Sitting of 3 March 1881

MINUTES.
NEW MEMBER SWORN—George James Howard, esquire, for Cumberland County (Eastern Division).
SELECT COMMITTEE—Railways (Rates on Fares), nominated.
First Report—Commons [No. 115].
PUBLIC BILL—Second Reading—Peace Preservation (Ireland) [98]—Second Night, debate farther adjourned.

QUESTIONS.

  THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE ACT, 1871—PATRONAGE OF THE LATE CHIEFS OF DIVISIONS.
  SIR R. ASSHETON CROSSasked the First Lord of the Treasury, What arrangements the Government propose to make with reference to the Patronage hitherto exercised by the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and the Lord Chief Baron; and how it is proposed to carry out such arrangements?
  MR. GLADSTONE: I have to thank the right hon. Gentleman for kindly postponing this Question in consequence of my unavoidable absence. I have to say that, upon examining the matter,
  132
  Her Majesty's Government have arrived at the conclusion that new arrangements are necessary with regard to the patronage hitherto exercised by the two Lord Chief Justices whose Offices are abolished. They will carefully consider what those new arrangements should be, and the House will have an opportunity of expressing its opinion upon them.

  ARMY—PROPERTY OF DECEASED SOLDIERS.
  MAJOR VAUGHAN LEEasked the Secretary of State for War, with reference to War Office Letter, E[79052] 8, of the 19th November 1880, If he can state when the father of the deceased soldier, No. 2085, Private Alfred Hill, of the 1st Dragoon Guards, who died at Pretoria, will be likely to be informed of the receipt of any sum arising from the sale of his effects; and, if he will cause inquiries to be made why the product of such sale has not been already transmitted?
  MR. CHILDERS: If the hon. and gallant Gentleman had spoken to me on this subject, I would have shown him the Papers and saved him the trouble of bringing the case before the House. Since I took Office, I have issued stringent orders to have these cases reported home without waiting for the periodical Returns. In this instance, the delay probably arises from the regiment having been employed on active service. I have called the attention of the Commander-in-Chief in India to the delay.

  ARMY—NATIVE AND COLONIAL LEVIES.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSONasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether the report alluded to in the "Daily News" of February 26th, that Sir Evelyn Wood is "organising an Intelligence Department, with Natives as scouts," conveys to him the impression that Natives may be employed as combatants against the Boers; and, whether he has any objection to state what instructions, if any, have been given in regard to the employment of Natives?
  MR. CHILDERS: I will answer together the Question of my hon. Friend, and also the Question of the right hon. and gallant Baronet the Member for the

  133
  Wigton Burghs (Admiral Sir John Hay), who asks me—
  "What assistance the Forces of the Crown may hope to obtain in the suppression of the rebellion in the Transvaal and in defence of the Colony of Natal, from local forces, volunteers, and native levies?"
  Her Majesty's Government entirely approve of the intention which Sir George Colley had expressed to avoid, as far as possible, the employment in the present war of levies raised either from the White Colonists or from the Native population; and in answer to a recent inquiry from Sir Evelyn Wood, he has been informed—
  "That both the White and Native populations in Natal may properly be employed to defend themselves, and have arms for that purpose; but, except in the case of an extreme military necessity, we deprecate the use of either White or Native populations as troops,"
  Similar instructions will be given to Sir Frederick Roberts. I have no knowledge of any Natives having been employed as scouts.

  IRELAND—THE ROMAN CATHOLIC ARCHBISHOPS OF DUBLIN.
  COLONEL COLTHURSTasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to a statement in the Paris correspondence of the "Times" of Saturday last, copied from "La Triboulêt," wherein it is stated, upon the alleged authority of the honourable the junior Member for Cork, that the Archbishops of Dublin are nominated by the English Government, which is careful in choosing them, these Catholic prelates share the prejudices of the Anglican Church against us; and, whether it is true that the Most Reverend Doctor McCabe, the present Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, was nominated to that see by the English Government; and, if, so, since what date, and under what circumstances, has the Holy See delegated such a power to the Irish Executive?
  MR. HEALY (for Mr. A. M. SULLIVAN)asked the honourable and gallant Member for Cork County, What steps, if any, he took before giving notice of the Question which stands in his name, to ascertain whether as a matter of fact the honourable Member for Cork City ever made any such statement as that referred to in the honourable and gallant gentle-
  134
  man's Question merely on the authority of an interviewer in a French newspaper?
  [Colonel COLTHURST did not answer the Question.]
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. LAW): I have seen in the newspapers the statement referred to in this Question; but I have no means of knowing whether it was published, as alleged, on the authority of the hon. Gentleman the junior Member for Cork. [Mr. HEALY: Hear, hear!] So far, however, as the statement itself is concerned, I can say that neither the present Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin nor any of his predecessors have been nominated to that See by the English Government. The statement quoted is utterly void of foundation.

  PIERS AND HARBOURS (IRELAND)— FOYNES HARBOUR.
  MR, DAWSONasked the Secretary to the Treasury, If his attention has been drawn to the present state of Foynes Harbour, which for want of dredging has silted up, and to the fact that the pier is unapproachable, necessitating the erection some time ago of a floating stage, now rapidly decaying; and, whether, in view of the requirements of the traffic and the probability of the establishment of a fishing station at the mouth of the Shannon, the Board of Works will have the harbour and pier put into proper condition?
  LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISH: The unsatisfactory state of Foynes Harbour has long been a matter of difficulty. Some years back an offer was made by the Treasury to contribute one-half of the cost, estimated at £1,200, of extending the jetty into deep water, provided the other half was contributed by those locally interested; but as no contributions were forthcoming, the design fell through. Subsequently a floating stage and gangway were attached to the end of the jetty by the Limerick and Foynes Railway Company for the use of the steamer running in connection with their line. It is supposed that it is this construction that the hon. Member describes as rapidly decaying. Recently the matter has received special attention, and inquiries are being made as to the best course to be adopted for putting the

  135
  harbour into a proper condition. In the meantime, directions have been given for making the harbour available, as far as possible, for fishing vessels by dredging out the mud at the pier-head.

  PARLIAMENT—"DRAFT EDITORIALS" —THE GOVERNMENT AND THE PRESS.
  MR. O'DONNELLasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether it was with the sanction of the Government that certain draft editorials on Mr. Speaker's New Rules and other matters have been forwarded to organs of the Press by the Noble Lord the Patronage Secretary; whether the acceptance of such draft editorials is connected with the communication of official information; and, whether he will lay upon the Table of the House, a list of the journals in London and the provinces which are in receipt of official information?
  MR. GLADSTONE: The Question of the hon. Member, if he will allow me to observe, is not one of a very usual character. It is, no doubt, within the Rules of the House, or it would not have been allowed to be placed on the Paper; but I am bound to say that with regard to Questions of this kind, and any Questions addressed to Members of the Government as to communications which they hold on their own responsibility, even with any gentlemen connected with the Press or any other person whatsoever, I have the greatest doubt—I will not deny the right of Members to put them—but I very greatly doubt our obligation to answer them. Let it be understood, therefore, that I enter a general protest. At the same time, in this particular case, a refusal to answer would appear to throw an air of mystery over an affair about which there need be no mystery whatever. I will not criticize the language of this Question; it is, a good deal of it, beyond the sphere of my knowledge, and I am not sure what is meant by draft "editorials." I know nothing about the draft editorials to which the hon. Gentleman refers or from whom he derives his information, such as it may have been, though I dare say it may have been from some Member of the House, possibly from one not sitting a very great distance from his present seat. But I have made inquiry from my noble Friend who is the imme-
  136
  diate object of this Question, and I have been provided with the following simple explanation on the subject:—When the Speaker's New Rules were read to the House a few notes upon them were drawn up by a private Member. I may perhaps observe, in passing, that as, by the Rules of the House, these Rules cannot be made the subject of discussion, I imagine that that private Member considered he was rather doing a service to the public than otherwise in endeavouring to explain or elucidate anything connected with them through the medium mf the public Press. However, he drew up a few notes upon them, and he requested my noble Friend (Lord Richard Grosvenor)—who was no more than a medium in the case—to forward them to the editor of The Daily News. My noble Friend did forward them; but, unfortunately, the editor did not make any use of them. That is the true story of a very grave and, I must say, rather an alarming Question.

  IRELAND—FAILURE OF SEED POTATOES.
  MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the fact that, although the whiterock potatoes supplied by the Poor Law Union authorities to the poor in Ireland last Spring have almost universally failed, the Guardians are not in a position, under the existing Law, to dispense with payment for the same; and, whether he proposes to take steps to relieve the poor people in question from payment for the seed that failed?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. LAW): I have communicated with my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary for Ireland in reference to this Question, and he wishes me to say, in reply to it, that his attention has been called to the fact that in some cases the seed potatoes supplied by the Boards of Guardians last spring have failed; but he has reason to believe that this failure has not been general, and it is not his intention to propose any legislation on the subject.

  POOR LAW (ENGLAND)—ST. OLAVE'S WORKHOUSE.
  MR. BLENNERIIASSETTasked the President of the Local Government

  137
  Board, Whether he has caused inquiry to be made into the following circumstance, which is reported to have taken place at the Southwark Police Court on Friday last:—
  "Elizabeth Shepherd, a young woman who had a child in her arms, waited upon Mr. Bridge to complain of the conduct of the guardians of St. Olave's Union, who had thrust her and her baby into the streets. About two months ago she was taken very ill, and, being destitute and friendless, was admitted to the St. Olave's Workhouse. On Wednesday last she was turned out by order of the guardians. She had no home or friends to go to, and she and the child were ill. Dr. Gittings, the medical attendant of the workhouse, was in court when the woman told her story, and confirmed it in every particular, saying he was surprised at her being turned out of the workhouse that morning, as her child was in a very bad state, and she had no means of providing for it. The presiding magistrate said he was of opinion that the guardians had acted very cruelly, and he had no hesitation in saying that had the child died, the guardians would have rendered themselves liable to be charged with manslaughter;"
  whether, if these allegations are well founded, the guardians acted within their legal powers in expelling these sick and friendless persons from the workhouse; and, what steps he proposes to take to prevent a recurrence of similar conduct?
  MR. DODSON: Inquiry has been made, and the report as to the discharge of the woman and her child appears to be substantially correct, except that the woman herself was in good health at the time of her discharge, and the order was not given by the Board of Guardians, but by a member of the Visiting Committee. The proceeding was altogether irregular. If however, the order had been given by the Board of Guardians, who unquestionably have the power of ordering the discharge of any person whom they may think able to maintain himself, the present case certainly does not appear to be one in which that power should have been exercised. The Board are at present in communication with the Guardians on the subject; but, pending their reply, I cannot say whether it will be necessary to take any steps to prevent the recurrence of a similar proceeding.

  COURT OF BANKRUPTCY, IRELAND— THE RETURNS.
  MR. LITTONasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Why
  138
  the Returns ordered on the 20th July, 1880, in relation to the Court of Bankruptcy, Ireland, have not been yet presented; and, whether he will be good enough to hasten the Returns?
  LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISH: I am sorry for the delay which has occurred in preparing these Returns, which has been partly owing to a misapprehension. Since then I have been in communication with the hon. Member for Dungannon (Mr. Dickson) with the view, if possible, somewhat to simplify the form of one of the Returns, which in its original shape would have been very expensive. The alterations have been agreed upon, and since then the Returns have been in preparation. One of them, Estates in bankruptcy prior to 31st of December, 1878, having assets undivided, will probably be completed within a fortnight, but the other one involves so much detail that it is feared that some time will still be required for its completion; but it is being pressed on as rapidly as possible.

  LAW AND JUSTICE—ADMISSION OF SOLICITORS TO THE BAR.
  MR. FINIGANasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether, in view of the resolution stated to have been passed by the Benchers of the Inns of Court, as to solicitors being admitted to the Bar after keeping four terms, it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to bring in a measure by which increased facilities will be afforded to barristers becoming solicitors; and, whether it is not at the present time necessary that barristers must be of five years' standing before they can be admitted on the roll of solicitors, and pass the usual final examinations for solicitors?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES), in reply, was understood to say that he was not aware that any complaint had been made as to the hardship of the existing regulations; there was no intention on the part of the Government to propose any legislation on the subject.

  METROPOLITAN BOARD OF WORKS— SUBWAYS.
  SIR HARRY VERNEYasked the honourable Member for Truro, Whether, when a new street is formed, it is the habit of the Metropolitan Board at the same

  139
  time to make a subway for containing gas, water, and other pipes; and, whether the Board will use their endeavours to have subways made whenever they have the opportunity of doing so?
  SIR JAMES M'GAREL-HOGG: In reply to my hon. Friend's Question, I beg to state that in forming new streets the Metropolitan Board have, when considered advisable, made subways for containing gas and other pipes, as in the case of the Victoria Embankment, Queen Victoria Street, Northumberland Avenue, Commercial Street, White-chapel, Garrick Street, and Southwark Street. The great inconvenience, however, of disturbing existing arrangements would not, I think, justify the formation of subways in all cases; and I am not, therefore, prepared to say that the Board will, on all occasions, use their endeavours to have them made. Power is usually taken in the case of long and continuous improvements to form subways; and such power has been taken with regard to the new streets proposed from Charing Cross to Tottenham Court Road and from Piccacadilly Circus to New Oxford Street.

  MIDDLESEX MAGISTRATES—MUSIC LICENCES (GOOD FRIDAY).
  MR. BRYCEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it is the fact that the form of music licence granted by the Middlesex magistrates expressly forbids the performance of any music in a licensed hall on Good Friday, although that day is not mentioned in the Licencing Act 25 Geo. 2, c. 36; whether he is aware that, in consequence of the action of the Middlesex magistrates in so framing their form of licence, and in refusing to permit any deviation from its terms, the directors of important public institutions in London are unable to have oratorios performed on Good Friday in the public halls under their charge; and, whether he will consider the propriety of so amending the Law as to enable the directors of these public halls to give sacred music on Good Friday?
  MR. COURTNEY, in reply, was understood to say it was true that Good Friday was not mentioned in the Act of Geo. II. In fact, no day was prohibited by that statute. The Justices were authorized to grant licences at their dis-
  140
  cretion, and at their discretion they had excluded Sunday, Christmas Day, Good Friday, and public fast days. He understood from the Clerk of the Peace for Middlesex that no application had ever been made for a variation of the usual terms on which licences were granted; and it was, therefore, incorrect to speak of any refusal on their part. Moreover, the Colleague of the hon. Member (Mr. Ritchie) had given Notice to bring the Question before the Middlesex magistrates at their next meeting; and, in view of this, it would be premature to consider the propriety of fresh legislation.

  PARLIAMENTARY REPORTERS.
  CAPTAIN O'SHEAasked the First Commissioner of Works, What progress has been made towards providing suitable rooms for the representatives of the press in this House, the number of whom has been increased during the present Session, by Mr. Speaker's consent, to upwards of 200.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE, in reply, said, that he had no objection to give further accommodation for the Reporters, as he admitted that the present accommodation was insufficient and unsatisfactory. It was no easy matter, however, to determine how to do so. He hoped to be in a position before long to do something for the Reporters. But they were much cramped for room in that part of the building.

  ARMY (THE AUXILIARY FORCES)— ARMOURIES FOR VOLUNTEER CORPS.
  MR. RANKINasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether, in consideration of the recent order with respect to the safe custody of rifles belonging to Volunteer corps, it would be possible to obtain some additional grant to assist the corps in defraying the expenses incurred by them in providing armouries?
  MR. CHILDERS: In reply to the hon. Gentleman, I have to state that the confidential Circular to which he alludes only instructed Colonels of Militia, Yeomanry, or Volunteer regiments to take precautions for the security of their arms and ammunition against sudden attack. Volunteer corps have to find their own armouries out of the capitation grant. I cannot promise any additional assistance for this purpose.

  PROTECTION OF PERSON AND PROPERTY ACT, 1881–THE CARTER ESTATE.
  MR. GRAY (for Mr. HEALY)asked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, If his attention has been drawn to a letter signed "Geo. T. Shaen Carter," addressed to the Rev. Henry Hewson, J.P. of Belmullet, county Mayo, and published in the "Freeman's Journal" of Saturday, in which he promises this clergyman that if certain persons will pay him rent—
  "It will be my pleasure to defend all the tenants on the Carter estate (with very few exceptions) from any aggressive action they may be subject to under the Coercion Bill, and I shall do so energetically wherever I find the opportunity. I shall give the tenants two weeks to come in and pay;"
  and, whether Mr. Carter had any authority whatsoever to make promises of this description; and, if not, whether the Government will take any notice of the covert threats conveyed by his letter to certain of his tenants?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. LAW): Since Notice of this Question was given by the hon. Member, I have read the letter referred to. Mr. Carter had no authority from the Government for writing the letter, nor is the matter one which calls for the interference of the Government.

  PUBLIC HEALTH—SMALL-PDX (METROPOLIS)—FULHAM SMALL-POX HOSPITAL.
  MR. FIRTHasked the President of the Local Government Board, Whether it is the fact that Fulham Small-Pox Hospital is now made the receptacle for more than one-third of the small-pox patients of the whole of London; whether the borough of Chelsea, which includes the whole of Kensington, Notting Hill, Fulham, Chelsea, and Hammersmith have volunteered to take charge of their own small-pox patients; whether the Metropolitan Asylums Board and the Local Government Board have not declined to confine the said hospital to such district; whether the Local Government Board do not decline to receive a deputation to urge such limitation; whether, according to the decision in a recent case, a small-pox hospital is not a nuisance per se which may at any time be stayed by injunction; whether he is
  142
  aware that the inhabitants of Western London, in consequence of such refusal as aforesaid, propose to take legal proceedings to obtain such injunction; and, whether, in order to save public money being wasted in fruitless litigation by the Metropolitan Asylums Board in defending such proceedings, he is prepared forthwith to advise such Board to close Fulham Small-Pox Hospital, and to remit the patients to the care of local authorities, or otherwise to abate such nuisance?
  MR. DODSON: The Notice of the hon. Member contains no less than seven distinct Questions. I will endeavour to answer them as concisely as I can. In answer to the first, it is not the fact that the Fulham Small-Pox Hospital is made the receptacle for more than one-third of the small-pox cases in the Metropolis. The total number in the hospitals of the managers is 763, of which 217 are in Fulham. I have not received any offer from the borough of Chelsea to take charge of their own small-pox patients. The borough, as such, has no power to undertake such a charge; and the vestries of the several parishes in the borough have not, so far as I have been able to learn, provided any hospital for such cases, although express power was given to them to do so as far back as 1866, and they have, from time to time, been reminded of it. The hospitals of the Metropolitan Asylums Board, of which Fulham is one, were provided for the whole Metropolis, at the cost of ratepayers generally; and so long as there is spare accommodation, admission could not be refused to patients sent from any part of that area. For this reason it appeared to me useless to receive a deputation on this subject. The alleged decision that a small-pox hospital is per se a nuisance, and may be stayed by injunction, is now the subject of appeal to the House of Lords. I am not aware that the inhabitants of Western London propose to apply for an injunction. My reply to the last Question is that I am not prepared to advise the Metropolitan Asylums Board to close this hospital and remit small-pox patients generally to the care of the local authorities, more especially seeing that the vestries and district boards have, as a rule, failed to provide hospitals, as they should have done—at all events for non-pauper cases, which form more than half of the cases admitted.

  DUBLIN SCIENCE AND ART MUSEUMS —THE NATIONAL LIBRARY, DUBLIN.
  MR. DAWSONasked the Vice President of the Council, Whether any site has yet been fixed on for the National Library in Dublin; whether any decision as to its external and internal plan has been arrived at; and, if the Trustees of the Library have been consulted on these points; if he would state why the Reports of the Visitors of the Dublin Science and Art Museum, the Natural History Collection, and Botanic Gardens for 1877, 1878, 1879, and 1880 have not been laid before Parliament; and, if the Visitors have met, and how often, to advise on matters affecting the Institutions above named?
  MR. MUNDELLA: The Lord President visited Dublin during the Recess for the express purpose of settling, if possible, the long-pending questions referred to by the hon. Member. He called the Visitors together for the first time, to consult with them as to the site for the new Museum. He also had an interview with the Trustees of the Library, and ascertained their views as to its future location and arrangement. We have not made the progress we hoped, owing to the conflict of opinion in Dublin as to the Leinster Lawn site. I can, however, assure the hon. Member that we are very anxious to come to some agreement as to the site, and to commence the new buildings as soon as possible. We shall ask the House for a Vote of money for that purpose; but, until the site has been decided upon, no plans can be finally settled. As to the last part of his Question, the Visitors not having been convened before the Lord President's recent visit, no Reports have been received from them; but a fortnight ago the Director of the Science and Art Department in Dublin was instructed to call them together, and I understand they all meet this week to discuss the points referred to in the hon. Member's Question. Any Reports they may make will be submitted to Parliament.

  THE EDUCATION ACTS—SCHOOL FEES
  MR. W. NEWZAM NICHOLSONasked the Vice President of the Council, If his attention has been called to a decision given by Justices Lindley and
  144
  Lopes, in the Court of Common Pleas on Saturday last, in an appeal from a decision of magistrates who hail fined a man five shillings for not causing a child to attend a school:—It appeared that a child, in obedience to a magistrate's order, had been sent to school, but without the school fees, and that admission had been consequently refused; the learned judges quashed the conviction, on the ground that the appellant had sufficiently complied with the order by sending his child to school, adding that, if this interpretation had the effect of creating difficulties about payment of fees, "which was likely enough," that was an omission to be remedied elsewhere; if he will initiate some legislation which will prevent the compulsory clauses of the Education Acts being so neutralized; and, if he will also take into consideration the desirability of reenacting the clauses that gave power to school boards to pay the school fees of children of necessitous parents?
  MR. MUNDELLA: My attention has been drawn to the newspaper report of the decision to which the hon. Member has referred, and we have decided to consult the Law Officers of the Crown as to the steps it may be advisable to take in consequence. I can hold out no expection to my hon. Friend that the Government will re-enact the 25th clause of the Act of 1870, which the noble Lord the Member for Liverpool (Viscount Sandon) found it necessary to repeal; but we are considering whether it is not possible to assist the children of necessitous parents to obtain payment of school fees with less difficulty and less contact with the machinery of the Poor Law than at present.

  THE ORDNANCE SURVEY.
  MR. NEWDEGATEasked the First Commissioner of Works, When the enlarged Ordnance Map of Warwickshire will be published?
  MR. WIGGINasked a similar Question with regard to Staffordshire.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVREI am afraid I cannot promise a very speedy publication of the Survey of Warwickshire, as, even under the scheme for accelerating the Surveys, it will not be begun till 1885. Of course, all the counties cannot be surveyed at the same time; but no time is lost in completing a Survey when

  145
  once it is begun. I cannot, at this moment, answer the Question of the hon. Member for Staffordshire.
  MR. NEWDEGATEasked, whether it was in any way in the power of the county of Warwick to assist in the earlier production of the Map?
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: Some of the towns obtained earlier Surveys by contributing a certain portion of the expenses. I am not sure whether the same thing can be done by counties; but I will make inquiries.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE TRANSVAAL— BRITISH GARRISONS.
  MR. GOURLEYasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether he can, without detriment to the public service, inform the House of the latest authentic intelligence received at the War Office respecting the provisioning of Pretoria, Potchefstroom, and Wakenstroom, and also if in the opinion of military authorities at home, it is deemed to be absolutely necessary for Sir Evelyn Wood to risk an early advance in order to relieve those garrisons; or whether it is intended as far as practicable to restrict further operations until the arrival of General Sir F. Roberts?
  MR. CHILDERS: Surely my hon. Friend must be aware that I could not, with due regard to the interests of the Public Service, state to the House, and through the House to the Boers, what is the condition of the beleaguered garrisons in the Transvaal. I have given to the House at this Table, and I have sent to the newspapers, all the information upon subjects of this kind which I think proper to communicate. If my hon. Friend would look at the morning papers he would see that with respect to Pretoria provisions were in abundance. As to the latter part of his Question, I am still more surprised that he should think of putting it to me.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE BASUTOS— OFFICIAL MINUTE OF THE CAPE MINISTRY.
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACHasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether it is true that Sir Hercules Robinson and the Ministers of the Cape Colony have published an official minute protesting against the public expression of disapprobation by the Home Government of
  146
  the terms of peace offered to the Basutos; and, if so, whether he will communicate such minute to the House?
  MR. GLADSTONE: I believe this Question has reference to an answer lately given in this House. [Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH: Yes.] All I can say at present is this—that on the 28th of last month Sir Hercules Robinson informed Lord Kimberley by telegraph that his Ministers were engaged in preparing a Minute on the subject. That Minute has not been transmitted to the Secretary of State, and he has no official intimation of its publication, or any official knowledge of its contents. It is probable that we shall have more information in the course of a few days; and I need hardly say that we shall then be happy to give the required information.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE TRANSVAAL (MILITARY OPERATIONS)—THE COMMAND OF THE FORCES.
  MR. WHALLEYasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether it is true that Major General Newdegate is under orders for the seat of war in South Africa; and, if so, on what grounds Her Majesty's Government have thought fit to supersede Sir Evelyn Wood as second in command of the forces there?
  MR. CHILDERS: I hope, Sir, that the House will not expect me to explain to them the reasons for the appointment of the officers selected to command Divisions or Brigades under Sir Frederick Roberts. I should deprecate extremely the House of Commons taking upon itself duties for which the Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary of State for War are especially responsible. But I must remind the House that matters have very materially altered since Sir Evelyn Wood went out to serve under Sir George Colley. The force in or on the way to Natal and the Transvaal now exceeds 15,000 men; and it would be out of the question to lay down the rule that no officer should be employed under Sir Frederick Roberts with higher rank than that of Colonel, which would be the result of only employing juniors to Sir Evelyn Wood. Sir Evelyn Wood is only a Colonel with Brigadier's rank; and in the event of Sir Frederick Roberts being disabled, it would be out of the question that the command of 15,000 men should devolve on an officer, how-over distinguished, of that rank.
  MR. O'DONNELL: Does the right hon. Gentleman think it right to communicate to the Boers the amount of the force on its way to Natal?
  MR. CHILDERS: Yes; because it has already been communicated to the newspapers, and is very well known to everybody who reads them.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE TRANSVAAL (NEGOTIATIONS).
  MR. HANBURY TRACYasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether the Government has considered the propriety of associating with Sir F. Roberts a civil commissioner, who might give assistance to the Commander in Chief in the event of an opportunity occurring of entering into negotiations with the Boers, in the same manner as political officers in India are attached to armies in the field?
  MR. GLADSTONE: Upon this subject I have to say that, when Sir Frederick Roberts accepted the appointment of Commander-in-Chief in South Africa, he was informed that in the event of negotiations for the settlement of affairs in the Transvaal, Her Majesty's Government would, in all probability, appoint Civil Commissioners for the purpose of conducting those negotiations. At the present juncture it would not be advantageous to enter further upon that matter. But I may say there is a widespread, and, I think, natural and just, anxiety on the part of Members of the House for information with regard to the political situation of the question in South Africa, and I wish to explain as exactly as I can at the present moment how we stand, hoping in a short time to be able to give fuller information. The House is aware generally that there were negotiations going on at the period immediately before the lamentable event of Sunday last—that actual communications had been made to the Boers, and that an answer was expected from them. The sad death of Sir George Colley has retarded, and, up to the present moment, prevented our receiving information as to the present position of those communications. On Sir George Colley's return from Majuba Hill, he would unquestionably have let us know their exact position. It will be borne in mind that in the actual state of things the authority devolved upon Sir Evelyn Wood; but Sir Evelyn Wood was not
  148
  at the front, and has not, therefore, been able to give us the information that we expected from Sir George Colley. On Tuesday last, my noble Friend (the Earl of Kimberley) telegraphed to Sir Evelyn Wood requesting him to lose no time in obtaining that information, and sending it to us in the fullest and most explicit form. Considering the probability of Sir Evelyn Wood's position, the time has hardly yet arrived to enable us to receive an answer to that telegram, but it may be expected within a very short period; and it will not be possible without that answer for us to convey to Parliament information of such a character as might not be open to the risk of leading to misapprehension after what has occurred. We hope to receive it in a very short time—very probably in a day or two, as it is not unlikely that Sir Evelyn Wood may have reached the front at the time I speak—and that then it may be in our power to lay before Parliament an exact account of the political situation as regards the communications between the Government and the Boers, so that hon. Members may be in a position to form their own judgment as to what has occurred. My right hon. Friend near me (Mr. Childers) informs me more distinctly that Sir Evelyn Wood will probably be at the front this evening.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE TRANSVAAL (MILITARY OPERATIONS)—THE NAVAL DETACHMENT AT MAJUBA.
  MR. W. H. SMITHasked the Secretary to the Admiralty, If he would give the House any information as to the number of men in the Naval contingent engaged at Majuba Hill on Sunday last; whether he could state how many were killed and wounded; and what their behaviour was so far as he had any information?
  MR. TREVELYAN: We have just had a telegram from the Commodore, in which he gives an account of the loss in the Naval Detachment, or, as in some of the newspaper accounts it is misleadingly styled, the Naval Brigade. Lieutenant Trower, of the Boadicea, and 16 men were killed; and Commander Hominy was wounded—very dangerously wounded—as well as 16 of his men. That is all we know; and as regards the behaviour of our seamen,

  149
  that is enough. As far as we have heard anything officially, the contingent went out 60 strong. The Gatling guns could not be hauled up the precipices, and had to be sent back to camp; and we may answer for it that they did not go back without a sufficient escort. Out of the slender remnant which stood on the hill top, 34 were killed and wounded; and the Admiralty await in full confidence the details of a story which, even in its present condition, speaks for itself.

  STATE OF IRELAND—MR. JOHN DEVOY.
  MR. GRAYasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether he will kindly read to the House the telegram he received from Mr. John Devoy of New York, and to which reference was made yesterday?
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I hope the hon. Member will not think me discourteous if I decline to comply with his request. If I produced the telegram, I should be giving to the affair an importance it does not deserve.
  MR. CALLAN: If the right hon. Gentleman will not read the telegram, perhaps he will inform the House, and through the House his many friends, whether the telegram alleged to have been received by him from Mr. John Devoy really contained any positive threat as to the right hon. Gentleman's life. I ask the Question all the more, as I understand that Mr. John Devoy is rather a small man.
  MR. GRAY; Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether he still adheres to his assertion, that the words "stamp out" were used in the telegram?
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I will not say. It is some time since I saw the telegram; but I remember the word "stamp" was in it. The other hon. Member asks me on behalf of his many friends—[Mr. CALLAN: The right hon. Gentleman's many friends.]—I do not know whether the hon. Member——
  MR. CALLAN: I rose distinctly to ask the right hon. Gentleman to allay the fears of the right hon. Gentleman's own friends.
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I thought, perhaps, you meant the many friends of Mr. John Devoy.
  MR. CALLAN: Sir! ["Order!"]
  MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member has put his Question, and he must allow the right hon. Gentleman to answer it.
  MR. CALLAN: I ask the House to allow me to express my regret and indignation that the right hon. Gentleman should think it consistent with his position to insinuate that I am in any way one of Mr. Devoy's friends.
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I did not mean to insinuate that the hon. Member was a friend of Mr. John Devoy, and I am very glad he repudiates him; but, as he has asked the Question on my behalf, I can assure him, and, through him, my many friends, that I have no apprehension on the subject.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.
  PEACE PRESERVATION (IRELAND) BILL.— [BILL 98.]
  (Secretary Sir William Harcourt Mr. Gladstone, Mr. William Edward Forster.)
  PEACE PRESERVATION (IRELAND) BILL.— [BILL 98.]
    SECOND READING.

