Estimates.
  Motion agreed to.
  MR. P. A. TAYLORsaid, that several hon. Members near him challenged the Motion when it was put in the usual way.
  MR. SPEAKERsaid, that no negative voice reached his ears.

UNREFORMED MUNICIPAL COREPORATIONS (ENGLAND AND WALES).

  RESOLUTION.
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE—Mr. Speaker: The 29th of February is a

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  day on which it has not been given to everyone to bring forward a Motion in the House of Commons; but I can assure the House that the day fixed for the discussion of this Motion is not odder than many of the topics of which it will be necessary for me to treat.
  It will be remembered that last year I called attention to the subject of un-reformed municipal corporations with special reference to the cases of New Romney, Queen borough, and New Wood-stock. This year it is my intention to refer in illustration of my general arguments to one other unreformed corporation of Kent, and to those of Sussex, the Isle of Wight, Dorsetshire, Devonshire, and Cornwall. I gave nearly three weeks' notice to those Members of the House who represent the counties in which the boroughs which I have to name in a hostile manner are situated, except in two cases, and in those cases one week's notice. If I do not escape alive from the House to-day it is to the Members from Cornwall that my destruction most probably will be due.
  I moved last year for Papers which were granted, and obtained from Government a list of the whole of the unreformed corporations of England and Wales. I told the House last year that the letters which I had received, and the inquiries which I had made led me to believe that there were 97 or 98 of them in existence. The Return makes them 102 in number, but three or four of them are now extinct, and the town of Newport, in the Isle of Wight, is, I believe, wrongly included, it being a reformed municipal corporation, so that the number 97 or 98 stands correct. Since the publication of the Return I have made special inquiry into the condition of such of these corporations as be south of London—not that I believe that the southern boroughs are the worst, but because they are the most easily reached. When I say that they are probably not the worst I must tell the House that I have received a vast number of letters from the respectable inhabitants of a great many of these towns, and that it is a singular fact that in every one of these letters the inhabitant who writes it informs me that the un-reformed corporation of his particular borough is undoubtedly the least efficient and the most corrupt of all. The fact is that each writer knows only the
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  case of his own town, and, knowing how bad that is, cannot conceive that there can be any worse. I do not deal to-day with the southern boroughs in any belief that in a monetary sense they are the most important, for the property wasted in the unreformed boroughs of the East Coast, and by some of those in the North is far more considerable than that which the southern boroughs have to waste. Wasted it is, in almost every case without exception, so far as I have yet gone: muddled away in some cases; in some cases stolen; but made effective use of in hardly one.
  When I spoke last year I pointed out that in all these boroughs we have the same general features. A very small number of persons, self-elected, let the town lands to themselves at ridiculously low rents, and spend the town property without account. In most of them, those persons or their nominees exercise criminal jurisdiction over persons who have nothing whatever to do with their election, and it will be observed that in the Notice that I have given I have attached peculiar importance to this matter of jurisdiction.
  Before I pass to the new cases with which I shall deal to-day, I wish to make a short reference to last year's debate. The only answer which was given to my charges in the House was that of my noble Friend who sits for Woodstock. The noble Lord said that the property of the corporation of Wood-stock was not public property at all. I would ask, in reply, not as to Woodstock only, but as to any of these corporations, if their property is not public property what in the world then is it? I should doubt whether any man would venture to assert that it is purely the private property of those individuals who happen at any particular moment to be the members of the corporation. Certainly, Parliament in 1835, when it took away all the property of all the corporations named in the Municipal Reform Act, did not pay compensation to individuals or treat that property as property of a private nature. I have, before I pass on, one other remark to make upon the last year's speech of the noble Lord. When I quoted the memorable words of the mayor of Woodstock, uttered on the solemn occasion when he was fined for repeated breaches of the Licensing Act—namely—"That in the past he had

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  always had a high respect for the police, but in future he should have none;" the noble Lord, making perhaps the cleverest, and certainly the most audacious reply ever made to such a statement, said, that the words the mayor had really used were these—"That he had always in the past had a high respect for the police, but in future he should have more." I have but one comment to make on that defence, and it is this—The mayor was again fined for a fresh breach of the Licensing Act on the very day on which he was thus defended by my noble Friend. The noble Lord was aware of that fact at the time at which he spoke, but unfortunately I was not, and he knew that I was not.
  When I said that no other answer was made last year to the charges which I brought forward, I forgot an answer in the Kentish papers by the town clerk of the corporation of New Romney. His long rambling statement was replied to at the time, and the correspondence revealing no new points was not of interest, except as showing the singular partial blindness which affects unreformed corporate authorities. The town clerk said, that neither he nor the mayor had ever seen any scurrilous hand-bills directed against the corporation. I replied to this in the best way I could by posting to both of them copies of the worst.
  Since last year's Motion the inhabitants of New Romney have broken out into poetry:—thus we find—
  "… out of a thousand a-year
  They pocket eight hundred, it is very clear."
  MR. Stringer's reply to me is thus touched—
  "The town is well-drained, says their legal wit! Of its own rights, it is, for they crib every bit."
  In dealing with the corporations of the South of England I shall name 16 which I have examined with equal care to that which I gave to the three into which I went last year. I shall incidentally allude to five others that are in the list, and shall thus have dealt when I sit down with 21, and 3, or 24 in all out of the 102, leaving 78 that I shall not have mentioned. Judging from the letters which I have received, I have no doubt that the 78 are just as bad as the 24 whose cases I have happened to investigate.
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  Going across England from east to west I have to name in Kent, in addition to Queen borough and New Romney, the corporate borough of Fordwich. A gentleman who had been mayor of this interesting place for many years had informed a friend of mine that his venerable corporation was "a positive nuisance, and ought to be got rid of without delay." But, on local inquiry, I have come to the conclusion that it was not so very bad a one when compared with many of the others. The rector of Fordwich has since written to me that he believes it to be "the worst corporation that exists on the face of the earth." I name this only to show that those which I think white, by comparison with the really black, are not so considered by the inhabitants who have less experience than I have now acquired of the depths to which municipal corporations may descend.
  These are the facts about Fordwich. The charter, which is lost, was granted by Edward the Confessor, and renewed by Henry II. The corporation consists of six persons, only one of whom is resident. Any friend of the six by paying £10 may become a seventh, and ex officio a justice of the peace. These persons hold sessions at which they try criminal offences, and they licence public-houses. No accounts are published, but they have lands, tolls, and a trading tax. These six self-elected persons also levy a rate. They have sold land, and the way in which the proceeds were disposed of is unknown. The rector writes, that—"During the 24 years that I have lived in the parish I have never known the corporation expend a single shilling for anything of material benefit to the borough." The official meetings are held at a public-house, "where rowdies collect and drink at the expense of the corporation." The present mayor has been mayor for 28 years, and a previous mayor ruled for 44. The latter was the person who, may I say, stole the property. The present mayor is mayor by force, for the Côutumier directs that "if a man refuse to serve, the freemen shall go to his house—if he have one—and the same by hooks, or any other means, shall pull to the ground."
  In Sussex, I have to mention Pevensey and Seaford. Both these towns have special privileges as Cinque Ports, and it may be said "the Cinque Ports are

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  venerable institutions which ought not to be touched." These privileges of the Cinque Ports thus enjoyed by Pevensey and Seaford were not granted by the Crown without consideration. The ports were bound to supply ships and men, and this supply in return for special trade advantages was the only system of naval defence existing in England in the early middle ages. The Cinque Ports now claim to keep their privileges although the consideration for which they were granted is altogether gone. Pevensey and Seaford, like New Romney, although Cinque Ports are not now ports at all. Just as the sea retired from New Romney and from Winchelsea, so the sea has retired from Pevensey, and the river Ouse from Seaford, and the harbours of both are bowling-greens.
  Pevensey returned itself in 1835 as having an income of £85 per annum for corporate purposes, although the village possesses only one house that is rated at £ 16 per annum. It is a tiny place of one street, with a butcher, a grocer, a parson, a Dissenting minister, and two publicans. The county magistrates have no jurisdiction within the liberty, and a grand jury is summoned to make presentments. They sometimes present that they have nothing to present; they sometimes present that the parish pump is out of repair; but whatever they present, as usual, in these cases, they end their arduous duties by a feast. The corporation licences public-houses. The election takes place in the church, as at New Romney. The corporation possesses a large amount of enclosed land in Pevensey Marsh, and its income ought to be a great deal above the £85 a-year at which it was returned in 1835; but the corporation, in addition to its revenue from lands, raises a "liberty rate." It makes no statement to the inhabitants of the purposes for which this rate is required, and it, of course, publishes no accounts. In 1835, the corporation used to spend a large proportion of the revenues on dinners to members of the corporation, and I believe that they still dine together frequently at the public expense. One of their payments in 1835 was an annual one to the Hastings corporation to which I invite the attention of my hon. Friends the Members for Hastings. Pevensey was what was called a limb of the Cinque Port of Hastings, and this payment is the Pevensey share
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  of the wages of the Members of Parliament for Hastings for which I would recommend my hon. Friends to sue the corporation of their town. In addition to all their revenue from land, and from the liberty rate, the corporation are trustees for a charity worth £100 a-year at least—the ancient hospital of St. John Goroglton.
  Seaford is returned as possessing a property of only £60 a-year, but it must be remembered that in all these cases the properties are valued greatly below the mark, and sometimes enormously below the mark, the lands being exclusively let to members of the corporation. As to a considerable portion of the corporation lands of Seaford, the corporation, induced by the bribery of a majority of their members, gave a lease to the late Dr. Tyler Smith, one of themselves, for 300 years, or, some say, for 199 years in consideration of the sum of £500. The inhabitants believe that the corporators divided that sum of £500 among themselves. I have in confirmation of that statement, which, of course, I cannot prove, there being no accounts, a written declaration' from one of the freemen, whose name I am willing to give privately to the Attorney General, and a verbal declaration from another, that the £500 was thus appropriated; but another authority has informed me that part of the money was spent upon law costs in an action, and that it was only what remained which was "shared out" among the members of the corporation. This last authority, a very good one, thus goes on, "all surplus is shared out at the end of every year; the neighbourhood regards the corporation as a sharing-out club, and despises them as such." The balance is now, being smaller, put in a big dish on the table on bailiffs' day, at Michaelmas, and the host is ordered to supply liquor to that amount. It seems to me that many of these corporations ought to come under last year's Act as "dividing benefit societies." The corporation of Seaford have lately saved £20 a-year by withdrawing their subscription to the National schools. It appears that the present vicar of Seaford is a High Churchman, and the views of the corporation being Evangelical, they have quarrelled with the vicar, and put the money in their pockets. The original charter of the town gave all the inhabitants