      ADJOURNED DEBATE. [SECOND NIGHT.]
      Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Amendment proposed to Question [2nd March], "That the Bill be now read a second time."
      And which Amendment was, to leave out the word "now" and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."—(Mr. Justin M'Carthy.)
      Question again proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
      Debate resumed.
      MR. DAWSONsaid, when he was interrupted the day before, he was pointing out that though in the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General for Ireland there had been a great deal of sound, there was a lamentable deficiency of facts and figures to support his argument. It was said that Mr. Hearne had been foully murdered; but Mr. Hearne was still living. It was also said, to add a dash of sensationalism to the matter, that Mr. Hearne was an agent of the brother of Lord Mountmorres. It had turned out, however, that he had no connection with that unfortunate nobleman, and that he was not dead. So it was that hour by hour, and day by day, additional light was thrown upon the inaccuracy of the statements which proceeded from the

      151
      Treasury Bench; and if the Bill were postponed more light might be brought to bear on the situation, to show how utterly unsuitable was the measure before the House. The hon. and learned Gentleman had cast a very severe censure upon the Irish Members on account of the manner in which the Irish Judges had been spoken of. It would, no doubt, be an extremely novel and unaccountable thing to hear hon. Members speak thus of English Judges; but it would not be so regarded if hon. Gentlemen were only intimately acquainted with the procedure which led to the Judicial Bench in Ireland, and with the conduct of those who found themselves in that high place. In this country eminent lawyers, irrespective of Party considerations, were chosen from the ranks of their fellows to sit on the judgment seat, and none of them were open to fear, favour, or affection. But in Ireland men proceeded to the Bench through the mire of politics; they were obliged, in too many cases, to be agitators, and there was evidence of one Judge, now deceased, whose appointment was a matter of debate in that and the other House on account of the agrarian agitation which he had stimulated. Therefore, they found excited harangues from the Bench where they should expect to find coolness and impartiality. A Chief Justice in Ireland had, in his own hearing, confessed in open Court that he had been carried away by passion and blinded by prejudice, and, therefore, he abandoned the part which otherwise he would have taken at a late trial. He would, however, address himself to the specific provisions of the Bill. The hon. Member for Sligo (Mr. Sexton), with his usual ability, had proved that continuous Arms Acts had in every case been followed by an additional crop of crime. Arms might be used by bodies of men riotously proceeding through the country and terrifying peaceable inhabitants. If that were so in Ireland, he would at once favour its repression with a strong hand. But that idea was immediately dismissed, when they came to consider the matter carefully. If there were bands of 50 and 100 armed men perambulating the country now, an Arms Act was not required for their repression. The provisions of the ordinary law would enable such bands to be stopped in their riotous career. It was said in that House, on
      152
      the part of the Government, that there should be every forbearance in the disarming of the Basutos; and, if so, it should not seem strange that a nation not in arms should appeal to the House to temper coercion with mercy. Firing at the person was a very tangible crime; and yet, with the gradual aggravation of distress in the last three months of last year, there were only three cases in October, three in November, and seven in December. Not one of these cases was attended by any personal injury. This was over the entirety of Ireland, amongst a population of 6,000,000, in a time of aggravated distress and the most intense excitement. But even then, when they looked into these, the majority of the cases turned out to be family quarrels, having no connection with the Land League, and which could not be termed agrarian. In one case, in October, a man named Harding had by will left his farm to a younger son, to the exclusion of the elder son, who had come from America expecting to have the farm. There was a family quarrel, and the pistol was fired by the wife of the elder son, who was tried, convicted by a jury, and sentenced to 12 months hard labour. In one case, in November, there had been a long standing family feud, existing long before the Land League was heard of, and before his hon. Friend (Mr. Parnell) had assumed his present prominent position. In this case, too, the offender was convicted by an Irish jury, and sentenced to 20 years' penal servitude. In the last case, in November, in which no injury was inflicted, the man was found guilty and sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment. In nearly every case in which a tangible crime had been committed evidence was forthcoming, and Irish jurors did convict. There had been no time to examine the Return just issued for December; but he recognized one case in which there had been a long-standing family quarrel. In the whole quarter there were only two agrarian murders. This was at a period of political excitement and aggravated distress in the four Provinces of Ireland, with its 32 counties and 5,000,000 of people. The cases of firing did not in the slightest way justify such a Bill as this, and there had been only two agrarian murders. It was astounding that the Government should think for a moment of bringing forward

      153
      a Bill of such a nature on such flimsy reasons. Let them turn to England, and for the same period they would see greater reasons for passing an Arms Bill for England. Let the Home Secretary turn to the shooting affair at Kensington, and the undiscovered murder of an officer in a dastardly manner at Chatham. In Ireland there were no such terrible cases, and yet an Arms Bill was about to be passed for that country, while he saw no sign that the people of England were about to be subjected to similar legislation. The noble Lord the President of the Council, speaking a few evenings before in "another place," had quoted the opinion of Lord Macaulay, to the effect that the Habeas Corpus Act was the bulwark of English freedom, and that the liberty which it gave ought not to be touched except for overwhelming reasons, and with the probability that good results would follow from its curtailment. But, in the present instance, no such overwhelming case had been proved, and the measure before the House, instead of tending to good results, was calculated to have the very opposite effect. That was the view, he believed, which the people of England now took of coercive legislation, which, notwithstanding the speeches made by the President of the Board of Trade in the Autumn, the Government had proposed. It was, perhaps, useless for him to deliver these remarks to the House when the mind of the Government was made up in the same way as it was made up in regard to the last Bill. Irish Members had been credited with good debating powers when there was none to debate with. It, nevertheless, was the duty of the Representatives of Ireland to protest to the uttermost against this superfluous and most unjust Bill; and notwithstanding the speeches of the Home Secretary, who took refuge in lengthy quotations, delivered, it must be admitted, with dramatic effect—
      "Not florid prose nor honeyed lines of rhyme Can blazon evil deeds or consecrate a crime."
      MR. DILLONsaid, he rose for the purpose of opposing this Bill, which seemed to him a most unnecessary measure; but, before he gave his reasons for objecting to the Bill, he would ask the permission of the Speaker and the indulgence of the House for five minutes, whilst he uttered a word or two of personal explanation on behalf of an absent
      154
      friend in answer to what he must term a most cowardly and uncalled-for attack. He thought he had a right to make a personal explanation on his own behalf; for he had read a speech of the Home Secretary, which had been interpreted by the Irish people to mean that he (Mr. Dillon) was an assassin. He only wished, however, to speak on behalf of his friend, who could not speak in this House, and who, the Home Secretary had boasted, could not set his foot on English soil. He thought it would have shown more manliness if the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary had abstained from that boast. The words he objected to were contained in the concluding passage of the Home Secretary's speech on the third reading of the Protection of Person and Property (Ireland) Bill—namely,
      "If there exist men entertaining such sentiments, it is the duty of the House and of the Government to stamp upon them as upon a nest of vipers."
      Also, in answer to a Question with reference to Mr. Devoy, the right hon. Gentleman had said that so long as Mr. Devoy and his confederates—the leaders of the Laud League (including himself, he supposed)—thought fit to remain beyond the seas—whether at the Straits of Dover or the other side of the Atlantic—the less notice the Government took of them the better. Now, if the House complained of Mr. Devoy being thrust under their notice, he (Mr. Dillon) would never have mentioned him if the Home Secretary had not made the remark he had. After accusing Mr. Devoy of cowardice, the Home Secretary said that if he set foot on British shores it would, no doubt, be his (the Home Secretary's) official duty to pay him some attention. That was certainly inconsistent with his (Mr. Dillon's) ideas of manliness. When he read the Home Secretary's speech, he thought it contained one of the most cowardly attacks that had ever come under his notice. It was always a cowardly thing for a man, taking advantage of an eminent position, and catching the ear of the multitude, to blast the character of a man whom he knew circumstances prevented from making a reply. There were peculiar circumstances connected with the present case which made it more cowardly than an attack of this kind usually was. Who was the obscure man whom the

      155
      Home Secretary had attacked? He was a man who had spent his whole life—who had spent the best years of his manhood—struggling, sometimes in the direst poverty, against a hateful and atrocious Government, which he saw was destroying his country. He had shown, on more than one occasion, the best and highest qualities of courage; and he could not believe that when the Home Secretary taunted him with cowardice that he was acquainted with his history. For seven long years he endured the torture of an English convict prison, and, though he had never proclaimed it before the world, he had described to him treatment he received which would have disgraced the dungeons of Naples. With regard to the language used in reference to Mr. Devoy, he did not know whether hon. Members of that House were aware how inaccurate the reports of American newspapers usually were; and to charge a man with being an assassin because of some report published in an American paper was a most unjust and unwise proceeding. But suppose, for argument's sake, that Mr. John Devoy, in a moment of passion, used the very language which was attributed to him by the Home Secretary, he (Mr. Dillon) would prefer his friendship, even after he had thus spoken, to the friendship of a sleek and contented Home Secretary who could make the attack he had spoken of. Mr. John Devoy had faced imprisonment and exile, which, to him, were very bitter; he had devoted the best part of his life to a cause which he held sacred; and now, at the end of all his exertions and all his sacrifices, he saw his country, as he believed, about to be drenched with the blood of her children deliberately by the Government. He saw his country stamped on and insulted by two such worthies as the Chief Secretary for Ireland and the Home Secretary. Therefore, if, for the sake of argument, he were to admit that John Devoy made use of these words—strongly as he dissented from anything tending to assassination—he would recognize that they were spoken in a moment of rage, which he would almost call a noble rage—that they were spoken from the bitterness of a spirit which was broken by long years of suffering and disappointment, and which saw all the hopes of a lifetime overthrown. In dismissing that subject
      156
      he now wished to say a few words with regard to the present Bill. He had been accused of advising the Irish people to supply themselves with arms. He most decidedly did advise the Irish people to supply themselves with arms, and he should explain his purpose in so doing. Not being an Irish farmer himself, he did not know what view they took exactly with regard to evictions; but he might be allowed to state in that House that if he were an Irish farmer himself, and a body of men came to turn him out of his house and land, he should decidedly shoot as many of them as he could manage to do, and then abide the consequences. He believed if the Irish farmers took that course the evictions would soon come to an end in Ireland. Not being a farmer himself, and not being likely to fall under those circumstances, he had not given that advice. If he did, he might lay himself open to the charge of cowardice by recommending others to place themselves in a danger which he would not have to encounter. Therefore, he had not been in a position to give that advice. But he thought it well just to state that he held that view. [Sir WILLIAM HARCOURT: Hear, hear!] This Arms Bill seemed to him to be a very cowardly measure, and also to be one of a degrading character. It was, to his mind, one of the greatest insults that could be offered to a free people. He did not even think the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act was as insulting to a free people as to deny them the right of carrying arms. Would the Government disarm the Irish landlords? Or would they do what he thought was one of the most cowardly things ever done—would they disarm the Irish people, and leave the English people armed? The Home Secretary, in introducing this Bill, said at least it would prevent the open and ostentatious carrying of rifles and revolvers. Who was it that had carried rifles and revolvers openly and ostentatiously? Who but the landlords and their retainers, who went about and brandished them without the slightest justification? If they wished to restore peace in Ireland, they would disarm the Irish landlords, and tell them that the 50,000 troops they had sent into the country were sufficient to protect them. Let them at least disarm everyone in Ireland, and not leave the Irish people helpless, to be

      157
      shot down, as they would be by armed landlords and their armed retainers. He had been accused, as he had said already, of advising the Irish people to procure rifles. The Home Secretary might have quoted a dozen speeches of his in which he gave the same advice. He did that for this reason—that he considered if the Irish landlords had the knowledge that in every farmer's dwelling there was a rifle, it might exercise some check on their depredations. [Sir WILLIAM HARCOURT: Hear, hear!] He did not believe that the English Liberals would have lent themselves to so cowardly a proceeding as to disarm one class and leave another class armed. Neither did he believe that many of the Irish Members who had voted for coercion would have given their support to this disgraceful measure. He could not admit that a shred of justification had been shown for it, for the absurd and offensive observations of the Home Secretary with reference to plots and schemes of assassination directed against himself and his brother Ministers would justify an Arms Act for England, quite as much as Ireland. The real object of the Bill was to remove the last check upon eviction in Ireland. The landlords were not content with the suspension of the Habeas Corpus. They were not content with having placed at their disposal 50,000 troops, who were now marching about the country, insulting members of the Land League, and provoking outrage and bloodshed. It was only three days ago since he was insulted by a company of English troops at Ballybrophy, in the county Tipperary. They were drawn up at the railway station, and they called out—"There goes the Land Leaguer," without receiving any reprimand from their officers, who wore listening. Was that conduct which should be permitted to go on amongst unarmed people, smarting under injustice and oppression? If they wanted to provoke a civil war in Ireland—but it could not be a civil war, for the Irish people had not the means of waging a civil war—he wished they had—[Cries of "Oh!" and "Withdraw!"]——
      MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is now exceeding the licence of Parliamentary language in advocating civil war.
      MR. DILLONwithdrew the expression, and said, if they wished to provoke
      158
      bloodshed in Ireland, they could adopt no better means than to let their soldiers, as they were, loose through the country, insulting the people. He wished he could take hon. Gentlemen into the offices of the Land League, and show them the unfortunate farmers coming in from every district with handfuls of writs and ejectment notices, which were falling in Ireland as thick as snowflakes; in fact, he believed that the proceedings of the Irish landlords would justfy any extreme that the people might have recourse to, had they any chance of success. The landlords knew this themselves; and, therefore, they asked the Government to take the arms out of the hands of the Irish people. He must confess that the Property Defence Association had given him a great deal more trouble and anxiety than had the Coercion Bill, for they hired gangs of armed men, and sent them down to sales of property seized upon for rent. The danger attending these proceedings was terrific. They came down in the midst of furiously excited masses of people. They came armed to the teeth, and they purchased the cattle of farmers which had been seized upon and sold for rent. He acknowledged honestly that these proceedings had interfered a great deal more with the power of the Land League than the Coercion Bill could, and that he was much more uneasy about them than he was about the Coercion Act. But he still believed that he would be able to defeat the Property Defence Association. What he wished to point out was the cowardice of these men, who sent down hired gangs of armed persons whom they would not disarm, but would leave arms in their hands, to seize upon the goods of the people, and who were surrounded by crowds of armed police, and the soldiers of England, who alone supported them in their brutal conduct in Ireland. And while these men were permitted to pursue this atrocious conduct, the Government wanted to strip the people of their arms, for fear on some occasion they might in desperation, resist the proceedings. He would not detain the House much longer, and probably he should not address the House again for some time. He should not detain it, except to comment upon one of the concluding statements of the Home Secretary. He said—and in that sentence was a complete condemnation

      159
      of the Bill—he (Sir William Harcourt) said—"I have no doubt that this Bill will fail to take away all the arms from the people. I have no doubt that numbers of arms will be retained with which murders and outrages will be committed." He would ask the House to consider that while the people were taking that advice of his, which had been represented as murderous, while they were acting upon his advice of supplying themselves with rifles, had murderous outrages increased? On the contrary, it had been acknowledged on all sides, and no attempt had been made to deny it, that while the people were arming themselves with rifles, outrages decreased in a most marked manner; and while Arms Acts such as these were in operation, ten times more murders were perpetrated in Ireland than there were now. There was much of the philosophy of Irish history contained in that sentence of the Home Secretary's. He (Sir William Harcourt) looked forward, he dared say, without regret, to an increase of murderous out-rages in Ireland. The right hon. Gentleman said that numbers of these arms would be retained in spite of all their exertions, that horrible crimes would be committed with them. He (Mr. Dillon) was afraid that was so. He was afraid that if they drove those people to desperation that they would have recourse to the old methods of avenging crime, which they had hoped they had succeeded in driving them from. He told the House the simple truth in that he said the men had come to him in Ireland and had blamed him because they had induced the people to leave the old methods which they considered effectual. They said it was all very well to drive them into Constitutional agitation; but there they were now to be disarmed and put under the heel of the landlords. Formerly, when they used the more effectual weapon, one or two landlords were marked, then shot, and that proved more beneficial than all your Constitutional agitation. By their Coercion Acts they had driven the Irish people out of their paths of legal and Constitutional agitation rich they induced them to go into; and they were driven back to the dark lays of assassination by these Coercion Bills, passed amidst the jeers of a triumphant Ministry and a triumphant Irish Liberalism; if they were driven back to the dark and desperate
      160
      methods which the leaders of the Land League had almost successfully induced them to give up, he said that the blame of the murders which would be committed on the return of the Irish people to the old methods must be laid at the doors of those men who struck out of their hands the weapons of open and legal agitation by arresting the men who committed any crime, and driving the Irish people back into desperation, from which they—the Land League—sought in vain to save them.
      SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I think the time has now come when this debate may be closed. We have heard the doctrine of the Land League expounded by the man who is an authority to explain it; and to-morrow every subject of the Queen will know that the doctrine so expounded is the doctrine of treason and assassination. Sir, I will not yield to the hon. Member——
      MR. DILLON: I rise to Order, Mr. Speaker. I wish to correct a mistake.
      MR. SPEAKER: The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary is in possession of the House.
      MR. DILLON: May I not say a word in explanation? ["No!" "Order!"]
      SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: No, Sir, I did not interrupt the hon. Member, for I was determined that without interruption he should be allowed to give utterance to sentiments which, I venture to say, will bring horror and disgust into the mind of every honest man. He said it was true that over and over again he had advised the Irish people to arm themselves with rifles, and he told us he would explain for what purpose they were to have these rifles. He added—"I have not in Ireland explained to them exactly what I meant." It was well he did not. He has come here, under the privilege of this House, to explain what he meant. He said—"If I was an Irish farmer, and if I saw men come upon my land to put me out of the land, then whatever people might think, and although they might come, in the name and under the authority of the law, I would shoot as many of them as I could." That has been said in the hearing of the House of Commons. To-morrow it will be in the hearing of the civilized world, which will pronounce its judgment on this—I will use the word—this vile conspiracy.

      161
      Sir, I knew that these were the objects of the Land League. I knew it as one responsible for the public peace in the Dominions of the Queen, and as one whose duty it was to denounce it as I have denounced the language of John Devoy, as I denounced the language of Redpath, and as I denounce the language of the Member for Tipperary. I call them confederates. They are confederates in action, and their language is the same. The language of Redpath, which I read out the other day, and in which he recommended that the landlords should be shot down like rabbits, was exactly the language which the hon. Member for Tipperary has just used.
      MR. DILLON: I rise to Order, Mr. Speaker.
      SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: No, no; the hon. Member was not interrupted when he was speaking.
      MR. DILLON: I did not advise the Irish people to do any such thing. I say it is a gross misrepresentation.
      SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I am speaking in the hearing of the House, who know whether or not I have misrepresented him.
      MR. DILLON: You have misrepresented me.
      SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I have said that it was the language of assassination. I have said that it was the language of treason. You, Sir, were obliged to rise in your place and stop the hon. Member, who said he advocated and desired civil war. We now know what the hon. Member and his friends mean by saying that they are the friends of Constitutional agitation. I have given the hon. Member greater credit for his frankness. I said his doctrines, his policy, and his principles were such as deserved the severest reprobation; but I also said that, at all events, he had the manliness to avow them, and did not pretend to the hypocrisy of those who, while advocating such schemes, pretend that they are acting in a Constitutional manner. All I can say is, that the matter has passed beyond the region of debate, when we have a man in the position of the Member for Tipperary getting up and speaking as he has done. He said I was cowardly in my attack on John Devoy in the absence of the man. Did Devoy think of the absence of 4,000,000 of people, when he said he meant to set Lon-
      162
      don on fire? Was that not a cowardly action on the part of a man who was, in a manner, one of the officers of the Land League in America? I felt it my duty—and I hope the House still think that I did my duty—in telling them what I knew—that the Land League is an association which depends upon the support of the Fenian conspiracy. The hon. Member has avowed it to-day. Who are the men they know? Who support the Land League in Dublin? Is it supported by Irish subscriptions? Why, the Irish subscriptions are coppers; but the gold and silver come from Fenianism in America. That is where it comes from, and the hon. Member knows it as well as I do. Who are the men they take for their agents to send this money to Paris and thence to Dublin? Men like Devoy, a convicted Fenian. When they set to work to organize this Land League, who were the chief agents by whom it was started and conducted? Why, they were notorious Fenians, many of whom had been convicted, while others were perfectly well known to be connected with the Fenian conspiracy. I am not accusing all the people who are members of the Land League. The hon. Member for Longford (Mr. Justin M'Carthy) appealed to me the other night; but who would suppose that he had sympathized with views of this kind? I do hope and believe that most of those hon. Members who sit upon that Bench will view the sentiments of the hon. Member for Tipperary with the same abhorrence as I do, and that they will to-night get up and disavow the language we have heard. If they do not, then the Land League is condemned by the language of the hon. Member for Tipperary, which must be reprobated by every honest and Christian man. For what is the use of going to Blue Books and asking what is the meaning of these armed attacks on men, women, and children? Why, was I right or was I wrong the other night when I said that it was the language of the hon. Member for Tipperary, and men like him, which instigated to such crimes? [Mr. DILLON: You are wrong.] I say that the case is concluded. There is nothing more to be said upon the subject. [A laugh from, Mr. HEALY.] Ah! I see one Member, at least, who sympathizes with those sentiments. I am not surprised.

      163
      I should, perhaps, have made him an exception when I expressed a belief that all the persons who sat near the Member for Tipperary would disavow his language. It was said that I did not prove my case the other day. If I did not prove it then, I summoned the witness, and I meant to summon him, who should prove that case before the House of Commons. If I had had a case to prove at the Bar, I would have called the hon. Member for Tipperary to prove the true spirit, the true character, and the true nature of the Land League. There may be men who think it more prudent to use more covert language; but the language which we have heard from the hon. Member for Tipperary to-night, depend upon it, is the true spirit that animates the Land League. [Mr. BIGGAR: Hear, hear!] It is therefore that Her Majesty's Government, with the assent of an overwhelming majority of the Representatives of the people, are about, by this Bill, to take the murderous weapons out of the hands of men who represent such opinions and avow such sentiments as we have heard from the hon. Member for Tipperary to-night.
      Mr. DILLON: I only wish to say one word of personal explanation. I am perfectly prepared to stand by every word I uttered; but the right hon. Gentleman grossly misrepresents what I said. ["No!"] Yes, he did, indeed. ["No!" and cries of "Order!"] May I not say a word? He represented me as having said something which amounted to approval and admiration of assassination. I did not, indeed; and I distinctly said in the beginning that no amount of injury or wrong would induce me to tolerate such a crime for one single second.
      MR. GRAYsaid, that no man could have more regard for anyone than he entertained for the hon. Member for Tipperary. He knew him to be an honourable man. He was not connected with the Land League; but he believed it had done much good in Ireland. He felt bound now to say that he entirely dissociated himself from a considerable portion of those who belonged to the Land League and its proceedings. [cheers.] Those cheers gave him great pain. He could not justify the language which had been used, except on the ground of excitement, by the hon. Member. He did not believe it was the
      164
      language of the Land League, and he was confident that much of it would not be endorsed by that Body. But whether that was so or no the could not connect himself with them. He was sure the hon. Member spoke what was true when he said that the results of the Government legislation would be disastrous, and would bring about that bloodshed and assassination which, notwithstanding the Blue Books, had never been caused by the Land League. Anybody who knew the hon. Member knew the loving heart he had and his great spirit; and he (Mr. Gray) believed that it was because the hon. Member foresaw from his knowledge of the country—his intimate knowledge of the country—more clearly than anyone else that the legislation that was about to be consummated, and the discussion of which the Home Secretary said had reached a sufficient point, would result in such a way that the hon. Member made the speech he did. The House would understand the speech better when they saw the results of their legislation, and that the hon. Member had been led into it.
      MR. M'COANfully shared the personal respect and regard for the hon. Member for Tipperary which had been expressed by the hon. Member for Carlow. He had not been present when the speech was made, but came in while the Home Secretary was speaking; and he took it that the character of the language used was accurately expressed by the right hon. Gentleman. Had he been in the House he would have heard it with deep pain, and immediately resolved to dissociate himself from language of such a character. Although he occupied a seat amongst the Irish Party, he would not hold it for an hour if, by doing so, he was supposed to identify himself with anything un-Constitutional, still less avowedly Fenian; for he claimed to be as loyal a subject of the Queen as any Gentleman in that House. He had no sympathy with illegal action; but it was clue to his hon. Friend to say that he associated himself with him most heartily to any amount of self-sacrifice that might be necessary in the effort to reform Irish grievances by Constitutional action. He had the highest opinion of the hon. Member; but he at once disavowed all sympathy with the violent opinions he had now expressed.
      MR. HEALYsaid, that the hon. Member for Tipperary was responsible for his own words, and he was well able to defend himself in that House and elsewhere. Anything he uttered did not implicate his Colleagues; and, for his own part, he felt no obligation resting upon himself to disavow the language he had heard. It was time, indeed, that they should take a lesson from the enemy, and give no one any handle by the use of expressions which were liable to be tortured by the ingenuity of right hon. Gentlemen on the Treasury Bench. For his own part he was not inclined to do so; but what must be the state of things in Ireland and the condition of the landlords when a Member like his hon. Friend (Mr. Dillon), who was as good and honest a man as the Chief Secretary, felt it incumbent on him to say so? Desperate was the condition of the country, and to such a pass had the people been brought, that if he found an armed party came to turn him and his family out on the roadside he would shoot as many as he could. ["Oh!"] The hon. Member was responsible for his words, and the right hon. Gentleman would be happy if any other Member accepted his words; but he thought they were a little too wide to give the right hon. Gentleman a chance. For himself, when he had anything to say to the Irish farmers, he would say it to their face; and if the Irish people were to be driven to a pass when he considered certain advice necessary, he would not shrink from giving advice, no matter how bad that advice might seem in the minds of some English Members. The hon. Member for Tipperary only put into plain words what was the saying of one of the best English, or rather Irish Generals, the Duke of Wellington, who said—"If you wish for peace you must be prepared for war." His hon. Friend said that if each man had a rifle, and knew how to use it, there would be less unfair evictions. Not being prepared to engage in any war with this country, because the people would simply be mowed down, he (Mr. Healy) did not feel at liberty to give any such advice; but there was sound truth at the bottom of the saying, for if the Irish farmers had guns, and knew how to use them—just as the Boers did—the Member for Tipperary would be found to be very near the truth. The Home Secretary
      166
      had stated that the doctrine of the Land League was a doctrine of assassination and treason. That statement was a deliberate untruth.[ Cries of "Oh, oh!" and "Withdraw!"]
      MR. SPEAKER: I cannot allow that expression to pass. It is un-Parliamentary, and the hon. Member must withdraw it.
      MR. HEALYwould withdraw the expression, and say that the Home Secretary, in so describing the Land League, had stated what was distinctly untrue. [Cries of "Withdraw!" and "Name!"]
      MR. SPEAKER: That is merely a repetition of the expression. I must call upon the hon. Member distinctly to withdraw it.
      MR. HEALYsaid, he was only following the example set by the Chief Secretary, who stated that what an hon. Member had said was untrue.
      MR. SPEAKER: If the hon. Member contests the authority of the Chair I shall have only one course to take.
      MR. HEALYsaid, he did not desire to dispute the ruling of the Chair; but the expression was not necessary to his argument, and he would pass from it. ["Withdraw!"] He supposed hon. Members wished the operation repeated half-a-dozen times. So far from its being true that assassination was the doctrine of the Land League, the Land League had distinctly lessened the number of assassinations. Before the Land League they were 132; but in 1880 they were reduced to eight. It was true that there was one assassination which had excited a good deal of comment. But if anyone deserved his fate, it was the person in question; for his cruelty, his evictions, his persistent rent-raising, his exactions as a Grand Juror, his cruelty as a magistrate, marked him out, if such a thing was justifiable, for the bullet of the assassin. ["Oh"] If the right hon. Gentleman searched the speeches at Land League meetings from first to last he would find a distinct deprecation in every sense, not merely of assassination, but of outrage in all its forms, though the landlords' journals, through which information filtered into English newspapers, ignored such things. The right hon. Gentleman had accused his hon. Friend of having made his statement under the Privileges of the House. But it might have en-

      167
      tered the narrow soul of the right hon. Gentleman, if he felt himself obliged to escape from the penal consequences of his acts, to come into the House to make attacks upon absent men, and charge them with committing the breaches of truth that he had committed himself. [Cries of "Withdraw!" and "Name!"]
      MR. SPEAKERI must call upon the hon. Member to withdraw that expression at once. It is the second time that the hon. Member has offended against the Rules of the House, and I must call upon him now to withdraw the expression without equivocation.
      MR. HEALYsaid, he did so frankly, and without any reserve whatsoever, because the expression only slipped from him. ["Oh!"] Hon. Gentlemen opposite might think it very good play to engage in baiting Members engaged in a struggle of that kind; but they could afford to despise such conduct, as they had behind them the opinion of their own nation. The hon. Member for Tipperary came into the House for the purpose of repelling the charges brought against him by the right hon. Gentleman. They would soon go over to Ireland; and he would venture to say the right hon. Gentleman's opinions as to their cowardice would not be sustained. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the Land League as a "vile conspiracy." He must allow the right hon. Gentleman to choose his epithets; but the Government and the entire might of the British Crown, though attempting to pack a jury, had failed to prove a conspiracy. There was no one who knew anything about the movement that did not know it was a Constitutional and noble movement, and that it had at its head a body of men the most scrupulous in any country—the Catholic priesthood. These were the men whom the right hon. Gentleman charged, by implication, with being abettors of assassination. The right. hon. Gentleman had referred to officers of the Land League in America. No doubt, many of them had expressed themselves without restraint as to the means of getting rid of the cruel laws from which the country suffered; but it was not because the Land League accepted aid from those men that it must be held responsible for what they said. The members of the Land League were not bound by, or responsible for, the politics or the religion
      168
      of the people who chose to send help to the Irish nation. Whatever men in America might say, they were not responsible to the Land League; those in America carried on their own organization in their own way. The Irish Members were not responsible for the opinions of those in America any more than for the cut of their coats. The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary, with his usual disingenuousness—["Order, order!"]—
      MR. SPEAKER: I think the House will feel that, after the frequent admonitions I have addressed to the hon. Member, I shall only be doing my duty to the House by Naming the hon. Member. I therefore Name you, Mr. Healy, as continually disregarding the authority of the Chair.
      MR. GLADSTONE: On the declaration you, Sir, have made, I propose that the hon. Member for Wexford be suspended from the service of the House during the remainder of this day's Sitting.
      MR. HEALY: The Member for Wexford County.
      Motion made, and Question put, "That Mr. Healy be suspended from the service of the House during the remainder of this day's sitting."—(Mr. Gladstone.)
      The House divided:—Ayes 233; Noes 15: Majority 218.—(Div. List, No. 106.)
      MR. SPEAKER: If Mr. Healy is in the House, I must call upon him to withdraw.
      Mr. HEALYrose and left the House.
      Question again proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
      MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he hoped that, in spite of what had taken place, the House would hear him with patient attention. He congratulated the Home Secretary on his invitation to the hon. Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon) to attend in his place having been accepted, and on his rhetorical triumph, which might be a satisfaction to the right Eon. Gentleman, but was no proof of the gravity befitting a statesman. For his own part, he was going neither to explain nor to extenuate the language which had been used by his hon. Friend the Member for Tipperary. At the same time, he must say that his hon. Friend

      169
      had given advice to which he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) could not give his adhesion, and which he thought would rather prejudice than serve the cause which he had so much at heart. On the other hand, he was glad that his hon. Friend had used words which expressed not only his individual opinion, but the burning thoughts of many Irishmen, both in Ireland and in America. It was well that the country should stand face to face with the hot, mad passions which the Government, by its conduct, was provoking. There was no use in coming to that House and telling hon. Members that the patient was merely suffering from cold when fever was in all his veins. The coercive legislation of the present Session was stirring up every bitter memory of the past; and statesmen who were not simply rhetoricians, and whose aim was not, by resorting to paltry witticisms, to win a momentary cheer, were not sorry when the true state of a country was laid before them, in order that, knowing the disease, they might try to apply the remedy. If his hon. Friend the Member for Tipperary had used hot language, it was only because he was giving voice to that universal sentiment in Ireland which the insulting sneers and safe braggadocio of the Secretary of State for the Home Department was so active an agent in promoting. He would remind the right hon. Gentleman that, in discharging in that House what ought to be the solemn and painful duty of proposing coercive legislation, a spirit of conciliation would have become him, and that taunts and sneers should be avoided, even though by refraining from their use he might receive one cheer the less. The restless vanity of the right hon. Gentleman might, he thought, on an occasion like the present, be satisfied in the absence of such incense. If his hon. Friend the Member for Tipperary had been betrayed into a display of feeling to which the right hon. Gentleman objected, he himself was the culprit who had provoked it by his insults. His hon. Friend had spoken of the dreadful possibility of civil war in Ireland, and had stated that if he was a farmer he would shoot as many of those persons who came to enforce an eviction upon his farm as possible. And did his hon. Friend stand alone? They had the words of the Prime Minister to show that the murderous outrage at Clerkenwell had
      170
      matured public opinion in England. [Mr. GLADSTONE: No, no.] The right hon. Gentleman had given several explanations on that point; but the fact remained that that outrage matured the opinions of English politicians as to the necessity of practical politics for Ireland. It was well that heated and passionate language like that used by the hon. Member for Tipperary should occasionally be heard in that House as a warning against the criminal and dangerous courses in which the present Government were engaged. The object of the Land Leaguers was that the people should offer a passive but Constitutional resistance to those who rack-rented their farms, and to pay only as much rent as they were able to do. As for the Bill, the best they could hope for it was that it would prove merely ineffectual. He would do all he could to discourage crime; but he very much feared, remembering the previous experience of the country, that crime under that Bill would increase.
      MR. GEORGE RUSSELLsaid, that some of those who sat below the Gangway on the Ministerial side had that night learnt a lesson which they would not readily forget. They had not been willing to include the whole body of Irish Members in one condemnation. They had discriminated between man and man—between, for instance, the hon. Gentleman the Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon), whose courage and candour they had respected, and some of his Coadjutors, who had neither the courage of their convictions, nor the silence of their shame. But the language that night of the hon. Member for Tipperary, although it might, perhaps, be the outcome of excitement, had been vividly impressed on the minds of all who heard it. It was true that his language had been disclaimed by those who sat near the hon. Member; but the hon. Member had expressed by his words, plainly and unmistakably, the terrible sentiments which the House had been told from the Treasury Bench actuated a great part of those who were said to be fighting for the liberties of Ireland. One hon. Member, in disclaiming the policy of murder and civil war, had expressly done so on the ground that he and his Colleagues were "too wide awake" to adopt it. The denial was not made on the ground of moral

      171
      reprobation. Liberals below the Gangway had followed with considerable reluctance the paths of coercion and repression; but they accepted the Bill as a disagreeable necessity on the part of the Government, for they had learnt that night to believe that those charged with the burden of government had better opportunities than themselves of realizing the actual situation. If that were the same kind of language as used by the hon. Member in addressing public meetings in Ireland, he would ask the House to picture to itself what might be the effect of such words on crowded assemblies of uneducated men, suffering, as it must be admitted they were, from extreme pressure of wrong and injustice. The possible effect of such words was the measure of the responsibility which rested on the Government to deal firmly, nay, peremptorily, with such an evil, terrible as it was in its dimensions, and one requiring to be sternly repressed. There was one thing—perhaps only one—that was more sacred than liberty, and that was human life.
      MR. REDMONDsaid, that, in desiring to give adequate expression to his feelings as to the unfounded accusations levelled by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department against the Land League, he was hampered by the limits of Parliamentary language, which prevented him from characterizing as untruths statements which he knew to be grossly inaccurate. He was a member of the Land League; but he denied that that association was a "conspiracy for assassination, and treason." The principles of the Land League were well known, and by no one better than the right hon. Gentleman. The Land League advised rack-rented tenants to combine and offer their landlords a fair rent; and, when that rent was not accepted, then to abide eviction if necessary. It endeavoured to create a public opinion strong enough to induce tenants to leave idle on the hands of the landlord farms from which tenants had been unjustly evicted. That, and that only, was the teaching of the Land League, which ever denounced outrage, and ever advocated passive resistance. The hon. Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon) had not, as the right hon. Gentleman cleverly asserted, spoken authoritatively on behalf of the Land League. The
      172
      hon. Member spoke in that House for himself, upon his own responsibility. He was perfectly ready to accept the responsibility of his words. He did not compromise the Land League or any of its members, whose policy in the present crisis was one of passive resistance. When the Speaker thought it his duty to interfere, he understood the hon. Member to be expressing his sorrow that the Irish people had not to-day the means of successful rebellion or of civil war against England. So far as that, he (Mr. Redmond) agreed entirely with the hon. Member; because he was firmly of opinion that if the only thing wanting—the possibility of a successful rising against this country existed, it would be an ample justification for the Irish people at the present moment. [Mr. PARNELL: Hear, hear!] Having said so much with regard to the speech of the hon. Member, he desired, notwithstanding what was said by the Home Secretary, to recall the attention of the House to what was the real question under discussion. It was not a speech of the hon. Member for Tipperary, nor an interpretation which hon. Members might please to put on that speech; but it was a Bill authorizing persons to search for arms, and arrest men who might be found in possession of them. He believed some time ago that a policy of repression was about to give way to one of reform; but he was disappointed. Exasperated as, no doubt, the Irish people were with the precedence which had been given to coercive legislation, he knew that all the country to-day were looking forward with feelings of intense anxiety to the promised Land Bill of the Government to save them from the tyranny which, under the admittedly unjust state of the law, at present rendered the life of the tenant-at-will to-day one of continual uncertainty, of hopeless poverty, and helpless misery. But once again their, perhaps, foolish faith in the justice and wisdom of that House had received a severe shock. Reform had been postponed indefinitely, and the policy of force and coercion was to have another innings. They were now discussing the latest development of English Liberalism, and it seemed inevitable that before many days were over this Arms Bill would form part of the laws of the land. He believed the measure would ever remain a fruitful

      173
      source of injury and wrong, and he had to protest against it as impolitic, unnecessary, and unjust. There never was, he believed, a Government since the so-called Union which had so great opportunities of winning the hearts of the Irish people, and of diminishing natural animosities, and of removing the great and admitted grievances of the country as the present Government. Such a policy was worthy of the great men at the head of that Administration, men to whom the Irish masses turned with confidence and hope, all the more confident and the more hopeful because of the six years of Conservative inaction which they had just passed. The Irish people had fought the electoral battle all over the Kingdom for their Liberal friends, and had listened with delight to the promises of the Candidate for Mid Lothian. They had materially assisted in transforming those Liberal friends and that philanthropic Candidate from a disorganized Party and a discredited Chief into the Rulers of the destinies of Ireland. The whole people cried aloud for the fulfilment of those promises, and what had been the reply? When the history of the day was written it would be a sorry record of what Liberalism was; and he regretted to think that these coercive measures would be the one sole blot on the reputation and character of a man whose name would otherwise be given down to posterity as a friend of the people—he meant the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. John Bright). The measure was impolitic, because it destroyed whatever chance remained to the Government to consolidate the Irish people by means of remedial legislation, and its very existence proved very clearly what the value of the Government Land Bill would be. If that Land Bill was, indeed, to be of a comprehensive and satisfactory nature, the necessity for repression, if ever it existed, would be at once removed. It was a common assertion amongst a certain class of politicians that agitation in Ireland was ever the result of cunning and self-seeking agitators; but he gave credit to Her Majesty's present Advisers for a keener insight into cause and effect. They knew very well that no agitators could create a movement such as the land movement unless there were real and terrible grievances crying for redress. It was not the Land League
      174
      that had created the agitation; but the wrongs and miseries of the Irish people had created the Land League. The only politic and sure way to pacify Ireland and make the law respected was to go to the root of the evil, and to rob the law of its injustice and inhumanity. The only effect of this Bill would be to render the agitation in Ireland more formidable, and to increase—if, indeed, it was possible to increase it—the intense hatred which was entertained by four-fifths of the Irish people against the rule of their country by this Parliament. The Government had indefinitely postponed reform; and, in the meantime, what were the people to do? By those coercive measures they had armed the enemies of the people with every hateful weapon known to the history of despotism. Emboldened by the weapons they had placed in his hands, the rack-renter and the exterminator would once more set about their unholy work. The sentences of death would again be showered down upon the people. But did they think the people would tamely submit to a law which they themselves had declared to be unjust and inhuman? What did the history of the whole world prove but that, when open agitation was stifled, the passion of an oppressed people found vent in secret organizations and secret plots. To stop outrages, forsooth! He would tell them what those Bills would do—they would create outrages; and if, as he prayed might not be the case, the history of these measures should be marked with blood—not the Irish Members, whom they suppressed upon the floor of that House, but the Government who, in order to carry their hateful proposals, sacrificed even liberty of speech in that House, would be the guilty ones. That measure was not alone impolitic—it was unnecessary. The measure which had already become law was sufficient to meet every possible contingency. Do not tell him that by an Arms Bill they would take the weapon from the hands of the assassin. He cared not if every house in the land were stripped of arms, the murderer would still find his instruments of murder. To prove the efficacy of Bills of that kind, the hon. and learned Solicitor General for Ireland told the House how outrages increased year by year up to 1870, when such another Bill came into operation, and then they suddenly and rapidly dimi

      175
      nished. When the hon. and learned Gentleman used that argument he (Mr. Redmond) knew he was speaking dishonestly, for the hon. and learned Gentleman knew that in 1870 the Land Act was passed, and that to it, and not to any wretched repressive legislation, was due the change. Now, as then, they said, remedy the grievance and the evils would cease. He listened to the speech of the Solicitor General for Ireland with feelings of the keenest humiliation and pain. He (Mr. Redmond) was pretty well accustomed, even from his short experience in that House, to hear English Members misrepresent the Leaders of the Irish people, and calumniate the Irish nation. But, it was with far different feelings he heard an Irishman, the Member for an Irish constituency, rise up and, encouraged by the cheers of ignorant and prejudiced men behind him, level calumnies against his own people and his own nation, in a speech which from an Englishman would have been unworthy, but from an Irishman was absolutely discreditable. If that Bill was impolitic and unnecessary, it must also be unjust; but of its injustice he did not care to say much, for the government of Ireland from that House ever had been, and ever would be, based upon injustice. But he would like to say of one thing that House might be assured. The Irish people would not be intimidated by those measures. They had passed through too many persecutions to learn what fear was now. They felt they were battling for the dearest cause that ever urged the heart of man—the right to live and prosper on the land of their birth. In battling for that cause they were ready that day to suffer as their fathers suffered before them, and their Representatives in that House would be found by their side in the hour of peril, ready to sustain them in their struggles, and share with them in their sufferings. He had done. He cordially detested that measure. Upon every opportunity which was open to him he should oppose it step by stop; and when at the close the Speaker should have, in the exercise of his new-born functions, stifled discussion upon every stage of the Bill, then he and the other Irish Members would, at any rate, be able to say they had done their duty to those who sent them there to protect the liberties of the people, and would be able to say
      176
      with pride, that owing to their efforts that House of Commons was obliged, in order to coerce Ireland, first to suppress, coerce, and to degrade itself.
      MR. BYRNEopposed the Bill, and condemned the language used by Ministers in the course of the debate. The Bill did not even exclude the female population from being arrested. The Bill was unnecessarily severe and cruel. It empowered the arrest of any person having arms or ammunition by any constable or peace officer, without warrant; this—without punning, for the subject was too serious—he regarded as a most unwarrantable interference with ordinary freedom. Clause 4 introduced a new personage upon the scene. Any warrant or order of the Lord Lieutenant could be signified under either his own hand or that of the Chief Secretary, or of the Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, and this would give the last-named official an amount of authority which was quite disproportionate to his proper function. The 4th sub-section of Clause 4 contained the provisions for proclamation, and he thought that these were altogether inadequate.
      MR. CHARLES LEWISrose to Order. He wanted to know whether the hon. Member was in Order in discussing the details of the Bill, clause by clause, as if the House were in Committee?
      MR. SPEAKERsaid, that the hon. Member was not at liberty at that stage to discuss the Bill clause by clause.
      MR. BYRNEsaid, he bowed to the ruling of the Chair. He was only giving his reasons for opposing the Bill, which was unnecessary and uncalled for. There was no evidence to show that the people had arms. The language of Judge Fitzgerald on the subject was very unguarded. That learned Judge had no means of knowing that every farmer's son and every farmer's servant had a gun or a pistol. He would oppose the Bill at every stage.
      Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members being found present,
      MR. LEAMY, referring to the statement that Aims Acts had been necessary in Ireland since 1847, said, they had been necessary since the Union, and would be as long as that House governed Ireland. The Home Secretary said that in the Bill the Government had adopted

      177
      the mitigated Code of the Act of 1875; but he forgot that the present Bill did not contain two important provisions of the Act of 1875. The latter Act gave a power of appeal which was not given by this Bill, nor did it contain a provision enabling a person accused and acquitted to obtain a certificate, freeing him from further proceedings. Moreover, under the Act of 1875, the magistrates had power to dismiss a case which they did not consider sufficiently serious to require the infliction of a penalty. No such provision was contained in this Bill. It was, he thought, a most serious objection to the Bill that it did not give a person who might be convicted at Petty Sessions by a resident magistrate, surrounded by landlord magistrates, the right to appeal to Quarter Sessions. That was a serious restriction upon the rights of the people, whom it placed in a far more unfavourable position than that in which they had been placed by the Act of 1875. He submitted it was unfair to legislate by giving undefined powers to the Lord Lieutenant. It was unfair that power should be given to disarm the people, and allow the landlord class to go armed. He was also strongly opposed to that provision of the Bill which would give to any Justice of the Peace the power to search any person whom he might reasonably suspect of carrying arms. In conclusion, he would observe that so long as measures of coercion for Ireland were before the House, it would be the duty of Irish Members to resist their passing, however anxious they might be to see a Land Bill introduced.
      MR. O'DONNELLsaid, the Bill was not levelled against presumably guilty persons, but against the whole people—the most honest, the most upright, the most just. The power of searching the person ought not to be given to a policeman. As the Bill stood it was a provocative to breaches of the peace and outrages. The right of search should be exercised only under a certain degree of responsibility; and he hoped a provision would be introduced into the Bill providing for compensation in the case of a man whose home had been searched, and perhaps his furniture, without any reasonable ground of suspicion. If the Bill was directed against the criminal classes, why was the night time carefully excluded from its operation? This ex-
      178
      clusion was an admission by the Government that the Bill was not necessary. There had been no proof submitted showing that there were such wholesale outrages with firearms as would justify a Bill of this kind. The increase of political badinage, such as that which had passed between the Home Secretary and John Devoy, could not be reasonably adduced as a reason for this Bill. The Home Secretary had dexterously made use of the language which had fallen from the hon. Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon); but he had submitted no reason for the Bill. The hon. Member for Tipperary had been betrayed into uttering expressions by the most unfair treatment he had received. He had, no doubt, used language which must be regretted in reference to evictions in Ireland. He (Mr. O'Donnell) could not justify those expressions; but how would those things which took place in Ireland be looked at if they had happened in a foreign country—in Bulgaria, Thessaly, or Epirus? The hon. Member for Tipperary wished to convey to the House the true state of affairs in Ireland, And to show how terrible they were, when Irish farmers were often placed in a position of great peril to themselves and families when evicted and thrown out to starve and die upon the roadside. The rash statement of the hon. Member was not, however, an argument in favour of this Bill, but for the passing of remedial measures. The whole policy of the Home Secretary was one of hitting them when they were down. Instead of proofs the right hon. Gentleman treated them with sarcasm, with quotations, with jokes more or less heavy, and seemed to calculate upon finding some one among the Irish Party more excitable than his Colleagues, who, irritated by the insulting tones and language, would give utterance to words too candid and too violent upon which he could seize. Thereupon he executed one of his characteristic war-dances on the floor of the House, and declared that he had proved that the Land League was a combination of assassins. The right hon. Gentleman had carried the game of irritation and provocation a little too far. One year's duration of this Bill would create a feeling of irritation which for years to come would tell against the Liberal Party.
      MR. CHILDERS MR. CHILDERS moved the adjournment of the debate, remarking that it

      179
      was understood on Tuesday that this Motion would be made soon after 9 o'clock.
      Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Secretary Childers.)
      MR. CHAPLINwished, before the Motion was put, to make a few observations upon the present position of affairs. ["Oh, oh!" and "Divide!"] He was surprised at these interruptions. He had sat some years in the House, and it had not been his habit to unduly trespass upon the time of the House; and he hoped he should not be interrupted in the few observations which he thought it right to make on this Motion. The present position of affairs was most peculiar; and, had it not been for the ruling of Mr. Speaker, he should have said most irregular. The Resolution of the 25th of January, which ordered that preference should be given to two particular measures, still remained unrescinded. Nevertheless, they were in this position. Government Business was taken on Monday last, and was to be taken again to-night, other than that which the House had ordered to have precedence. If this course were continued, independent Members would have to surrender their nights and days for an indefinite period, in order that the Government might get on with Supply. That was not an object for which, generally speaking, he should feel called upon to make any sacrifice, unless the Government were, in their turn, prepared to make some sacrifice in behalf of English Members and English Business in which they were interested. He himself had obtained, by persistent balloting, a place for a matter which he regarded as of urgent and immediate importance; and that was with respect to the foot-and-mouth disease. If the Government would guarantee to give him a place for his Motion before Easter he would consent to the adjournment. Not only that; but he had also a Motion on the question of compensation to tenants for improvements, and this, too, he took leave to consider as "urgent" Business. He thought independent Members ought to raise their voices against the course which was being taken by the Government, unless the Government made some compensation to them for the days of which
      180
      they would be deprived. The noble Lord had told them that the course taken by the Government was owing to the excessive delay in discussing the Protection to Person and Property (Ireland) Bill. He differed entirely from the noble Lord. He said the Government, and the Government alone, were entirely responsible for it. The unfortunate position in which they were placed arose from two facts—first, from the gross mismanagement of Irish Business by the Government; and, secondly, from the violation by the Government of the solemn pledges they gave to call Parliament together in the autumn. ["Question!"]
      MR. SPEAKER: I must remind the hon. Member that the Question is the adjournment of the debate. He is not speaking to that Question.
      MR. CHAPLINwas perfectly aware that the Question before the House was that of adjournment; but he referred to the pledge given by the Government in order to illustrate his argument—to show that the necessity for this adjournment was solely caused by the conduct of Her Majesty's Government. The noble Lord (the Marquess of Hartington) complained of delay; but surely he must have foreseen this delay when the Cabinet decided not to call Parliament together in the autumn. ["Order!"]
      MR. DILLWYN: I rise to Order, and wish to ask whether the hon. Member is acting in accordance with your ruling?
      MR. SPEAKER: I have already stated that I consider the hon. Member is passing beyond the immediate Question before the House, which is the adjournment of the debate.
      MR. CHAPLIN: As I consider that to bow to your ruling, whatever that ruling may be, is the first duty of every Member of this House, I will not continue my remarks.
      THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONEven if I thought I should be in Order, I certainly should not have attempted, upon this occasion, to follow the hon. Member into the remarks which he seems to have found this the most convenient opportunity in the course of these two months to make upon the conduct of the Government in regard to Irish affairs. The course of the de-bates surely might have afforded a

      181
      more appropriate opportunity. But I am willing to admit that the position in which we find ourselves is, to a certain extent, an anomalous one. I explained on Monday how we stood, and the circumstances in which we had to ask the House to accede to the arrangements we proposed; and I stated that we were bound by, and were still under, the operation of the Resolution of January 25, by which it was determined to proceed with the Peace Preservation Bill from day to day, and it was our intention, as far as the exigencies of the public service would permit us, to proceed with the Bill; but I stated, at the same time, what was the condition of affairs as to Supply, and that it would be absolutely necessary to interpose, from time to time, with the Business of Supply before the consideration of the Peace Preservation Bill. That is simply the state of the case. I pointed out that it was absolutely necessary that a certain class of Supply should be disposed of within a very short time; and it cannot, therefore, be said that we are moving this Motion in order to go on with any other Business. If the House decline to accede to the arrangement which we proposed, it will be necessary for the Government to take some other course; but I understand it was the sense of the House generally—and, at all events, that it was the sense of the Party opposite, if I may understand it is represented by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Stafford Northcote)—that the proposal was acquiesced in, and that, for the purpose of proceeding with certain classes of Supply, the Opposition, at all events, were quite willing that the debate on the Peace Preservation Bill should, from time to time, be interrupted.
      SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE: The noble Lord has made a personal appeal to myself, and I must say that, to a great extent, I admit what he has said. There is no doubt that in the discussion the other day the Government proposed to ask for urgency for the Arms Bill, with the understanding that the discussion on that Bill should be suspended at a particular time, in order that an important statement of great interest might be made. I expressed my assent to that arrangement; but, at the same time, it should be borne in mind that on that occasion there was no opportunity for
      182
      discussion. We were unable to do more than ask for explanations; and it is, consequently, not unnatural that my hon. Friend should take the present opportunity of making observations on the course of Public Business, considering that it is not easy to find such opportunities. I hope it will be understood, at all events, that if we consent, as I hope we do consent, to the course proposed by the Government on the present occasion, we do so on the strict understanding that it is for the convenience of the House, and because we are anxious to hear the statement of the Secretary of State for War, and that the House is in no way bound to accept a similar course without full understanding and argument on its own part. It certainly strikes me that my hon. Friend has a very strong case. We have sacrificed the rights of private Members to a great extent in order to give way to the Government for a particular object, which, I think, they have not taken the best means to promote. I am not referring to the necessity of calling Parliament together last autumn; but with respect to this particular Bill within this particular Session, I do think that if the Business is to be urgent it should be urgent throughout, and that the wasting of Monday night and the interruption of the debate this evening have not advanced the Business of the House. For my part, I think we should go on with a determination like that of a man who means to clear a fence, and intends to get over it. However, we are bound by the understanding we came to, and, not so much for the convenience of the House as for the sake of the House and the country generally, to hear the statement of the right hon. Gentleman. It is clearly understood that it is only for that purpose that we propose to adjourn this debate.
      EARL PERCYcomplained that there were very few opportunities for discussing the state of Public Business. The noble Marquess had spoken of the urgency of the Estimates; but, after all, were the Estimates so extremely pressing? This was the 3rd of March, and on only one occasion during the last 10 years had the first Vote for the Army been taken earlier in the Session; the same might be said of the Navy. The Supplementary Estimates, also, had only on three occasions during the last 10 years been

      183
      taken earlier than the 3rd of March. The point, however, was not a Party question, but rather concerned the rights of private Members, many of whom on both sides of the House felt very keenly the invasion of their privileges by the Government. ["Divide!"] He was sorry hon. Members opposite should be so impatient while their rights were being defended. He would take another opportunity, if one presented itself, of bringing the matter before the House.
      MR. PARNELLwished to enter his protest against the action of the Government in moving the adjournment of this debate at the early hour of 9 o'clock. He could not understand the policy of taking this course. They were told that the Arms Bill was a very urgent matter; but the urgency was only in the view of the Prime Minister, and was of such a character that it could cease at 9 o'clock, or any hour the right hon. Gentleman desired. If a question was urgent yesterday it ought to be urgent to-day. There had been no reason assigned why the discussion on this Bill should cease at this hour, and why the House should proceed to the consideration of a fresh subject. A Resolution was passed on the 25th of January, declaring that the introduction and several stages of the Protection of Person and Property (Ireland) Bill and the Peace Preservation (Ireland) Bill should have precedence of all other Business until the House should otherwise order. And now the Government were attempting to evade that Order. The Government said they were not going to take any Votes. But the right hon. Gentleman was about to adopt an unprecedented course in making a statement on Army Organization before the Speaker left the Chair, thus preventing private Members from exercising their inalienable right of discussing grievances before Supply. The whole course of the Government was nothing more nor less than a dodge to override the Rules of the House, and to do that by a side wind, indirectly so illegitimately, which they could not do in a straightforward manner. He claimed the right of the Irish Members to continue the discussion on the Peace Preservation Bill until half-past 12, and then the Government could adjourn the debate if they liked. He was
      184
      not going to lend himself to this attempt of the Government to put aside the Orders and Regulations of the House, and thus deprive them of time for discussing the Bill. He would prefer to obtain such time as he could to show the false position the Government had taken up with regard to it rather than to listen to the eloquence of the right hon. Gentleman. The whole conduct of Business for the last fortnight was most extraordinary. A few days ago rumours were circulated in the Press that the Arms Bill was to be abandoned.
      MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not keeping to the Question before the House, which is simply that of the adjournment of the debate.
      MR. PARNELLsaid, that he was only referring to the introduction of the Arms Bill instead of the Laud Bill. He believed that the great body of Members had been misled by the introduction of the Arms Bill; in fact, the policy of the Government had been shifted about in the most extraordinary manner, and they did not seem to have made up their minds for 24 hours together. Let them go on with the debate, and give Irish Members an opportunity of convincing the House by fair argument that they were right. He was sure the eloquence of the right hon. Gentleman would keep.
      MR. O'DONNELLasked whether he was to understand that while the Government asked, for their own particular purposes, to have an interruption of the debate to-night, they meant to give the Irish Party any compensation for the time so taken? On the showing of the Government, there was no extreme urgency with the statement of the Secretary of State for War. He did not see why the right hon. Gentleman should not send his speech to the newspapers. The Home Secretary always did so. The Government had entered on the Land Bill in a dilatory manner, showing there was no Cabinet agreement with regard to the measure. They seemed to be engaged in burlesquing their own policy.
      MR. DAWSON, who doubted whether it would be necessary to adjourn the debate, in order that the right hon. Gentleman might deliver a combustible speech, spoke amid cries of "Oh!" "Divide!" and "Question!" and said.

      185
      he was really speaking to the Question, because it was one between a paper war in that House and real war in Ireland.
      MR. SPEAKER: I must call upon the hon. Member to confine himself to the Question of the adjournment of this debate.
      MR. DAWSONsaid, they were asked to adjourn the debate on the Arms Bill; and there was an intimate connection between an Arms Bill and war. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War might say, "Arma virumque cano." He sang of arms, and they against arms.
      MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not confining himself to the Question before the House. [Cries of "Twice!"]
      MR. DAWSONsaid, no doubt some hon. Members would be glad if it were thrice; but it should not be if he could help it.
      MR. SPEAKER: I wish again to point out to the hon. Member that he is bound to confine himself strictly to the Question of the adjournment of the debate. [Cries of "Thrice!"]
      MR. DAWSONsaid, he had thought that on the proposed adjournment of a debate on an Arms Bill there was a fair opportunity for alluding to the status quo in Ireland; but he did not wish to make himself a hero by coining, at the goading of hon. Members opposite, into conflict with the ruling of the Chair. He was of opinion that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin), whom he gladly welcomed to their ranks, had made out a very good case against adjourning the debate.
      MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORasked whether, if the Irish Members consented to the adjournment of the debate, the Government would undertake to do nothing to curtail the debate on the Arms Bill to-morrow morning?
      MR. FINIGANexpressed his satisfaction that Members on the Opposition Benches had at length had the courage to break down the outworks of Whig tyranny. He did not see why the debate should be adjourned for a matter which was neither urgent nor necessary.
      SIR JOHN HAYsaid, he should vote against the adjournment. He quite
      186
      agreed with the hon. Member for Mid Lincolnshire. He considered that two Saturdays and a Monday had been wasted by the Government that ought to have been applied to the carrying forward these measures of urgency which were important for the peace of Ireland. As had been pointed out, it was quite as early now in the Session as it had been customary to introduce the Army Estimates. Therefore, he did not see any necessity for adjourning a discussion on a Bill which had been voted to be urgent.
      MR. BYRNEspoke against adjournment.
      MR. REDMONDrepeated the question of his hon. Friend (Mr. O'Connor), for the purpose of demonstrating that there was a little courtesy left upon the Treasury Bench.
      COLONEL STANLEYhoped that, after the expression of opinion which had taken place, the House would assent at once to the adjournment of the debate, so that the Secretary of State for War might have the opportunity of making his promised statement. It had been said the statement of the right hon. Gentleman would not really advance the Business before the House. That was perfectly true in a certain sense; but what really advanced the Business was the Vote for the men and for the Supplies. Unquestionably, as a preliminary to both these, the statement of the right hon. Gentleman must be made; and it was for the convenience of Parliament that the statement should be made when the House was full. He believed it was understood such an arrangement should take place. He quite admitted that his hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lincolnshire had considerable ground for complaining that he was unable to bring forward the important question of which he had given Notice relating to the agricultural interests.
      MR. BIGGARsaid, he did not know that he should oppose the Motion, because, as a rule, his policy was in favour of the adjournment of debates. He must, however, point out that the course pursued by the Government with regard to a Bill which they had declared to be urgent was extremely inconsistent. But it would, perhaps, after all, be a hardship on the Secretary of State for War

      187
      that he should not be allowed to proceed with his statement, especially as he understood the greater part of it was in type.
      Question put.
      The House divided:—Ayes 277; Noes 28: Majority 249.—(Div. List, No. 107.)
      Debate further adjourned till To-morrow.
      MR. PARNELL: I beg to move an Amendment—["Order, order!"] I wish to ask you, Sir——
      MR. SPEAKER: The Clerk, in pursuance of his duty, is proceeding to read the Orders of the Day.
      MR. PARNELL: Yes; but I wish to ask you whether——
      MR. SPEAKER: Is the hon. Member rising to a point of Order?
      MR. PARNELL: I wish to know, Sir, whether, when you put the Question to the House that the resumption of this debate be taken to-morrow, whether that is not a matter within the cognizance of the House to decide; and whether I shall not be entitled to move an Amendment to that Question—namely, that the resumption of the debate shall be deferred until Monday. I would wish to point out to you a precedent which occurred in the course of the progress through the House of the Protection of Person and Property (Ireland) Bill, which has since become law. I think it was after the Committee stage, when the Question was put as to the committing of the Report for a certain day, that I moved an Amendment to that Question that it should be taken on a later day. You permitted me to move that Amendment; it was put from the Chair, and a division was taken; the House affirming the Previous Question, that the resumption of the debate should be taken on the following day. I wish to ask, therefore, whether in the present instance I shall not be in Order in now moving that the resumption of the debate be deferred until Monday?
      MR. SPEAKER: No doubt the hon. Member has correctly stated what occurred on the former occasion, and no doubt that proceeding was quite correct and in Order. If the hon. Member had proposed his Amendment in time, no doubt it would have been in Order; but to-morrow has been appointed for proceeding with the Bill.
      MR. CALLANrose to speak, but was received with loud cries of "Order!"
      MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. Member rise to the Main Question?
      MR. CALLAN: I rise to another point of Order. The Question that the debate be resumed to-morrow was never put to the House; and, Sir, until it is put to the House I ask, as a point of Order, is it not competent for any Member to move an Amendment?
      MR. SPEAKER: The Question was put to the House, and the House has decided that the resumption shall be taken to-morrow.
      MR. A. M. SULLIVANrose on a point of Order.
      MR. SPEAKER: By direction the Clerk has proceeded to read the Orders of the Day. The Order of the Day for Supply has been read, and I have called upon the right hon. Gentleman to address the House.
      MR. CHILDERS: Mr. Speaker——
      MR. PARNELL: I rise to another and a fresh point of Order not connected with the other point——
      MR. SPEAKERagain said that the right hon. Gentleman was in possession of the House.
      THE O'DONOGHUE: I rise to Order. [Cries of "Chair?!"]
      MR. CHILDERS: In accordance with the understanding arrived at on Tuesday last, I now rise to explain what are the main recommendations as to Army Organization which Her Majesty's Government propose to follow.
      MR. CHAPLINrose to Order. He wished to know whether the right hon. Gentleman, in making his Ministerial Statement before going into Committee of Supply, was in Order; and he also wished to point out that when the noble Lord the Member for Liverpool (Viscount Sandon) wished to make a similar statement on the Educational Estimates on the 10th July, 1877, before the Speaker left the Chair, he was not allowed to do so?
      MR. PARNELLalso rose to a point of Order as to whether it was regular for the right hon. Gentleman to make his statement before hon. Members, who had previously given Notice, had had an opportunity of moving their Amendments against Supply? He found that there were a number of Notices on the Paper; and he submitted that if the right hon. Gentleman was entitled to make his statement on the present occasion before the Speaker left the Chair, and before

      189
      any of the hon. Members who had given Notice had moved their Amendments, it practically precluded those Members from the right which had hitherto been secured to them by the Forms of the House. He submitted that he was en-titled, according to the Rules of the House, to move the Amendment of which he had given Notice—namely—
      "That, in the opinion of this House, the Boers of the Transvaal, by their valiant resistance, have proved the earnestness of their desire for independence, and earned a right to its restoration."
      LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Before the point of Order is distinctly decided by you, I wish to ask you very respectfully whether, in the course of the last Parliament, you did not declare that my right hon. Friend the Member for Westminster (Mr. W. H. Smith) was adopting an un-Parliamentary and irregular course in attempting to move the Navy Estimates with you in the Chair?
      MR. SPEAKER: I conclude the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War is about to conclude with a Motion, and I shall not interpose to prevent his making any observations to the House he may think proper before so doing. At the same time, if the right hon. Gentleman were to go into great detail in regard to the Estimates which will have to be voted in Supply, I should consider it my duty to interfere.
      MR. ARTHUR O'CONNOR: If the right hon. Gentleman proposes to conclude with a Motion, will it not be necessary for him to confine himself to such remarks as are relevant to that Motion?
      SIR JOHN HAYsaid, that no reply had yet been given to the question of the hon. Member for Mid Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin) with regard to the course which was adopted when the noble Lord the Member for Liverpool wished to move the Educational Estimates in the last Parliament before the Speaker left the Chair.
      MR. SPEAKER: I have already stated within what limits the right hon. Gentleman would be at liberty to address the House, and, of course, the hon. Member asked me whether the right hon. Gentleman would be in Order in doing so and so. If the right hon. Gentleman is out of Order, of course I shall interfere.

SUPPLY.—COMMITTEE.
Order for Committee read.
SUPPLY.—COMMITTEE.
  ARMY ORGANIZATION.

    STATEMENT.
    MR. CHILDERS: Mr. Speaker, I rise, in accordance with the understanding arrived at on Tuesday, to move that you do now leave the Chair, in order that I may have an opportunity of explaining to the House the main recommendations of the Government as to changes in Army Organization, and other matters not strictly financial, which it is my duty to place before the House of Commons.
    I will first ask the House to recall to their recollection our military condition in 1867, 14 years ago, when General Peel, standing at this Table, moved the Army Estimates. The organization of our Military Forces was far less efficient than it is now. The Militia were still practically separated from the Army; and, indeed, the Militia Vote had only quite recently been prepared and moved by the Secretary of State instead of by a Select Committee. Less than 2,000 Militiamen annually enlisted into the Army. The Volunteers had only about 150,000 efficients against about 200,000 now, were hardly at all connected with the Army, and were still regarded with little favour in many quarters. In the Army itself, the system which we now call that of "Long Service" had, in two respects, entirely broken down. It held out insufficient inducements to recruits; so much so, that from 28,000 a-year in 1859, the number annually recruited had fallen in 1865 to about 13,000, against above 20,000 stated by Lord William Paulet, the Adjutant General, to be required; and it had entirely failed to produce any Reserve. Almost the whole body of the older officers disapproved of the system, and looked back with regret on that which before 1847 had been known as "Life Service," and which had in that year only been abolished, against the general sense of the officers, by the personal influence of the Duke of Wellington. Indeed, it is most instructive to read, on this question, the Evidence taken by the Recruiting Commissions of 1860 and 1866. The Commission of 1860 was appointed because, to use the words of the Report—

    191
    Even when, after the Mutiny, the bounty was increased, and the standard lowered to such an extent as to bring boys instead of men into the ranks, the required establishment was not complete."
    But the remedies they proposed failed; and then the second Commission was appointed, in 1866, because the number of recruits had fallen to the extent which I have just described. Then, as before and since, the most varied opinions were given as to every detail of Army Service; but the great majority condemned the then existing length of service—10 or 12 years—as too short. The Adjutant General, in 1866, especially complained of the youth of non-commissioned officers, and urged the increase of pensions as a means of filling the Army with older men. The Commander-in-Chief was anxious for enlistment for 21 years; and did not consider any Army of Reserve necessary. Lord Grey, on the other hand, thought the Militia a gigantic mistake, and that the failure of the plan for a Reserve was due to the manner of its administration. There was a minority who advocated still shorter service; so that every view, from life enlistment to a colour service like that which prevailed in foreign armies, was represented by witnesses before the Commissions.
    On the question of the adequacy of recruiting for a 12 years' service, the second Commission were hopeful, if large additions were made to the pay and prospects of the soldier; but as to the formation of a Reserve they practically despaired. For a solid Reserve they said we must look to the Militia; and for two or three years after their Report, nothing in this respect was done.
    But, meanwhile, the country was dissatisfied. The Crimean War had indeed shown, some years before, that without a Reserve of men who had passed through the Army, our military force would soon be exhausted; but it was the two great wars in which Germany was concerned that occasioned the deepest anxiety in the public mind. In 1866 Prussia, with an army consisting of men between 20 and 23 years of age, enlisted for three years with the colours, and, supported by Reserves, had, in seven weeks, totally defeated the more veteran troops of Austria; and in 1870 the French Army, which had only recently been re-formed on the basis of
    192
    containing a much larger proportion of old soldiers, received a still more crushing defeat at the hands of Germany. Is it to be wondered at that the difficulty in obtaining recruits, and the impossibility of forming a Reserve with long service, taken in connection with the evidence of what a short-service system could do on the Continent, made public opinion all but unanimous in favour of such a system being tried here?
    Lord Cardwell, however, did not effect this change all at once. In the Artillery and Cavalry it commenced in 1874; and as the period with the colours was fixed at eight years, it is only in the financial year 1881–2 that the Reserve will begin to be fed from these Arms. In the Infantry it began in 1870, and for some time recruits were accepted both for long service—that is to say, 12 years with the colours—and for short service—or six years with the colours and six in the Reserve. But it was soon found that both systems would not work together. Men would not enlist for long service, if they could enter the Army for the shorter period; and at present the only term of Infantry service, with unimportant exceptions, is six years.
    Lord Cardwell's second reform, the first in point of date, was to recall from the Colonies a large number of battalions serving there, until the number of home battalions and of those serving in India and the Colonies were just equal. He then took advantage of this equality to combine the battalions in pairs, a system which he found in existence with respect to the 25 first regiments; and for this purpose adopted a plan proposed by the Commander-in-Chief, for linking, as it was called, a pair of battalions, so that each battalion abroad should be mainly fed by drafts from the one at home; which, when low on the roster, would be little more than a recruiting machine. With the two Line regiments he linked two county Militia regiments, establishing depôt centres for the four battalions, which formed a brigade; and to this depôt he appointed a colonel and other officers, both for the recruits to the two regiments and for training the Militia.
    Lord Cardwell's third reform was the Abolition of Purchase. The disadvantages of that system were manifest; but it had one great merit, inasmuch as it enabled officers who did not care to