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  a voice in the corporate elections. I need hardly say that here as elsewhere in these boroughs "commonalty" has been defined by the corporation to mean only their own nominees, and the lodging-house keepers who, from the growing favour of Seaford as a place of summer resort, have begun to be numerous in the town, are entirely excluded from any voice in the government of a place, the prosperity of which, if it is ever again to be Prosperous, they must make. This corrupt corporation, like that of Pevensey, licences the public-houses, though the chief brewer is one of the members, and here is a side of this unreformed corporation question which touches the Home Office, and into which inquiry should be made. The corporation has criminal jurisdiction—one of the magistrate members has been three times bankrupt under doubtful circumstances, and has also been fined by his own colleagues for breaking a man's head in the street. I have a solemn written declaration by a well-known gentleman of high standing that he has known judgment delivered by a magistrate drunk and a colleague interested in the case, and that he has known a prosecution "squared" in Court for a quart of ale. The chamberlains who collect the revenues, and keep those accounts which are never shown, are with singular irony rewarded for their services by the rent of Hangman's Acre. But of them one is yearly elected hangman to the corporation! Just as the corporators of New Romney sit round a tomb to elect their mayor, and, locking the gate of the church to keep the people out, declare themselves a public meeting of the inhabitants, so the freemen of Seaford on Michaelmas Day of each year march in a body to an ancient gate-post, near West House, and there elect their bailiff. Freemen only, because while the word "commonalty" is always taken to mean inhabitants generally when privileges are pleaded, when an election is held it is interpreted with, as I think, illegal strictness. This is the present state of a borough for which Pitt was Member.
  Coming to the Isle of Wight we find the corporation of Newport, included as I have said in the list by mistake, and in addition those of Yarmouth and of Brading.
  At Brading, the Town-hall and the
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  stocks are the only outward and visible signs of the existence of the corporation. A Town-hall, only 8 feet by 10. The corporation of Brading performs no duties whatever; its officers are elected at a private meeting, and it differs from all other corporations that I know in being forced to admit that it cannot find its charter. The members of the court leet of 13 jurymen are cautioned at their annual meeting that they must not disclose anything that takes place, but the small tradesmen who are summoned are most compliant, for they do not like to lose the annual dinner which the corporation gives. The corporation returned their income in 1835 at the ridiculous figureof£6 17 s. 11 d. Though knowing but few out of the many sources of their income, I can prove that it is above ten times that sum. There are taxes upon commencing trade, and fee farm-rents from all the lands, and nearly all the buildings in the borough. I said just now that the corporation of Brading did nothing whatever with their money; I am wrong, for they have lately put up nine oil lamps to light the town.
  At Yarmouth, a very large property seems to mysteriously disappear. The accounts, which were reported by the Commissioners in 1835 as not having been published or audited, do not seem any better kept at the present time. The property of Yarmouth, which is given in my Return as only £30 a-year, amounts to £180 a-year from one source alone to my personal knowledge. The quayage dues are not only large, but fast increasing. The corporation do, for the money which they receive, absolutely nothing except, once a-year, hoist a glove on a flag-staff to protect their charter rights. This they do at fair time, but the fair is now extinct. So little public spirit has the corporation that it insisted on a payment being made by the revising barrister for sitting in the Town-hall to revise the county list, which has led him to hold his sittings at an hotel. The right of the corporation to levy quayage dues at all was contested in a law-suit some years ago. This suit was ended by the corporation, in a highly diplomatic manner, electing Mr. Blake and Mr. Bagges, their opponents, to seats upon the Board, and Mr. Blake is now mayor. In 1858, the corporation having a preponderating influence in a company called the Yar

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  Bridge Company, smuggled a clause into an Act obtained by that company which confirmed the right of the corporation to levy these disputed dues. The corporation of Yarmouth has not only large property at the present time, but also great expectations, for the Yar Bridge property will revert to the corporation after the debt has been paid off, and an inquiry before the Inclosure Commissioners in 1862, arising out of a dispute about the Common, proved that the revenues of Yarmouth, which had been returned by the corporation as being only £30 a-year in 1835, were then £200 a-year, and the quayage dues have greatly increased since that date. My strong impression is that it would be found by a searching local inquiry that almost the whole of these corporations made false Returns to Parliament in 1835.
  I come, now, to the Dorsetshire corporations—Wareham and Corfe Castle.
  Wareham was returned in 1835 as "having £40 a-year of corporate property received by the mayor without account." Most of this was spent upon an annual dinner. The feast continues, and, according to the account of a friend of mine who was staying at the inn on one occasion when it took place," rages from 3 in the afternoon till 11 at night." The corporation of Wareham licences the public-houses, and the county magistrates having, as I am about to show, failed in the case of Corfe Castle in the legal steps which they took to contest the jurisdiction of the corporate authorities, these licensing powers are still exercised without control. Three brewers are members of the very small corporation, and, I will not venture to say in consequence, there are 20 public-houses in the very tiny town of Wareham. The average number of public-houses to population in small towns of the West of England is 1 to 1,000 inhabitants—in Wareham the proportion is 7 to 1,000.
  Corfe Castle is the most peculiar of all the unreformed boroughs that I have met with. It may be said to be a corporation with only one member. There are, so far as I can tell, no revenues, but there are large charities and considerable jurisdiction. The magistrates of the borough with the ordinary powers, and with licensing powers, would be the mayor, and the ex-mayor, if there were an ex-mayor, but there is no ex-mayor.
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  There ought to be two barons at least to swear in the mayor, and there ought to be eight barons in all, but no one can be discovered who ever heard of a baron in the village of Corfe Castle. In cases which require two magistrates, Mr. John Johnson, grocer and draper, who for many years past has been mayor of Corfe Castle, is willing enough to act as one magistrate, but there being no ex-mayor, the policeman complains that he has sometimes to travel 30 miles before he can find a county magistrate who will come in and sit with Mr. Johnson, grocer and draper. Corfe Castle had, with New Romney, in 1835, the proud distinction of having refused all information whatever to the Royal Commissioners and to Parliament. The lord of the manor is known to have very large chartered privileges, and he possesses by Royal Charter the dignified and belligerent title of Lord High Admiral of the Isle of Purbeck and the adjacent seas. I have heard, with what truth I know not, that he is an inoffensive clergyman. He is also Lord Lieutenant of the Isle of Purbeck, with power to call out the whole population in "mustration," that is, for military service. The inhabitants of Corfe Castle have all the privileges of inhabitants of the Cinque Ports, and the shores of the Isle of Purbeck are exempt by charter from Admiralty jurisdiction. The mayor hides his charter and refuses all information, but there being no barons it would seem that he must elect himself. As he exercises much licensing and other jurisdiction, he must, I suppose, hold frequent meetings with himself, but I am not aware as to whether he keeps minutes of what passes.
  In The Times of the 5th June, 1875, there was a very singular legal proceeding reported at great length. It was an application by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Penrhyn on behalf of the justices of Dorsetshire for a quo warranto against the mayor of Corfe Castle, calling on him to show by what authority he assumed to grant licences to ale-houses. The mayor, with his customary good sense, again said nothing, and, as in 1835, his predecessor had had the wisdom to say nothing, no one knew the facts. Mr. Justice Blackburn said, that there he was, that he was exercising this jurisdiction, and that the presumption consequently was that

  1137
  he had a right to exercise it, and that the other side must show good ground for believing that the mayor had no authority to act. The Lord Chief Justice said—"Can you ask us to assume that he acts without a lawful commission." Mr. Justice Mellor said—"Must we not assume that he has a title to act, until some reason is shown to doubt it, otherwise any man's title may be questioned." My hon. Friend, at his wit's end, then got a man to make an affidavit that there was no separate commission of the peace for the borough of Corfe Castle. "But," interposed Mr. Justice Blackburn, "he gives us no ground for so swearing." The result was that the quo warranto was unanimously refused by four Judges. I was reminded of a curious event which occurred in India last year, when a Fakir, near Oudipore, uncrowned and untitled, became virtually a king, being invested by himself with authority over a large district. When troops were sent against him by the Oudipore durbar, he said that this was most unfair, inasmuch as there he was, and that it was the business of the Oudipore authorities to show that he was not acting rightfully in the authority that he had assumed.
  After my Motion of last year, one of the comic papers had six cuts of "our unreformed corporation from our provincial correspondent." The first was of "our grocer;" the second was of "our mayor;" the third was of "the gentlemen who elect our mayor;" the fourth of "the gentleman who disposes of our public trusts;" the fifth of "the gentleman who benefits by our public trusts;" the sixth of "the Committee appointed annually to look into the accounts of the gentleman who disposes of our public trusts." Each of the six cuts contained one figure. All six were one person in different costumes, from the apron of our grocer, to the velvet robes and gold chain of our mayor, and to prevent any doubts as to identity the distinguished inhabitant was in each cut represented with a large wart on his nose. Last year I thought this a somewhat exaggerated joke, and even the experience of New Romney had not prepared me for its being literally true of the borough of Corfe Castle. A matter which has been perplexing me is what happens when a mayor of Corfe Castle dies. We all of us know the
  1138
  difficulties which occur in Chinese Tartary when a grand Llama ceases to exist. It is found necessary to conceal the fact of the death, and to bring forth from the seclusion of the palace some youth who has been captured for the purpose when a child. I fancy that this must be the system adopted at Corfe Castle in the case of the dynasty of Johnson.
  The first of the two Devonshire corporations that I have to mention is that of Okehampton. This is a very important town, incorporated under a charter which, although dated so late as the end of the reign of Charles II., nevertheless, following probably the words of an earlier charter, gives the corporation a jurisdiction which it still holds "concerning all, and all manner of felonies, witchcrafts, incantations, sorceries, magic arts, forestallings, regratings, ingrossings, and extortions whatsoever." The market tolls alone, which belong to the corporation, are let for £300 a-year. But the rest of the property of the town, worth not less than £30,000, has, in consequence of a quarrel in the corporation, been lately handed over to trustees. The corporation still perform large magisterial duties. The "capital burgesses" are nearly all tradesmen, and nearly all related to one another. In 1873, the corporation brought in a private Bill which failed to pass this House. Their town clerk ran them up a bill of £700 for the legal portion of the business, and the market tolls for 1874 and 1875 have been swallowed up by this outlay. No man can say what it will please the unreformed corporation of Okehampton to do in future with this £300 a-year.
  Close to the borders of Cornwall is the Devonshire corporation of Plympton Earle. In 1835 no accounts of its revenue were produced, and I had been told by persons living in the locality that the charter had been dropped, and that the corporation was extinct. If it had been so, I should have asked, as I am going to ask in some of the Cornish cases, what then has become of the property? But it is not so. The corporation is not extinct; the charter is not surrendered. A sort of tontine has been formed of the money, and the corporation is in a state of suspended animation. It can revive if it pleases. There is no mayor; there is no bailiff; there are no town-sergeants; the Guildhall is