    193
    make the Army their profession, or saw little chance of advancement, to retire by the sale of their commissions, and thus secured a most unequal, but still large, flow of regimental promotion. It remained, however, to be seen how this promotion could be secured in a professional service.
    We have now, Sir, had from eight to ten years' experience of these changes, and the time has arrived for reviewing them, and, if any defects have appeared, for applying the necessary remedies. I will endeavour to point out to the House some of their merits, in what respects they have been criticized, what blots, if any, have been hit, and how we propose to cure them.
    I will take, in the first place, the question of the proper length of service. Now, there can be no doubt whatever that to short service we owe the fact net only that we have obtained of late years an ample supply of recruits, but that they are almost from year to year of a better class, and of a higher average of age. Comparing 1871 and 1879, we had in the Army at the former period 190 men in every 1,000 under 20 years of age, and in the latter only 106; and the percentage of recruits under 20 years of age in 1874—which is the first year in which the information is shown in the official Returns—and 1879 was 58 and 43 respectively.
    But, on the other hand, there are two considerations to which I think great weight must be attached. The first is, that whereas Lord Cardwell only appears to have contemplated that three-fourths of the recruits should be enlisted for short service, and one-fourth for the whole term of 12 years, the fact that the two systems of recruiting, would not work together has led to the whole of the Line being recruited for short service, and hence arises the inability to retain any men with the colours for more than six years, except with their own consent. The second is, that the Army has to provide, not only for service in this Kingdom and its Colonies, but, so far as European troops are concerned, for India; and that a six-year term of service, especially where the Army is, to a great extent, recruited at 18 and 19 years of age, does not practically give an average of more than four years in India. There is, I admit, great difference of opinion, both medical and mili-
    194
    tart, as to the proper length of a soldier's Indian service. But, after carefully considering these conflicting views, I think it may be fairly said that six years is, according to the best authorities, about the time during which a soldier who is not invalided should generally be kept in India, and this undoubtedly points to an increase in the present time of service.
    This question of the proper length of service was, in 1879, referred by my Predecessor to a Committee of 11 officers—Generals and Colonels—over which Lord Airey presided. I do not mean that this was the only question upon which the Committee were invited to advise the Secretary of State; but the others were subsidiary to it, except, perhaps, the best means for obtaining more efficient non-commissioned officers. Much difference of opinion was expressed by the Committee. One Member did not sign the Report, and five more signed it with qualifications. But on the question of the length of service, a decided majority were in favour of enlistment for 14½ years, of which six months were to be at the depôt, eight years with the colours, and six with the Reserve.
    One very distinguished Member of the Committee, Sir Lintorn Simmons, who is known as the writer of letters signed "One Who Has Served," wholly differed from his colleagues, and advocated enlistment for three years only with the colours, any extension of that period for foreign service being voluntarily made by the soldier. We do not think that it would be possible to rely for the defence of our possessions abroad, requiring about 90,000 men in India and the Colonies under arms on such a system of volunteering; and, after well weighing its merits, I am unable to adopt Sir Lintorn Simmons' plan. But, with some modification, the plan of the Committee is, in my opinion, more feasible; and I will now state in what respects I think it faulty. It assumes that men could be enlisted for 14½years without infallibly raising a claim for pension. Now, I do not believe this. Under the system in force in 1867, it was found very difficult to obtain 13,000 men for time Army with the obligation to only 10 years' service. I doubt, therefore, whether, without the promise of pensions, or without large

    195
    bounties, 25,000 men could be got annually for a service of 14½ years. But with pensions, the expense would be such as no House of Commons could be expected to pay. Reference to the 73rd Appendix to the Report of the Committee, which will be in the hands of hon. Members to-morrow, will show that without pensions the proposals of the Committee would add to the normal expense of the Army about £700,000 a-year; with pensions, this increase would reach at least £1,500,000.
    The Report of Lord Airey's Committee also contains a proposal for abolishing the system of linked regiments, and for obtaining recruits for each battalion separately, whether at home or abroad, from large training depôts. I must refer to this part of their Report with some qualification; because, however eminent may have been the gentlemen who constituted the Committee, their opinion on this question was not sought in the official reference to them. On the contrary, they were told—
    "That there was no intention on the part of the Government to depart from the general principles of re-organization which had been accepted by the country since 1870;" and the "formation of the Army in regiments of more than one battalion for the purposes of mutual support"
    was expressly stated to be one of those general principles. I find, however, that at the last moment, when five-sixths of the Evidence had been taken, and when the Committee were on the eve of preparing their Report, a note, in an unofficial form, of which there is no record in the War Office, was received by the Chairman of the Committee, saying that they were not "precluded from touching on" this question. Whatever may have been the authority for this note, I must decline to treat the recommendations of the Committee on this head, in which they were not unanimous, as other than the personal opinions of a body of officers for whom, as individuals, I have the greatest respect.
    On the question of the effect of promotion on the abolition of purchase, it became soon evident that, without the adoption of some comprehensive scheme, great stagnation would occur under the new system. As I had for some years before taken, myself, a great interest in this question, and, anticipating the consequences of the abolition of purchase in the Line, had studied it as Chairman
    196
    of a Select Committee with reference to the three corps in which purchase did not exist—I mean the Artillery, the Engineers, and the Marines—I hope I may be permitted to detain the Committee for a few moments while I explain the conclusions at which I arrived, and which formed the basis of the scheme of naval retirement of 1870, with which my name is connected. No plan will secure an efficient and steady system of promotion which is not constructed according to mathematical rules in two respects—one the proper proportion of the higher to the lower ranks of the Service, and the other the ages at which officers must retire from those ranks. If the higher ranks are unduly small compared with the lower, you must provide from the latter a very burdensome and unpopular forced retirement at an early age. If you are able to increase the proportion of the higher ranks, this forced retirement may be minimized and even almost dispensed with. Now, this was what I effected in the Navy, and what Lord Cardwell did in the Artillery and Engineers. By largely reducing the number of cadet entries, and the volume of the ranks of sub-lieutenant and lieu-tenant as compared with the higher ranks, the Admiralty will be able, when the great surplus list of officers has been reduced, to keep promotion in an efficient state. Similarly, Lord Cardwell reduced the captains and subalterns, and created majors, of Artillery and Engineers, with the result that there will be in those corps little or no forced retirement from the rank of captain. But with respect to the Line and the Cavalry the Secretary of State who succeeded Lord Cardwell appointed a Royal Commission under the presidency of Lord Penzance, which, not feeling itself authorized to propose any alteration in the relative numbers of regimental ranks, necessarily fell back on compulsory retirement at early ages, and so, if they solved the problem at all, did so at an enormous cost, and in the way most distasteful to the officers themselves. I shall give the figures when I describe the remedy we propose; but, in passing, I will only say that the present system will force out of the Army more than half its officers before or when they reach the early age of 40.
    I think I have now brought my narrative of the changes introduced into the

    197
    Army between 1867 and 1872, and of the controversies which they have evoked, pretty well down to the present day, and I proceed to explain what proposals we have determined upon. I will do so as concisely as possible, first explaining what are those which are of a general character; then giving in more detail the alterations in length of service and regimental organization which we consider necessary.
    I will first take changes which affect specially the Auxiliary Forces. Her Majesty has been graciously pleased to decide that the number of her Aides-de-Camp shall be increased by four, and that these much-prized, though honorary, distinctions, shall be conferred on Volunteer officers. Her Majesty has also approved of an alteration in the regulations of the Order of the Bath, under which five Knight Commanderships and 25 Companionships of the Civil branch of that Order will be conferred upon officers of the Auxiliary and Reserve Forces who may, while in command of a regiment, have contributed in a marked degree to its efficiency.
    Perhaps I may here state that I am permitted by Her Majesty to announce her intention to hold a Review of the Volunteers in Windsor Park, unless anything unforeseen should occur to prevent it, either in the middle of May or towards the end of June.
    My attention has been drawn to some anomalies in the regulations under which Militia and Volunteer officers are allowed to retain their rank or to obtain steps of honorary rank after long service or on retirement. It has been decided that after 15 years' commissioned service in any of the Auxiliary Forces, or in combination with Army service, an officer will be allowed, if duly recommended, to retain his rank and wear his uniform; that after 25 years' similar service in the Militia or Yeomanry, or 30 years' in the Volunteers, a lieutenant-colonel or a major will be allowed a step of honorary rank, and a captain after 20 years in the Militia or Yeomanry, or 25 in the Volunteers. The same boons, if not already granted while serving, will be granted on retirement, and in each ease combined service will count like service in the corps from which the officer retires, or in which he gets the step of honorary rank.
    198
    There is one other question in connection with the Volunteers, about which, after taking the highest legal advice, I have not felt able to comply with, a suggestion from time to time made in this House—namely, that Volunteer officers should be exempt from serving on juries, to the same extent as Militia officers. Militia officers are, in fact, only exempt while on full pay, which Volunteers never receive; but that is not the only difficulty. I do not see on what ground we could exempt Volunteer officers and not privates, who, for the most part, are of the same social class; and if we exempted the latter, among whom there must be many thousand jurymen, a heavy burden would be thrown on the rest of the community, which it would be impossible to justify. I have, therefore, arrived at the conclusion that I should not recommend to Parliament an amendment in this sense of the Juries Act. I believe, however, as a matter of fact, that Judges will always excuse Volunteers shown to be absent in camp, or on similar duty.
    With respect to the Militia, I shall explain, before I sit down, the arrangements we contemplate, acting on the Report of my right hon. Predecessor as Chairman of the Committee of 1876, for still more closely connecting this ancient Constitutional force with the Army proper, by making county Militia regiments the third and fourth battalions of the new territorial regiments. But in thus bringing the Militia into still closer connection with the Line, I think it will be necessary to apply to their officers some rules as to age retirement, the absence of which has certainly produced some remarkable anomalies. I find among colonels and lieutenant—colonels actually commanding regiments—I do not include honorary colonels—officers of over 70 years of age, and some nearly as old among majors. In future we intend to provide that no colonel, or lieutenant-colonel commanding, shall retain his appointment after 55, or, under special circumstances, 60 years of age; and that none now serving remain after 67, or, if at present under 60, after 62 years of age. All future majors will retire at 50, and all present majors at 55. All captains will retire at 50.
    Passing from the Auxiliary Forces, I will now fulfil the promise which I gave to the late First Lord of the Admiralty,

    199
    a few clays ago, that I would explain our policy about ordnance. I hope to give full details of the matériel to be bought or manufactured this year when we arrive at Vote 12; but, meanwhile, I may say that we are now engaged in a series of important experiments with breech-loading guns of various calibres, from the 43-ton gun to a 13-pounder field gun; and the recent renewal of the controversy between the muzzle-loader and the breech-loader, and the multiplicity of proposals for ordnance of every variety of construction, have led Her Majesty's Government to the conclusion that it would be desirable to recur to the advice of an independent Ordnance Committee, with functions somewhat differing from those of the former Committee. It will consist of officers of the Artillery, of the Navy, and of the Engineers, with two eminent civil engineers; and while we hope to obtain from this Committee technical advice of extreme value, we have determined not to run the risk of the disadvantages felt in connection with the old Ordnance Committee, and strictly to limit its functions to such inquiries and experiments as may be categorically referred to it by the Minister holding my Office. We have every reason to believe that the additional cost to the country, about £3,000 a year, of the services of these gentlemen will be far more than compensated for by the valuable results which the weight of their authority may be expected to secure. I had hoped to be able to name to-day the gentlemen selected for this service; but I find I must postpone doing so for a few days.
    I will now state to the House what we recommend as to length of service.
    In the first place, we propose to raise the minimum age when a man may be enlisted from 18, at which it now stands, to 19; and not only to that age nominally, but so that no man who (though 19) has not the physical equivalent of that age will be accepted. I should have been glad to raise the minimum age to 20, and I hope that this may be possible before long; but if we did so at present, we should risk not obtaining a sufficient number of recruits. No man under 20 years of age, or with less than a year's service, will, under any circumstances, be sent to India or to a tropical station; and it is most desirable that after arrival he should not be em-
    200
    ployed on active service for a year or so—that is to say, until he is acclimatized.
    In the second place, we propose that the terra of enlistment should remain 12 years, as now, but that the period with the colours should be seven instead of six years; and that all soldiers serving abroad should be liable to remain with the colours eight years, and, if serving in India, should always be required to give this additional year. This extra year's service is rarely enforced now; but we propose to make it the rule. The effect of these two changes will be, that instead of serving from 18 to 24 years of age, every man who goes to India will serve in the Army at least from 19 to 27.
    We have well considered whether it would be safe to make obligatory colour service longer than eight years; but we have decided that this very considerable increase on the present system goes as far as prudence will allow. I have carefully read the Reports of, and the Evidence taken before, the two Commissions of 1860 and 1866, and Lord Airey's Committee; and while I find many officers anxious to revert to the old term of what is now called long colour service (that is, 12 years), and indifferent to the formation of an Army Reserve, which this would render impossible, I find hardly anyone advocating nine or ten years with the colours. The term we have proposed, and which was formerly recommended among soldiers by Sir Charles Napier, and among civilians by Mr. Godley, will, I believe, both supply us sufficient recruits, and, with the further provisions I shall explain, steadily build up a Reserve. It must be remembered that it is to the attractions of short service with the colours, and passage to the Reserve, that we owe the great majority of our recruits and their continuous improvement, and we must be cautious lest in making the term of service too long we spoil our market, and revert to the disastrous state of things in 1860 and 1866.
    We also propose that the Secretaries of State for War and India should from time to time settle the extent to which, and the terms on which, a certain proportion of men in good health, and serving in India, should be allowed to extend their service within the period of their engagement. I doubt whether it

    201
    will be often necessary to carry out this extension for more than two years, as the previous conditions will insure from six to seven years' service for all men in India who may not be invalided; and probably not more than 10 to 15 per cent of the privates of a regiment will, under any circumstances, be permitted so to extend their service.
    I come now to non-commissioned officers; and, in addition to the other advantages of pay, pension, and rank, which we intend to give them, we pro-pose the following boons in respect of service:—
    First. Every corporal, on completing a year's probation and being confirmed in his rank, will be allowed to extend his colour service to the full period of 12 years.
    Secondly. Every sergeant will be allowed to engage for his second term of nine years, subject only to the veto of the War Office in each individual case; and thus to have an "assured military career" of 21 years, ending with a pension. His deferred pay will also continue during his second term of service, instead of ceasing, as now, after 12 years.
    Similarly, every corporal will lie allowed, with the sanction of his commanding officer, to engage for his second term of service, and to earn a pension.
    Finally, we shall arrange that sergeants, after 15 or 16 years' service, shall be liable to be transferred to the permanent staff of their Militia battalions.
    I may say that we propose that the term of seven or eight years' service should be applicable to all arms alike, whether Infantry, Cavalry, Artillery, or Engineers.
    This change front six to practically eight years' service will have an unfavourable effect on the Army Reserve. Under the present system, the Infantry Reserve may be expected to reach, in about 1890, its maximum strength of 44,000, and even this I do not consider sufficient. To meet, therefore, the effect of the extension of service, and still more to strengthen the Reserve, I propose two things: the first, that men serving at home, and not likely to be sent abroad, should be at liberty, and indeed encouraged, if the state of recruiting permits, to go into the Reserve after completing three or four years' service. One of the inducements to do
    202
    this will be permission to receive, when so discharged into the Reserve, their accumulated deferred pay, none of which is now paid to men until the expiry of their full time of colour service. The second will be to allow Reserve men, on or before completing their 12 years' engagement, to volunteer for a further period of four years, during which they will receive pay at the rate of 4d. a-day, but will not be liable to be called out until after all the other Reservists. We shall limit the number of this class to 10,000. On the other hand, we propose to allow the Enrolled Pensioner Reserve gradually to die out, as such, without diminishing the service liabilities of pensioners. It has been suggested to me that we might allow Volunteers of certain qualifications to join the Army Reserve, and I propose to take powers with this object. But I have not yet had time to mature a scheme for this purpose.
    Under these conditions we hope to secure for our military system two great advantages; first, for all regiments on foreign and especially on active service, a full proportion of what are called "seasoned soldiers," by insuring an average of about eight year' service from all men not permanently invalided; and, secondly, a steady flow into the Reserve, not only of men who have served seven, eight, or mote years, but of a considerable number who have served three or four years, and who will bring habits of steadiness and discipline into the civil employments for which their age will well fit them. Besides this, we shall be able to set against the great increase in deferred and reserved pay a solid reduction in the Pension List, which, for non - commissioned officers and men, is rapidly approaching £2,000,000 a-year, but which, under our proposed system, will be applicable mainly to non-commissioned officers. Finally, I may say that this great economy will be much more felt by India than by the Imperial Exchequer, and will, I hope, be an answer to some of the plans for restoring a separate Indian Army, upon which I confess I look with unmitigated dislike.
    The second great branch of the changes in the period from 1867 to 1872 related to the localization of the Army, and especially of the Line, and I will now state our proposals on this subject.

    203
    I must premise by stating that, from everyone who has studied this branch of the question, I have heard, at any rate, this undoubted proposition, that we cannot leave things as they are. Either we must follow the advice of those who, like the late Colonel Anson in 1872, or my right hon. Friend and Predecessor with his influential Committee in 1876, recommended the complete union in a territorial regiment of the four battalions—two of the Line and two of the Militia (and it must be remembered that on that Committee sat Sir Henry Havelock, General Taylor, Sir Garnet Wolseley, General Bulwer, General Greaves, and General Herbert, besides the Duke of Buccleuch, Lord Exeter, Lord Limerick, and Colonel Corbett); or, according to every opponent of the system, we must repeal our whole legislation and undo our whole policy as to a territorial Army; convert the Depôt Centro Barracks, for which Parliament voted £3,500,000, into something else; alter the whole system of brigade enlistment; confuse the rights and seniority of every officer appointed during the last eight years; and, by making each regiment recruit for itself, through the agency of its own depôt, add perhaps 11,000, perhaps, according to the Appendix to Lord Airey's Report, 15,000; or, according to some, 20,000 men to the Army. The first 25 regiments of the Line, which are already double-battalion regiments, would be broken up and made into 50 single-battalion regiments, and the Rifle Brigade and 60th Rifles would be similarly divided into four regiments each.
    I have studied this question most carefully, with the aid of my professional advisers and by the light of the Committees which have investigated it during the last 10 years, and I have come to the conclusion that in this matter we should adopt an advancing, not a retrogressive, policy. We propose, therefore, that the two battalions of the Line, and the two battalions of Militia which now form a territorial brigade, shall hence-forth form a territorial regiment with a county depôt; the first and second battalions being Line and the third and fourth Militia. The officers and men of the four battalions will have the same uniforms, only, in the case of the men of the Militia, distinguished by the letter "M" on their shoulder-straps. The
    204
    regiments will be carefully preserved, but be common to both battalions. In fact, the whole Line will be organized as the 25 first regiments now are.
    To this there would be two classes of exceptions. We do not propose to disturb the four-battalion organization of the rifle regiments; and the special circumstances of some of the Scotch regiments require particular treatment. I will describe them with a little detail, as some most extraordinary misconceptions appear to exist, about projects affecting them and their uniforms, which never entered my mind.
    At present there are nine Highland regiments, the 42nd, 71st, 72nd, 74th, 78th, 79th, 91st, 92nd, and 93rd, wearing the kilt or trews; two double-battalion regiments, the Royal Scots and Royal Scots Fusiliers; and three single-battalion regiments, the 26th, 73rd, and 90th, all localized in Scotland, and one, the 75th, localized in England. We propose to group these after a new arrangement, in a manner which I will now describe.

    1. The 72nd and 78th will form the Seaforth Highlanders, kilted and with the Mackenzie tartan.

    2. The 92nd Gordon Highlanders will remain at Aberdeen, and the 75th will become its second battalion, and receive the same dress.

    3. The 42nd will continue at Perth, and the 73rd, which is a Perthshire regiment, formerly the second battalion of the 42nd, will receive the same dress, and form with it the "Black Watch."

    4. The 79th will have their depôt at Inverness, and will be the odd battalion of the total 141 of the Army.

    5. The 91st and 93rd will form a regiment, with their depôt at Stirling. They will be dressed in the kilt, wearing the tartan, which, we understand, is common to the Argyll and Sutherland clans.

    6. The 71st and 74th will be combined at Hamilton as the Highland Light Infantry.

    7. At Hamilton also will be the 26th and 90th, formed into a rifle regiment. The other two depôts, Edinburgh and Ayr, will remain unchanged. There will thus be nine kilted battalions and two in trews, as against five kilted and four in trews at present.

    Among the Papers which will be distributed to-morrow will be found full

    205
    titles, badges, and colours, which this amalgamation of the regiments will involve.
    This, Sir, is, I think, the place for explaining to the House what changes I propose in the establishments of the Infantry, resulting in an aggregate increase of 2,792 men. One of the most important reforms which a study of these questions has impressed on me is the necessity for increasing our preparedness for such minor wars and expeditions as the history of the last 10 years has shown to be unavoidable. Should we be engaged in a European war, or a war for the preservation of our Indian Empire, we should, of course, at once call out the Army Reserve, and 25,000 trained men so added to the Army, to saynothing of the Militia Reserve, would, even in the present state of the Reserve, fill our battalions at home with seasoned men, ready to take the field. But we ought to be ready for contingencies of a much less serious character, and I will explain to the House how we propose to effect this.
    According to the Establishments of the year 1880–81 there were:—Six battalions at home consisting of 800 rank and file; 6 of 720; 6 of 640; 6 of 560; and 43 of 480, all with depôts of 80, except in the case of eight brigades having both their battalions abroad, which had 280.
    In the Colonies there were 24 battalions, of which 15 had an establishment of 600 rank and file, and nine of 800.
    We propose that in future there shall be at home 12 battalions of 950 rank and file; 4 of 850; 4 of 650; 8 of 500; and 43 of 480. Eight of the battalions of 950 and four of those at 850 will have depôts of 150 rank and file, which will furnish drafts to the other battalion of the regiment; the remainder small depôts of 50. In the Mediterranean and the Colonies there will be 20 battalions, each of 800 rank and file.
    The 12 first regiments, containing, with their depôts, 1,100 rank and file each, and six of the Mediterranean regiments, containing 800 men each, and ready to be raised to 1,000 efficients from their home battalions, will, with three battalions of the Guards, six regiments of Cavalry, and 17 batteries of Horse and Field Artillery, be always in a state of preparedness; and next to the 12 home regiments will come four
    206
    of 850 each, which could also promptly be raised to war strength. We shall thus, after these changes have been completed, be able at any moment, and on the. shortest notice, to bring together and despatch a corps d'armée, consisting of 18 battalions of the Line, three of the Guards, six regiments of Cavalry, and 17 batteries of Artillery; and this without trenching on the four regiments of Infantry required for our annual reliefs, under a system which I will endeavour to explain to the House.
    At present our 70 battalions abroad. (50 in India and 20 in the Colonies) are relieved by other regiments at the rate of six a-year. These frequent reliefs not only are a source of great expense to India, but, under the system of double battalion regiments, will be, to a great extent, unnecessary. We propose that, in future, reliefs of whole battalions should be, to a great extent, superseded by annual reliefs by drafts, both in the case of officers and men, so that neither officer nor man should serve in India for more than eight years. The head-quarters of the battalion would be relieved about every 16 years, in some cases by the other battalion of the regiment, in others by another regiment, but so that every year one regiment furnishing a battalion to India will come on to the Colonial roster, and similarly one from the Colonial roster will come on the list of those furnishing battalions to India. Every regiment will thus take its turn for Indian and Colonial service, but at a much less expense than under the present system.
    I pass now to the third branch of the reforms which we contemplate—namely, those which concern pay, promotion and retirement. I will take first the noncommissioned officer. I have already explained the advantages we propose to give this important class in respect of what has been called "Assured Service"—in other words, the right to continue in the Army until they have acquired. pensions, with the privilege of transfer to the Permanent Staff of the Militia. We propose, however, much more than this. Every regimental sergeant-major will in future have the rank of a warrant officer, with pay in the Infantry of 5s. a-day, and with a higher rate of pension. Similar boons will be given to non commissioned officers of an equivalent position. Colour-Ser-

    207
    geants will receive on appointment 3s. a - day, and sergeants on promotion 2s. 4d. a-day. Corporals' pay, when confirmed, will be 1s. 8d. a-day, including good-conduct pay. The rates of pension throughout will be remodelled, and generally to the soldier's advantage.
    We are in communication with other Departments, with a view to increasing the number of civil appointments to be granted to non-commissioned officers, as recommended by the Committee of which I was Chairman in the last Parliament.
    We have also, as I promised last Session, taken up the cases of the quartermasters and riding-masters. I propose to make additions to the rates of pay which quartermasters of Infantry and Cavalry receive on their appointment to that rank. These will be substantial; the lowest rate for a quartermaster of Infantry being fixed at 9s. a-day instead of 8s. 2d., and rising by increases of 1s. 6d. a-day every five years to 13 s. 6d. Quartermasters will be retired at the age of 55, their pensions being fixed at £200 a-year, with 12 years' service as quartermaster. To riding - masters I contemplate giving the same advantages as regards retirement, and they will receive their present rates of pay, free from the stoppage for forage to which they are now subject.
    But the more important reforms in connection with pay, promotion, and retirement, are those which affect the great body of combatant officers, and I must ask the indulgence of the House while I explain to them our proposals in some detail.
    I have already referred to the, to my mind, inadequate recommendations of Lord Penzance's Commission, which led to the Royal Warrant of 1877; and I hope that, both with respect to compulsory retirement from regimental ranks and to the system according to which the establishment of general officers is framed, the proposals that I am about to explain will form the basis of very beneficial improvements.
    The great blot in the present system of regimental promotion and retirement is the enormous number of compulsory retirements from the Service at an early age, which will shortly be inevitable. I will deal separately with the case of purchase officers—I mean of officers who obtained their present rank by purchase; but the very unsatisfactory prospects of
    208
    regimental non-purchase officers, when the present system reaches its normal condition, will be understood at a glance when I give the following figures, the result of careful actuarial calculation. Out of 1,000 gentlemen who enter the Line as second-lieutenants, excluding those whose object is to join the Indian Staff Corps, no less than 581 will be compulsorily retired as captains at the age of 40 on £200 a-year. Of course, this number would be diminished by any voluntary retirements. Only 216 have any chance of becoming employed as majors, and only 139 as lieutenant-colonels. About the same proportions will be found in the Cavalry and in the Guards. In due time, as a consequence of these forced retirements, there will be up and down the country nearly 4,500 captains ejected from the Army at the early age of 40, and costing the country £900,000 a-year, besides some 500 more, compulsorily retired as majors. It is undoubtedly necessary to provide some retirement from these ranks; but that more than half the number of captains should be compelled to retire from that rank is intolerable. Now, as I have already shown, there is one way, and only one way, in which this evil can be abated; that is, the re-adjustment of the proportions of the several regimental ranks. Lord Penzance's Commission refer to this remedy, and some details on the subject will be found in the Appendices to their Report; but they considered themselves precluded by their instructions from entertaining it. I have, however, given most careful attention to this, the only method of putting regimental retirement on a satisfactory footing; and, with the entire concurrence of the Commander-in-Chief, we have elaborated a scheme which I will now explain to the House.
    A double-battalion Infantry regiment has now two lieutenant-colonels, four majors, 20 captains, and 34 subalterns, two of whom are adjutants.
    We propose that the future organization should be two lieutenant-colonels commanding, two second lieutenant-colonels, eight majors, 12 captains, (two of whom will be adjutants), and 30 subalterns. Under this organization the battalion at home and the battalion abroad will each have one officer less, while at the depôt there will be, besides the colonel commanding the sub-district,

    209
    a lieutenant-colonel, four captains, including two supernumeraries as adjutants of Militia, and two subalterns. We propose, at the same time, to do away with the rank of second lieutenant, giving the same pay to lieutenants of less than three years' service.
    This change will greatly reduce the amount of compulsory retirement; as, under it, instead of 216, no less than 516 officers out of 1,000 will, in the Line, reach the rank of major; but we also propose another change for the benefit of captains. Instead of leaving the Service at the age of 40, captains will be allowed, at that age, to go to a list of unattached majors, from which list, as well as from regimental captains, officers will be in future selected for regimental majorities and equivalent Staff appointments. At the age of 43, however, an unattached major must retire on £200 a-year, with the honorary rank of lieutenant-colonel. In the next grade, a major, on completing seven years' service, will become an unattached lieutenant-colonel, unless he has sooner reached the age of 48, when he must retire; and vacancies in the regimental rank of lieutenant-colonel, or on the Staff, will be filled by selection from majors serving and lieutenant-colonels unattached. This increase in the number of field officers will, I may say in passing, warrant us in greatly reducing for the future the grants of brevet rank.
    In the two Ordnance Corps the reform effected by Lord Cardwell, under which the rank of major was conferred on the senior captains, has rendered unnecessary any general re-organization of either the Artillery or Engineers. But certain grievances have remained, which were brought before Parliament in 1879 by Colonel Arbuthnot; and I promised last year, instead of appointing a Royal Commission on the subject, to inquire into them departmentally. I shall lay on the Table the Report of the Committee which I appointed, with Lord Morley as Chairman, and I hope that their recommendations, which I have generally adopted, will be satisfactory to the House, and to the officers concerned. As the House is aware, Colonel Arbuthnot's principal demand—namely, that the officers of these two distinguished corps should be declared, for the future, equally eligible with the rest of the Army for commands
    210
    and Staff appointments—has been formally and conclusively recognized.
    I referred just now to the case of purchase officers. We propose two changes, both of which have been the subject of debates in this House. The first relates to purchase captains, in whose interest we continued last year the system of Succession Brevet promotions to October, 1881. We propose that, in future, all purchase captains should be allowed, on retirement after 20 years' service, the rank of major, which will carry with it the honorary rank of lieutenant colonel. The other change refers to the near relatives of officers who have been killed in action or died of wounds. We propose, finally, to settle this often-debated question by giving to these relatives the full regulation value of the commission held by the officer in the shape of an annuity or annuities, if these should exceed in value the rates of pension laid down in the present Warrant.
    I come next to the establishment of general officers. Omitting the Indian Staff Corps and the Marines, the active list now consists of 77 generals, 116 lieutenant-generals, and 194 major-generals, or 387 in all. Their method of remuneration, whether before or after retirement, is certainly most anomalous, and the best that Lord Penzance's Commission could say for it was that it was not unpopular. Speaking generally, all these officers, whether active or retired, receive—besides, in some cases, good-service rewards of £100 a-year—£450 a-year until they succeed to the honorary colonelcy of a regiment, or a colonel commandantship. in the Artillery and Engineers, worth £1,000 a-year; and the only cause for removal from the active to the retired list is, attaining 70 years of age. We propose, with respect to these officers, to apply the principles of the system of pay, promotion, and retirement of flag officers in the Navy. Their number will be reduced to 140–95 major-generals, 35 lieutenant-generals, and 10 generals. The first will retire at 62 years of age, the other two ranks at 67, all two years later than the corresponding ranks of the Navy. Non-employment for five years will also involve retirement. The scale of pay will be—For a major-general £500 a-year; lieutenant-general £650 a-year; general £800 a-year; and the rates of retired pay will be £700, £850, and £1,000 a-year

    211
    respectively, with the right of earlier optional retirement at a somewhat reduced rate. Subject to vested interests, which will be very carefully guarded, the colonelcies of regiments will be purely honorary; but in consideration of this change, as affecting the colonels of the Household Regiments, the number of Field Marshals will be raised to a maximum of six, with pay at the rate of £1,300 a-year for life. In addition to these permanent arrangements, temporary provision will be made for the present senior colonels whose pecuniary interests may be prejudiced by the change. Good-service rewards will not be received after retirement, and their number will be gradually diminished to one-half.
    I may say here that promotion to the rank of major-general will in future be given to any colonel of the arm in which the vacancy occurs, whom the Commander-in-Chief may recommend, and whom he considers that it will be for the benefit of the Public Service to promote. In the absence of such a recommendation, the senior colonel qualified to command in the field will be promoted.
    As a rule, all these arrangements will take effect on the 1st of July next.
    The House will now be desirous to know what will be the financial result of the reforms which I have explained; but in accordance with my promise I will only give the general result, reserving the details for Committee.
    The increase in the length of service from six to seven and eight years, with the extended system of relief by drafts, and the increased proportion of noncommissioned officers and men allowed still further to extend their service, set against the addition to the numbers of the Infantry, will cause an ultimate small saving to the Exchequer, which will be about balanced by an increased charge for the other arms. The improved pay of non-commissioned officers is provided for in the present Estimates. The saving to India will be about £200,000 a-year.
    Again, the effective charge for officers from the grade of subaltern upwards will hardly be altered by my proposed changes. But the non-effective charge will be considerably reduced, and the combined saving is calculated by the actuaries at about £230,000 to the Eng-
    212
    lish Exchequer, and £14,000 to India. This is, of course, mainly due to the decrease in the number of gentlemen entering the Army, which the great reduction in compulsory retirement will bring about. Instead of 451 young men annually becoming officers, the number of entries will be just 400; and the total number of officers, active and retired, which, under the present system in its normal condition, should be about 14,600, will be only 12,500. The actual prospect of an officer entering the Service will be considerably improved.
    Taking, then, the whole of the reforms which we contemplate as to men and officers, India and this country will each, in the end, gain not much less than £250,000 a-year, while both the officer and the soldier will be pecuniarily the better by the average addition to their term of service.
    I come now, Sir, to the last branch of my subject—I mean the fulfilment of the promise which. I gave to the House last year relating to corporal punishment. As in the Navy, we propose that in the Army corporal punishment shall be abolished. For the offences, on account of which it may now be inflicted, we propose to substitute a summary punishment in the shape of restraint without injury to life or limb, the exact nature of which I will explain when moving the Army Discipline Continuance Bill. It will also be available as a punishment for an offence not now subjecting the soldier to flogging—I mean drunkenness on active service. I am very conscious of the reluctance with which, step by step, the majority of Officers have seen corporal punishment disappearing from the Statute Book; but without re-opening now this old controversy, I think I may safely say that the compromise of 1879, which limited this punishment to the case of offences punishable by death, was the doom of flogging; and I trust that the greater popularity of the Army, and the consequent improvement in recruiting, which I do not hesitate to predict as the result of this final step, will reconcile to it many of those who, before 1879, reluctantly clung to corporal punishment as a necessity.
    I have now, Sir, finished my task in laying before the House a sketch of our military proposals. It may be thought that at a moment when we have scarcely