  1139
  let; no new freemen are created, and "when the "capital burgesses" are reduced to one, I suppose that he may claim that all the remaining assets of the corporation are his property. Sir Joshua Reynolds was once mayor of Plympton Earle, and not being able on one occasion to attend the corporation dinner, he sent down his portrait painted by himself to be put in his vacant place. It was afterwards hung in the Town Hall, but after a long period had elapsed the representatives of the aldermen claimed that the portrait had not been given to the corporation, but to the aldermen as private individuals. They sold it, and it is now in the possession of Lord Egremont at Silverton Park.
  I turn now to the Cornish boroughs, and first to the town of Saltash, near Plymouth. In 1835, the town, of Salt-ash informed the Commissioners that its corporate property was about £400 a-year, but "could not be accurately ascertained." I will put the matter thus; the Saltash corporation had £400 a-year by their own computation, and a great deal more by the computation of all other persons. I am sorry to say that in 1835 the Commissioners reported that the revenues were misapplied, and that the mayor appropriated the surplus to himself. I fear that England is the only country in which ancient abuses are so tenderly dealt with, that such a report to the Legislature should not be followed by any action. The borough of Saltash bears the arms of Richard king of the Romans on its seal, of which, however, the reverse has been lost, having been carried off in the middle of a free-fight which once occurred among the members of the corporation. Saltash collects, up to the present day, dues on all ships entering Plymouth Sound—a most monstrous power. The country has to pay considerable sums on account of those among these unreformed corporations which possess the power of levying shipping dues. By various treaties we have bound ourselves to give up differential dues directed against foreign ships. These ancient ports, such as Queenborough and Saltash, possess by charter the power to levy differential dues, and they used to tax French ships most severely. Saltash taxes Spanish ships at six times an English or three times a French ship. These differences we now have
  1140
  to pay. For the dues which are levied by Saltash on all vessels that anchor in Plymouth Sound nothing whatever is done, except that £1 a-year is spent upon a trumpery buoy. Eights of bushel-age and oysterage, the latter let for £110 a-year, are also exercised in the Tamar by the Saltash corporation, and it has absolute jurisdiction over the whole liberty of the Tamar which goes right past the far more flourishing towns of Plymouth and Devonport. During the last few years the corporation has done something towards street improvements, though why all ships entering Plymouth Sound should be made to pay for the improvement of the streets of Saltash it is hard to say.
  Saltash corporation elects its own recorder, who is a practising attorney. He has enormous power, which he has exercised so far as to transport persons for the term of seven years.
  The muniments of Saltash are kept in a chest which has seven locks, for there are seven aldermen. Each of the seven aldermen has his key, and unless all the seven aldermen are there with their seven keys, the chest cannot be opened.
  The town administered by the corrupt body which I have described, and thus governed by a self-elected irresponsible clique of local tradesmen, is growing very fast, and growing, it happens, with a population of a wealthy and a cultivated kind. The new inhabitants say that they are unable to discover why a flourishing community should in these days be ruled by a body as close as the corporation of New Romney. As long ago as 1854, the inhabitants petitioned both the House of Commons and the House of Lords for the abolition of the corporation, and the local papers are at the present time full of histories of their misdeeds. They check trade by levying taxes at markets and fairs; they have sold land; they have largely let land to members of their own body with the customary bad results; they own the living; they own the church; and some time ago they sold its ancient font. General jobbery is also alleged against them.
  The conclusion to which this evidence leads with regard to Saltash, is that this is a case in which it would not be enough merely to insist on the revenues being properly applied with due publicity. I

  1141
  confess I think that the dues levied on ships easting anchor in Plymouth Sound ought to be taken away from the corporation.
  Passing along the coast from Saltash we come next to East Looe. In 1835, the corporation of this town returned its revenues as £100 a-year, but the Commissioners reported "accounts not published, and not known, and lands much underlet." This is, however, the purest corporation that I have come across; it happens by chance to have fallen under the control of a few public-spirited and honest men of means who have devoted themselves to the welfare of the place, but the objections of principle to the existence of this corporation are the same here as they are elsewhere. A self-elected body licences public-houses and possesses the power to exercise criminal jurisdiction, and there is nothing but chance to prevent this self-elected body from here also becoming a clique, narrow-minded, or corrupt. Even here lands are sold without public competition, and the future of the town is pledged, rightly perhaps, perhaps wrongly, but, at all events, without its own consent.
  Divided from East Looe by a narrow river is the sister borough of West Looe, also an unreformed corporation. It is the most interesting ease of the class which includes Grampound and Plympton Earle. West Looe is a rather modern borough. It was chartered by Queen Elizabeth, and endowed by her with lands out of the property of the Duchy of Cornwall, the Duchy being at that time held by the Crown. The corporation paid always until its extinction, if it be extinct, a nominal rent of 5s. a-year to the Duchy for these lands. About 40 years ago a kind of tontine was arranged, the corporators ceasing to fill vacancies in their number under the amiable idea that the last survivor would become possessed in his person of the whole of the property of the town. When Nathaniel Hearle died in 1870, he being the last elected mayor, it appeared that the stealing of lands which had been successfully carried out at Grampound, and which, in the absence of inquiry, will be successfully carried out elsewhere, could not be carried out at West Looe because of the singular character of the charter. In most cases the lands have come down from times before all documents, or have been purchased
  1142
  by the corporations with the proceeds of dues and tolls, or have been given by individuals, but in this case they had been granted along with the charter, and with a nominal rent reserved by a still existing body corporate—the Duchy of Cornwall. In 1870, accordingly, the Duchy claimed that the charter had been forfeited, and it stepped in and resumed its grants. The Duchy, in 1874, reconveyed the whole of the property to trustees for the benefit of the town for a rent which, though no longer nominal, is very small. But just as the corporation had exceeded their powers, so the Duchy seems to have exceeded its powers, and an action of ejectment brought last year to turn out a person who paid no rent wholly broke down and failed, and I believe that unless we pass a confirming statute the trustees will find that the corporation property of West Looe no longer exists.
  The next borough of which I have to speak is one that has been long dead, but I mention it in order to show that the infamies of the extinction of these corporations are as great as the corruption of their lives. Grampound, a borough for which in the 17th century there sat as a Member of the House of Commons John Hampden, but which, in the 19th century, was extinguished by Parliament for its gross corruption, was reported by the Municipal Commissioners as being almost without property, its lands having been, between 1822 and 1835, stolen by members of the corporation. The very small portion which remained in 1835 has, I believe, been stolen since. David Varcoe, who was mayor at the time of the disfranchisement of the town, sold most of the lands and bolted with the money, after burning the whole of the corporation books. But 13 years after this the corporation was for a time revived, and it might be revived again. The last mayor informs me that at the time of his election the property had entirely disappeared. He refused to serve, believing his election to have been illegal from informality. All these dead corporations are still called over by the Clerks of the Peace at the county Quarter Sessions as though they survived. Lot us put an end to the walking of the earth by their ghosts, for as matters stand their jurisdiction might undoubtedly be re-established. The calling over of their names reminds me of

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  the reading on the muster roll of the French grenadiers—La Tour d' Auvergne, but it cannot be replied of Grampound Mort sure champ d'honneur.
  Tregoney is also dead like Gram-pound. It had property in 1835, but no accounts to produce. The farm of Treswallen belonged to the corporation, and in what manner that corporation has become extinct, and with what financial arrangements no person in the locality can say.
  Returning to the coast we find the town of Fowey. The Commissioners stated that its charter was forfeited in 1826, and it is not one of the boroughs returned as existing in the paper of last year. Nevertheless, there are certain statements which have to be made in regard to it which, I think, will prove of interest. Fowey, which was the town which sent most ships and men to the siege of Calais, and which in the days of Elizabeth was almost the first seaport of England, but which now is a mere village, had the misfortune to quarrel with its lord, Mr. Treffry, lord of the manor and steward of the town. A great Chancery suit was pending in 1835, but the Commissioners stated in their Report certain points with regard to the administration of the town, and, among others, that lands which were worth £250 a-year had been let for the sum of £8. Mr. Treffry obtained an injunction in Chancery against the corporation for mismanagement, but Chancery proceedings were pending for 19 years before Mr. Treffry took other steps which had the effect of bringing the existence of the corporation to an end. He seized the Town-hall, the muniment chest, and the records by force, and I believe that the Treffry family possesses the mace and other insignia at the present day. What I want to show is that if we look at the worst of these corporations, committing, with the least caution, the most illegal acts, we shall see that there is not the smallest chance of putting them down unless under such purely exceptional circumstances as those which existed at West Looe or at Fowey. At West Looe it will be remembered that the Duchy of Cornwall proved the original grant of the lands to the corporation. At Fowey, Mr. Treffry had the prestige of the great local family in fighting the corporation, and he also was able to show a grant by his ancestors
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  in the year 1421 of considerable estates to the town. Yet even here the case was pending for a vast number of years, and the Treffry property was mortgaged to the extent of £40,000 on account of the law suit. The lands are now held and managed for the benefit of the town by trustees, and nine-tenths of the land on which the town stands is in their hands. No entry as to the property of Fowey is made in my Return, but I believe it to be very valuable, and I know not upon what it is expended, except that £30 a-year is given to the church and £80 to the church school. My strong impression derived from local inquiry is that the balance goes to the Treffry estate. There are heavy tolls and quayage dues, and this unfortunate town has in addition to pay another £40 a-year to the neighbouring unreformed corporation of Lostwithiel. The Lost-withiel corporation levy Is. 4d. upon every English ship entering Fowey, and 2s. 8d. upon alien ships, besides bushel-age on the cargoes, and we, of course, have to pay the differential dues as I have explained before.
  Lostwithiel, which I named just now, is one of the worst places in all England. In 1835, the corporation was composed of six members in all. They kept no accounts, and they stated that their property was worth only £153 a-year, although the Commissioners thought it was worth more. The mayor published his accounts in 1843, and showed that the income of the corporation, even at their own rates of letting, was £400 a-year instead of what they had told the Commissioners. Their rents from lands alone were vastly greater than the £153 which they had named. In addition they had heavy harbour dues and quayage dues, and large receipts from tolls, fairs, and markets. In fact, I have reason to believe that if the property of the corporation of Lostwithiel were let at its full value it would produce, at least, £1,000 a-year.
  In 1843 they spent £150 in repairs of the church, but those were repairs such as could be only needed once in a century or so. It was probably on account of this special expenditure of £150 that 1843 was chosen for the publication of accounts, inasmuch as in other years the corresponding £150 had probably gone into pockets which it would not have been convenient to have specified