    213
    recovered from the strain of the campaigns in Afghanistan and Zululand, when we have been compelled suddenly to collect a large force for operations in Natal and the Transvaal, when we may have another Ashantee War on us, and, above all, when we have been compelled to keep in Ireland a larger and better organized force than that country has seen for many years, it was not the time to deal with such grave questions as the length of service, the linking of battalions, or the compulsory retirement of our officers. I am, however, Sir, of a different opinion. It is to these very events that we owe the dissection of our system by able and experienced hands, and the exposure of its weak points. I offer our reforms to the house of Commons, assured that they will not be ill-received by those who will see in them evidence of our deep anxiety for the well-being of the Army; and confident that if adopted by Parliament they will add greatly to our military strength and security.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."—(Mr. Secretary Childers.)
    COLONEL STANLEY: Sir, I believe that I only express the general sense of all around me, and I may add, I hope, of the opposite side of the House also, when I say that the statement which the right hon. Gentleman has just made has, at all events, had this effect—it has caused us to forget, for the last two hours, how the hands of the clock were moving. We have listened to the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman with the greatest pleasure and the greatest interest. I do not propose now, in the remarks I am about to make, to enter into any discussion whatever upon the statement of the right hon. Gentleman; but before the discussion comes on, which I understand the right hon. Gentleman is perfectly willing to take, there are one or two points which I think it is desirable to clear up, and in regard to which I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to supplement the statement he has made by giving some further information to the House. Perhaps, before I specify what those points are, I may be allowed, from a personal point of view, to say a word with regard to what fell from the right hon. Gentleman about Lord Airey's Committee. It
    214
    will be within the recollection of the House that that Committee was appointed to discharge a very difficult and a very delicate duty at a time when it was perfectly clear that our forces were not quite in so good a condition as could be wished, and when, above all things, it was desirable to know, from candid observation, what was the real truth of the case. The right hon. Gentleman has said, and, no doubt, he is perfectly right, that the Committee went beyond their official instructions. Now, I desire to say that those official instructions, although they were framed so as formally to prescribe the limits of the inquiry, were supplemented by constant reference to myself on the part of the Committee, and if the Committee, in any instance, went beyond their original instructions, the responsibility of their having done so rests with myself. I can only bear my testimony to the zeal, ability, and industry with which the Committee pursued their inquiry, and I do not doubt that the right hon. Gentleman himself will acknowledge the assistance which he has received in his scheme from the Report which the Committee felt it their duty to make. I have no desire to enter further into this matter now; but I wish to ask for one or two particulars from the right hon. Gentleman if he feels himself at liberty to give them. I should be glad, if by printed statement or otherwise, the right hon. Gentleman could find himself able, at an early date, to acquaint the House with the nature and general scope of the experiments which the revived Ordnance Select Committee are to undertake. I speak with some reserve; but I must confess the fear which is in my mind, and I believe in that of some other persons also, that if the Committee is appointed for experimental purposes, they may be induced to leave out of sight that which was the original intention of the Committee I had the honour to appoint—namely, to secure, as soon as possible, the best gun for the Service. I hope that the Ordnance Committee will have their instructions limited so that they shall not go off into a series of experiments and put off the securing of the best gun, both for the Army and the Fleet, until a remote date. There is another point upon which, if the right hon. Gentleman is able to give any ex-

    215
    planation, it would be of great interest and utility to the Committee when we come to discuss the proposals of the Government in a Committee of this House, and that is the manner in which the roster for the Service will work. It is very easy, and, at first sight, most important, to show by figures how the bringing up of battalions to a particular strength at a particular time will enable drafts to be sent out in regular proportion, and the service to be carried on equally in all parts of the world. But I am anxious that the right hon. Gentleman should give the House such information as lies in his power, and is convenient, so far as his public duty is concerned, to show the House upon what data these calculations are founded, and how the details are worked out. I should like to ask a further question in regard to the proposal for allowing the regulation value of commissions to be granted to the families of officers. I want to know how the right hon. Gentleman gets over what has always been felt to be a considerable difficulty—namely, whether the scheme is to apply to the future only; and, if not, whether he has considered to what extent he will be committed to a retrospective action? Dealing with the past has always been one of the crucial difficulties in dealing with the matter, and I should be glad if the right hon. Gentleman can give the House any information on that point. With respect to the reduction of generals, I will not say anything in regard to that proposal at present; but I may have a word to say hereafter as to whether the advantage proposed to be derived from the limitation will really compensate for the disadvantages you may have obtained from striking off from the active list officers who, although above a certain age, are perfectly competent for the performance of all the duties attending strategic command. There is another and a more prominent question, which I dare not touch in detail now. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman Will be able to accomplish all that he proposes within the limits of the Estimates laid upon the Table. I would really ask the right hon. Gentleman if all his proposals are included within the four corners of the Estimates; or whether he thinks that on any of these points it will be necessary hereafter to take Supplementary
    216
    Estimate? I am extremely glad that the right hon. Gentleman has found himself able to deal with a case on which, I think, there is a general agreement—the case of the non-commissioned officers. Last year, in moving the Estimates, I said that I hoped to deal with it at an early period. It will, no doubt, be a difficult matter to deal with satisfactorily; and I would congratulate the right hon. Gentleman if he is able to carry out the whole of his proposals within the four corners of the Estimates. I am not going to say one word with regard to corporal punishment, except that, having had occasion to consider the question, and to consider it in a serious and practical light, I believe I speak the mind of a good many persons when I state that I welcome the time when the right hon. Gentleman, acting upon his responsibility for the discipline of the Service, feels himself enabled to dispense with this punishment, although, of course, I reserve my opinions as to the merits of his proposal until I know what he intends to substitute for it. We should all be glad if anything in the character of a sentimental objection could be removed on the part of those who entered the Service. Personally, I may say that, having willingly assented to the changes that were made in 1879, I am additionally glad, if the right hon. Gentleman feels it is safe for the Service, and from his own observation is able, upon his own responsibility, to dispense with this punishment now. I hope it will be fully understood that the right hon. Gentleman can show that it can be done without any relaxation of discipline. It is not necessary that I should touch at present upon any other point. I think, if the right hon. Gentleman is able to give certain details, such as I have indicated, it may facilitate the progress of the Estimates through Committee. Personally, I confess that, so far as my experience goes, the fuller the information given to the House, generally speaking, the more ready has the assent of the House been to the proposals made; and I hope the right hon. Gentleman will consider that, in making these suggestions, I am prepared to consider fairly the propositions he intends to submit, and to assist him as far as is in my power.
    SIR HENRY HAVELOCK-ALLANbelieved the statement which had just

    217
    been made by the right hon. Gentleman gave promise of changes that would be highly beneficial to the Service. It was especially gratifying to those who, knowing they were contending against popular feeling on the subject, had maintained for the last six years that the general lines of the system of short service, when modified, were capable of being made to answer all the requirements of the country, in giving us better means of concentrating Reserves to be called out on an emergency. The announcement made by the Secretary of State for War with regard to the changes about to be introduced was also satisfactory; and, in his opinion, the more those changes were considered, the more they would commend themselves to the country. It had never been maintained that the system was perfectly right; but, on the contrary, it had been admitted that, in matters of detail, it was open to revision and improvement. The changes proposed were, of course, too large to form the subject of discussion that evening; but they contained in themselves the promise that the system about to be introduced would give the country that which had been looked for eight years ago, when the present system was announced. There were, however, two subjects upon which the statement of the right hon. Gentleman did not enter into so much detail as would probably be afforded hereafter. The first was that of the benefits proposed to be held out to the families of officers killed in action; and upon this point the right hon. Gentleman did not say to what degree he would make them retrospective. In making the suggestion, therefore, that the retrospective benefit should be made to include the casualties incurred within the last two years during the Afghan War, he believed the proposal of the Government to that effect would be received by the country with the greatest satisfaction. Again, with regard to the proposal to cut down the list of general officers, he reminded the right hon. Gentleman that within the last year and a-half a considerable number of young colonels—70 in all—were chosen by the late Government to rank as major-generals. He trusted that, whatever changes might be made in the higher ranks of the Army on account of age, they would not apply to those
    218
    officers. The subject, however, was one that would be considered more in detail upon another occasion. In conclusion, he thanked the right hon. Gentleman for giving his attention to all the evidence and suggestions laid before him in the Report of Lord Airey's Committee.
    LORD EUSTACE CECILcordially agreed with almost all that had fallen from his right hon. Friend, and would not, therefore, trouble the House by going into all the details touched upon by him. The enlistment of recruits of not under 19 years of age was a question of great importance, and with reference to it he should have some remarks to make at another time. He was glad to see that the right hon. Gentleman would have no recruits sent to India but those who had at least one year's service, and would like to know whether that rule would extend to the Colonies—whether, in fact, it was the intention of the right hon. Gentleman that no soldier should leave the country until he was 21 years of age, and had seen one year's service? Again, while the statement of the right hon. Gentleman with regard to the list of generals would, no doubt, cause a great deal of inquiry as well as satisfaction, hon. Members on that side of the House were puzzled to understand how all these proposed reductions were to be effected within the scope of the Estimates. He would also like to know whether the reduction of the number of general officers to 140 was to begin on the 1st of July next; and when the now scale of pay, as laid down, agreeably with the scale of pay to officers in the Navy, would come into force? The recommendations of the Committee over which he had the honour to preside had been dismissed by the right hon. Gentleman in a very few words; but when the subject was again approached it was to be hoped he would refer to it at greater length. With regard to the Ordnance Committee about to be appointed, he wished to ask whether the Chairman would be a naval or military man, and if the right hon. Gentleman could give the names of the Members? However that might be, he thought it most important that the Chairman, whether a military or naval man, should report direct to the Secretary of State for War; for, as the right hon. Gentleman would understand, where two

    219
    such Departments as the Admiralty and War Office were concerned, uniformity of system and report were most necessary, in order that the wants of the two Services should be uniformly supplied. He had to thank the right hon. Gentleman for his statement; and, although it contained some points upon which he found himself unable to agree with him, he admitted that no one could have placed his proposals before the country in an abler or clearer manner.
    GENERAL SIR GEORGE BALFOURwas understood to say that the statement of the right hon. Gentleman had not made it clear to the House in what manner the recruits of the age of 19 and upwards were to be obtained. The difficulty of getting suitable men as respects age and stature was recognized by the Commission of 1866, on which he had served; and he felt sure that since that time no sufficient improvement had been made in the mode of obtaining recruits, so as to supply the heavy drain to meet the short service system. He found that out of 18,000 recruits enlisted last year, 1,000 were entirely unsuitable for the Army; while a large proportion of the men serving in India, the Colonies, and at home were also unsuitable on account of their age. He would therefore like to see the settlement of the important question as to how men of 20 years of age and over were to be obtained. The right hon. Gentleman had stated that in future he would prevent any soldier going to India under the age of 20. But a similar rule had been in force for many years, and it was still found that many of the troops sent to India were under the required age. He suggested, with regard to the battalions on service in India, that the present establishment of 780 privates should be divided into six instead of eight companies, the number of subaltern officers being too few for the requirements of the regiments when divided into eight companies. He would also urge that all men forming the band, the pioneers, clerks, lance sergeants, and corporals now returned amongst the privates being returned separately, and not counted as part of the duty privates.
    SIR HENRY FLETCHERasked whether there was any intention of increasing the retiring allowance to purchase captains, many of whom, having paid £2,000 or £2,300 for their com-
    220
    missions, stood in a worse relative position than the non-purchase captains? He trusted the right hon. Gentleman would direct his attention to this subject.
    LORD ELCHOsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had grappled with nearly all the difficult questions in connection with the Army, and there were some changes proposed as to the value of which there could not be two opinions; for instance, in the age of recruits, and the improvement in the position of non-commissioned officers. Further, there was the main point to be considered of keeping a certain number of regiments up to their war strength, for such campaigns as we had been recently engaged in. Then there was another point, as to the Militia; and upon this matter he wished to put a question to the right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Gentleman had made no reference to the Militia Reserves, and this was very like leaving out the part of Hamlet from the play of that name. The Secretary of State for War knew the Militia was the backbone of the Army, although it was to be feared it was semi-invertebrate at the present moment. Would the right hon. Gentleman look into this question, so that before the Estimates came on he would be able to say something about it?
    COLONEL COLTHURSTwished to know whether the right hon. Gentleman would take into consideration the desirability of adopting one of the recommendations of Lord Airey's Committeen—namely, that such privates as might be recommended by commanding officers should be allowed to extend their service and proceed to pension, provided that the total number of men of all ranks so allowed to extend their service should not exceed 25 per cent of each battalion? There was another matter to which he wished to call the right hon. Gentleman's attention. He had said that the sergeant-major was to be made a warrant officer; but if they were to judge by present experience, the position would be anything but an enviable one. Without going at ony length into the matter, he would ask the right hon. Gentleman to give the House some information on these points.
    CAPTAIN MILNE-HOMEwished the right hon. Gentleman to explain the alterations he proposed to make in the Infantry to do away with so many compulsory retirements of officers,
    MAJOR NOLANthought the right hon. Gentleman's proposal an excellent one, especially with regard to the improvement in the position of the non-commissioned officers; and he (Major Nolan) hoped that in future years the position of those men would be still further improved. It was satisfactory to know that the right hon. Gentleman had corrected the retirement scheme, as the whole of the statistics upon which it had been based were wrong. He agreed with the proposed plan of fixing the age of the men at 19, although, with regard to the point of service, he was afraid the Secretary of State for War had made a step in the backward direction in yielding to the long-service cry. Many officers, no doubt, thought differently; and the subject was one which admitted of argument, and should be thoroughly discussed; but, for his own part, he thought that the right hon. Gentleman, in increasing the period of service with the colours from six to seven years, had made a mistake. He did not think that more than six years' service at home was necessary, and the problem was to reconcile a short service at home with a tolerably long one in India. It was satisfactory to find that the right hon. Gentleman had not given way to the popular cry on the subject of localization. It was right to put three or four battalions together—much more advantageous than only having two together. In following the example of Continental Armies on this point, and making our regiments as large as we could, we could not be far wrong. With regard to breech-loading guns, he thought this country had made a mistake, for if proper experiments had been made four or five years ago many millions would have been saved. No; we had so many men in the Department pledged up to the lips for muzzle-loading that innumerable experiments would be necessary to change their opinions. It was time to take up a firm position on this subject, and say—"We will have no more muzzle-loading guns, with one or two exceptions." A rapid change to breech-loading was necessary; not that he would wish to see any extraordinary expense incurred; but no more muzzle-loading guns should be made than were necessary for ships of a certain construction, and for other special purposes, and as little muzzle-loading ammunition as possible.
    SIR WALTER B. BARTTELOTquite agreed with the general concensus of opinion that the statement of the right hon. Gentleman had been a most explicit, and, so far as he could judge, a most satisfactory one. He would go farther, and say that it was the most important statement that had been made to the House since 1870. No doubt, the right hon. Gentleman did not expect, and could not wish, that they should now discuss any of those great changes which he had shadowed forth; and he would venture to ask him that lie would now give them the assurance he had tendered to them before—namely, that they should have a clear fortnight for the consideration of his proposals, so that they might consider them in all their various bearings. There was one point which the right hon. Gentleman had not made quite clear. He had told them that the head-quarters of regiments were to be in India for 16 years; but he had then informed them that no individual was to go for more than eight years. It would be as well to have this explained, for if the Staff were to be at head-quarters 16 years, it was obvious that some individuals would be there more than eight years. With regard to the Ordnance Committee which had been referred to, there was nothing that the country was more interested in than its composition. What was wanted was a judicial Committee, and not a constructive Committee. They had had enough of constructive Committees—not that they had done anything absolutely wrong; but they had been too fond, for their own ends, of carrying out their own theories, and of having done what they thought ought to be done, and having made what they thought ought to be made. What was now wanted was a Committee who would judge as to what was best to be done in the interest of the country.
    COLONEL WALRONDthought it was only proper, before the adjournment, that some Volunteer officer should get up and thank the right hon. Gentleman for the great concession he had made to the demands of the Volunteers. He was a Volunteer officer; and he wished to present to the right hon. Gentleman, on behalf of the Volunteer Force of the country, his sincere thanks for what he had done, and to assure him that the honour he intended to confer on the

    223
    different officers would be highly appreciated by them, and taken as a compliment by the whole Force. If he understood the right hon. Gentleman rightly, he intended to grant to the Volunteer officers the same honorary rank as Militia officers; and he congratulated the Government upon being able to offer such a piece of good news. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman that Volunteer officers should not be exempted from serving on juries; but, at the same time, it was only right that a Volunteer, when in camp on military duty, should be exempted; and he believed a Judge invariably took that view, and on such an occasion exempted Volunteers from their civil duties. The right hon. Gentleman had said that Her Majesty would be graciously pleased to hold a Review at Windsor this year. He wished he could persuade the right hon. Gentleman to recommend that it should be held in Hyde Park. He did not see why Reviews should not be held in Hyde Park, and certainly did not think it would do any more damage than the monster meeting held there two or three Sundays ago. He would not further discuss these matters now, as they were sure to have a further opportunity when they got into Committee.
    MR. MACLIVER, though not a Volunteer, had lately been much consulted by Volunteer officers on the various points raised during the discussion, and to which the right hon. Gentleman had alluded in the course of his statement. He could concur in the expressions of satisfaction of the hon. and gallant Gentleman who had just sat down, because he believed that the concessions made by the right hon. Gentleman would afford considerable gratification to the Auxiliary Forces throughout the country. It was not without reason that some concession had been made to the Volunteer Army, for in London there was not a single Volunteer regiment with its full complement of officers. The same remark would apply to other parts of the country; and the concession that had been made, and others that might follow, involving no expense, would give great satisfaction to the Auxiliary Forces, and bring in an accession of officers which was now so much required.
    MR. CARINGTONwished to know whether the right hon. Gentleman did
    224
    not consider it desirable to have some scheme whereby the Army Reserve could be called upon to act in the regiments when they went out to take part in these small wars that we were now engaged in? The regiments otherwise would, when kept up to their full strength, consist mainly of young soldiers. He wished to point out that a grievance in the Army was the stoppage of 1d. a-day on board ship for certain grocery allowances.
    SIR PATRICK O'BRIENsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had made a concession to the Scotch regiments; and he would like to ask him whether he could not also make a concession to Irish regiments? There were 16 regiments bearing a Scottish designation, whereas the number of Scotchmen in the Army was under 15,000; but there were only six regiments bearing an Irish designation, while there were 40,000 Irishmen in the Army. He would ask the right hon. Gentleman not to destroy the individuality of two historic regiments like the 87th Royal Irish Fusiliers and the 88th Connaught Rangers, by affiliating them, but rather to add to each regiment one of the old Indian regiments, which had had no local connection with the United Kingdom.
    MR. CHILDERS: I have no right to address you again, Sir; but perhaps I may answer some of the questions that have been put to me. My right hon. Friend opposite (Colonel Stanley) for whose encouraging words I am very grateful, asks me to illustrate certain of my statements by a printed paper. I am very anxious that the House, when in Committee, should have before it all the facts as to our proposals in a simple and intelligible form, and I will lay an explanatory Memorandum on the Table. With regard to the question as to how the roster will work under the new system, when the leading regiments will be so much stronger than they now are, we have given great attention to that subject; and there are at the War Office gentlemen who are extremely skilled on this particular point, and who have satisfied me that there will be no difficulty. It has been asked whether any retrospective arrangement will be made with respect to the families of purchase officers who have been killed in action or have died from wounds. I may state that there will be, to a small

    225
    extent, a retrospective character in our proposals in this respect. I have also been asked whether I can give the Committee when it sits the fullest opportunity of discussing in detail the statements I have made. I will undertake to do so; and by a method, which I need not describe now, I will practically bring before the Committee all the particulars of the proposals I have stated. I am asked whether the limit of 20 years of age will apply to the Colonies as well as to India, and I should say that in regard to some Colonies it would not be necessary to send soldiers to them under that age. The noble Lord the Member for Essex (Lord Eustace Cecil) also asked me whether the Chairman of the Ordnance Committee will be a soldier or a sailor, and to whom he will report. He will be a soldier, and he will report to the Secretary of State for War. Another hon. Member asks how we hope to obtain sufficient recruits. I can only say that, in the opinion of the Inspector General, a most efficient officer, we shall obtain them under the new system. He has submitted some plans for bringing the advantages of Army service home to the young people of every village through the instrumentality of the Post Office; and this, I think, will work very much to our advantage in bringing young men into the Army. Living a good deal in the country, I am bound to say that in many places I cannot find anybody who knows anything about the Army, or how to become a recruit, and I hope we shall be able to tap many new sources. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Kincardine asked whether we had consulted the Government of India about charges involving an additional charge on them—as, for instance, the increased number of field officers. Yes, we have done so, and I am happy to say that the charge, instead of being a burden, will be an immediate relief to India. At present, when a captain retires, if he is on the Indian charge, India has to pay the capital value of his retired pay, so that the proposed reduction in compulsory retirements is a benefit to India exceeding any increased charge for pay. As to the question of the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Henry Fletcher), whether any increased payment will be made to purchase captains on retirement, I will look into the matter; but I cannot imagine good
    226
    ground for it. The hon. and gallant Member for Cork County (Colonel Colt-burst) asks whether our proposal with regard to sergeant-majors will be a real boon. I certainly think so. The hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Major Nolan) fears that I have given way to the long-service cry. I do not know from what time he would date this cry; but all the arrangements on the subject of the length of service, down to the smallest details, were certainly settled three or four months ago. He says, also, that I do not pledge myself on the question of breech-loading or muzzle-loading ordnance. I was careful to say nothing on the matter this evening; but when we lay our proposals in that respect before the House, I think we shall be seen to have adopted a perfectly clear policy. With regard to the headquarters of regiments remaining in India longer than now, I can only repeat that, unless they wish, no one need remain in India for more than eight years. An hon. Member suggested that the Volunteer Review to be held by Her Majesty should be held in Hyde Park instead of at Windsor. I am afraid I have nothing to do with that question, as the Park is not under my control. The hon. Member for Buckinghamshire (Mr. Carington) asks whether any portion of the Reserve will be called out for small wars. I think it is important not to make the Reserve unpopular among employers of labour by increasing the legal liabilities of the men to be called out for service; and so far, when we have asked the Volunteers, the invitation has answered admirably.
    Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
    Supply Committee deferred till To-morrow.

    RAILWAYS (RATES ON FARES).
    Ordered, That the Select Committee on Railways (Rates on Fares) do consist of Twenty-three Members:—Mr. ASHLEY, Mr. BARCLAY, Mr. BOLTON, Mr. CALLAN, Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, Mr. CRAIG, Mr. CROSS, Mr. DILLWYN, Sir DANIEL GOOCH, Mr. GREGORY, Mr. LOWTHER, Mr. MONK, Mr. SAMUEL MORLEY, Mr. MULHOLLAND, Mr. WILLIAM N. NICHOLSON, Mr. O'SULLIVAN, Mr. RICHARD PAGET, Mr. JOSEPH PEASE, Mr. PELL, Mr. SAMUELSON, Mr. SCLATER BOOTH, Sir HENRY TYLER, and Sir EDWARD WATKIN:—Power to send for persons, papers, and records; Seven to be the quorum.
    House adjourned at half after One o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Committee—Report—Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Clonakilty, &c.) * (31).
Report—Local Taxation Returns (Scotland)* (37).

CANDAHAR.—RESOLUTION.
THE EARL OF LYTTON, in rising to move the following Resolution:—
"That nothing in the information laid before this House justifies the announced policy of Her Majesty's Government in regard to Candahar,"
said: My Lords, I rise for the purpose of moving the Resolution of which I have given lengthened Notice. My Lords, it is not without a deep sense of responsibility that I ask your Lordships to place upon record this expression of opinion. The security of the Queen's great Empire in India is an object which all British statesmen must have equally at heart, and in the promotion of that object I do not attribute any monopoly of patriotism to either side of this House. Deeply as I deplore—and I do most deeply deplore—the intention announced by Her Majesty's Ministers with regard to Candahar, still I am persuaded that it does at least represent their conscientious estimate of what they consider sufficient for the attainment of an end which their Predecessors in Office no less conscientiously endeavoured to attain by stronger and more far-reaching measures. If this intention had been irrevocably carried out, I should have shrunk from suggesting to others those causes for anxiety which it certainly creates in my own mind. But, fortunately, both for the safety of India and the honour of England, that intention, although the announcement of it has been reiterated, is not yet carried out; and in the situation it concerns there is much which seems likely to render both difficult and dangerous any immediate attempt to carry it out. In these circumstances, there is still time for further inquiry and reflection; and I confess I am not altogether without hope that if, on full examination of it, your Lordships should be led to the conclusion that the difficulties and dangers of this situation are of a permanent rather than a temporary character, Her Majesty's Ministers may even still be induced to re-consider a decision at which they appear to have arrived upon, to say the least, a very rapid and summary survey of the circumstances affected by it and the authorities opposed it. My Lords, whatever view may be taken of the policy which induced the late Go-
50
vernment of India to maintain a permanent and powerful military control over Western Afghanistan, I can assure your Lordships that this was, at least, the deliberate determination of a unanimous Administration, acting upon the no less unanimous advice of all the most competent authorities in India at that time. It was not the arbitrary fiat of a Viceroy or a Secretary of State. It was wholly uninfluenced by the passions of Parties or the humours of persons; and it was not a hasty decision. It cost the late Government of India a much longer time to arrive at this decision than it has taken Her Majesty's Ministers to announce their intention of reversing it. On all the grounds of it, there was a complete unanimity of conviction between the Supreme Government of India and the two great Frontier Governments of the Punjaub and Bombay. Indeed, I doubt whether in the whole history of Indian Administration the action of the Governor General in Council has ever been supported on a question of equal importance by a stronger or more authoritative body of opinion in India itself. But, my Lords, this is not all. Your Lordships will remember that at the time when the Queen assumed the Imperial title in India, Her Majesty was pleased to mark her confidence in the loyalty of the Feudatory Courts by appointing many of their Rulers to be Imperial Councillors to the Suzerain Power. Now, this question of Candahar concerns all the interests of India, regarded as an Imperial whole; and I cannot imagine a question upon which the Viceroy might, with greater advantage or propriety, place himself in personal communication with those Princely representatives of Native sentiment and opinion in India. I do not mean to say that it is always possible, or even advisable, to treat Asiatic questions from a purely Asiatic point of view; but I do say it is most advisable to endeavour to ascertain that point of view, and not to underrate the practical importance of it in dealing with such questions. Be that as it may, I did personally and confidentially discuss this question with all the chief Feudatory Princes of Northern and Central India; and I do not hesitate to say that our policy respecting Candahar was in accordance with the opinions they expressed to me about it. As

51
regards Native opinion in the Provinces under our own immediate administration, I could pass hours, were it worth while to do so, in reading to your Lordships both public addresses and private letters expressing, on the part of all classes of the Native community of British India, their sympathetic approval of our policy on the subject of Candahar. And, lastly, I will remind your Lordships that Her Majesty has upon the North-West Frontier of her Indian Empire, besides the Ameer of Cabul, another great neighbour—a neighbour whose interests are vitally concerned in the retention or abandonment of Candahar. That neighbour is the Khan of Khelat, our loyal and useful ally. Well, my Lords, the Khan of Khelat has repeatedly evinced his lively satisfaction on account of our policy about Candahar; and, since my return to this country, I have received from His Highness a letter, expressing his hope that it will not be disturbed. My Lords, I will not dwell any longer upon this aspect of the question. I trust I have said enough to satisfy your Lordships that the retention of our military control over Western Afghanistan is a policy advised by all the most competent authorities in India, approved by Native as well as European opinion in that country, and congenial to the only Asiatic ally upon whose active loyalty you can confidently reckon, so long as you do not disregard the protection of his interests in the prosecution of your own. Surely such a policy ought not to be set aside without grave consideration and convincing evidence of the obligation to abandon it. And, in point of fact, my Lords, not long before the announcement made to us in the gracious Speech from the Throne, this was the opinion apparently entertained—it was certainly the opinion publicly expressed—by the noble Marquess the Secretary of State for India. All attempts to elicit from him any premature declaration of policy on the subject of Candahar were repelled, and I think most properly repelled, by the noble Marquess. He pointed out that the new Government and the new Viceroy had only just come into Office; that they found themselves confronted with facts and considerations, not previously familiar to them, which it would be their duty to study very carefully, in consultation with their political and military advisers in India; and that,
52
until all the facts and opinions bearing on this question had been laid before them and seriously examined, Her Majesty's Government could not form, still less could they express, any decision about Candahar. That was, I think, a sound, a statesmanlike, and an honourable statement of the position of the present Government, and of its responsibilities in reference to this question. But how has that statement been carried out? I think your Lordships would like to know, and, on a question so vital to their interests, I think that the people of India and of England are entitled to know, what is the opinion of the new Viceroy, and what is the advice tendered to Lord Ripon by his Councillors in India. To these questions the Government have vouchsafed us no reply. Pressed by an increasing public opinion to show some ground for what appeared to be a foregone conclusion arrived at without reference to the Government of India, Her Majesty's Ministers have, at the ninth hour, produced certain documents—and what are they? They have laid before your Lordships a very lengthy Minute of my own, written three years ago, previous to the first Afghan campaign, before a shot had been fired in Afghanistan, and at a time when the Government of India was not only most anxious, but still hopeful to avoid hostilities with the Ameer of that country. Now, in this Minute I reviewed from a general, and, I may say, a confidential standpoint, a variety of hypothetical contingencies; but I did not review, because I could not review, the situation that did subsequently arise—that situation with which the Government of India had to deal—and with which it has still to deal—with especial reference to Candahar after Candahar has been twice conquered by British troops, after a British Mission has been massacred at Cabul, and after the discovery at Cabul of those most sinister documents which are now upon the Table of this House. I have no personal objection to the publication of this Minute; but I need hardly point out to your Lordships that it was intended for confidential consideration by my Advisers and by the Cabinet of England. This is the first time that I have ever heard of a Government publishing, for the information of foreign Powers, the confidential discussions and speculations of

53
its own authorities about its means of international defence and attack. Therefore, although I have no personal objection to the publication of that Minute, I must say that I think its publication was not a necessary, that it was not a wise, and certainly that it was not a patriotic act on the part of Her Majesty's Government. In addition to this document Her Majesty's Government have furnished us with a series of lucubrations by a gentleman who I believe was once, many years ago, a Judge at Bombay, and who never in the whole course of his life, so far as I know, was directly concerned in the responsible Administration of India, or intrusted with any responsible employment on the Frontier. They have also given us a variety of opinions by other gentlemen not connected with the Government of India. Some of these gentlemen are no doubt men of ability, and one of them is an officer of great eminence and deserved reputation acquired from his successful conduct of campaigns, not in India, but in Africa. But all these gentlemen, whatever their ability, labour under an essential disqualification for giving any authoritative opinion on the precise question before your Lordships, because they, one and all of them, are destitute of any recent local or personal experience in regard to the circumstances which have created this question, and with which the Government of India has been dealing in reference to it. No doubt the noble Duke the Lord Privy Seal has told your Lordships that the contemplated action of Her Majesty's Government as to Candahar is in accordance with the opinions of former Viceroys, and also of former Secretaries of State for India—himself being one of the latter. Now, I do not yield to the noble Duke or to any one of my countrymen in my feeling of veneration for the great men who in former times have governed India; and I listened with amazement to the denunciations of the noble Duke when last month in this House he accused me personally of having gone out to India expressing myself, as he said, in terms of condemnation and contempt towards all former Viceroys from Lord Auckland to Lord Northbrook. Since the noble Duke made that statement I have referred to every one of my public utterances both in India and England, upon Indian affairs,
54
and I defy the noble Duke to find in any one of them a single syllable that can in the least degree warrant such an accusation. This, my Lords, is a very small matter, and perhaps I ought to apologize for noticing it; but I should feel myself unworthy to stand here and appeal to your judgment on a question of the greatest national importance if, on any previous occasion, I had been guilty of the vanity and folly attributed to me by the noble Duke. I hope, however, that it is not inconsistent with due respect to former Viceroys to say that the question we are now concerned with, and the particular circumstances which have forced that question on the Government of India and the Government of England, had not arisen in the time of former Viceroys, and could not possibly have engaged the practical attention of those eminent men. Former Viceroys were not called upon to deal with the established influence of the Government of Russia at Cabul; they were not called upon, under immense responsibilities, to study those Russian revelations which we have found at Cabul; and surely the known opinions of all the most competent and responsible authorities in India who have been practically dealing with these circumstances and this question during the last five years ought not to be invalidated by a vague reference to the opinions of former Viceroys and former Secretaries of State in regard to essentially different circumstances and a totally different situation. I must say, moreover, that the great importance which has been attached by the noble Duke opposite to the opinions of eminent men no longer personally concerned in the government of India or its affairs appears to me difficult to reconcile with the reason lately given by the noble Viscount (Viscount Enfield) for withholding so long from the knowledge of this House and the country the very strong opinion expressed on this precise question by my noble Friend the late Commander-in-Chief in India. The noble Duke told us that the Government did not think it worth while to furnish us with the opinion of Lord Napier of Magdala on this question, because he was no longer personally connected with the military or the political affairs of the North-West Frontier of India. But was the late Lord Lawrence so connected with those affairs at the time when his opinions, ex-

55
pressed more than 20 years ago, were so vehemently invoked by noble Lords opposite, and so vociferously proclaimed from every Radical platform, by all the drummers and trumpeters of their party? No, my Lords! of the terrible mandate issued by Her Majesty's Ministers for the repudiation of British pledges, and the virtual destruction of British influence, in Afghanistan, there is only one intelligible explanation. It is the only explanation in regard to which Her Majesty's Government have not shifted their ground between finance and morals; it is the only explanation on which they have constantly laid stress, and to which they have appealed with a great appearance of pride; and, therefore, I do them no injustice if I assume that this explanation represents the real motive of their contemplated action in regard to Candahar. It cannot be doubted that the means placed in the hands of the Government of India to exercise from Candahar a powerful military control over Western Afghanistan represents one of the most important results of the late Afghan War. But the present Ministers, before they came into Office, before they had any opportunity of studying the facts, the origin, and the circumstances of that war, or the situation in regard to which it should be practically considered, pledged themselves—not, my Lords, to the people of India, not to the people of England, but to the most violent and most ignorant of their own political supporters, to treat that Afghan War, if they could, as an interpolated record in the authentic pages of the history of India—a record to be torn out or obliterated, if possible, by reverting, regardless of its existence, to what? To their old policy, with its old results, to the old reliance upon Russian promises, with the old confidence in Afghan friendship, the old faith in English inactivity, associated in their recollection with those palmy days when the lion and the lamb lay down together, under the joint administration of the noble Duke opposite and the noble Earl the late Viceroy of India. My Lords, believing, as I do, that this Golden Age is a fiction, I am perfectly content to place the whole question of Candahar upon the issue of its historical truth. That issue has been greatly simplified by an important admission lately elicited from Her Majesty's Ministers, who have now told us, not only
56
that they do not dispute, but that they unreservedly, endorse the principle laid down by every Indian administrator, and by every British statesman, that Russian influence in Afghanistan is in-compatible with British power in India, and that, even at any cost, it must be excluded or counteracted. That being the case, the expediency of retaining or abandoning Candahar is narrowed from a question of principle to a question of fact. If, as a matter of fact, the policy to which Her Majesty's Government is now so confidently reverting did succeed in excluding or counteracting Russian influence in Afghanistan, then, notwithstanding the events and revelations of the last five years, there is a primâ facie case for reverting to that policy, and resting content with its results. But if, on the other hand, that policy wholly failed, upon the fullest and fairest trial, to achieve this result; if, as a matter of fact, it actually facilitated the establishment of Russia's influence in Afghanistan, and if I can satisfy your Lordships that such influence is a serious danger to the British power in India, then I think there will be very few noble Lords who will not share the feeling of extreme alarm with which I contemplate this reversion to the principles and results of it. Let us come to facts. The discussion of them is further simplified by the noble Earl the First Lord of the Admiralty, who has told your Lordships that, during the whole period of his Viceroyalty, he had no reason whatever to suppose that the Russian Government was seeking any influence in Afghanistan, or that the action of its Central Asian authorities was in the least degree incompatible with a loyal observance of its engagement towards our own Government. I listened to that statement with great surprise. My impressions are materially at variance with those of the noble Earl. I have the strongest possible reason to suppose, and not only to suppose, but to assert most positively, that the whole period of the noble Earl's Viceroyalty was marked by incessant and successful efforts on the part of the Russian authorities to establish an illegitimate influence in Afghanistan; and I further assert that this influence was constantly directed towards the formation of a Russo-Afghan Alliance for purposes which, if they could have been carried out, would have shattered the whole fabric of British power in India.

57
What I assert I trust I shall be able to prove to the satisfaction of your Lordships without detaining your attention at any inordinate length upon this preliminary, but essential, point. Your Lordships will doubtless recollect that Russia's engagement not to seek any influence in Afghanistan was given in 1869. The attempts of her authorities to acquire such an influence commenced as early as the spring of the following year. They began with a complimentary letter from General Kaufmann, answered by the Ameer in terms dictated by the Viceroy of India, who was then Lord Mayo, and who, naturally enough, saw nothing in that letter to object to or complain of. But, my Lords, the Correspondence, thus commenced by the Russian Governor General, gradually, indeed I might say rapidly, assumed a more practical and significant character. And in the summer of 1872 he addressed to the Ameer of Cabul a communication about the boundaries of Bokhara, which caused considerable sensation in the Cabul Durbar. The Ameer was seriously alarmed by that communication. He lost no time in forwarding to the Viceroy a confidential message, in which he expressed his anxiety and apprehension about Russia's apparent designs upon Khiva; and he appealed to the British Government to protect him from the attempts of the Russian authorities to establish regular and frequent communication with Afghanistan. Well, my Lords, this appeal was made to the British Government in 1872; and, in reply to it, the Ameer was advised to thank General Kaufmann for the friendly sentiments of a letter which had caused His Highness so much uneasiness. Thus encouraged General Kaufmann continued his correspondence; and, in the autumn of the same year, the Russian officer acting for him at Tashkend informed the Afghan Governor of Balkh, at the desire of the Russian Government—
"That the friendly relations subsisting between the Russians and the Afghans should become more firm and consolidated daily."—[Central Asia, No. 1. (1881). pp. 7–8.]
My Lords, pray consider this expression. Firm and consolidated relations between the Russians, and a State excluded from the sphere of their influence! On this the Cabul Durbar observed—
"Notwithstanding the Russians are well aware that the Government of Afghanistan is united with the British Government, they
58
openly write unsolicited letters for the promotion of their friendship with Afghanistan, and do not relax in the frequency of their communications on the subject."
The Ameer, however, was again informed by the Viceroy that the British Government in nowise shared, or approved, his dissatisfaction at the increasing frequency and significance of these unsolicited communications. His Highness, consequently, ceased to consult the British Government about them; and in the winter of 1873 the acting Governor General of Russian Turkestan appears to have considered himself in a position to address Shore Ali as a subordinate ally of the Russian Government.
"I entertain the hope," he wrote, "that the High Governor General will not refuse your request, and that he will represent to His Majesty the Emperor your conscientious mode of action and your endeavour to become worthy of the grace of my august Master."—[Ibid., p. 8.]
Worthy, my Lords, of the grace of a potentate from whose influence we, in our innocence, understood the Ameer's dominions to be solemnly excluded! Well, at the close of that year the Ameer's disregarded apprehensions had been justified by the Russian conquest of Khiva. From the Governor General of British India, to whom he had so recently confided those apprehensions, he received no communication whatever on the realization of them. But he did receive from the Governor General of Russian Turkestan a long communication on this subject. It was followed by a significant change in the tone of his own communications with the Viceroy, whom the Ameer then, for the first time, addressed in a form forbidden by established etiquette, and for which no precedent could be found in our Indian archives. My Lords, while Shore Ali was thus beginning to display his estrangement from the Government of India, these are the terms in which he was being addressed by the Government of Russian Turkestan in the spring of 1874—
"I hope that after your death Sirdar Abdulla Tan will follow your example, and make himself an ally and friend of the Emperor."—[Ibid., p. 10.]
The ally and friend, that is, of a Power pledged to treat Afghanistan as a State entirely beyond the sphere of its influence! Why, what more than a friend and ally could the Ameer have been to the British Government? This letter was quickly followed up by another

59
from General Kaufmann himself on the same subject. The Russian Governor General writes—
"I hope that the chain of friendship now existing between Russia and Afghanistan will in future increase and become firm, owing to the recent alliance between the Emperor of Russia and the Queen of England."
And he adds—
"I doubt not that this alliance of the two Powers will be an omen for those countries which, under the protection of the Emperor of Russia and the Queen of England, live in great peace and comfort."—[Ibid., p. 10.]
And the writer adds that he is in a position to assure the Ameer that the British Government is well disposed towards His Highness. My Lords, to European ears these words may sound unimportant, although, no doubt, your Lordships will appreciate the skill with which a matrimonial alliance between two reigning Houses is here represented as a political alliance between two Empires—an alliance, moreover, having special reference to the treatment of Afghanistan by the Allied Governments. Nor need I dwell upon the significant anxiety to convey to the Ameer of Cabul assurances which would have come, to say the least, more naturally from the Viceroy of India. But Orientals are accustomed to study phraseology of this kind with the utmost nicety, and to read between the lines suggestions of what "more is meant than meets the ear." Upon receiving this letter the Cabul Durbar observed—"The Russian Government has now made itself partner in the protection of Afghanistan." Whatever; impression this letter may have been intended to convey, that is the impression that it did actually convey; that is the impression which the Ameer of Cabul communicated to the Government of India; and as that impression was left uncorrected by the Government of India, it naturally continued to influence the Ameer's appreciation of his position. My Lords, if this incessant talk about chains of friendship, and firm and consolidated relations, was in anywise compatible with the plain terms of the Russian engagement of 1869, surely that engagement is not worth the paper it was written on. I am not aware that the British Government is under any similar engagement to regard Khiva and Bokhara as excluded from the sphere of its in finance; although, as a matter of fact, we do not interfere in the affairs of those countries. But if the
60
Government of India, or its Frontier authorities, allowed themselves to send constant messages and letters to the Princes of Khiva and Bokhara, exhorting them to become worthy of the grace of our August Mistress, by strengthening the chain of our friendship and alliance with them, can any of your Lordships doubt that the Russian Government would call upon the noble Earl the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to put a stop to such provocative proceedings? For my part, I am persuaded that the demand would be peremptory, and that the noble Earl would promptly and courteously comply with it. And more than this, my Lords; I feel no doubt that if Lord Lawrence had been Viceroy in 1872 and 1873, he would have then considered it just as necessary to protect Afghanistan from the obtrusive patronage of Russia as it was, he said, in 1868 to protect that State from her far less probable, and far less dangerous, hostility.
My Lords, we have heard from the noble Earl the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, on the authority of the Russian Ambassador in London, that these terms, "friendship and alliance" do not really mean friendship and alliance; that, in fact, they do not exactly mean anything at all; and that we are to regard them as extraordinary mistranslations. Now, I must ask leave to remind your Lordships that the letters in which these terms occur, and they occur in all the Russian letters to Shore Ali, were written in Persian. Those letters have been translated over and over again by a series of experts in India; and I am loth to believe that the Government of India is so ill-served that its officials are more ignorant of the Persian language than are those of the Russian Government at Taskhend. But one thing is certain—whatever these terms were meant to imply, they were interpreted by the Ameer of Cabul, to whom they were addressed, as meaning friendship and alliance in the fullest and most practical sense of such words.
But here, my Lords, I must notice an event which I cannot but regard as the turning point—the fatal turning point—in our relations with Afghanistan. In the year 1873 Shore Ali reviewed his position. There was much in it which, rightly or wrongly, he regarded with avowed dissatisfaction and increasing anxiety.

61
He had the wisdom to perceive in time that Afghanistan, or, at least, its Ruler, could not permanently stand alone in a condition of complete independence and isolation between the British and Russian Empires. He saw one Power apologizing and advancing, the other expostulating and standing still. And he saw that, sooner or later, he must practically throw in his lot with that Power which might prove, not only best able, but also most willing, to befriend and assist him. Recent events had convinced him that the time was at hand when his final choice must be made. He had also the shrewdness to see that the alliance of a wild, warlike State like Afghanistan, lying between the no longer distant bounds of their respective Empires, would be a political acquisition of considerable value to either England or Russia, and that he was in a position to offer it to the highest bidder. He offered it first to the British Government, with a result which disappointed his expectation; and Russia, who was obviously the best able, proved also the most willing, to make the highest bid for it. If he joined her in a quarrel with us, she could offer him the re-conquest of half the Punjaub, the plunder of Peshawur, and perhaps a slice of Persia. If he joined us in a quarrel with her, what could we offer him on the other hand? Absolutely nothing, except this—the guaranteed and unconditional assurance that we would, against all corners and in all eventualities, maintain for him what he already possessed; and even this guarantee the noble Earl in consultation with the noble Duke declined to give him. When Shore Ali found himself placed in that position—when he saw that the British Government declined to give him the assurance he asked for—when he saw that the Viceroy of India was painfully afraid of giving the slightest umbrage to the Russian Government—when he saw the authorities of the Russian Government so reckless of the susceptibilities and rights of the British Government—is it surprising that he should then have lent a willing, and afterwards a greedy, ear to the constant assurances he was receiving from Tashkend of Russia's desire to consolidate and tighten with him what General Kaufmann correctly called "the chain of her friendship?"—that chain which ultimately dragged both the Ameer of Cabul
62
and the Government of India into the sea of trouble he himself had in vain foreseen! One thing is perfectly certain—that the Ameer of Cabul lost no opportunity of publicly venting his disappointment and resentment at the result of his overtures to the Government of India. Nothing has more astonished me, in all previous discussions of our relations with Afghanistan, than the scant attention paid to the attitude of the Ameer towards the noble Earl who was then Viceroy of India after the summer of 1873. Before that time the Ameer of Cabul had promised Lord Mayo to en-courage by all means in his power free intercourse between his subjects and ours. And he had talked of establishing great fairs for that purpose. I need scarcely say that he did nothing of the kind. But what did he do instead? He hermetically sealed his dominions to us, and maltreated his own subjects whenever he suspected them of intercourse with ours. The former Government of India had virtually constituted him sole guardian of the main passes into India by intrusting to him arrangements, which he undertook to carry out on our behalf, with the Pass Tribes, for keeping them permanently open to us. But, instead of doing this, he used his influence with those tribes to induce them to keep the passes permanently closed against us. Regardless of the repeated remonstrances of the Punjaub Government, he courted forbidden relations with the States to the East of Cabul. He curtly refused to the noble Earl (the Earl of Northbrook) a passage through his dominions for a British Envoy, bound on a peaceful errand, to a neighbouring State. In spite of all these evidences of ill-will and hostility, the noble Earl continued to press upon him pecuniary assistance; and this he contemptuously rejected, leaving it untouched and unacknowledged in the Indian Treasuries.
This being the condition of the relations between Cabul and the Government of India at the time of which I am speaking, a great change occurred two years later, as far as its relations with the Russian Government were concerned. In the month of September, 1875, an Envoy from the Russian Governor General in Turkestan arrived at Cabul, and the Russian Government was from that time forward permanently represented to all intents and purposes at Cabul by incessant relays of special Envoys, the

63
one always arriving before the other departed. The business of these Envoys could not be ascertained, for it was not transacted like that of our own Vakeel, openly, and in public Durbar, but secretly and at midnight with the Ameer himself. We are now told that these Envoys are not to be regarded as Russian Envoys, because they were not European, but Native subjects, and servants of the Russian Emperor. But really, my Lords, I cannot see that this makes any practical difference. Whether these gentlemen came from Bokhara or St. Petersburg, they were the agents of Russia, and were sent to Cabul in order to represent there the authority of the Russian Government, and to establish its influence. The Government of India was informed by its officiating Commissioner at Peshawur that—
"The meaning of these frequent communications from Russia is obviously to establish friendly relations with the Afghans, and gain them over to an alliance with Russia. As soon as one agent is preparing to take his departure, another conies."
My Lords, I cannot think your Lordships will deem it unreasonable to connect these prolonged secret negotiations with the subsequent open despatch and reception of General Stolieteff's Mission; or to assume, as I did assume, and do assume, that they had some deeper object than a mere exchange of civilities between one Government and another, wholly excluded from the sphere of its legitimate influence. A Russian Envoy was at the Court of Shore Ali when I arrived in India; and I feel not a shadow of a doubt that, from the date I have mentioned, the Ameer was acting towards us under the established influence of Russian advice. And so matters went on, till the arrival of General Stolieteff at Cabul for the open conclusion of a Russo-Afghan Alliance against India. Upon the proceedings of General Stolieteff, and the advice given by him to the Ameer, I shall say nothing to-night. They are now known to your Lordships, and they speak for themselves. But I must refer to one commentary made upon them by the Ameer himself, as bearing upon the Peshawur Conference. At the time when our Envoy was in peaceful communication with the Amour's Envoy, for the purpose of endeavouring to improve our relations with His Highness, that
64
Prince was exhorting not only his subjects but his neighbours to prepare for a jehad against our rule in India—and I need not say that a jehad, being a religious war, is one of the most cruel and fanatical character. In September, 1878, however, when, from those who had promised him a permanent dominion at Peshawur, Shore Ali was obliged to crave a temporary lodging at St. Peters-burgh, he published a Firman to his subjects explaining the advice of Russia, upon which he was acting. In this Fir-man he quotes a letter written to him. by General Stolieteff from Livadia, and containing these words—
"Like last year, you are to treat them (the English) with deceit and deception until the present cold season passes away; then the will of the Almighty will be made manifest to you—that is to say, the Russian Government having repeated the Bismillah, the Bismillah will come to your assistance."—[Central Asia, No. 1. (1881). p. 24.]
My Lords, what is the meaning of this allusion to "last year?"—
"Like last year, you are to treat them with deceit and deception until the present cold season passes away:"
What does this mean? Why, it can have but one meaning, and that meaning is plain. It means this—"The advice we give you now is the same as the advice we gave you last year, and on which you then acted so successfully at the Peshawur Conference. You must do now what you did then—engage time British Government in a deceptive and abortive negotiation for peace, in order to gain time for the preparation of war."
And now, my Lords, allow me to recapitulate the conclusions which appear to me established by the facts to which I have solicited your attention. On the strength of these facts I affirm once more that Russian influence at Cabul did not commence with the Stolieteff Mission, and that it did not cease with the withdrawal of that Mission. I affirm that for all practical purposes the late Ameer of Cabul had ceased to be the friend and ally of England, and that he had virtually become the friend and ally of Russia, at least three years before I had any dealings with His Highness, or any connection with the Government of India. I affirm that the sole cause of the late Afghan War was a Russian intrigue of long duration, for purposes which it was the imperative duty of the

65
Government of India to oppose at any cost. And, finally, I affirm that the establishment of Russian influence was caused by the collapse and paralysis of British influence at Cabul, and that this was the natural result of that deplorable policy to which Her Majesty's Government are now so eagerly reverting.
My Lords, all duties are reciprocal; and in face of the Russian engagement of 1869, one of two positions must be accepted by any British Government. Either that engagement leaves us responsible for the Ameer's conduct towards his other neighbours, or it does not. If it does, we must have, and use, the means of controlling conduct for the consequences of which we are responsible. If it does not, then the Ameer's other neighbours are clearly entitled to enforce against him, without any reference to us, his full responsibility for conduct affecting their interests. And, in doing this, his Russian neighbours may be compelled to enforce the influence of their power up to the very gates of India. Unless, therefore, we are willing as well as able to exercise in Afghanistan a paramount influence, involving an acknowledged responsibility, we forfeit the right to exclude Russian influence from that country, and the engagement of 1869 becomes a mischievous fiction, for neither can we enforce, nor Russia fulfil, the terms of it. This was fully, though fruitlessly, pointed out by Shore Ali, when in 1873 he said to our Cabul Agent—
"Great anxiety weighs on me day and night, and I am not relieved in any moment from it, that the juxtaposition of boundaries with Russia will involve difficulty in making provision for the security of the borders in the interest of both Governments."
And again—
"Time has approached very near when the Russians … will make communications for exercising some influence in my kingdom. It is as clear as daylight that, as soon as the Russians will take possession of Merv Shah Jehan, the Turcomans will necessarily take refuge in Badghees in Herat;"
and then he added—
"Under these circumstances, such difficulty will present itself to me that even the British Government with regard to the interests of the Afghan and British Governments being identical, will have to adopt very serious measures for its removal."—[Afghanistan, No. 1, (1878) p. 111.]
My Lords, this reference by the Ameer
66
of Cabul to the probable result of a Russian occupation of Merv reminds me of a duty I owe to my right hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies. I regret very much that in some former remarks of mine I attributed to Mr. Grant Duff an opinion which he has not expressed and does not entertain. The opinion repeatedly expressed on this subject by Mr. Grant Duff is not—as I then erroneously supposed—that Russia's occupation of Merv would send a thrill to the heart of India, but that Merv is the first point at which Russian and British interests would come remotely into contact; that Merv lies inconveniently close to Herat, and that if Russia, having advanced to Merv, were to threaten Herat, it would then become our duty to go to war with her all over the world for the protection of Herat. My Lords, my divergence from the opinions of my right hon. Friend is less than my admiration for the clearness and candour with which he has recorded them. I do not think that Russia, if established at Merv, would threaten Herat, for she would have no cause to do so. But, without beating a drum, or firing a shot, her presence at Merv would silently, swiftly, and irresistibly establish at Herat that influence which, in the opinion of Liberal statesmen, must impose on us the exceedingly disagreeable, and probably very inconvenient, duty of going to war with her all over the world. This would be the inevitable result of such contiguity between an Asiatic population at Herat, and a great European Power so inconveniently close to Herat. But surely, my Lords, prevention is better than cure. Surely it is wiser and safer to stay at Candahar, whence we can exclude Russian influence from Herat by peaceably extending our own influence in that direction, than to retire to the Indus, and there passively await an event which is to involve us in a great European war for the purpose of undoing what could not otherwise have been done in a remote corner of Asia. The noble Duke (the Lord Privy Seal) has expressed his astonishment at the prodigious importance I now attach to the retention of Candahar, because, he says, I did not hold this opinion till a late period of my Viceroyalty. That is true—I did not. But, in the statement which elicited this remark, I thought I had explained the

67
reason why. I can sincerely assure your Lordships that the late Government of India was not an annexionist Government. As long as we had any reasonable hope of loyalty on the part of Ayoob Khan, or of the observance of the Gandamak Treaty, which gave us moral guarantees of adequate control over Afghanistan, our wish was not to weaken, but to strengthen the Cabul Power; but the whole situation and our duty concerning it were changed irrevocably by the atrocious crime which compelled us to occupy Cabul, and by the revelations discovered at Cabul and now known to your Lordships, of the extent to which Russian influence had penetrated to the very heart of the country.
My Lords, it then seemed to all my Colleagues in the Government of India, and it still seems to me, that the only practical means of counteracting the dangerous consequences of Russian influence at Cabul would be to assume to ourselves over Western Afghanistan a controlling and commanding position, not dependent on the good or bad faith of any Cabul Ruler. Such control can only be exercised from Candahar. The history of the last eight years clearly shows, not merely that the Russian power is approaching, and must approach, to-ward India, but that Russia has long sought, is still seeking, and will continue to seek, great political influence over Afghanistan; that this influence has already found a fulcrum at Cabul; and that it must be a permanent source of disquiet to the British power in India, because it is to Russia the means of disturbing British power in India whenever she wishes to embarrass British policy in Europe. Therefore, for the safety of the British power in India, it is indispensable that the Government of India shall have the means of preventing—at all events, of counteracting—Russian influence in Afghanistan. But how are we to counteract it unless we can exercise in that country a more powerful and certain influence of our own? It is absurd to suppose that you can have any controlling power over a country in which you have no locus standi at all. Now, amongst the arrangements contemplated by Her Majesty's Government after the evacuation of Candahar, where do they expect to find a locus standi in Afghanistan? I cannot see where. The experience of the past few
68
years has certainly proved two things—first, that you cannot exclude Russian influence, wherever you fail to establish British influence, in Afghanistan. Secondly, that you cannot secure the friendship or alliance of any Afghan Ruler by merely leaving him alone; and for this simple reason—no Afghan Ruler wishes to be left alone. He cannot stand alone. No doubt the Afghan Tribes, like all other wild tribes, cherish their independence. But the Ruler of those tribes cannot long remain independent of foreign support. He needs it; he knows that he needs it; and if he does not get from you the support he requires, he will seek it, and probably get it, from Russia. On the other hand, if you give him the support he requires, you incur on his behalf liabilities which you cannot safely accept, or conveniently discharge, without the means of controlling his conduct. And yet, at the same time, if you shrink, as well you may, from such indefinite liabilities—if, like the Government of 1863, you dare not, or will not pledge to them all the support he requires—how can you reasonably expect from him active gratitude for your cheap advice, or confident submission to your timorous control? History has emphatically answered this question. And therefore, my Lords, if you are not prepared to abandon all control over Afghanistan and to yield it up to Russian influence, I say that you must give the Government of India some guarantee—not moral, but substantial and material—that it shall have the means of occupying and keeping in that country the natural and necessary position of a powerful protecting State. That is just the guarantee we have in the possession of Candahar. If we had not had confidence that Her Majesty's Government would not deprive the Government of India of this great security for India's practical independence of the good or ill-will of any Cabul Ruler, we should not have done anything so dangerous as to recommend Her Majesty to recognize as Ruler of Cabul a Prince who is undoubtedly a Russian protégé, who has passed a great period of his life in receipt of Russian hospitality, and who re-entered Afghanistan as an uninvited candidate for the Throne, supported by Russian arms and Russian money.
But it is stated that high military authorities have said that if we give

69
up Candahar we can get it again when we want it. Well, my Lords, I think that that is a very bold assumption. I have no doubt that if you retired now, and wanted to take it again two or three months hence, you could do so with ease; but can you say with confidence that you could take it two or three years hence? Great as are the undisputed strategical advantages of Candahar, the late Government of India did not regard the retention of it primarily, or mainly, as a military question. We felt that it would give us a political and commercial control over Western Afghanistan up to Herat so complete that we might contemplate with unconcern the course of events at Cabul. If you retain Candahar, and hold it firmly and fearlessly, then you may view with indifference the uncertain faith and fate of Cabul Rulers, and the certain advance of the Russian Power. If you retain Candahar, and administer it wisely, you will replace anarchy and bloodshed and difficulty and uncertainty on your own border by peace and prosperity; and if you connect Candahar by rail with the Valley of the Indus, you will be able to sweep the whole commerce of Central Asia, vastly augmented by the beneficent protection of a strong, a settled, and a civilized Government, into the harbours of Kurrachee and Calcutta, and thence into the ports of Liverpool and London. But, my Lords, you cannot do all this unless you retain a garrison in Candahar. And let me remind the House that those who now denounce the occupation of Candahar have been, for four years and upwards, denouncing with even greater vehemence, the occupation of Quetta. Arguments so eagerly adopted in the one case are not likely to be resolutely resisted in the other. Will not the pressure which ends in the abandonment of Candahar be also brought to bear upon Her Majesty's Government till it secures the abandonment of Quetta? Allow me to remind your Lordships of the circumstances which led to the occupation of Quetta and the consequences which have resulted from that measure.
When I reached India in 1876, the Khan of Khelat and his Sirdars were at open war with each other, and the whole Khanate was in complete anarchy. The British Resident had been withdrawn from the Khan's Court, and the subsidy
70
of His Highness had been stopped. He was too poor to bribe, too weak to coerce, his turbulent nobles and hungry tribes. The result was that the whole of our Sindh, and a great portion of our Punjaub, border, were seething with disturbance, and harassed by depredations which we could neither prevent nor punish. The Bolan Pass—then the great trade route between India and Central Asia—was permanently held and closed by robbers. This state of things was so intolerable, that, whilst I was on my way to India, the noble Earl who was then Viceroy had despatched Major Sandeman with a strong military escort, and a general instruction to settle matters, as best he could, in Beloochistan, without any reference to the Ameer of Cabul. To have recalled this important Mission when it had already crossed our border would only have made confusion worse confounded; and I am bound to say that it is mainly owing to the great ability of Sir Robert Sandeman, and not a little to the strength of his military force, that before the close of that year we were fortunately able to re-establish our relations with Khelat on a foundation which has not only relieved the Government of India from all serious anxiety in this direction, but has also proved fruitful in blessings to the Prince and people of the country concerned. The Bolan Pass, then re-opened, has never since been closed. The re-opening of it added two lass of rupees to the income of "that unfortunate man, the Ameer of Cabul." During the Afghan campaign of 1878 not a single British soldier was maintained, or a single robbery committed, in that Pass. Throughout the country villages have been rebuilt, and trade and agriculture not only restored, but powerfully stimulated. The revenues of the Khan, and the wealth of his subjects, have been largely increased; both the Sovereign and the people are contented; and our Khelat border is perfectly quiet. My Lords, the occupation of Quetta was indispensable to this result; for neither could the Khan's legitimate authority be adequately supported, nor could his Sirdars feel any confidence that their own legitimate rights would be adequately respected, without the presence of a British force at, or near, Quetta. The measure was adopted at the joint request of His

71
Highness and his subjects, and it was carried out in accordance with treaty rights of long standing, which were then solemnly reaffirmed. There is only one word I wish to add on this subject. Let me ask your Lordships to consider how terribly the difficulties, the anxieties, and the expenses of the Government of India would have been augmented, if the condition of that country, and of our relations with it, had been in 1878 or in 1880 such as I found them in 1876. And yet, my Lords, it is to the intolerable condition of 1876 that Her Majesty's Government will revert, in their relations with Khelat, if, for the sake of stultifying the policy of their Predecessors, they abandon Quetta. But what reason can be urged for the abandonment of Candahar, which does not equally, and even more forcibly, apply to the abandonment of Quetta?
Her Majesty's Government have told us that they are going to retire from Candahar, and I gathered from the statement made the other day by the noble Viscount the Under Secretary of State for India (Viscount Enfield) that the stampede will not be stopped at Pishin. Will it never be relaxed till it has reached the Indus? Up to the present moment no limit has been put to this policy of surrender and retreat. We can only surmise the unavowed limits, by reference to the avowed principles, of it. We have been told that it proceeds upon the purest principles of morality. But, my Lords, in the abandonment of Quetta the purest principles of morality will be confronted by far fewer practical impediments than those which have, on behalf of such principles, been surmounted by Her Majesty's Government in their decision to abandon Candahar. As regards the abandonment of Candahar, I greatly fear that the reputation of the British Government, in that minor but practical department of morals which belongs to courageous loyalty and scrupulous good faith, will not be saved by the assertion that the Wali of Candahar has spontaneously resigned the charge he accepted in reliance on our support. I fear that throughout India and Central Asia there will be a universal and a lasting impression that the Wali's resignation is only the natural consequence of the announcement made by Her Majesty's Government, that it is not their intention to
72
fulfil the pledges given to him by the late Government of India. And, if Candahar is to be given up, to whom is it to be given? Surely this question ought to have been considered and decided before the intended abandonment of Candahar was publicly proclaimed to all our supporters and well-wishers in Western Afghanistan. But, my Lords, if it was considered and decided, why is the decision of it still withheld, even from the knowledge of those whose personal safety it so terribly concerns? My Lords, whatever policy Her Majesty's Government may prefer to the policy of keeping the pledges bequeathed to their keeping, there is certainly one policy which, in the interests of all concerned, they cannot too promptly abandon before they abandon Candahar itself; and that is the policy of continued indecision and mystery about their ulterior intentions. This may be a very convenient policy to Her Majesty's Government; but it is a very cruel policy to a large number of other human beings. You cannot, without danger as well as humiliation, hand over Candahar to your recent and notoriously inveterate enemy, Ayoob Khan. Will you, then, restore it to Cabul? But if there be one thing more hated than another by the Candaharis, it is the yoke of the Cabul Power. Will you give it to Abdurrahman? He is at present barely able to hold his own in Northern Afghanistan. Abdurrahman may possibly turn out by-and-bye to be the ablest and most loyal ally you have ever had upon your North - Western Frontier. May it be so! But at present you have no certainty that he will be anything of the kind. On the contrary, there is much in his antecedents which ought to restrain any sanguine expectations of that sort. At present you have absolutely no means of insuring his good behaviour; and in future, if you give up Candahar, you will have absolutely no means of punishing his bad behaviour. And this he will know. My Lords, it would surely be no act of true friendship or statesmanship to put Abdurrahman in a position which must augment not only all his present difficulties, but also all the future temptations whereby, if he is ever led to doubt your power or your firmness, as they were doubted by Shore Ali, he will be sure to do what must, as your Lordships well know, bring him

73
sooner or later into conflict with the Government of India.
And yet, my Lords, if Her Majesty's Government do neither of these things, there is absolutely only one alternative open to the policy they have proclaimed. They cannot avoid it; and their victims cannot escape it. Candahar will be left as a prize to be raffled for, or rifled, by every ambitious gamester in the sanguinary lottery of Afghan politics. But what does that involve? It involves the most grievous calamities to a population we have undertaken to protect, and the most serious danger to an Empire of which we are the guardians. It involves the creation of a fervid focus of intrigue and conflict on the most vulnerable point of our own Frontier—intrigue and conflict unrestrained by even the faintest confidence in the good faith of British promises or the steadfast purpose of British power. And are all these calamities to be inflicted, all these interests to be betrayed, all these shameful tragedies to be enacted, in the name of morality? Really, my Lords, one is tempted to re-echo the reproach addressed to Liberty by the victim of her fraudulent executors, and exclaim—"Oh, Morality, what crimes are committed in thy name!"
My Lords, I have little more to say. I have found it impossible to explain the grounds of my appeal to that attention which your Lordships have so indulgently accorded me, without reference to events and circumstances in some of which I have been personally concerned. But it is not in defence of myself, it is in defence of great national interests that I stand here to-night. The question now before your Lordships is not whether the late Government of India was right or wrong in all its action, but whether the present Government of England will be acting rightly or wrongly, if it abandons Candahar. This is the issue raised by the Resolution I submit to you. Allow me to sum up the situation which must be affected by your vote on it. Russia's unavowed, but active, influence in Afghanistan has been steadily increasing ever since the year 1872. The Afghan policy to which Her Majesty's Government are now endeavouring to reverthas not only failed to prevent, but it has practically facilitated, that result. The Afghan policy they refuse to continue has at least bequeathed to them the means of counter-
74
acting that result. If you accept the conclusion admitted by the noble Duke, and affirmed by every Indian statesman, that Afghanistan must on no account be allowed to remain under the forbidden influence of Russia, then, my Lords, for the enforcement of that conclusion you must choose between the retention of Candahar and reliance on the instructions said to have been issued to General Kaufmann "not to do it again." There is no alternative. To talk about developing the internal resources of India is nothing to the point. There is no reason why the continued development of India's internal resources should not proceed pari passu with the consolidation of her external securities. But do not fatten the lamb only to feed the wolf. My Lords, all those whose privilege it is to build up the noble edifice of India's prosperity must be content to labour like the builders of the second Temple—working with one hand, but holding the sword in the other to defend their work.
To me, my Lords, it seems, and I doubt not that to, at least, many of your Lordships it must also appear, that Her Majesty's Ministers inherited from their Predecessors in Office great advantages, and easy duties, on the North-West Frontier of India. They had only to maintain positions already won for them by others, and promises for which they, at least, could not be blamed. What is being done with those positions? What has become of those promises? To both, the good faith of the British Government, and the honoured name of the British Sovereign, were pledged with the sanction of the Constitutional Advisers of the Crown. They constitute, therefore, a great national trust. Some part of that trust has, I fear, been dissipated by its recent guardians. But before it be too late, let us, my Lords, for the sake of India's safety, for the sake of England's honour, endeavour to rescue what remains of it.
Moved to resolve, That nothing in the information laid before this house justifies the announced policy of Her Majesty's Government in regard to Candahar.—(The Earl of Lytton.)
VISCOUNT ENFIELDsaid, that on a former occasion they had been told by certain noble Lords opposite, that there should be no reference to the causes which led to the Afghan War while discussing the propriety of retaining

75
or leaving Candahar. Any expectation that no such feeling would be shown in connection with those causes must have been rudely dissipated by the speech of the noble Earl. In the observations which he should make, he (Viscount Enfield) would keep as closely as possible to the question whether the Government were right or wrong, from political, financial, commercial, and military points of view, in the determination to evacuate Candahar. It was neither his wish nor his intention to stand up as the apologist of Russia. He believed that our relations with that country were, at the present, moment of a very friendly character. The noble Earl, who talked so much of the ill-will disclosed in the Russian Correspondence discovered at Cabul, should bear in mind the frank and very friendly way in which the noble Earl (the Earl of Beaconsfield) spoke of Russia on December 10, two years ago. The noble Earl said—
"Eight months ago war was more than probable between this country and Russia; and an imprudent word might have precipitated that war. ….I will say of the expedition which Russia was preparing in Central Asia at the time when she believed that war was inevitable between our country and herself—I will say at once that I hold that all those preparations on the part of Russia were justifiable; and if war had occurred, of course they would have contributed to bring about the ultimate result, whatever that might have been. Had we been in the position of Russia I doubt not we might have undertaken some enterprise of a similar kind.….We may admit that if war had occurred between the two countries all the preparations in Central Asia against Great Britain and India were justifiable; but when it was found that war was not to be made, Her Majesty's Government made becomingly courteous representations to St. Petersburg, and it was impossible that anything could be more frank and satisfactory than the manner in which they were met."—[3 Hansard, ccxliii. 514–15.]
The words then spoken were the words of a British statesman who was anxious to preserve the goodwill which at this moment happily prevailed between this country and Russia. The noble Earl (the Earl of Lytton) had made such frequent references to the Afghan War that he could not refrain from making some remarks on that subject. The noble Earl had said that the Government and its friends had acted as though they wished that recent events in Afghanistan could be expunged from the historical records of this country. He was not ashamed to say that he should
76
be glad if that record could be obliterated from our history. He believed that feeling was shared by those with whom he had the honour to act, and by a great majority of the people of the United Kingdom. But the present Government had not, as the noble Earl had implied, rudely and quickly undone the work of their Predecessors. What was the state of things when the present Government came into Office? They found that overtures had been conducted more or less satisfactorily with Abdurrahman Khan. These negotiations were further carried on by the Queen's present Advisers, and by the 22nd of July something in the nature of a final settlement had been made with him with respect to the government of Cabul. What had happened with respect to Candahar? The Government found that Shore Ali had been placed there in authority, supported by British forces. Then followed the defeat of our troops by Ayoob Khan at Maiwand and the successful march of General Roberts. All these events had happened in the interval since the accession of the present Government, and it could not be said that they adopted any sudden course, whether their proposals in respect of Candahar were right or wrong. It had been said that the people of Candahar were extremely anxious for our rule. But those who knew the character of the Afghan people would know that the Afghan was a man who feared no danger, but would do anything to preserve his independence and his liberty. If lie were made the servant of another State his first endeavour would be to emancipate himself. Therefore, British rule was not likely to sit lightly or pleasantly on the Afghan people. On that question he referred to a letter of Sir Douglas Forsyth, published a few weeks ago. That letter contained the following passage:—
"While While the question of the retention or evacuation of Candahar is under discussion and the opinions of eminent military authorities and statesmen are canvassed, it may not be out of place to quote the words of an Oriental, now no longer able to speak for himself, whose sagacity and keen intellect would be readily acknowledged by his most distinguished opponents, and whose intimate knowledge of the Afghan character and of the whole subject entitles his opinions to great weight. In frequent conferences with him I found that he invariably turned the conversation to the question of Russian advance towards India, and how Afghanistan was to be