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  in a Return. In 1843, the corporation appear to have spent a large sum on a dinner to themselves on an occasion called "mayor-choosing."
  The corporation of Lostwithiel ought to consist of seven aldermen, one of them acting as mayor, and of 17 assistant burgesses chosen by the seven aldermen. "The seventeen" are mere dummies, having no voice whatever in any matter except "mayor-choosing," and this is always arranged before-hand and is a mere farce. "The seventeen" are sometimes locally styled "the wise men," but they are more commonly known as "the seventeen nines with their tails cut off," that is, ciphers. The town is in reality governed by five persons, that is, by five out of the seven aldermen, for one of the seven refuses to act, and another of the seven was a bankrupt and has not lived in the town for 20 years. The five take it in turn to be mayor. Of these five two are tradesmen, and under the thumb of two others who are brothers, and the fifth is their doctor. One of the brothers is a tanner, and one is a tanner and banker. One of these brothers, who was elected mayor the moment he had been made an alderman, was not even a ratepayer of the town. The tan-pit of the reigning family makes a horrible stench in the middle of the place, but nobody dares complain for the tanner is dictator. The sanitary state of the town is disgraceful. There are five slaughterhouses and scores of pig-houses, intended, not for the use of the locality, but for the supply of places around. A thousand sheep a week are slaughtered in the village for the London market, and pigs are fed there on the entrails of the sheep. It is impossible to obtain a conviction in the borough for a breach of the sanitary laws, for the butchers are of "the seventeen," and help to keep the ruling family in office. In 1872 virulent smallpox broke out in Lostwithiel, and carried off no fewer than 36 persons out of the very small population. The conduct of the corporation in sanitary matters has ruined the river Fowey as a salmon and trout stream, although it was one of the best in the South of England, and the tanner who pollutes the stream is one of its "conservators." The refuse from the gas works, and from a yard where railway sleepers are pickled in creosote is all sent into the river to help to feed
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  the fish, and I am told that the few fish left in it are blind upon which they are to be congratulated. I can further tell the Government, who have shown by their Bills that they are in earnest in trying to prevent the pollution of rivers, that the moment the Commissioners' letter was received which announced a local inquiry at this interesting place, the corporation set to work to put a temporary stop to the pollutions, which, however, have become as bad again as ever since that day.
  Salaries are paid out of the revenues of the town, not only to the town clerk who is not one of "the seventeen," but to nearly all the members of "the seventeen" themselves. There is an educational charity under the management of the corporation, but the master is one of "the seventeen," and he fills a multiplicity of offices under the corporation; for besides being schoolmaster, he is tax collector, stamp distributor, relieving officer, secretary to the gas company—of which one of the aldermen is chairman, and in which the mayor has an interest, and which has a splendid contract with the corporation—secretary to the sanitary board, and keeper of the corporation accounts, which I have reason to believe might be audited with advantage. He is also vicar's churchwarden. The following officials are also assistant burgesses or members of "the seventeen;" two town-sergeants, two beadles, two constables, a swine driver, an ale-taster, two regulators of weights and measures. Another of "the seventeen" is the salaried organist of the church, also paid by the corporation. I can prove that fifteen out of "the seventeen" are in the pay of the corporation. I believe that a sixteenth is in their pay, and it is possible that all seventeen are. "In the pay of the corporation" means, as I have shown, in the pay of the mayor whom they elect. "The seventeen" dine together, as I have said, at the corporation expense at "mayor-choosing," but they also compose the court maritime of Fowey, and being again called together, as such, 14 days after "mayor-choosing" they then get another dinner.
  I turn, now, to the jurisdiction of the Lostwithiel corporation. There is a Recorder of the town, appointed by the Aldermen, but he never comes, and one of the Aldermen acts with all authority

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  as his Deputy. The Deputy-Recorder is bound by the words of the charter to be "sufficient," which, I believe, means sufficient in the law, that is, versed in the law; but the present Deputy-Recorder is the tanner and despot of Lostwithiel. The magisterial decisions of the ruling authorities of the town of Lostwithiel are curiosities in our judicial annals. The sentences may be judged of from the fact that a local ruffian was lately fined the sum of 6d. for an assault on one of the county police. The county police do duty in the town, although salaries are paid out of the accounts, as I have shown, to the constables and other similar officers of the corporation. When the police catch a noisy drunkard on the bridge, which is half in the borough, they always try to push him over to the county half of it, because if they take him there they can get him convicted, otherwise not.
  The living belongs to the dictator of the corporation. It was held by the late incumbent for 55 years, and he died three years ago at the age of 86. For a long period he had been one of the Aldermen of the town. The living had been his, and it was only a few months before his death that he sold the living for a low price to its present owner. Now, the church is kept up out of the income of the corporation, who completely control it—for instance, instead of one of the churchwardens being chosen by the parishioners in their vestry, the vicar's churchwarden's colleague is nominated by the Aldermen, and is one of "the seventeen." He is, indeed, the painter and glazier who effects the repairs of the church for the corporation. The present owner of the living sits and votes money out of the Town income towards his own church. The present vicar was appointed only for six years, and the owner of the living has another brother who is preparing to take orders. Of this person, I will only say that he was formerly in a cavalry regiment, which he had to leave, and that he is not a fit person for the office. It is understood that when this person is made vicar he will at once be chosen Alderman, and then the three brothers, even without their dependents, will carry all before them. The corporation are paying an additional income to the present vicar, who lives in a corporation house rent-free.
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  The corporation of Lostwithiel, like the corporation of New Romney, but even to a larger extent, has sold, without account and apparently without reinvestment, freehold property of the Town. We ought to know to whom the property was sold, and at what price; and also what houses and lands belonging to the Town are held on lease by Aldermen. It is believed in Lostwithiel that they let their own lands to themselves at perpetual leases.
  It may naturally be asked why a self-elected body should be kept thus in possession of uncontrolled power to squander a property certainly worth £500 a-year, and probably worth £1,000 a-year; why, in Lostwithiel, the county magistrates should have no jurisdiction, and the law be administered according to the judicial ideas of country tradesmen. What crime have the inhabitants of Lostwithiel committed that they should not enjoy the same rights and privileges as the rest of the people of England, and that they should be refused all voice in the government of their own town.
  The last of the Cornish corporations with which I deal are those of Marazion, Camelford, and Tintagel. Marazion, or Marghasieuve, has attracted much local attention since my Motion of last year, but is unimportant. The mayor gets three guineas a-year to spend on cakes. There is in Camelford a revenue from fairs and markets, and from land; the members of the corporation are, as usual, self-elected; the rector, who is one of them, is non-resident, which here, as at New Romney, is said to be illegal; there is an educational charity for teaching Latin to six poor scholars, the conditions of which are said to be violated; and another charity, the money of which is said to be misspent.
  The Tintagel property appears to have been resumed by the Duchy of Cornwall on a claim of forfeiture of charter, though the charter was granted by Richard king of the Romans; but the Duchy did not here, as in the West Looe case, hand over the property to trustees for the benefit of the town, but sold it. The mace was carried off by one of the free-men, who also made in his own person and name a sale of the Town-hall and market-house. At Tintagel, the vicar is, under the old charter, constable of King Arthur's Castle. Presuming on this position he has introduced rabbits,

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  and is said to have ruined the sheep-feed of the Duchy; but thorough reliance cannot be placed on the local statements in regard to him, because he is making a large income out of quarrying slate on the glebe land, which the inhabitants hold to be illegal. The place is so dangerous that no insurance office will pay on ships loading under King Arthur's Castle—one of them was, indeed, totally lost there last year.
  I believe that the whole of the unreformed corporations are very like the 19 that I have carefully examined. As for the corporations of Wales, for instance, the most frightful abuses exist in the case of Conway, the mayoralty of which curiously enough is in the gift of the Crown. In the summer of last year Mr. Vernon Darbyshire, of Pendyffryn, a member of the corporation of Conway, brought forward an unsuccessful Motion in favour of its dissolution. I hear that the account-book of the corporation has been made into a picture-album by the grandchild of the agent to the corporation. There is at Conway a large income with the ordinary abuses, and with even more than the ordinary sale of corporation lands. The town of Henley-upon-Thames is also one of those possessing unreformed corporations, where a Motion for the dissolution of the corporation was brought forward in consequence of my Motion of last year, with the usual want of success. Relationship, as at New Romney, is essential for election to the corporation, and Dissenters, as at Woodstock, have been till lately rigidly excluded from the body. Since my Motion of last year, and the local stir in Henley which it caused, some of the leading Dissenters have been asked to join the corporation. With one exception they have all declined, although some years back they would have consented. They have declared, to quote the words of their manifesto—
  "That they will not become members of a body the very existence of which is a stumbling-block to that political life which is necessary for the welfare and progress of the town."
  Henley was returned, in 1835, as possessing a property of only £72 a-year; but I have a statement by a leading member of the local board to the effect that the unreformed corporation of Henley does, in fact, administer property worth £1,600 a-year. It is impossible
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  for me, in the total absence of evidence, and complete concealment of accounts, to even pretend to say whether it is the corporation Return or the local statement that is right; but there is this confirmation of the local view, that in 1858 some accounts were published which showed a balance in a single year of £350 unexpended monies. This balance, moreover, existed in spite of some of the lands being let to members of the corporation at half their value. The discrepancy between the sum of £72 returned by the corporation, and the sum of £1,600 a-year, always alluded to in the local papers, and named on high authority to me, of itself shows the urgent need which there is for inquiry into the funds held by unreformed corporations.
  I have also received many letters about the case of Higham Ferrers in Northamptonshire. There is property estimated at £300 a-year; no accounts; criminal jurisdiction exercised in sessions by the mayor and ex-mayor, ex officio, and licensing jurisdiction. The members of the close body let their land to one another in the usual way. With the exception of a sum of £25, the inhabitants assert that the corporation "scramble" their large funds among themselves.
  With regard to the jurisdiction of the corporations, it seems to me so clear that persons neither nominated by the Crown for fitness nor elected by their fellow-subjects should not be allowed to try criminal cases, that I shall conclude my speech by moving that we forthwith abolish all criminal jurisdiction exercised by unreformed municipal corporations. Here is a case of jurisdiction for the House—At Havering-atte-Bower, in Essex, the steward, who is magistrate with criminal jurisdiction, is nominated by the lord of the manor, though the manor has been sold for money. This is selling a right to sit and try one's fellow-subjects! Liberty sessions are held every fortnight, and all the privileges of the ancient "Horned Monastery" are claimed.
  With regard to their property, however, and their administration, I think that a local inquiry by means of a Commissioner should be held. There may be some objection to this course, and I will not make any Motion as to it, but I will instead, with reference