77
protected. With the map spread before him, he would carefully measure the distance from Merv to Herat and from Candahar to Mooltan, and eagerly ask what troops we had in the Punjaub and how soon they could be pushed forward. His idea was for us to move a force when necessary to Quetta, to be pushed forward as far as Candahar if required. But he always accompanied the idea with the ready remark—'But you must withdraw from Candahar as soon as you have made the Russians retire.' The language he used was very much in the following words:—'We Afghans are people of the hills, and, please God, we can take care of ourselves, and give a good account of any foe who tries to enter our mountains,' adding emphatically, 'Whoever be our invader, whether Russian or English, the Afghans will never rest till they get the enemy out of the country. But in the plains it is different, we cannot cope with your European armies, and therefore we should be glad to avail ourselves of your help should the Russians come by way of Herat and the route to Candahar. But you must not think of remaining in Candahar, or you will in such case be looked upon by the Afghans with hatred, as foes instead of friends, and there will be perpetual warfare. But if we can feel certain that you will retire as soon as your work is done, your temporary march to and occupation of Candahar will do good; you will be welcomed as friends, and by retiring to Quetta or to the Indus you will be quite close at hand to render assistance at any future time when required.' Such was the advice given by Syad Noor Mahamad, and whether it be considered good or bad by the light of more recent experience, there can be no question as to the sincerity and intensity of Ids alarm at the possibility of annexation, an alarm which overpowers the mind of almost every independent Chief and Prince in India, and which often drives the weaker-minded among them to very foolish acts."
These wore the words of the late Minister of Shore Ali. He would also refer, on the general question of the policy of annexation of fresh territory, to the alarm felt during the Viceroyalty of his noble Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty lest Baroda should be annexed. He would also give extracts from the Blue Books with respect to the Khyber Pass and the arrangements made with the Khyber and Kuram Tribes. First, with regard to the Khyber Tribes—
"It is arranged that the pass shall remain under their independent and exclusive charge, and shall be kept open by them, and they are to receive the customary allowances. So long as they fulfil their conditions we will place no troops in the pass, and it is to be clearly understood that no other regular troops will be permitted to occupy posts in the pass without our consent."
With respect to the Kuram Tribes—
"The Jajis, who inhabit the country beyond (westward of) Peiwar, to pass under Cabul juris-
78
diction. The Tunis, on eastern slopes of the Peiwar, and the Bangash tribes, are to be self-governed. Two leaders have been chosen who are to rule by means of a general tribal council. This form of self-government was unanimously agreed upon by the tribes themselves. Their proposal was accepted, and General Watson has given small sums of money to assist enrolment of a levy for defence, and warned them against intriguing with Cabul agents beyond the Peiwar. … In return for its recognition the British Government requires the tribes to conform to any advice it gives them."
He did not think that the maxim of a great foreign statesman, "Beati possidentes," applied to the condition of things in Afghanistan, for our tenure of Candahar might be very precarious. We should be exposed to constant intrigues and to attacks from Cabul and Herat—there would be a nest of intrigues constantly around us—every adventurer from Cabul or Herat would endeavour to secure Candahar by doing his best to expel the infidel and the invader, whilst a stray shot or the knife of the fanatic might at any time rouse the people in arms against us. Then it was said that our prestige in India would suffer. He did not agree with that view. We had sufficiently avenged the murder of Sir Louis Cavagnari, and the disaster at Maiwand; and he felt sure that, great as had been the admiration excited in India by General Roberts' brilliant march and victory, moderation in the use of that victory would arouse even greater admiration. He would next turn to the commercial aspect of the question, upon which his views were much strengthened by those of a man who might be considered one of the highest authorities on the subject. He alluded to Lieutenant-Colonel Browne, of the Royal Engineers, who had lived many years in South Afghanistan, and who was Engineer in charge of the Public Works along the line from the Kohat Pass in the north, to below Dehra Ghazee Khan in the south. During these years he learnt the common language of the tribes, Pushtoo, and cultivated the acquaintance of their Chiefs; and he left behind him on this Frontier a name well known to the present day. He had accompanied General Biddulph's force as Political Officer on its return march from Pishin, through' the Bori Valley to Dehra Ghazee Khan, and fed it during its march through this, at that time, unexplored country. Afterwards he did similar duty with Sir Donald

79
Stewart's force as far as Khelat-i-Ghilzai, on its march from Candahar to Cabul. In a lecture in London last December, Colonel Browne alluded to possibilities of increased trade. He said—
"The idea that by retaining Candahar, by developing its agricultural and trade resources, &c., we could make it pay its expenses, is another illusion, as, under British administration, it would not pay a tithe of the cost of its occupation. Let anyone who knows both Peshawur and Candahar, and their relative trade, agriculture, and distance from the Indus, consider the fact that after 32 years of English administration, the revenues of the Peshawar district are entirely inadequate, in time of peace, to pay for its garrison. In face of such a fact, can it be gravely argued that Candahar might be made to pay for the expenses of a garrison on a war footing?"
And further on he said—
"It is sometimes supposed that by occupying Candahar we might develop, to our advantage, a great Central Asian trade, and remove the vexatious dues which have hindered its expansion. This is a pretty theory, founded on European ideas of civilized trade. As a matter of fact, the dues on Central Asian trade are levied at Herat, at Maimaneh, and Balkh, and will not be in the least degree affected by our holding Candahar."
He (Viscount Enfield) protested against the doctrine that we should proceed to destroy the independence and liberties of the people of Afghanistan for Ole, chance of selling a greater quantity of Manchester cottons and Birmingham hardware. In illustration of what had been so ably said by Colonel Browne, he would refer to the case of Peshawur. Similar promises of a remunerative commerce had been made with respect to that territory; but it had never been found that the revenue was equal to the expenditure. The real reason which was urged why Candahar should be permanently occupied by our troops was that if it was evacuated there would be great danger to our Indian Empire. From Whom would that danger arise? Either from Afghanistan or from Russia. As to the Afghans, from 1850 up to 1878 our relations with that people had been of a fairly friendly and harmonious character. At the time of the Indian Mutiny Dust Mahomed valued the friendship of England. It might be said that Russia would intrigue against us, and persuade the Afghans to attack our Indian Empire. His answer was that the Afghans were quite as likely to dislike the Rus-
80
sians as to dislike us; and they would hardly be disposed to pull the chestnuts out of the fire for Russia. But it might be suggested that the Russians would first attack and occupy Afghanistan, and then attack us. What should we be doing all the while? We should be massing our troops, organizing our reserves, and accumulating our supplies at the proper base. It would take some time for Russia to conquer Afghanistan, occupy and annex it, and then advance to attack us in India. At a lecture given by Sir Henry Rawlinson about three years ago, as to the formidable character of the difficulties which Russia would have to overcome before she could thus prepare to invade India, the following words occurred:—
"The distance from the Caspian to Merv by the Akhal country and Serakhs is about 700 miles; and to keep up communications by a line of posts along this interval would be a very serious operation indeed. From the western end of the Deregez Atock, moreover, to Serakhs, a distance of 200 miles, the line would pass through Persian or quasi-Persian territory, and Russia, therefore, could not, of course, undertake such a movement without an understanding with the Government of the Shah. In the matter of supplies, also, food could not be possibly obtained in the districts traversed by the Russian columns. Either provision caravans must follow the troops from the Caspian, which, along a line of 700 miles would entail enormous expense and risk, or grain must be supplied. from Khorassan."
Lieutenant General Sir John M. Adye, a distinguished Artillery officer, wrote a year ago as follows:—
"A General Officer at Merv ordered to move southwards on Herat, and so on to Candahar and the Indus, might well feel in a condition of almost hopeless despair. In the first place, it would be absolutely incumbent on him to collect a very considerable force, duly provided with heavy artillery and munitions of all kinds, the mere concentration of which over such routes its have been described would occupy a long time and entail enormous cost. Looking back, he would be aware of the vast distances between himself and the nearest resources of the Empire—distances not merely to be measured by the actual number of miles, although they are very great, but aggravated by the accumulated obstacles of unhealthy foodless deserts and unsafe communications. Neither from the north nor from the west could he hope at any time to receive reinforcements, except by small detachments and at rare intervals; so that his very position, without moving at all, would be precarious and depressing. But it may be said that a General, while not neglecting his communications, should refrain from dwelling too much on dangers left behind, and should rather keep his eyes and. his thoughts

81
constantly directed to the front. The out-look from Merv, however, and the prospects of a successful advance, are, perhaps, even less promising than a retreat across the desert. From Merv to the Indus is, in round numbers, about 1,000 miles; and although, in the vicinity of Herat and Candahar, a certain limited amount of supplies could be found, we know, from the accounts of Ferrier, Marsh, and others, that the only route lies through districts where rocky mountains and sandy wastes vie with each other for the mastery, and that the country, as a matter of course, is infested with marauding tribes. Our own experience is amply sufficient to enable us to realize the difficulties and dangers of a march of 1,000 miles through Afghanistan."
But it would be said that Russia, perhaps, would not wish to conquer, occupy, and annex Afghanistan, but would only be anxious to march through it, and to attack us through a friendly territory. Well, to do that she must have an army of at least 50,000 men, infidels in the eyes of the Afghans, who would have to occupy Herat, Ghazni, and Cabul, and then march against us. Many years ago that danger, which had always been regarded as possible though somewhat problematical, was dwelt upon with great force and eloquence by one whom all admired and respected, the late Sir James Outram. The words which Sir James Outram used in 1854 were equally true now in regard to the position of any European troops marching from the westward against British India. Even assuming that such an army would meet with a friendly reception from the Afghans in the first instance, it was scarcely possible that those amicable relations could be maintained long enough to afford it time to recover from the effects of the fatigue and privation which it had undergone in coming so far. Afghanistan produced little beyond what was necessary for the support of its own inhabitants, and the demands on such limited resources would inevitably soon create such a dearth in the land as must excite the irritation of the population against the cause of their distress. Sir James Outram went on to say—
"And no efforts of their Chiefs could then restrain them from acting as hostilely towards those quondam friends as heretofore they did against the British Army. Ere Russian or Persian troops could reach Candahar or Cabul we certainly should have authentic knowledge of their approach. It would then be time enough to enter upon defensive preparations. It is scarcely possible that less than one season would be required by the enemy to recruit in Afghanistan ere descending the passes; but,
82
allowing that a shorter halt would suffice, there still would be ample time to concentrate sufficient forces at Shikarpore and Peshawur to meet the enemy when he debouches from the Bolan or Khyber."
Another danger, however, which might be apprehended was not an actual invasion, but possible intrigue. It had been said that a golden key opened most doors; and if Herat was the key to India, what was the kind of key that was proposed to be used a few years ago? That Persia should be provisionally permitted to occupy Herat, under sufficient guarantees for her good administration of it, and for her adequate protection of British and Indian interests at that point, and with a special reservation of our right to occupy the place with British forces in certain eventualities. If Persia temporarily occupied Herat, Russia would have a right to establish Consuls there. That proposal never went beyond preliminary stages. There was a dry point connected with this subject of Candahar to which the noble Earl never alluded in his speech—namely, the cost which a permanent occupation of Candahar would entail. Sir Henry Norman, who was for many years chief Military Adviser to the Governor General in Council, estimated the cost of maintaining 20,000 or 22,000 men there at £1,400,000 a-year; while the expenses of barrack accommodation and of fortifying the town—both of which were considered absolutely essential by Lord Napier of Magdala—had been estimated by another authority, on the basis of providing accommodation for 10,000 men, at £1,609,180, the interest of which sum would have to be added to the annual expenditure. The Secretary of State did his duty in producing the best materials he could for the formation of an opinion on the question of retaining or abandoning Candahar. Fifteen authorities were given, seven of which were in favour of the views of Her Majesty's Government, and seven in favour of the views taken by the noble Earl opposite. The other authority was Sir Donald Stewart, who had thought fit to change his opinion. The Memorandum of the noble Earl opposite on this subject was a most masterly production. The noble Earl entered fully into the subject. He said, though we could never allow Candahar to fall into the hands of a rival Power for political,

83
and especially for military, considerations, yet he did not think that a permanent occupation of Candahar by us would actually strengthen our power. He further said that to occupy Candahar permanently would entail a large military expenditure; but he anticipated no necessity for such permanent occupation unless we found ourselves in a great war with Afghanistan; but that we might reasonably hope to avoid. Sir Henry Rawlinson believed the Afghans would offer the most determined opposition to the interference of Europeans in their domestic affairs. Upon the question of extra pay to the Native troops, a contingency which Lord Napier of Magdala very frankly said might become necessary, General Rennell Taylor, a distinguished officer, and one who knew India and Indian troops very well, said—
"The Candahar duty would be unpopular with the Native soldiery after the novelty had worn off; and as regards Lord Napier of Magdala's remedy of raising their pay, this is a door which, if once opened, it is not so easy to close again. Men who have been for some time on high pay do not fancy having it cut down when they return to the Provinces. After a time we might get tired of giving enhanced pay in what we might consider to have become a prosperous and pleasant city; and then if we proposed cutting down the pay of the soldiery to the original scale, an old and ominous struggle between the Government and its Native soldiery might be revived."
The proposal to give increased pay to Native soldiers was, therefore, one the propriety of which was open to question. Sir Garnet Wolseley, of Asiatic and African fame, had said that to occupy a point so far removed from the Frontier would involve us in very serious financial burdens, and that no Afghan army could ever prevent an English army marching from Quetta to Candahar. Sir Frederick Roberts, while advocating the retention of Candahar, said that "our presence there must be little felt," and went on to say—
"It may not be very flattering to our amour propre; but I feel sure I am right when I say that the less the Afghans sue of us the less they will dislike us. Should Russia in future years attempt to conquer Afghanistan, or invade India through it, we should have a better chance of attaching the Afghans to our interest if we avoid all interference with them in the meantime. The military occupation of Candahar is, as I have before stated, of vital importance; even there we should make our presence but little felt, merely controlling the foreign policy of the ruler of that province."—[Afghanistan (1881), No. 1, par. 30. p. 71.]
84
If we retained Candahar permanently we should have also to permanently annex an adjoining territory half the size of England and Wales; we should have to take Ghazni and Khelat-i-Ghilzai to the east, Furrah, Girishk, and Herat to the west. Lord Hartington, in his despatch of the 11th of November, 1880, said—
"But they cannot believe that the measure which is now advocated would really satisfy the demands of those who propose it. They are inclined rather to believe that it would only be the first step towards still more extensive enterprize. In the despatch of your Predecessor's Government of the 7th of July, 1879, they said, in discussing the question of the retention of Candahar—'The local experience recently acquired by our expedition into Western Afghanistan has fully confirmed our previous impression that the strategic value of Candahar exists only in connection with a system of frontier defence much more extensive than any we now require or have ever contemplated.' Whether this be an accurate statement of the strategic value of Candahar or not, it cannot, I think, be doubted that its acquisition as a permanent military post would quickly be followed by fresh apprehensions as to its security, and further demands for the completion of a system of defence of which it would be represented to constitute only a part."
Thus, whether looking at the question of the retention of Candahar from a political, a military, a commercial, or a moral point of view, he should say that there was a strong balance of opinion against that step being taken. The military opinions were divided, the commercial advantages were doubtful, the political objections were serious, and the financial embarrassments were probable. It had been said that the resolution of the Government had been taken hastily; but the despatches of Lord Hartington disproved that assertion. On the 21st of May last, his first despatch indicated this line of policy, without giving an actual pledge with regard to it, and on the 11th of November the noble Lord stated his final decision on the subject. That decision might be erroneous, but it was not ambiguous; it was the result of a careful study of the question and of the opinions of those who in a civil and a military capacity could throw light upon an intricate question. In recommending this policy for adoption by the Government of India the Government were acting in the spirit of those noble and weighty words which were addressed to the people of India by Her Majesty in the

85
Royal Proclamation of November 1, 1858—
"We desire no extension of our present territorial possessions, and while we will permit no aggression upon our dominions or our rights to be attempted with impunity, we shall sanction no encroachment on those of others."
He hoped that Her Majesty's Government would pursue the line of policy so indicated constantly and persistently, and that they would be enabled, by the blessing of Providence, to do that which every noble Lord in that House, of whatever side in politics, must have at heart—namely, to secure the prosperity, the security, and contentment of Her Majesty's Indian Empire.
LORD WAVENEY, who had placed Notice of an Amendment on the Paper to add at the end of the Motion the following words:—
"That Commissioners be appointed to consider and report on the most suitable form of administration for Candahar and its dependencies, whether as a Crown Colony, as a portion of the Presidency of Bombay, or as attached to the Government of the Punjaub,"
said, that as one who had taken an early interest in this subject, he desired to be allowed to record his testimony in favour of the retention of Candahar. In his opinion, the debate admitted of being carried on on a wider basis than that on which it had been placed hitherto, and that some permanent system of policy should be discussed. The reason for the fact that, in this respect, we were without a policy was not far to seek. After the conquest and occupation of the Punjaub, the idea of an Afghan policy sprung up, and was maintained as part of our Indian system. It seemed to him at the time—and he had not since altered his opinion—that for the first time in the history of India we were desirous to devolve upon others duties which were our own—we desired to erect a barrier between the forces of Central Asia and our Indian Government; in other words, to adopt a policy which had never been pursued down to that time. He, for one, wished to see adopted a policy which did not rest upon any foreign buttress—he wished to see a policy devised which should determine our course of action in Central Asia—particularly at this moment, when Central Asia was about to be annihilated, in a political sense, by the approximation of the Russian and the Indian Frontier. Whatever Her Majesty's Government
86
might decide ultimately as to the abandonment of Candahar—and he did not think they could themselves state with precision the course they meant to take—he hoped that a policy would be adopted which would suffice for many years to come. Masterly inactivity was desirable if it meant an attitude of watchful repose; but if it meant mere indifference as to consequences it was a policy much to be deplored. It did not seem to be generally understood that the city and territory of Candahar were admirably suited for incorporation with our Indian resources, and could be made practically impregnable when occupied by forces under British rule. What he wished particularly to see was the adoption of a policy which should put an end to the miserable suspicions which were as bad in their effects as small wars; and he believed such a policy would be perfectly easy, without involving any considerable additional cost in the maintenance of our Indian Army. With regard to the great question of commerce, he would quote the informed opinion of the late Sir William Merewether, who said—
"In a commercial point of view the security given to trade by a strong government at Candahar cannot be otherwise than most advantageous to the Afghans as well as to ourselves, and should have full consideration. It will insure that trade safe and speedy transit to and from our seaports, … while the exports … will proportionally increase."—[Afghanistan, (1881), No. 2, p. 57.]
A report from a Cavalry officer, dated October 17, 1880, said—
"We have moved to the rich country to the south of Candahar. I cannot exaggerate the wealth and richness of this country. Anything will grow in it. The soil yields rich crops of wheat year after year. Many parts of it could be turned into wine-producing vineyards. The grapes are simply magnificent, and only a fourth of the land available is now cultivated."
All, in fact, that was required for the increased prosperity of Candahar was increased security. What he suggested by the Amendment he had placed on the Paper was that the Ministry should inform themselves of the best form of government for Candahar under the protection of the British Crown. He preferred to constitute it into a Crown Colony rather than under the Government of the Punjaub or of the Presidency of Bombay. The completion of the railway would place it within six weeks of Woolwich for defence, and of Liverpool for

87
commerce. They were now at Candahar, and, in the words of the great soldier who had made Italy what it is—"We are here—here we will remain; we are at Rome—at Rome we are determined to abide."
LORD CHELMSFORDwas painfully aware that the military opinions he held on the subject under discussion were not in accordance with those generally held on that side of their Lordships' House, and ran counter to the opinion of many distinguished officers of the Army to which he had the honour to belong. He did not, however, come to the consideration of the question simply by examining maps and reading official Correspondence. Out of a service extending over 37 years he had been 16 years in India; and he had, in company with Sir William Mansfield (the late Lord Sandhurst) travelled over the whole of the Western Frontier of that country, had visited the border station of Jacobubad, and had ridden over a good part of the desert in which it was situated. His opinion had been formed not without considerable anxiety, opposed as it was to opinions which must carry great weight; but he was satisfied that any permanent occupation of Candahar, or of any portion of Afghanistan, would place our garrison there in an entirely false military position. He was anxious, however, that it should be understood that he did not express any opinion as to whether it was advisable to evacuate immediately that important position. The length of the communications which a Russian force would have to keep up in any advance which they might make to the Indian Frontier would be a very difficult and a very serious obstacle to their reaching the Indus. It was a very difficult matter to conduct operations successfully when an army was divided by a long distance from the base of its supplies. He had himself fully realized that difficulty in the course of the Abyssinian War. It was quite clear to him that if Russia chose, looking at her present advanced position—her line of advance being probably through Merv—she could occupy Herat at any moment. Should she do so, however, she would be on the horns of a dilemma, because she could not feed her army through the long line of desert, but would require to do so by the shorter and more favourable line through Persian territory, her real base being the
88
Caspian Sea. In order, therefore, to obtain necessary supplies she would have either to make an alliance offensive and defensive with Persia, in which case the Afghans would become her enemies, or to take by force the line of communication in Persian territory, in which case the Persians would be her enemies. Herat was spoken of as the key of India; but Herat was miles from the Indus—the only door by which an enemy could enter India. The possession of Herat, it was true, might open the door to the possession of Candahar, and the possession of Candahar might open the way to the Indus. But if the Russians should even arrive at the Indus it did not follow that they would get any further. The occupation of Candahar would not prevent Russia from occupying Herat; nor was it certain that Russia, if she should take Herat, would advance through Candahar. Some authorities believed that they would advance by Cabul and the Khyber. Supposing that the Russians should determine to advance from the Oxus by the direct route to Cabul, what advantage would it be to India to have a garrison occupying Candahar? Sir Donald Stewart and Sir Frederick Roberts had both marched with a force along the road between Candahar and Cabul. But when they did so, they had a harbour of refuge at the end of their march occupied by our troops. No General, however, occupying that place would venture to march viâ Ghuzni, which would be in the enemy's hands, to Cabul in order to drive the Russians out of it, unless he was supported by another army coming through the Khyber; and, even under those circumstances, it would be very doubtful if either force could be properly supplied with all that an army, advancing on so serious an undertaking, would require. Therefore, Candahar, in the event of an advance on India through Cabul and the Khyber, would be of no real advantage. It would, in fact, be disadvantageous, as a large number of troops would have to remain there and could not be withdrawn. Turning his attention to the question of a Russian advance through Herat and Candahar—what steps, he asked, ought to be taken in such an event? Ought our forces to meet the enemy half way between Herat and Candahar, or ought they to await the attack in the neighbourhood of the

89
latter place? Suppose the Russians were in possession of any portion of Afghan territory—suppose they occupied Herat—they would still be 400 miles from Candahar; and it would be a serious consideration for an army to cross such a country as that 400 miles—a country scantily provided with food and water, in traversing which an army would have to carry its supplies with it forwarded from enormous distances. Suppose them arrived at Candahar, how far were they from India? Still 400 miles of more difficult country. There was an impression abroad that our Western Frontier was a weak one. He was of opinion, however, that it was an extraordinarily strong one. The line of the Indus was our natural boundary line. A river was said to be a bad frontier to defend; but that only applied when the river could be crossed at several different points. But there was only one point where an army, debouching from the Bolan Pass, could cross the Indus, and when they had crossed it they would still have some 250 miles of almost desert country to march through before reaching the Sutlej, a broad and difficult river to cross. Even before crossing the Indus their supplies would have to be carried over 400 miles of wild and desolate country. Those difficulties would apply even if Russia occupied the whole of Afghanistan. He felt sure that the danger to India was not from without, but from within. So long as our subject-population in the country were contented, and so long as our troops were well-seasoned and disciplined, we might look without anxiety upon the advance of Russia. But he would give one note of warning. The safety of India depended upon the loyalty of the people and the trustworthiness of our Sepoy Army. He trusted, therefore, that in any re-organization changes which might be made, the caste prejudices and old traditions of the Native Army would not in any way be ignored. Any attempt to introduce changes distasteful to the Native portion of our Army in India might have the most serious results; and we might suddenly find, when looking to it for support, that we had been trusting to a broken reed.
LORD SANDHURSTsaid, he owed an apology for addressing their Lordships on a subject of such importance, and he
90
should not have ventured to do so but that he had in his possession memoranda of his father, who had been Commander-in-Chief of the Forces in India during the Viceroyalty of Lord Lawrence. The late Lord Sandhurst had said—
"I can conceive no greater political mistake than that which would unite the whole population of Afghanistan in the most open hostility against us, which would compel us to meet that hostility on ground most favourable to our opponents, and with a great waste of our resources. I believe that, putting the case hypothetically, if Russia and England must contend for supremacy in Asia, that party will enter into the struggle with greater advantage which shall have abstained from forestalling events by the annexation of Afghanistan."
That view was corroborated by the late Lord Lawrence, who said—
"The Afghan will bear poverty and insecurity of life; but he will not tolerate foreign rule."
The Papers, written in 1867, were accompanied by Minutes by Sir Henry Norman and others now surviving, who, by Minutes issued lately, stated their opinions to be unaltered. Although a large garrison at Candahar might give security and promote trade, he believed that the Hindoo traders in no way represented the feelings of the people of that country. The late Lord Lawrence said that the Afghans would not tolerate foreign rule, and he believed that British influence was synonymous with Afghan hatred, and it followed that by withdrawing from Candahar we should no longer be acting as Russia's catspaw in incensing the Afghans against ourselves. His father had expressed the following opinion:—
"It may he said that the alarm testified with regard to Russia as affecting British interest in India is more unreasonable than anything that is possible to describe. As a military and political rower we have absolutely nothing to fear from Russia, whether she stop at her present limits, or spread her power even to our own borders. A great mischief is done by those who, from whatever cause, occupy themselves with preaching the falsehood of our weakness in India. We are simply invincible in that country, provided only we are true to ourselves. I take my stand upon this—that we must at times use influence and enforce results; though it is my conviction that we have reached the proper limits of territorial development. I have ever been the uncompromising opponent to British aggression in the Kingdom of Cabul in opposition to Russian advance in Central Asia."
As to Russia's position at present he might remark that she had no strength.

91
An army of mobility required supplies, ease of transport, water, and good roads. Russia had none of these things. She was 1,000 miles from us, and the further she advanced the more her difficulties would increase; and if we, by going to Candahar, met her half way, we should incense the inhabitants of that country against ourselves, which would materially facilitate the progress of Russia. The people through whose country she would have to pass were of the most fanatical description, and we had no reason to suppose that they would have any greater affection for the Russians than for ourselves. By withdrawing to our own Frontier we should force Russia to lengthen her lines of communication, and thus to weaken them. The advantage of withdrawing to our own Frontier was obvious. When General Primrose met with that disaster at Maiwand, all our communications were attacked, and the shock was felt as far as our Frontier. With Russia advancing and the tribes hostile to us we should labour under the greatest disadvantages in that respect; whereas, being strong in our compact position on our own Frontier, we could await Russia backed by the wealth and resources of India. As to the internal effect which the occupation of Candahar would have, let him give their Lordships another extract from the authority he had already quoted—
"Supposing that, for the reasons we are debating, we had been obliged to send forward a large force, say two-thirds of the Bengal Army. Consequently, it might be that the whole resources were divided by the mountains from India, and that all our communications might be in extreme jeopardy. … It is a great mistake to look upon India as a solid base of operations, whence to pour 100,000 men, as we should do from England in a case of emergency, trusting to the people to redeem the Government from difficulties."
India was not our native country—we were aliens there; and even if it were possible to draw 100,000 men from that country it was doubtful whether we should have right on our side. He believed that the Native Army was in a very efficient state; but it was an undoubted fact that this foreign service was most distasteful to it. Recruiting had almost come to a standstill, not only in the Punjaub, but also in Madras. It was said that the Natives had no patriotic feelings; but they must be endowed with a certain modicum of com-
92
mon sense, and they would not relish service beyond the Frontier, if they could possibly avoid it; and our military system being based on the voluntary principle, the number of our recruits must diminish. The public should search in the proper channels for information, instead of being the victims of irresponsible lecturers and travellers. Lord Lawrence, almost to the last day of his life, advocated the policy of non-interference to which he was always so true. He was unable to discover that Sir Henry Norman and other eminent men at the India Office at this moment had changed their minds on that subject; neither had the noble Earl the Viceroy of India (the Earl of Northbrook), who preceded the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Lytton) changed his; and therefore he felt perfectly convinced that had the late Lord Sandhurst been still alive, he would have given his most cordial support to the policy of Her Majesty's Government in the withdrawal from Candahar. In conclusion, he must strongly oppose the Motion of the noble Earl opposite.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMOREsaid, it was with considerable diffidence that he ventured to offer a few remarks to their Lordships upon the large and very important subject now before them, in the form of the Motion of his noble Friend the noble Earl and the Amendment of the noble Lord opposite (Lord Waveney). Apart from its importance, the subject appeared to him to be one which adapted itself most naturally to the calm and critical temper which it was the custom of that House to exercise in its deliberations. Whatever might be the views of noble Lords individually upon the policy of annexation generally, he did not think there were any Members of the House who belonged to that particular school of politicians who might be termed the "Take nothing and give up everything school"—those who would set aside and ignore as unworthy of consideration the most vital interests of the Empire, and who based their proposed course of action upon grounds snore or less sentimental or vague, or upon considerations purely financial, without calculating whether the expense incurred would be justified by results obtained or advantages gained. Therefore, in that House, at least, it was possible to approach that question of the retention

93
of Candahar distinctly on its merits. They were all equally interested, no matter on what side of the House they sat, in the preservation and integrity of Her Majesty's Dominions in India. The point at issue between them was the means by which that was to be secured; and he should therefore endeavour to avoid saying anything of an acrimonious character or in the nature of Partizan criticism. If the question had assumed a Party character, it appeared to him very much to be regretted. It was distinctly an Imperial question, and the result of the ultimate action of the Government would be to determine whether or not a decisive step should be taken to secure us, once and for all, against the possible occurrence—in his opinion, the not very remote occurrence—of a great national catastrophe. He was not going to discuss the advantages of Candahar as a military position. That was incontestable, and he fancied was not disputed. It had been recognized as the key of India from the time of Jenghis Khan downwards; and suppose we were to evacuate Candahar now the necessity for its re-occupation at some future time was inevitable, whatever might be our ability at that future time to enforce that necessity. The question, therefore, arose in two forms—whether this was the moment for us to choose for occupation, and whether, in the event of our deciding that it was not, we should not find ourselves in a position of great disadvantage, and perhaps worse, when the necessity of reversing that decision was forced upon us? Now, with regard to the first point, he begged their Lordships to consider what the policy of successive Viceroys was with regard to Afghanistan previous to the accession of the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Salisbury) to the Seals of the India Office in 1874. It had been variously described. The noble Duke opposite (the Duke of Argyll) was of opinion, he believed, that it was a policy of absolute non-interference, and he cited in support of that contention the entire agreement which existed between himself and the late Lord Mayo during their official connection. It would appear to be argued from this that had Ids (the Earl of Donoughmore's) lamented Relative been alive now he would have still adhered to that policy of non-interference. But what was
94
the state of the case in 1869? There was ample evidence in the Papers to show that at that time there was no disinclination on the part of the Ameer to admit English Agents to certain towns in his territory, always excepting Cabul itself; and that evidence was confirmed by a note of Colonel Barnes, written in 1877, in which he states—
"I can fully corroborate all that Captain Grey and Dr. Bellow say as to the willingness of the Ameer at Umballa to consider the subject of British agencies in Afghanistan, had he received encouragement to enter officially into the subject, and had his expectations of being granted a new Treaty been responded to."
But in that case it was the Viceroy who was the unwilling party. There was no object at that time, and in the then condition of affairs in Central Asia, in going further than he did. Lord Mayo's object at that time was to establish an intermediate policy, which should be capable of further development should necessity arise—a necessity which he (the Earl of Donoughmore) believed he certainly contemplated, and which if he had lived till now, he ventured to think, he would have admitted to have arrived. And, apropos of that, he had read with some care the voluminous Papers upon this subject, and there was one point that had struck him particularly. Lord Mayo met with his death before the Khanate of Khiva fell into the hands of the Russians; but he was alive at the time of the establishment of the Russian stations at Krasnovodsk and Kizil on the Caspian. In fact, these stations were established a very few months after the Conferences at Umballa. Well, the subsequent events and the utterances of Russian diplomatists in the matter of Khiva were well known to their Lordships; but if we looked through the published Papers we did not find a single representation to the Home Government from Lord Mayo as to this matter. In fact, after the despatches of the Conferences of 1869, we had nothing more to do with Lord Mayo's Viceroyalty, but pass at once to that of the noble Earl opposite. Now, he could not help thinking that there must be some slight omission in this matter—and, at all events, it would be very advantageous to know what Lord Mayo's feelings were upon this question—and he sincerely hoped that seine noble Lord either at present or lately connected