  1151
  to this branch of the subject, proceed to shortly put to the Attorney General certain legal questions as to which I have given him full private Notice.
  It is my impression, and this is one reason why I make no Motion with regard to the funds of these corporations, that there does exist a manner of reaching some or all of them under the present state of the law. It is not free from difficulty, and it needs the intervention of the Attorney General. Here is the point to which I ask his careful attention. "A charity," by 43 Eliz, c. 4, includes all property held by corporations, partly for municipal and partly for church or educational purposes. In the great majority of cases these unreformed corporations have some such claims upon their money. In all these that circumstance seems to bring the whole of their property under the legal obligations of the Charity Acts. Comparing the 61st section of the Act of 1853 with the 44th section of the Act of 1855, the trustees, or, in the case put, the corporations have to send accounts annually to the Charity Commissioners. This law is broken by the vast majority of the unreformed municipal corporations holding mixed properties partly under charitable, educational, or religious trusts. Again, under section 29 of the Act of 1855, trustees, or, in the case put, the corporations, are forbidden to make, without the approval of the Charity Commissioners, any sale, mortgage, or charge of the estate, or any lease, in reversion, after more than three years of any existing term, or for any term of life, or in consideration, wholly or in part, of any fine, or for any term of years exceeding 21 years. This law is also broken by the great majority of unreformed municipal corporations holding mixed properties. These corporations, if written to by the Charity Commissioners, would reply that they do not hold upon charitable trusts. Now, when trustees deny that they hold on charitable trusts, or, as it is called, when they hold adversely, the Charity Commissioners by the 15th section of the Act of 1853, are precluded from demanding any information. I wish to ask the Attorney General whether if, in the case, for instance, of the Lostwithiel corporation, who, undoubtedly, hold part of their lands upon a charitable trust, inhabitants
  1152
  were to ask him to assist them, he would, if written to by the Charity Commissioners, help them under Clause 20 of the Act of 1853?
  The clause to which I call the Attorney General's attention is the 16 & 17 Vict. c. 137, s. 20, which enacts that in any case in which it shall appear to the Charity Commissioners that the institution of legal proceedings is requisite or desirable with respect to any charity—and the Lostwithiel corporation is, as I have shown, for these purposes a charity—it shall be lawful for the Commissioners to certify such case to the Attorney General, and thereupon the Attorney General, if upon consideration of the circumstances he think fit, shall prosecute such legal proceedings as he shall consider proper by application to the High Court of Judicature.
  With regard, then, to the property of these corporations, I feel that local inquiry by a Commissioner is desirable; but while I urge the Government that they should grant it, I will not make a Motion to that effect. I have shown how in many of the cases, if local inquiry is refused by the Government, we shall be able, although with the difficulty which is caused by local fears and local pressure, to procure applications to the Charity Commissioners. I ask the Attorney General with regard to these, whether, in the event of such applications coming to him, backed by the authority of the Charity Commissioners, he will prosecute? I wish also to ask either the Attorney General or any other Member of the Government whom it may more properly concern, whether I may have, as an unopposed Return, any correspondence which has lately taken place between the inhabitants of Lost-withiel and the Charity Commissioners upon this point?
  Upon the other, and, as I think, the clearer branch of the question where both are clear, because I know not what answer can be made to our case, I beg to move the Resolution of which I have given Notice.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That, in the opinion of this House, it would be desirable to forthwith abolish all criminal jurisdiction exercised by unreformed Municipal Corporations or their officers, with the exception of that of the City of London, for which due provision has been made by statute."—(Sir Charles W. Dilke.)
  THE ATTORNEY GENERALsaid, he had listened very carefully to the speech of the hon. Baronet, and he understood that the question which had been put, was whether, if the Charity Commissioners should ask one of these corporations for information with reference to its property or an account of the disposal of its property, and the corporation should decline to give any information or any account, the matter should be certified; and he understood the hon. Baronet to have asked him whether in such a case he would direct legal proceedings to be taken against the corporation. In a moment or two he would answer that question as definitely as he could; but before he did so he would ask leave to call attention to the position of these corporations with reference to the property they held. He believed it had been decided, over and over again, that corporations, whether Ecclesiastical or Civil, except charitable corporations, were not trustees of the corporate property—that was to say, were not to be considered primâ facie as trustees. In order to make them trustees of the corporate property it was necessary to show that the property was subject to some specific trust, public or private, by some Act of Parliament; some will, deed, or instrument of some kind or other. Primâ facie these corporations were not trustees of separate property. If they had been, no doubt many of the abuses alluded to by the hon. Baronet would have ceased, because those interested in the trust property would have taken proceedings against them and had it properly administered. "With respect to municipal corporations under the Municipal Corporations Act, they were trustees of the corporate property. That Act made them trustees, and provided that the corporate property should be trust property. But unfortunately the Municipal Corporations Act did not apply to the corporations to which reference had been made, and therefore those provisions which made their property trust property were not applicable to them. Then came the question as to what proceedings might or should be taken under the Charitable Trusts Act of 1853 and 1855. The Act of 1853 said that the Commissioners might make inquiry as to all property held on trust for charitable purposes; and if they came to the conclusion that any property was held on trust for a charitable purpose, and they thought that
  1154
  charity was not being duly carried into effect, they might certify the case to the Attorney General for the time being, at the same time giving him all the information they could afford with regard to the particular property or charity and a full explanation of the case; and if the Attorney General, on considering the explanation thus given to him, thought it was a proper case in which proceedings should be instituted, then it was within his power, and it would undoubtedly be his duty and also, he thought, his pleasure, to direct that proceedings should be instituted. But to deal with the specific case alluded to by the hon. Baronet—namely, where the only fact submitted to the attention of the Attorney General was that the corporation, having been applied to for information with respect to its property or for an account of its proceeds, simply refused to give the information or the account—whether, in that case, the Attorney General would be justified in directing proceedings to be instituted, he should very much doubt. As at present advised he should hesitate to direct proceedings to be taken against any of the corporations on that simple fact being established; because it was clear that until, at all events, a primâ facie case had been made out of the existence of a trust, the corporations were not bound to answer such a question put to them by the Commissioners, and could hold themselves adverse, so to speak, to the Commissioners. But though he might not be justified in directing proceedings in specific cases like those, a very little evidence showing that there was a trust in some persons would induce him to consider it a fair ease for investigation and to direct proceedings to be taken. In such cases it would not take much to satisfy him that the property held of the corporations was held upon trust. If it was made out that it was in any way a charitable trust, then it would come under the jurisdiction of the Charity Commissioners, and he should have much pleasure in directing that there should be an inquiry, in order that that property should be administered as the donor had desired. The question put to him having been one of a somewhat vague nature, it perhaps did not admit of a more distinct answer than he had given.
  MR. GREGORYcould have wished that the Notice of the hon. Baronet the

  1155
  Member for Chelsea had been more specific, and had given some intimation of the charges he had made against individuals. The Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 distinctly recognized the antecedent right of the corporation to the property vested in them, and it protected not only the right of property of individual members of the corporation, but even those of their wives and families. That fact did not bear out the statement of the hon. Baronet; but, on the contrary, it confirmed the view of the law laid down by the learned Attorney General. The hon. Member then referred to the corporations now in question which were within his own district, leaving other hon. Members to deal with those existing in their respective neighbourhoods. The corporations of Pevensey and Sea-ford had been referred to by the hon. Baronet. Pevensey, he said, was a place of very great antiquity, having, in fact, been a Roman town. It was, perhaps, the oldest corporation in England, its original charter going back to the time of Edward I. It contained a population of between 1,100 and 1,200. The corporation consisted of 40 freemen and seven jurats, or elected magistrates, the latter being a body of gentlemen than whom none more fit for the office they held could anywhere be found. The corporate property was very small, not exceeding £110 a-year; it was expended on education or in charity and on other purposes useful to the inhabitants, and he did not know that any grievous error had been alleged against the corporate management. The hon. Baronet had alluded to a charity under their administration; but it was now administered under a scheme settled some 15 years ago by the Charity Commissioners. As to the rates they levied, they were, in fact, county rates for police and lunatics, levied under a precept sent to the jurats by the quarter sessions. He came next to the borough of Seaford. The corporation consisted of about 45 corporators; their income was £40 a-year, and they had expended about £540 for improvements, and £500 for building a guyne or sea-wall. It was true the corporation granted a lease of their property for 299 years to a gentleman named Tyler Smith, under the impression that he would carry out certain improvements, and would, among other things, erect a sea-wall. The speculation, however,
  1156
  failed, and the works were not carried out. As far as the corporations on whose behalf he spoke were concerned, he would say for them that they had no objection to any inquiry which might be instituted, nor would they resist such alterations in their constitution as Parliament, in its wisdom, might think necessary. What they would consider a grievance, however, would be any proposal involving their utter annihilation as corporations.
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he thought the admissions made by the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just sat down in reference to the corporation of Seaford furnished a strong argument in favour of the Motion of the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea. They had leased their property for 299 years to Mr. Tyler Smith without taking any precautions to secure his carrying out works for the public good, and having received £500 from Mr. Smith, they divided it among themselves. He would not dispute with the Attorney General the law which he had stated, that corporations were possessed of property not affected with any trust, but that he would be glad to imply a trust. This was not, however, a question of trust, but a question of policy for Parliament to deal with. Under the Municipal Corporations Act Parliament said that corporations should be treated as trustees acting on behalf and for the benefit of the public in the vicinities over which they had control, and how these corporations had escaped the net he did not know, but it was quite time that they should be brought into it. Last year the Home Secretary dealt with the brick and mortar rookeries existing in different parts of the country, and it was to be hoped that he would now take in hand the municipal and political rookeries which still remained in the shape of these small unreformed corporations. Anything more scandalous than the condition of some of these corporations could not be conceived. Some were better and some worse than others. Those which were better would not suffer from inquiry, but those which were worse ought to suffer. All bodies of this kind ought to be made to do their duty, or else they ought to cease to exist. He considered the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea had been very wise in confining his immediate Resolution to the most objectionable of all powers

  1157
  held by these corporations—namely, the exercise of criminal jurisdiction. How was it possible that hon. Gentlemen whom he addressed, who formed the best part of the magistracy of the country, and who were desirous of maintaining its authority, could desire that side by side with the magistrates under the authority of the Lord Chancellor, who were nominated by the Lord Lieutenants, there should sit a body of men exercising criminal jurisdiction who were elected in the manner stated, and who were under no authority? What did anyone know of these men, and what guarantee was there that they were persons who ought to be charged with such authority as that they were possessed of? The administration of the Licensing Act was one thing which he was sure the Home Secretary would not think was a fit subject to be left to persons elected in this manner. Therefore, he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would let the House know whether he was prepared to give in some form or other support to a Motion the object of which was to do away with the flagrant abuses.
  MR. ASSHETON CROSSsaid, he felt sure the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea would admit that every facility had been afforded him by the Government for bringing the matter forward. He was equally sure that the House was indebted to the hon. Baronet for having taken a vast amount of trouble in ferreting out what he took to be abuses requiring remedy. On one occasion the right hon. Gentleman behind him (Mr. Henley) described the sport of ferreting out ecclesiastical abuses as being something better than a rat hunt. In the same spirit the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea had delivered to the House what was not only a useful, but an amusing speech. The Attorney General had not spoken of the question of policy, but had' wisely and properly confined himself to the question of law; but he (Mr. Cross) did not see how it could well be considered that the property held by corporations had not trust attached to it. However, he would be ready to give any help that he could in bringing about an inquiry into these corporations and in providing a better state of things. As to the question of the administration of justice by these corporations, that was a matter of the greatest importance, and if there were any division he could not divide against
  1158
  the Motion of the hon. Baronet. In all boroughs, whether large or small, justice ought to be properly administered, and fit persons only should be entrusted with the important duty of administering it; and as to the Licensing Laws he thought that only justices of the peace ought to be intrusted with the powers conferred by the Acts of Parliament. He hoped the Motion would not be pressed to a division by the hon. Baronet until he had heard the reason why these things had been allowed to remain for so long; untouched, and why they were not mentioned in the Report of the Commission of 1835. It was supposed that the exercise of the criminal jurisdiction had ceased. In the case of Romney Marsh, although a Court of Session was held before the Bailiff, the offenders were very few, and there had been no cases of felony for three or four years. They would find that the criminal jurisdiction had practically ceased in the views of the Commissioners. Now that the matter had been brought before the House and the country, he felt bound to say that it was time the whole question should be looked into, and the corporation put upon a better footing; and if the hon. Baronet would trust him, he would promise to take such steps as the Government might think best in order that that should be done.
  MR. PEMBERTONsaid, he was anxious, in consequence of being absent last year when this question was brought on, to say something on behalf of New Romney, which was once one of the Cinque Ports. The corporation of that borough was an ancient one. Its charters had been confirmed by several Sovereigns, and the last was granted by Queen Elizabeth. There were at New Romney a mayor and five jurats, and certain freemen and commonalty. One of the charges made last year by the hon. Baronet was that the corporation was not legally constituted, that the number of jurats ought to be 12; but the charters stated that there might be any number of jurats not exceeding 12. In the time of Queen Elizabeth there were five, and from that time to the present the number had varied from four to 11; therefore, he thought that charge of the hon. Baronet had broken down. As to the mayor, who had been alluded to, it was true that he had a residence a mile and a-half away, but he had large property in the borough, and went there

  1159
  daily. The mayor and corporation had applied the property which they held for the benefit of the town. Leases had been granted according to the valuation of surveyors, and a great deal of property had been reclaimed from the sea, much money having been spent for that purpose, and they had applied the residue of their funds for the benefit of the borough, paying out of them the borough, police, paving, and lighting rates. There had been no borough rate from time immemorial; therefore, so far as New Romney was concerned, the charge of maladministration had not been sustained. Of the mayor and jurats two were county and borough magistrates, appointed by the Lord Lieutenant and the Lord Chancellor. Those gentlemen did not wish to oppose any inquiry, nor to oppose anything that the Government might think desirable. As to the election of the mayor being in the church, that was required to be done by the charter, in the absence of all but the commonalty and freemen. [Sir CHARLES W. DILKE; The commonalty?] Yes; but the hon. Baronet would, if he read the charter, see that commonalty and free-men meant the same persons. As to the borough of Queenborough, no doubt it once possessed some property, but the corporation engaged in the speculation of oyster breeding, and in the year 1845 the corporation became bankrupt, and the whole of its property, under an Act of Parliament, was sold to pay its debts, and they were paid off, and now the only property which it possessed was the Guildhall, a house, and the advowson of the living, and its income was, on the average, £50 a-year, which was applied purely towards corporation purposes. Of the corporation of Fordwich he knew nothing, as he had had no communication from the borough. On the part of the other corporations there had never been any desire to make concealment.
  MR. CHADWICK, in support of the Motion of the hon. Baronet, said, that never had a better case for an inquiry been made out. He thought that if these corporations were not affected with a trust for charitable purposes they held their property in trust for the public good, and not for themselves personally; and he also thought that the answer of the Attorney General would be looked at by the public as a legal quibble. He would venture to suggest that there
  1160
  should be either a Royal Commission or a Select Committee appointed by the Government to inquire into and report upon the whole matter, as regarded the constitution, funds, forms of government, and the mode of appointment in all these boroughs. Such a Report would form the only sound and reliable basis for any proposed reforms.
  MR. H. T. COLEsaid, he was of opinion that the hon. Baronet had conferred a great benefit on the public by his able exposure of the defects and anomalies of these corporations. He could add one fact with regard to Corfe Castle. The mayor of Corfe was himself an elective officer; curiously enough he had the power of appointing a deputy who acted as a justice of the peace, who sat at licensing sessions, and exercised all the other powers conferred on those magistrates appointed by the Lord Lieutenant of the county or by the Lord Chancellor. That was, he believed, the only case known in which a mayor could exercise such a power.
  SIR CHARLES W. DLLKEsaid, that after what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department—who, he was sure, would do what was right in the matter of jurisdiction—he would not press his Motion to a division.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

COUNTY PALATINE OF LANCASTER (CLERK OF THE PEACE) BILL.
(Mr. Hardcastle, Mr. Holt, Mr. Clifton)
COUNTY PALATINE OF LANCASTER (CLERK OF THE PEACE) BILL.

  [BILL 53.] COMMITTEE.
  Bill considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  Clause 1 (Appointment of deputy clerks of the peace).
  MR. RATHBONEmoved, page 1, line 17, after "him," to insert—
  "Provided always, That each deputy clerk to be appointed shall be a solicitor of ten years' standing, and shall have an office within the district for which he is appointed, and the clerk of the peace shall have no interest in the emolument of any deputy clerk."
  If the patronage was to be taken from the hands of the Chancellor of the Duchy, in whom the public would have confidence, they should have some security that it would be properly exercised. In every instance where there had been decentralization the results had been more gratifying than the most sanguine persons could have imagined,

  1161
  Large centres of population like Manchester and Liverpool were entitled to have some security that the persons appointed should be competent for the discharge of their duties.
  Amendment proposed,
  In page 1, line 17, after the word "him," to insert the words "Provided always, That each deputy clerk to he appointed shall be a solicitor of ten years' standing, and shall have an office within the district for which he is appointed, and the clerk of the peace shall have no interest in the emolument of any deputy clerk."—(Mr. Rathbone.)
  Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
  MR. ASSHETON CROSSsaid, that the question of the division of the county of Lancaster might arise, and if the proposition were started he should be prepared to consider it; but so long as Lancashire was one county, so long did he think it necessary that there should be one clerk of the peace. He had enjoyed considerable experience in this matter, for he had sat as chairman of quarter sessions in the extreme north and in the extreme south of the county, and he thought the same clerk of the peace should follow the magistrates round. He could conceive nothing more inconvenient than three clerks of the peace, acting on different lines, instead of there being one clerk of the peace whose business it was to go all round the county. He was willing to adopt any safeguards for the appointment of a proper deputy, and was ready to adopt the Amendment to the extent of requiring that he should be a solicitor of seven years' standing. It was better to leave it to the magistrates to say whether he should have his office within the district. Whether his office were in the south-west or south-east of the county, it was necessary, however, that there should be a head office.
  MR. RATHBONEexpressed his readiness to accede to the insertion of seven years instead of ten years in his Amendment.
  Amendment amended, by leaving out the word "ten," and inserting the word "seven."
  MR. HARDCASTLEmoved to omit from the Amendment all the words after the word "standing."
  Amendment proposed to proposed Amendment, as amended, to leave out from the word "standing," to the end of the Amendment."—(Mr. Hardcastle.)
  Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the proposed Amendment, as amended."
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 45; Noes 53: Majority 8.
  Bill reported; as amended, to be considered To-morrow.

VALUATION OF PROPERTY (METROPOLIS) ACT (1869) AMENDMENT BILL.
(Mr. J. G. Hubbard, Mr. Forsyth, Mr. Twells.)
VALUATION OF PROPERTY (METROPOLIS) ACT (1869) AMENDMENT BILL.

  [BILL 74.] SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. J. G. Hubbard.)
  MR. GOLDSMIDobjected to the Bill being disposed of without some further explanation than had been given of its provisions.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, the measure was one to which he entertained very serious financial objections, and pointed out that the Bill introduced by the President of the Local Government Board proposed to repeal the Act with which the present measure dealt. He thought it would be inconvenient to proceed with the discussion of this measure at present until the House had heard some statement on the subject.
  MR. GOLDSMIDbegged to move, as an Amendment, that the Bill be read a second time on that day month.
  MR. P. A. TAYLORseconded the Amendment.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day month."—(Mr. Goldsmid.)
  Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  MR. J. G. HUBBARDsaid, the object of the Bill was to mitigate the assessment of Imperial taxation on all real property in the metropolis, reducing the rateable charge on the gross rental of the property by the outgoing necessary to maintain it. Nothing could be more equitable, and the President of the Local Government Board proposed to apply the same principle to the whole of the country which it was sought by this Bill to apply to the metropolis. In 1870 or

  1163
  1871 the gross value of property assessable in the metropolis was £24,000,000. Since that estimate was made the rateable value of the metropolis had been raised from £24,000,000 to £28,000,000, not absolutely by increased value, but by the system which had been very diligently pursued by the assessment committees and surveyors' of surcharging the value of the houses whenever there was any excuse for doing so. He could mention instances in which the valuation of houses had been doubled and even trebled, although their actual value had not been increased. The consequence of this was that £4,000,000 had been added to the gross value returned for the metropolis. If his proposition were accepted he believed the Government would receive, owing to the enhanced value of property in London, nearly as large an amount in property tax in 1876 as they received in 1871.
  MR. GOLDSMIDbegged to withdraw his Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, he hoped his right hon. Friend (Mr. Hubbard) would withdraw his Bill, or consent to an adjournment for a long time. There was nothing in his statement peculiarly applicable to the metropolis. If it were right to charge property tax on rateable value instead of gross value in London, it would be equally right to do so in the country, and he apprehended there were few people who complained more of the property tax in that respect than the owners of land. The Government also had before the House a Bill in which it was proposed to consolidate the general law of the country as to valuation, and therefore the present Bill was inopportune. Besides, if they interfered with the rating under Schedule A they must also interfere with that under Schedule B, and thus upset a system which had been in existence for many years. He hoped his right hon. Friend would rest satisfied with having placed his views on this interesting subject before the House, and would consent to withdraw his Bill.
  Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members not being present,
  House adjourned at Eight o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading—Drainage and Improvement of Land (Irelan) Provisional Orders* (21).
Second Reading—Crossed Cheques (12).

CHURCHYARDS—THE BURIAL LAWS.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, I have been intrusted with a number of Petitions from various parishes in my diocese praying your Lordships' attention to the subject of an alteration in the Laws of Burial. I desire, my Lords, in presenting these Petitions, to guard myself against being supposed to agree in every expression contained in Petitions which, as they do not refer to any Bill before your Lordships' House, deal rather with general propositions on the subject of the Laws of Burial. It may not be generally known to your Lordships that the two Houses
1106
of Convocation of the Province of Canterbury are at this moment, under Her Majesty's licence, engaged in a revision of the rubrics which have reference to the Burial of the Dead. In the discussion of those rubrics many questions will naturally arise with respect to the general Law of Burial in this country. It appears to me very desirable that those who are intrusted with Her Majesty's licence to discuss these questions should approach them quite unpledged, with a full consciousness of all the difficulties which surround the question, and having no desire to increase those angry feelings which unfortunately have been called forth by discussions which have already been raised on this Question. My Lords, I beg to lay the Petitions on the Table. I am sure they will receive every consideration from your Lordships, though those who present them are not pledged to any propositions which the Petitions themselves may contain.
Then Petitions against authorising any other religious service in churchyards other than those of the Church read, and ordered to be on the Table.

CROSSED CHEQUES BILL.—(No. 12.)
(The Lord Chancellor.)
CROSSED CHEQUES BILL.—(No. 12.)

  SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
  THE LORD CHANCELLOR, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said: My Lords, when I brought this Bill before your Lordships' House, I postponed any explanation of it in order that it might be in your Lordships' hands in the first instance. I am now about to give a short explanation of the objects of the Bill, and of the reasons which render a measure on the subject necessary. Your Lordships are aware that crossed cheques have been for a very long time in use in this country; but it was not until 1856 that any notice was taken of them by the Legislature. Up to that time the crossing of cheques and the effect of it remained a matter of convention, or courtesy, between the banks; but in 1856 an attempt was made by the Legislature to give a statutory security to cheques which were crossed. A Bill was brought into the other House by a private Member, which became law;

  1107
  and I am sorry to say that it is not a very happy specimen of legislation. It enacted nothing but this only—that any cheque crossed either generally "and Co.," or specially to some banker, should be paid only, in the one case through a banker, and in the other through the banker to whom it was crossed. My Lords, I think it is obvious that the framers of that measure overlooked one peculiar characteristic of a cheque—that no one can bring an action against the banker on a cheque but the person who draws it. This is because a cheque is simply a direction by the drawer to pay money of his which is in the banker's hands. Well, what happened after the passing of the Act of 1856 was this—some cheques from which the crossing had been obliterated were presented for payment. Bankers paid thorn, saying—"These are not crossed cheques, and there is nothing in the Act which tells us not to pay them." The consequence was that in 1858 another act was passed to remedy this defect. It provided that the crossing of a cheque should be taken to be a material part of the cheque itself, and that no banker should pay it if the crossing was removed, obliterated, or erased. That has been, then, the state of the law since 1858: But a case has occurred lately which has given rise to a great deal of apprehension and excitement in the commercial world. There was a cheque drawn on a particular bank—the Union Bank of London. The person who first received that cheque crossed it with the name of his own bankers, the London and County Bank. A servant took it to pay it into his master's bank, but lost it on the way. Some person found it, and subsequently it was passed for full value to a person who had no notice that the cheque had been found. The person to whom it was passed in the way I have just mentioned took it and paid it into his own banker, the London and Westminster Bank. This bank passed it through the Clearing House; and the Union Bank, not observing the name of the London and County Bank crossed on the cheque, paid it. That, of course, was an oversight, and such a peculiar case is not likely to occur again. But the person to whom the cheque was originally given, and who had lost it, Mr. Smith, brought an action against the Union Bank of London for the amount. The Court in which the action
  1108
  was brought—the Queen's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice—and afterwards the Court of Appeal, held that the action could not be maintained, and for these two reasons:—First, the Courts held that the cheque was a negotiable instrument to pass from buyer to buyer, and that the person who had taken it for full value without notice of infirmity of title had acquired a good title to it, and that Mr. Smith had lost his property in the cheque; secondly, that no person could bring an action on a cheque but the drawer, and that the drawer in this case had lost his property in the cheque, and consequently had lost his right to bring an action on it. This, my Lords, exhibited a new phase in the crossed cheque system, and, as I have said, it has given rise to no small amount of anxiety, and it was desired that a remedy should be provided. In the Bill now before your Lordships I have taken the opportunity of repealing the two Acts to which I have referred—the Acts of 1856 and 1858—but I re-enact the important and material provisions of both in a better form, so that the whole of the law of crossed cheques may be found in one enactment. Your Lord-ships will find in the Bill before you that the first eight sections do not contain any new law, but a simple re-enactment of the existing law. The 9th clause, on which I shall make some further observation, provides that—
  "A person taking a cheque crossed specially shall not have, and shall not be capable of giving, a better title to the cheque than the person from whom he took it had. But a banker to whom a cheque is crossed specially, and who has in good faith and without negligence received payment of such cheque for a customer, shall not, in case the title to the cheque prove defective, incur any liability to the true owner of the cheque by reason only of his having received such payment."
  Now, as to the particular form a provision of this kind should assume, there is no doubt that the question has been raised that, as to whether you should impart this infirmity of title to cheques, crossed generally, or confine it to cheques crossed specially. Many persons advocate that you should legislate in this way for all crossed cheques. My Lords, it appears to me that would be a very dangerous course, and that it would be found so irksome in practice that there would be soon a demand for its repeal. Your Lordships

  1109
  will readily understand this if you consider for a moment one or two matters. A very great many persons in business will take in the course of a forenoon 20 or 30 cheques crossed simply "and Co." They receive and collect money due to them in that way, and send all those cheques to their bankers, who in the ordinary course pass them through the Clearing House. If, in the case of such cheques, an infirmity in the title of any one person through whoso hands one of those cheques had passed were to prevent the ultimate holder from recovering the amount, the consequences would be very serious. A person who takes, perhaps, 20 or 30 of those cheques in a forenoon might find, not in weeks even, but in months after he had received a certain number of them, that one of that number had been stolen, and had passed through the hands of a thief, or some other person who had no title; but to require that the payment ultimately made for that cheque to a holder for value must be handed back would be so monstrous that such a practice could not be tolerated. I will give a further illustration of how unwise such a law would be. I dare say your Lordships have heard of a bank established in very recent times, and called the Cheque Bank. I do not know much of its details, but I have heard that it has proved a great convenience. Well, every cheque of that bank bears the printed crossing "and Co." The object of the cheques of this bank is that they should pass over a counter and from hand to hand like money, until they ultimately come back to the bank itself. Of course you would defeat that object if you were to enact that an infirmity in the title of any of the hands through which one of those cheques passed should prevent the ultimate holder from receiving payment of the money for which it was drawn. Take the case of a bank-note; what would become of the negotiability of a bank-note if it was enacted that an infirmity in the title of any holder was to prevent the ultimate holder from receiving payment? When any of your Lordships cross a cheque, generally, all you mean is that the cheque ought to be paid through some banker, in order that there may be some mode of tracing the hand which ultimately receives the money; but you do not wish to attach the property in the cheque to any particular
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  person. It is, however, quite different if you cross the cheque with the name of a particular bank. The moment you do that you intimate by the crossing that the cheque must be regarded as the property of the person who has that particular bank, and not as an instrument which may pass from hand to hand. For these reasons I propose that Parliament should confine itself to enacting that no person taking a cheque crossed specially shall have or shall be able to give a better title to the cheque than the person from whom he took it had—that persons must take such cheques subject to any infirmity of title in previous holders. But I think it right that there should be a protection for the banker to whom a cheque is crossed specially. Accordingly, if, for instance, a cheque is crossed specially to the London and Westminster Bank and it receives payment of it for a customer, that bank shall not, in case the title to the cheque prove defective, incur any liability to the true owner by reason only of that act of the bank. Those are the two provisions of a Bill which, if adopted by Parliament, will be an addition to the existing law on the subject of crossed cheques.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Lord Chancellor.)
  Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday the 9th of March next.

ARMY—KNIGHTSBRIDGE BARRACKS.

  QUESTION. OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD SANDHURSTinquired of the Under Secretary of State for War, On what grounds the decision of the late Government affecting the choice of a site for Barracks on account of the cavalry regiments now stationed at Knightsbridge has been reversed? The late Government had condemned these Barracks, and the Commission which in 1863 considered the question reported very strongly against them, not only on account of the bad condition of the buildings, but also on account of the site on which the Barracks were placed. He asked their Lordships to recollect the important bearing which the second ground of the adverse Report of the Commission had in respect of the decision

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  which Her Majesty's present Advisers had reversed. The Commission condemned the site quite as forcibly as the bad condition of the buildings. He imagined that there were various matters which had engaged the attention of the noble Viscount (Viscount Cardwell) when he was considering the question. Independently of the site being considered unhealthy, everybody must know that Knightsbridge Barracks were unfit for Cavalry, owing to tactical reasons or arrangements required for the convenience of regimental administration. They were exceedingly narrow, and very long. On the other hand, he was informed that there was a strategical argument in favour of the site—namely, the great value which many persons attached to having a Cavalry regiment available in the immediate vicinity of an open space like Hyde Park in the event of any outbreak among the people. That argument did not recommend itself to him, but must be taken for what it was worth. He thought everybody should deplore the idea of ever seeing the Household Cavalry engaged in aiding the civil power. That was a contingency which should be avoided if possible. For obvious reasons it was the last body of troops in the Army which should be applied to such a purpose. It was said that the householders in Knightsbridge had no claim to have their property improved by the removal of the Barracks. Their Lordships must remember that almost all the public improvements in the various parts of the Metropolis had been brought about by private improvements in their several localities, and he did not think that it should be a reproach to the owners of property in Knights-bridge that they wished to see improvements effected in that neighbourhood. He believed it had been determined by the present Government to make a still further extension of the present long and slender slip of ground by taking some ground the property of a noble Duke. This would scarcely mend matters if, for the want of sufficient area, the Barracks would have to be built on a principle which sanitary considerations had condemned—namely, that of having the rooms for the soldiers over the stables for the horses. The rooms of the men ought to be in a building separated from the stables. The late Government had condemned the Barracks, but with the
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  change of Ministers a change had come over the policy of the War Office, and it was now proposed to build the new Barracks on the old site. He should like to hear some Ministerial explanation of this action.
  EARL CADOGANsaid, that in his Question the noble and gallant Lord (Lord Sandhurst) assumed that the decision come to by the present Government was, in effect, a reversal of the decision of the late Government. He had searched through all the somewhat voluminous correspondence and other Papers on the subject which he could find during the last 10 or 11 years, and he had not been able to discover any record in the War Office of any decision on this subject having been come to by the late Government. Therefore, he could not agree with the noble and gallant Lord that the action of the Government in the present instance was a reversal of the decision of the late Government. He ought, however, in candour to state that, in all he wrote on the subject, the feeling of the noble Viscount the late Secretary for War (Viscount Cardwell) seemed to be that the Cavalry barracks were not destined to remain on the present site at Knights-bridge; and the noble Viscount left on record that it had been his intention to go into the question in the year 1874, had the Government of which he was a Member remained in office. Under the late Government, Mr. Lowe, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed a scheme for the removal of the Bar-racks; but he understood that an important part of the plan of the right hon. Gentleman was to sell the ground on which the Barracks stood, and to apply the money received for it to the erection of new barracks on another site. He believed, also, that if the War Department had given up the Barracks the Woods and Forests would have stepped in and claimed the land. He thought, therefore, that all proposals based upon the sale of the site at present occupied by the Barracks must be abandoned. He thought it would be found, also, that no suitable site could be obtained elsewhere without considerable difficulty. The noble and gallant Lord asked the grounds on which the Secretary of State had arrived at his decision. He had arrived at it entirely on military grounds. It was not for him (Earl Cadogan) to

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  enter into the military advantages of the site; but it had been recognized by the Duke of Wellington and other military commanders. He was sure the noble and gallant Lord would not allow his great authority to be made use of for private interests, but based his opposition to the decision of the Secretary for "War on military grounds and the good of the soldier, in whom he took so deep an interest. He (Earl Cadogan) hardly liked to characterize the agitation which had been carried on in opposition to these Barracks, or the proceedings of the promoters of that agitation. One of the objections put forward was the unhealthy character of the Barracks. Now, last Session he had the honour to lay on the Table Reports which gave a very favourable account of the sanitary condition of the Barracks. Again, charges had been made against the conduct of the soldiers quartered in the Knightsbridge Barracks. He thought he might say that no more unfounded charges were ever made against any body of men. He was not afraid to say that it would be difficult to find an equal number of men filling any other position in this country whose character would stand examination better than that of the men of the Household Cavalry. Another ground of objection to the continuance of the Barracks at Knightsbridge was the number of public-houses in the neighbourhood. Last Session he was able to show that those public-houses were not frequented by the soldiers. Those who were anxious for the closing of some of them ought to apply to the licensing magistrates instead of agitating for the removal of these Barracks. Neither the Government nor the Legislature was responsible for the "bulling" and "bearing" of house property in the neighbourhood which had been caused by the proceedings of persons who might have been speculating on the removal of the Barracks. He was not aware of any general wish for the removal of the Barracks, nor did he see any prospect of the Government being able to obtain a site as little open to objection as that at Knightsbridge. He hoped, therefore, that their Lordships would approve the decision at which Her Majesty's Government had arrived after a full consideration of the subject.
  VISCOUNT CARDWELLsaid, he had no fault to find with the statement of the
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  noble Earl the Under Secretary for War that no decision had been arrived at by the late Government with respect to these Barracks; but lest he should convey a false impression if he left the noble Earl's statement where it stood, he thought he ought to amplify it by some further explanation. When, in 1868, the late Government succeeded to office, he found that the question of the Knights-bridge Barracks was not only being considered, but was giving rise to no little excitement. He thanked the noble Earl for having given him access to the official correspondence which was in the Office at the time to which he referred, and in that which passed in 1866, when General Peel was Secretary for War, he found these passages, after considering Report of Army Sanitary Committee—
  "Quartermaster General informed for His Royal Highness that it appears to the Secretary of State most desirable that no time should he lost in acquiring a new site. Under all the circumstances of the case, and the difficulties attendant thereon, it appears to the Secretary of State that the site at Millbank may he worthy of consideration, and he would be glad to he favoured with the further opinion of His Royal Highness
  … "had under consideration, and in the absence of any better site which can he obtained within a reasonable distance His Royal Highness recommends that the ground now occupied by Millbank Penitentiary should he made available."
  That was not a decision of the late Government, he admitted, and he did not wish to convey the impression that it was; but it showed what were the views of the War Office in 1866, and upon which it was acting at that time. He was not aware that there was any trace of his immediate predecessor having adopted the same view—he believed he did not adopt it—but when he (Viscount Cardwell) came into office it was his impression that the feeling of the community and the feeling of Parliament was in favour of the removal of the Barracks; and his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer at that time (Mr. Lowe) caused notices to be served in respect of property extending from Albert Gate to Knightsbridge Barracks. The idea was that the sum of money derived from the sale of the site would go materially towards the erection of new barracks at Millbank. The noble Earl opposite seemed to be under the impression that the site of Knightsbridge Barracks was

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  not capable of being made of pecuniary advantage to the country if the Barracks were removed elsewhere. That was not his impression, nor had it been the view of his right hon. Friend, who had expected that it would realize a large sum. The notices, however, came to nothing, and he (Viscount Cardwell) therefore never had the opportunity of deciding conclusively upon what might have been a great improvement. He had never ventured to throw any doubt on the military opinion expressed by the Duke of Wellington, nor had he ever joined in the least imputation on the admirable soldiers quartered at Knightsbridge. The objection against the site which, to his mind, seemed to have great force was that it was not large enough to admit of the erection of the new Barracks, if they were to be built in accordance with modern requirements. Millbank was a site which had been very much considered by high authorities, and in both military and sanitary points it had been much commended, and anybody who only looked at the map could see the position it occupied between the Bar-racks at Chelsea and the Wellington Barracks, connected with both by a broad way, flanked on one side by the Thames, and commanding a ready access both to the Houses of Parliament and to Buckingham Palace. He did not, however, wish to say a word by way of military opinion. He took part in this conversation rather as a witness than as assuming to himself the right to speak as an authority on points of strategical opinion.
  THE DUKE OF CAMBRIDGEsaid, he fully endorsed what had been said by the noble Earl and the noble Viscount, so far as his knowledge went; but he took issue with the noble and gallant Lord (Lord Sandhurst) who had brought this question under the notice of their Lordships. The noble and gallant Lord seemed to be under the impression that there were other sites which, on military grounds, were preferable to that at Knightsbridge; but the Duke of Wellington and other high authorities had expressed their opinion that no other site in this great Metropolis was so suitable for the purpose to which the site of the Barracks at Knightsbridge was applied. Considering the very limited number of the Household troops there could be no
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  more convenient place than the Parks for exercise, while the site gave immediate access to the Park, and thence to every part of the Metropolis. The noble and gallant Lord expressed his hope that the troops at Knightsbridge might never be called on to assist the civil power. He (the Duke of Cambridge) also hoped sincerely that there never would be occasion for it; but they could not ignore the possibility of its arising. The noble and gallant Lord must know that, whenever the civil arm had been found insufficient to do what was required of it in ordinary times, it had been on those extraordinary occasions supplemented by military aid—but this on all such occasions must be most tenderly applied. He appealed to noble Lords on both sides of the House whether that had not been the case in this country; and he appealed to his noble Friend (Earl Spencer), who had lately filled the office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, whether in that country he had not called on the Commander-in-Chief to support the civil power with military aid, which had been afforded with ready alacrity, but which he had felt bound to apply with that tenderness and delicacy which should always characterize any assistance rendered by the military to the civil power. But the noble and gallant Lord said that in a sanitary point of view the site was unsuitable for Cavalry Barracks. He concurred with the noble and gallant Lord in wishing they had more space for the purpose; but when the noble and gallant Lord spoke of the necessity, in a sanitary point of view, of the men being separated from the horses, his reply was that he believed it would be found that the most healthy Cavalry Barracks in the country were those in which the rooms of the men were over the stables. During the time the noble Viscount presided over the War Department Cavalry Bar-racks were built partly on the one plan and partly on the other; and all the officers of Cavalry regiments which had had experience of both plans, including the medical officers, were of opinion that the men who slept over the stables enjoyed better health than those who slept in buildings away from the stables. If men were separated from the stables they would walk to and from stable duty without coats or jackets, and so contract colds. No doubt there was a certain miasma from stables; but by good shafts

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  and good ventilation that could be got rid of. The conduct of the men had not been impeached in this debate, and therefore he need not say anything on that point. As to the injury to property in the neighbourhood, it must be remembered that it was not the Barracks which were going among those who had created the property there, but it was those persons who created property there who had come to the Barracks. It was speculative landlords who had taken property in Knightsbridge—and that was quite a different thing from bringing down Barracks upon the improving owners of property. But he did not see why, with a proper elevation, a Barracks at Knightsbridge might not be made a very agreeable-looking building. He quite admitted the document which had been quoted by the noble Viscount; but he had agreed with the matter stated in that document solely because he believed that at the time the question had reduced itself to that of the choice of another site. As to his ever having expressed any desire to remove the Bar-racks from the admirable position at Knightsbridge, he believed there was an abundance of documentary evidence to prove that he never had expressed such a desire.
  THE EARL OF LUCANsaid, that the Duke of Wellington used to say that the defence of London must be chiefly carried on from the Parks, which permitted the concentration of troops to any amount; and in this respect the Bar-racks at Knightsbridge possessed the same advantage. He concurred with the noble and gallant Lord (Lord Sandhurst) that it was a calamity for the military to have to aid the civil power; but the best way to prevent that calamity was to provide against it. The noble and gallant Lord was against providing for such a contingency.
  LORD SANDHURSTexplained that his objection was to any particular body of troops being placed in the invidious position of being specially told off to assist the civil force in case of disturbance; this remark especially applying to the Household Brigade—the Royal Body Guard.
  THE EARL OF LUCANsaid, that the object of having the Barracks in that particular place was not that any particular troops should be employed for that purpose, but of having a large open space
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  in which troops could be readily assembled in case of need. The late Government had considered the different advantages offered by other spaces in the Metropolis for that purpose, but had been convinced that the present site for the Barracks could not be improved upon. The movement against the Knightsbridge Barracks was no more than a cabal of builders, house-agents, and shopkeepers.

SCOTTISH TEINDS.

  QUESTION. OBSERVATIONS. RETURNS. LEGISLATION.
  THE EARL OF MINTOasked Her Majesty's Government, "Whether certain Returns moved for last Session relating to Scotch Teinds (Tithes) have been completed, and will be soon distributed to Peers; also, whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to introduce a measure to place the Law of Teinds on a reasonable and an equitable basis? The very fact that he was obliged to ask his first Question was strong evidence that the Office of Teinds in Edinburgh, no less than the whole of the antiquated and unjust procedure and law connected with teinds, stood urgently in need of thorough reform. Early last Session, in the month of April, certain Returns calculated to throw considerable light on the defects of the present system were ordered by the House; and that now, 10 months later, he was unable to learn whether they had been completed, or even commenced. Unless there was good reason for such extraordinary delay, he thought an immediate inquiry ought to be instituted into the condition of the Office, to ascertain whether it must be attributed to the negligence and incompetency of the officers at the head of it. His second Question required no explanation.
  THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND GORDON, in answer to the last Question, said, that in view of the various Bills Her Majesty's Government had in hand, and intended to introduce before Parliament, he could not give the noble Earl any assurance of being able to deal with the Question to which he had referred during the present Session. With regard to the noble Lord's first Question, he had correctly stated that on a Motion made by him in the early part of last Session, an Order was made for certain Returns

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  relating to Scotch Teinds, which Returns certainly ought to have been prepared and laid upon the Table long before this time. He could not account for the delay, but would promise to take immediate steps to ascertain why the Returns had not been prepared, and would, so far as was in his power, insist upon their being laid on the Table forthwith.
  House adjourned at half past Six o'clock, to Thursday next, half past Ten o'clock.