95
with the India Office would be able to enlighten them on the subject. Well, Lord Mayo's was an intermediate policy, and one capable of, and intended for, future development; but it was, at the same time, the continuation of the policy of his Predecessor. Well, let them see whether they could find in the minds of the statesmen of the time any reason for instituting "a policy capable of development." And hero he felt that he was getting upon more or less dangerous ground. He was liable to be told that it was inconvenient and embarrassing to bring charges against a Power with which we were in relations of amity. Well, he would endeavour not to offend in that respect. He had no desire to say anything ill-natured against Russia and the Russians. He had lived in the midst of them for five months, and had always found them, socially, the most charming nation he ever came across—which was probably the secret of their constant and invariable diplomatic successes. But, at the same time, he could not help remembering—what some people appeared not to have learnt, or to have forgotten—that we had to deal with a Power who had already, in the steady pursuit of an hereditary policy, threatened India by active measures, and did so now by her position on the Frontiers. What did Lord Clarendon say in 1869? He foresaw, as long ago as then, what had been a most important factor, as he (the Earl of Donoughmore) could say from practical experience elsewhere, in the Russian advance in Central Asia. The noble Earl then read a portion of Lord Clarendon's despatch. Then followed the negotiations about the neutral zone, resulting in declarations from Russia as to non-interference with Afghanistan, the boundaries of which principally were finally settled in 1873. But where were the Russians in Central Asia all that time—that was, in 1869? Why, they were not oven at Krasnovodsk Bay—they did not go there till December. It was true that they held Samarcand, and practically commanded Bokhara, and the plains beyond it as far as the Oxus; but they did not threaten our Western Frontier as they did now. And yet the late Lord Clarendon—and, we may presume, the noble Earl who succeeded him, as he subsequently carried out his policy as regarded the Frontiers of Afghanistan—were fully alive to the dan-
96
ger which now threatened us face to face. After Lord Mayo came the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Northbrook), who succeeded to the policy of his Predecessor, as Lord Mayo had to that of Lord Lawrence; but, unfortunately, as he thought, the Government did not consider, in spite of the noble Earl's representations, that the moment for the development of that policy had arrived. He was not going to enter into that question; but the fact remained that in 1873 there was an opportunity of putting our relations with Afghanistan on such a footing as would tend greatly to remove uneasiness on our part as to Russian progress in Asia. It was not, however, until the noble Marquess came into Office that any attempt was made to develop the policy of Lord Lawrence and Lord Mayo. But then it was too late. The Ameer had already been alienated, and the result had been the events of the last two years, and the position in which we were at this moment. And this was that position. Instead of a friendly Ruler and a friendly people, whom we might have secured in 1873, we had a country disorganized by a recent war, with a Ruler who professed himself our friend, but whom we knew to have been for years a refugee in Russian territory, and subject to Russian influences; we had a neighbour on our Western flank upon whom we could not count, but upon whom our possible adversaries can. We have those possible adversaries in such positions as to command practically all the high roads into Afghanistan. The road was open to them, should they ever choose to move, or should circumstances similar to 1878 recur. We hold at this moment the key of India. The question for their Lordships and the country was, would they retain it? Remember that the danger was not only external, but internal as well. The course we pursued was being watched by every Native Prince, by every intelligent and educated man in India itself, and it was being watched equally in Europe. There had been few more valuable contributions to the literature on this question than a letter from Professor Vámbâry—an impartial, uninterested observer, to the noble Earl, published a few weeks ago. But we were told there was an alternative course. We could retire from Candahar, and, when the necessity arose, we could take the necessary steps for its re-occu-

97
pation. It had been a favourite argument with those who advocated a retrograde movement at this moment, that it was only opposed by military opinion and upon military grounds. He could not quite agree with this. It appeared to him that there were very important political considerations to be noticed, more especially such as he had pointed out, and which would result from the impression produced upon the Queen's subjects in India by our action in the matter, whatever it might be. There was, however, this to be noticed as regarded the military aspect of the question, that while the great preponderance of opinion was at this moment in favour of the continued occupation of Candahar, two at least, if not more, of the most reliable authorities upon the question had only lately changed their opinions on the subject—he meant Lord Napier and Sir Donald Stewart; and as regarded those who disagreed with their fellows in the Profession, the disagreement was, not upon military grounds, but for financial reasons. Those were the arguments of Sir Garnet Wolseley and Sir Erskine Perry, who argued almost entirely upon the question of cost, and not upon reasons of military expediency. The question of cost was one into which he did not care to enter. It required a more advanced politician than he was to argue as to whether the Empire should be maintained at "too great a cost" or not. But the political question remained. He was convinced that the time was not very far distant when Candahar would be a necessity to us; and what they had to decide now was whether we should remain there now and endeavour to conciliate the population and accustom them to our rule, or whether, when the time came that we must advance, we should take the risk of doing so through a hostile country, with all the disorganization created by our present retirement behind our backs. Let their Lordships remember the years it took to accustom the inhabitants of the Punjaub to English Sovereignty, and let them recollect the condition of popular feeling in India at this moment. He saw no reason why in a very few years the Candaharis, who were not Afghans by descent, should not be converted into as loyal subjects of the Queen as the Sikhs were at this moment. He believed them even to be anxious for our government, and, con-
98
sidering what they had undergone from Cabuli Rulers in past times, it was not to be wondered at. As regarded Indian opinion, it had been clearly expressed, and he would give it to their Lordships as he had heard it expressed by a distinguished Indian ex-official the other day—
"You know what we are; you are our masters, and your rule is the best we ever had; but you are still strangers, and if we saw other strangers coming from the north, making great promises, and having apparently through your negligence a great chance of success, we could not help ourselves. Many would flock to the stranger; some of them would set up for themselves, but the effect upon you would be the same. You could not oppose Russia and re-conquer India at the same time. You would have to go. But if you hold such a position as would make an invasion from the north to our minds impossible, you would have no troubles in India. And Candahar would undoubtedly be such a position."
Before he sat down he should like to say one word as to the reality of what some people in this country looked upon as a bugbear. He meant the ultimate advance of Russia upon Afghanistan and the Indian Frontier. He was one of those people who did not share the views of the noble Duke opposite (the Duke of Argyll) and those who agreed with him upon this subject, nor could he admit that the danger was in any way overestimated. He did not find any fault with Russia, and perhaps if he were in the position that Russia was we should do very much the same. Now that the strain that existed between the two Governments in 1877 and 1878 was removed, he was quite willing to admit that we had more to fear for the moment from the danger Lord Clarendon foresaw than from anything else—the danger of independent action on the part of Russian officials. Turning for a moment to the last Blue Book issued by the India Office, it would be seen that it contained a Memorandum written by Sir Henry Rawlinson, in which he went into the whole question and discussed alternative lines of policy. That Memorandum was written on the 25th of September last, and there was a postscript to it, which, perhaps, he might be permitted to read to their Lordships—
"It may be only proper to notice that as I am closing this Memorandum, intelligence arrives from Persia of the Russian Government having despatched Colonel Grodekoff with three officers to the Khorassan-Afghan frontier, laden with

99
presents, but charged with what is called an 'exclusively commercial mission.' As Colonel Grodekoff knows nothing whatever of commerce, but knows a good deal of Afghan politics, being the officer who very recently published a very interesting account of his journey from Samarcand by Sir-i-Pul and Mymench to Herat, there can be no reasonable doubt that his present mission is connected with the pending settlement of Western Afghanistan. Can it be prudent, then, to obliterate all traces of our Candahar occupation, and even cancel our means of acquiring information as to current events upon the frontier, just as Russia is showing signs of renewed activity in that direction, and the opportunity seems to be now offering for the realization of her long-cherished scheme of exerting a direct influence at Herat:"—[Afghanistan (1881) No. 2, pp. 65–6.]
That paragraph was worthy of attention, and should afford food for reflection to those whose views at present were in favour of evacuating Candahar. He had only gone very slightly and very marginally into one or two points connected with this very large subject. He had attempted, as far as possible, to avoid controversy upon questions of past policy, and upon which much might be said. It appeared to him that the issues were so grave, the decision to be arrived at so important, that it was not a moment for Party recriminations or differences of opinion upon the past. He had said nothing—though much might be said about it—of that very ably and skilfully conducted diplomatic advance by General Kaufmann into the confidence of Shore Ali, conducted first by letters, then by messengers, and finally by Embassies. He had said nothing of that extraordinary Correspondence which had lately been laid on the Table of the House, which showed what relations it was possible for the Russian Government to create with the Rulers of Afghanistan—relations which, unless we took steps to prevent it, it would be in its power to create again. He had one more proposition to place before the House. He did not desire to play the part of Cassandra; but he asked their Lordships to look abroad—to Africa, to Eastern Europe—and at home as well, and then to consider whether this was a moment to do anything to weaken our Indian Frontier. He did not think that it was; and holding that opinion, and believing that the time had at length arrived when it was necessary and expedient for us to hold the key of India, he should follow the noble Earl into the Lobby that night.
THE EARL OF DERBY: My Lords, in a discussion of this importance I will not waste your time with merely verbal criticism, but I wish to point out that there is something unusual in the wording of this Resolution. The noble Earl who moved it passed in his speech an uncompromising censure on the policy of the Government, but in the Resolution I do not find a word of censure on that policy. The Resolution does not in way condemn it. What we are asked to affirm is merely this—That the justification for the abandonment of Candahar, be it what it may, is not to be found in a particular set of Parliamentary Papers. That is not a very important conclusion, and I notice this point, because the very peculiar wording of the Resolution seems to imply a doubt on the part of those who framed it how far a Resolution framed in the spirit of the noble Earl's speech would be accepted by your Lordships.
My Lords, no one, even of those who least agreed with the substance of the noble Earl's argument, could fail to recognize the singular ability and ingenuity with which he conducted his case. No one, further, can consider it strange that, having been absent from England when the debate on the Afghan War took place two years ago, he should take the earliest opportunity of vindicating his own share in that transaction in which he took so active and conspicuous a part. The noble Earl laid great stress on the support which his policy had found among the Native population, and he assured us that he could take up hours in reading letters of approval which he had received from Natives. Well, Indians of all ranks and classes are very apt to be of opinion that what the Governor General for the time being does is right; but I think it would require a very large number of written communications from individuals to enable any man to say with confidence that he carried with him the support of even a small fraction of the enormous population of India. Among the witnesses whom he called was one in particular, the Khan of Khelat. Well, he is undoubtedly a very competent witness as far as knowledge of the subject is concerned; but I do not think the noble Earl or anyone else would consider him altogether an impartial witness on such a question as the holding of Candahar.

101
It is not necessary for the consideration of the question actually before us to go into details as to past transactions, or to revive the controversy of two years ago on the policy of the Afghan War. That matter is settled and disposed of; the country has decided upon it; whatever our personal opinion may be, the verdict of the jury has been pronounced, and argument comes too late. And, for my part, I am heartily glad that there is no need to go back upon it. The issue now before us is simply this—things being as they are, the war having taken place, having been successful in a military point of view, and Cabul having been abandoned, is it or is it not wise to retain Candahar as a British possession? I must still further disencumber the debate, as far as I am concerned, of irrelevant or practically unimportant matter. If there are any persons who look upon this merely or mainly as a local question, affecting the local interests of the people of Candahar—if there are any to whom the mere fact that we have no right to Candahar except the right of conquest seems conclusive against our remaining—I say, plainly, that I do not hold their view. We are bound in such a matter to weigh the various interests concerned, and to give to each its proper value; and, considering the enormous importance, not to England only, but to Asia, of keeping unbroken the peace of India, and considering the ruin and misery which would be caused by the disruption of our Indian Empire, I have no doubt that we should be justified in holding Candahar, with or without the consent of its people, if by letting it go we risked the security of India, and if by holding it we made India safe. My Lords, it is for the sake of India—it is for the sake of our power there, and all that it is implied in the continuance of that power, that I come to the opposite conclusion from that which is embodied in the Resolution of the noble Earl. Only this I will add—that the question is not merely a military one, in which case I should leave it to soldiers, or one merely diplomatic, or merely financial, but it involves considerations of war, diplomacy, and of finance; and that all these together, not any one of them separately, must be the basis of the judgment which you form. My Lords, let me first take that which is the
102
simplest and easiest to deal with—the consideration of expense. Is the Indian Revenue in a position in which we can afford to incur any outlay not absolutely necessary? I may be an "alarmist," though I hope that that is not my habit; but I confess I have looked for many years past with considerable apprehension at the position and at the prospects of Indian finance. I will keep clear of details, but look generally at the situation. You have, in the first place, an Income which is barely kept equal to the Expenditure by keeping down public. works, or by charging to capital many of those public works which are absolutely necessary. You have a Debt—not heavy, indeed, in itself, not heavy in regard to the numbers of the population on whom it falls, but which is heavy in proportion to their wealth, and which is felt as a double burden, because nearly the whole of the interest goes out of the country, and is not returned to it. You have a further drain, inevitable but burdensome, to supply the salaries and pensions of civil and military officials, and a good deal of that also, probably the greater part—is sent to Europe, and does not return. You draw £8,000,000 a-year from the most uncertain and precarious of all conceivable sources of revenue—the opium monopoly. The Chinese Government might cut off that source of supply, as it were, by merely holding up its hand; they have only to licence opium growing at home, and a largo part, at least, of your £8,000,000 vanishes at once. You have a Revenue not absolutely inelastic, as it has sometimes been called, but which is not to be compared in regard to expansion with what we see at home. More than that, my Lords, you have a difficulty and a danger before you compared to which, in my mind, the risk caused by foreign intrigues is utterly insignificant. You have a population living on the simplest food, without trade or manufactures, which will not migrate, and which continues to increase. In old times the population of Bengal was kept down by wars, by famine, and by pestilence. We have put an end to internal wars, we do what we can to mitigate the pressure of famine and to prevent pestilence, and what is the result? Dr. Hunter, the able statistician employed by Government, tells you what is the state of the case. You are threatened with a

103
pressure of population upon your means of subsistence such as the world has never seen before. I only touch upon that subject. This is not a time to go into it; but I think you will find that those who have most deeply studied the economical situation of India are generally those who take the least sanguine view, and who feel the deepest anxiety as to its economic future. But, my Lords, we need not look so far forward. Take India as it is at the present time. Can you safely increase the taxation to any appreciable extent? I do not believe you can. I believe you are now very near the point at which increased taxes do not bring an increased Revenue; and in any case, suppose it possible to raise more than we do, is the risk of creating internal discontent nothing? If what we fear is not so much invasion as disaffection excited from without; if the risk which we are so anxious to avert is the risk of internal insurrection, surely, my Lords, it is more important to make sure that the materials for a conflagration do not exist than to take extraordinary and costly precautions against a spark or two finding its way in. If you have a people ready and ripe for revolt the occasion will come some day. If they are on the whole contented, incitements to insurrection will do little mischief. When, therefore, I am told of the danger of foreign intrigue in India, I do not meet the argument by the assurance that India is in no danger—I wish I could think so—but what I say is, that you have to choose between incurring one risk or another, and that the risk which arises from crushing down a people with taxes is tenfold greater than that of leaving a vulnerable—if it be a vulnerable—point on your Frontier. But then I may be told that England—the English Exchequer—will bear part of the burden. It will be quite time enough to discuss that hypothesis when it is shown that English constituencies, chiefly composed of working men and poor men, are willing to increase their burdens for any such purposes. I do not believe they would agree to it; and if under any impulse they did so, still you would have no security for the arrangement lasting. We have seen enough in the last few years of the rapid fluctuations of public feeling in matters of this kind; and if, for the first
104
time, India were made a direct burden on the English taxpayer, I am afraid you would create a state of opinion at home far more dangerous for the maintenance of the Empire than any which now exists. Nor, my Lords, is it possible to argue with those persons who contend that the revenue derived from the Candahar district would appreciably lessen the cost of holding it. You will sooner get honey out of a wasp's nest than you will draw taxation from an Afghan province. I see in the last Blue Book, that Shore Ali is reported to have said—
"I am not afraid of your annexing Afghanistan, because it yields only £1,000,000 revenue, and it would cost you £10,000;000 to keep it."
I recollect hearing some saying of the same kind ascribed to Dost Mahomed many years ago. Whoever said it, the estimate is just; and what holds good of a whole holds good equally of a part. Stones and armed men are the produce of the Afghan country, and you will find no other. But, my Lords, putting the financial part of the question aside, in what sense is the occupation of Candahar intended to be a safeguard? What is it that you are afraid of? Is it invasion, or is it diplomacy? My Lords, if India is to be invaded from the Russian Dominions one thing is certain—the invading force must first occupy and hold for a considerable time a large portion of intervening Afghan territory. Do you think the Afghan nation will submit willingly or tamely to an occupation of their country? Do you suppose that the presence of Russian troops in their towns and villages, for however short a time, will be acceptable or even tolerable? Why, we know enough of Afghan character to be aware that one of their most marked characteristics is an intense love of independence and consequent jealousy and hatred of any foreigner who meddles with them. With a people such as they are, fanatical, suspicious, intolerant of strangers, no prospect of distant advantages would ever compensate for the domination of their country by a Russian force. If Russian troops were to enter the country on their way to India, I daresay it might be a wise step, in a military point of view, to occupy Candahar. I grant you that. But in such circumstances as I have supposed, would you require to go there as an enemy? No; you would be received as a liberator and as an ally.

105
The foreign Power, whoever it may be, who is actually holding Afghan soil will be more detested by the Afghans than any other Power for the time being. If we are occupying Afghanistan, the Afghan Chiefs, whoever they may be, will intrigue with Russia. If Russia is holding Afghan territory, they will throw themselves into our arms. Given a nation and a Government which only wants to be left alone, which is comparatively weak, between two great Empires and almost equally afraid of both, it is that Empire of the two which shows the least wish to intrude upon or control them which will be looked upon as a protector and friend. And even if it were otherwise—if necessity compelled you again to advance on Candahar against the will of the Natives—is that a matter of extraordinary difficulty? We have had, unluckily, a good deal of experience of fighting in Afghanistan. Where have we met any serious resistance? The difficulty has been—what it always is in a turbulent and half-civilized country—to maintain communications and to get supplies up to the front. No Asiatic fortress has held out in recent times even for a few days against European artillery. Putting matters at the very worst, therefore—supposing a foreign Army to have entered, or to be entering Afghanistan—supposing that under that state of things the Afghans refused to call in help from us—supposing that we considered it a military necessity to reoccupy Candahar, can you not take it when you want it without holding it permanently in a time of peace? Is it worth while to incur the cost even of £1,000,000 a-year—probably of a great deal more to hold for 20 or 30 years a position, which would be only an embarrassment and an encumbrance to you in time of peace, on the bare chance that if you are attacked in one particular manner or by one particular enemy you may possibly find it useful as an outpost? But, then, my Lords, it is said, what we really have to fear is not foreign invasion, but foreign intrigue with the Native population. Well, be it so; but how in the world will holding Candahar protect you against Russian intrigue at Cabul? Only in one conceivable way—namely, that the occupation will be a standing menace to the Rider of Cabul—that is to say, to reduce the country to the condition of a Dependency, so that he
106
will not dare to receive overtures from Russia—at least openly and to our knowledge, whatever he may do in secret. But, then, what you mean is a great deal more than the mere occupation of Candahar. What you mean is that you intend, by means of holding one Afghan capital, to make the whole country dependent. Well, that is going a good deal beyond the point which we had reached some time ago when a leading Member of the then Government told us that what he desired to see was "a strong, friendly, and independent Afghanistan." And, my Lords, that is not the least valid of the objections against this occupation. You may, as I conceive, keep entirely clear of the internal feuds and politics of Afghanistan by remaining within your present, or nearly your present, boundaries. I am not now arguing the question of a few square miles more or less which may be required to give a better line of defence. You cannot, I am sure, hold one-third of the Afghan Kingdom in your own hands, and, at the same time, keep clear of the internal affairs of the other two-thirds. There is no well-defined Frontier—no line of demarcation. England remaining outside of Afghanistan may possibly be an ally—at any rate, may not be regarded as an object of hostility; England occupying Candahar can never, in the nature of things, hold any position at Cabul except that of an enemy or a master. I do not affirm that the two capitals have never been separated. No doubt at various times they have; but they are looked upon by the whole Afghan nation as constituting integral parts of one Kingdom. The nation has been broken up, no doubt, into tribes; but it has been often seen in nations, having a similar tribal organization, that, however hard it may be to induce them to combine in time of peace, however incessantly occupied they may be in fighting one another, they are always ready to unite against a foreign invader. Let us take a lesson from what is passing in Europe at this time. What do we see in Greece at the present day? We see that no Government has a chance of holding power at Athens that does not dangle before the people the prospect of an extended Greek Empire. And so it will be in Afghanistan. No Ameer will ever be able to hold his own at Cabul who does not encourage the notion of the

107
recovery of Candahar sooner or later. Is not that a bribe easy for Russian or other foreign agents to offer? Does it not furnish the best and most convenient opportunity possible for those very intrigues of which you are always afraid? Whereas, so long as you keep outside of the Afghan territory, no Ameer who is not a madman will be likely, under any circumstances which we can foresee, to engage in an offensive war against England in the hope of conquering and keeping some outlying fragment of the British Dominions. That, my Lords, is a fact to which you can hardly attach too much importance. Stay where you are, or, rather, where you were, and it is at your own choice whether you go further. Advance to Candahar, and I believe you cannot stop there. The very jealousy and hostility which you will provoke at Cabul will be a reason for going on to Cabul; the jealousy with which your advance will be viewed in Russia will be the reason for further Russian advances. My Lords, I should really like to know how many of those who cry out for the retention of Candahar will be satisfied in their own minds to make that a limit? Have we not heard something of Herat? There was a meeting held last week, crowded and enthusiastic, to protest against the proposed withdrawal; but who was the chief speaker at that meeting? An able officer, a brilliant writer, an eager partizan of the policy of advance; and it is not very long since I read an interesting little book by him, written in support of that policy, pointing out the fertility of the Herat country, the resources which it possesses, the ease with which it could be defended, the danger of letting any other Power hold it, and so forth. That question is kept a good deal in the background just now. But I say, with some confidence, whatever reasons may be valid for the move onwards from Quetta to Candahar, I will undertake to find reasons just as conclusive why, if you go there, you would not leave the matter unfinished; why the position of Candahar should be regarded as insecure, and the object of it unaccomplished, if you do not hold Herat at the same time. My Lords, if the cost and the risk of holding Candahar were infinitely less than they are, I would still advise against it for this reason—If once you get even a finger entangled in this complicated
108
wheelwork of internal Afghan politics, the finger will draw in the hand, the hand the arm, and you will not extricate yourself except in a very damaged condition. You are free to keep out of it; you are not free if once involved, to determine how far or to what extent you will be involved. My Lords, the noble Earl has told us that, without advancing one step or moving a single soldier, Russia, once holding Merv, will be practically dominant at Herat, as a necessary consequence of being in close proximity to that city. Why is that argument valid in favour of Russia, and not valid where it applies to us? Are we not also in close proximity to Afghanistan? Why is proximity to count for so much in the case of Russia, and for nothing at all in ours? Again, the noble Earl says—
"If you withdraw from Candahar, your retrograde movement caunot stop there; you must give up Quetta, too."
My Lords, where is the likeness between the two cases? We are at Quetta in virtue of a Treaty of not very recent date, with the full and free consent of both Chiefs and people, who have never shown the slightest desire that we should withdraw. Will anyone contend that that is the state of things at Candahar? And, if not, where is the resemblance? Besides, there is a considerable difference between occupying a position on your own Frontier and occupying one 300 miles beyond it. It may or may not be wise to hold Quetta. I am not arguing that question; but it is a question in no way affected by the decision concerning Candahar. My Lords, a great deal of stress is laid—and not unnaturally laid—on the fact that among civil and military officials in India there is a preponderance of opinion against withdrawal. I admit that that is so, although with many exceptions; and I admit, also, the great ability and the disinterested purpose of those who are in favour of the policy of advance. But I contend that the weight of their opinion is lessened by one fact about which nobody who knows anything of Indian history can have a doubt, that the same language has been held and the same arguments used from the time of Warren Hastings to our own, where the alternative has been between annexation or leaving things as they were. The Services unite almost to a man where there is a question of extending the area

109
of British possessions. They pushed on Lord Auckland; they applauded every annexation of Lord Dalhousie, some of which were certainly questionable, both in point of justice and of policy; and they almost hunted down Lord William Bentinck, the only Governor General who, up to that day, pursued a policy of reducing expenses and keeping out of wars. It is not difficult to see why that should be the predominant feeling of the official class in a military Empire administered by Europeans. An Army would not fulfil the conditions of its existence if it did not look forward with pleasure to fresh campaigns; and fresh provinces to administer have their attractions for civilians. The feeling is not a selfish one; it is partly a natural esprit de corps, partly an equally natural tendency to overrate the advantages of English administration. Anyhow, the feeling is there; and it would be just as strong if the matter in dispute were the holding of Persia or Burmah—or, I had almost said, of China—instead of Afghannistan. But surely, my Lords, a sentiment of that kind ought not to be blindly accepted by us in the place of argument. Surely we, at least, know that the great danger of military Empires is their constant tendency to expand into proportions which make them impossible to hold together. From the days of Alexander to those of Bonaparte, that has been the temptation and the ruin of conquering States; and why are we to suppose ourselves an exception? My Lords, the main argument for an extension of territory is always the same—that it is necessary for safety, because safety depends on prestige. The argument is plausible, and it is dangerous because it is plausible. I can very well believe that under many circumstances it might require a real exercise of political courage to refuse a possible annexation—you disappoint thereby your officials and your Army, and possibly, though not necessarily, you create for the moment an impression of weakness; but is not that a risk which you must run, and is it not a less evil than the evil of indefinite and perpetual expansion? Go on as far as you please—you must have a Frontier somewhere. Wherever you have a Frontier, there is a possibility of disputes and quarrels; but you do not lessen that risk by advancing. Swallow up Candahar, Herat remains; seize on
110
Herat, and Persia still lies behind. It is likely enough that our Asiatic relations with Russia may, in any case, be uneasy; but are we likely to improve them by closer contact? Proximity only multiplies possible causes of difference; it certainly can do nothing to lessen them. But, in the present case, is any loss of prestige involved? When Afghanistan was invaded two years ago all intention of annexation was emphatically disclaimed. We were not at war, it was said, with the Afghan people, but with the Ameer; we wished for nothing so much as to see Afghanistan strong, independent, and friendly. It is not my object now to criticize these utterances; all that I contend for is, that they harmonize perfectly well with the policy of retirement from Afghan territory, while they are absolutely inconsistent with the policy of even partial annexation. What loss of prestige can there be in doing in 1881 that which we announced that we should do in 1878? But, then, it is said—"The Natives will think your power is gone, and they will begin to defy you." Well; but did they do that before? The circumstances are not new. We have held all Afghanistan. We marched through it 40 years ago; and not out of fear or weakness, but on the ground of rational policy, we withdrew. What followed? Was there any disturbance? Were our motives misinterpreted then? Did anybody think our Indian Empire was about to collapse? And, if not, why should they think so now? My Lords, if there be such a thing as a cowardly policy, I will tell you to what kind of policy that name applies—it applies to a policy of aggression founded on terror. It is the worst form of public cowardice when you do that which you do not believe to be in itself wise or politic, merely because you think if you do not do it somebody will say you are afraid. My Lords, the purely military question is one which it would be presumptuous in me to dwell upon. I know that military opinions are divided. I only, therefore, venture to ask one or two questions, which, no doubt, some one more competent than myself will answer. I would ask first whether, having a vast Empire and small Army, it is wise to impose on yourselves the necessity of locking up a very large garrison in a very out-of-the-way place, whore it is useless except for

111
one special purpose? I would next ask whether service in the Afghan country has not been found peculiarly unpopular in the Native Army—so much so as to have latterly interfered with recruiting? I would inquire, further, whether, in the event of any general disturbance in India, a garrison at Candahar is not liable to be cut off, or, at least, greatly annoyed, by insurrections in its rear; whether, in fact, the position is not too isolated to be safe from a military point of view; and whether, in the event of a war with Russia, one of our chief advantages of defence does not consist in the long and difficult country to be traversed, and whether we do not throw away a good deal of that advantage by advancing to meet the enemy half-way? These, at least, are matters for inquiry. My opinion upon them will be worth nothing; but if we are asked to go to vast expenses and incur many risks in order to secure a military advantage, we ought, at least, to know where we shall get the advantages for which this sacrifice is made. My Lords, a great deal has been said—a great deal more, probably, may be said—about those Russo-Afghan Papers which have appeared after so long an interval. I mention them merely in order that I may not seem to ignore their existence; but I do not see how they bear on the present argument. What they show is this—that a Russian Agent tried to get Afghan support when a war was expected between England and Russia; that he held out expectations to the Ameer which he could not make good; and that, when the difference between Russia and England came to an end, he threw over his intended ally without scruple. I should imagine that the result of that transaction would be to make secret alliances between Russia and Afghanistan very difficult for the future. For what is the language of the Russian General?—"Be ready to fight, but don't fight without us;" and when that was said he perfectly well knew that Russia had no intention of fighting. A more deliberate deception never was practised; but it is the Afghans, and not we, who have reason to complain. But, my Lords, had things been otherwise it would not effect my argument. I have never said that Russia could not try to meddle in Afghan affairs. What I contend for is that holding Candahar is not the right way
112
to meet such attempts if they are made. My Lords, I have stated the reasons for which, in my judgment, it is not desirable to adopt the policy embodied in the Resolution of the noble Earl. I cannot do what, under such circumstances, is usually done—make an urgent appeal to your Lordships to avert the public dangers and inconveniences which will attend the adoption of this Resolution. I cannot do that, because I do not believe that any dangers or any inconveniences to the public will follow. The Resolution, I suppose, is very likely to be carried. What then? You will not alter the opinion of the other House of Parliament, nor the opinion of the Government who are responsible for the course that they may take. I will venture to say you will not alter the opinion of the country. You will simply have uttered a protest. It is your right—no one questions that; but for myself, deeply concerned as I have always been for the credit and influence of this House, I doubt the wisdom of putting on record, without necessity, an opinion which will remain without result. You set your own consciences free, no doubt; but, at the same time, you register—I do not like to use a harsh word and say your own impotence, but your own inevitable inability to alter the course of events. The outside world, I am afraid, will take a cynical view of the situation; they will simply say—"By all means let the House of Lords pass as many Resolutions as they like; it pleases them and it does no harm." But is that a dignified position for this House to accept? One of two things must happen if this Resolution is carried. Either a counter Resolution will be moved in the other House of Parliament, and, of course, be carried there, or else no notice whatever will be taken. In the one case you are snubbed, in the other you are ignored. Neither is, to my mind, a pleasing alternative; and I should not have thought it was one to be accepted, far less to be invited, by those who are most anxious to support the dignity of this House. But, my Lords, that is a view which chiefly concerns those who, on the Main Question, look upon the matter differently from me. For myself, I shall vote against the retention of Candahar, because I believe it will be a burden and not a benefit—a source of weakness, not of strength—be-

113
cause I hold that our best defences in India are a full Treasury and a contented people, an Army not too widely scattered for its work, and neighbours who are satisfied that we have do design on their territory or their freedom. Keep Candahar, as the noble Earl proposes, and every one of these conditions is reversed; and if I thought the dangers of Russian intrigues were as formidable as some persons seem to consider them, I cannot see the way by which they would be more effectually promoted than by endorsing the policy embodied in this Resolution.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The counsel, my Lords, with which the noble Earl opposite concluded his speech amounts to this—that your Lordships, being a part of the Great Council of the Realm, should never give your advice upon any subject unless you are certain beforehand that it will be accepted. I am not entirely surprised at that recommendation coming from the noble Earl, for I cannot help remembering that at the last great debate we had in this House his own view of the course which was best for him to pursue was to express an opinion strongly against the Bill then under consideration, and then to vote for it. He naturally expects your Lordships to follow, in some sense, the example which he has set, and, though you feel strongly against the abandonment of Candahar, because you are not certain your advice will be followed, you are to abstain from following your own convictions. In my view, that is not a worthy estimate of the duties of this House. On others lie the responsibility of the course which is being adopted. Our plain duty is to express the truth as we feel it on this and the other momentous questions of the day. If we fulfil that duty, we shall fulfil the highest function for which we exist. I am not prepared to admit that because at present the opinion of the House of Commons and, as some persons think, that of many persons in the country tends to an opposite direction, therefore the proceedings of this House will be wholly without effect in bringing about a sounder state of reasoning and opinion. My Lords, in reference to the functions of this House, it is right that you should bear in mind that, while in one sense your position is less powerful by far than that of the other House of Parlia-
114
ment in that you cannot immediately influence the actions of the Executive in those matters which lie in its immediate jurisdiction, you are in another respect in a superior position to that of the House of Commons in that you are able freely, and without reference to other considerations, to give your opinion frankly upon such matters as are brought before you, The other House has a Government to support and a Party to keep in Office, and even if the opinion of the House wore the contrary of what it is, it might be that they would be disposed to keep back that opinion from the fear of imperilling other objects nearer their hearts. Therefore—especially when Party discipline is so strong as it is now—it is on that account all the more desirable that the people of this country should have freely and frankly laid before it the opinions of those who are nearer the centre of affairs, and have better facilities than the other House of judging of matters which concern the external welfare of the Empire. The great point to be borne in mind in this debate is that we have been dealing for a great number of years past with a danger which has constantly been altering in the way in which it approaches us and m nearness and intensity. The result is that there is, on the one hand, a great latitude and a great diversity of opinion on the part of distinguished authorities. On the other hand, it must be borne in mind that when many of the authorities referred to were alive the danger was much less serious than it is now. Such authorities would probably not now, if they were living, hold the opinions which they then expressed. We have heard, on the other hand, a number of high authorities quoted by the noble Viscount who represents the India Office in this House. He went back as far as 1854, and quoted the opinion of Sir James Outram on the danger we had to apprehend, and the remedies we ought to take to meet that danger. But when that opinion was expressed the Frontier of Russia was several thousand miles further off than it is now, and many obstacles existed to her advance which have since been removed. It is as though someone, in discussing the necessity of applying a remedy to the rinderpest were to quote the opinions of celebrated experts as to what should be done for keeping away that plague when it was as far

115
distant as Hungary or the Dardanelles. Naturally, your views as to what should be done against the rinderpest would be much affected by the fact whether it was at the time in Germany, Holland, or Lincolnshire. You would be much more inclined for drastic measures when it was close by than when it was far away. It is impossible for us to tell what might have been the views of the great men who have passed away. I doubt very much whether even Lord Lawrence would be inclined for this abandonment of all the positions we have gained, although he did, as we well know, deprecate the policy in consequence of which our present position has arisen. But the truth is, that within the last few years the danger from Russian aggression—or rather Russian advance, for aggression is, perhaps, a word which we have no right to use—has constantly increased. It is not merely that it has increased by the addition of new territories to the Russian Empire. On the East and towards Turkestan, no doubt, the Russian Frontier has constantly advanced. But while the advance was confined to that region it was always open to Russia to say that that was only the natural growth of her Empire, and that it was only what must happen when cililization came into contact with barbarism; that it was the natural policy of a civilizing race. But now the cloud approaches us from the shores of the Caspian Sea. In that direction there are no Provinces to bring under; there are no Russian interests to watch over. Her presence on the eastern shores of that Sea, where there is nothing before her but a desert to conquer, is in itself a plain proof of a design against something beyond that desert. Since she came there, within the last few years, persistent and successful efforts have been made, and she has advanced first to one point and then to another. The most desert and difficult part of the country has been overcome. The formidable resistance of the Turkomans, upon which many of us—and I myself at one time—relied to delay her advance, has crumbled into dust before one of the ablest Generals in the Russian Service. And now we are at this point, that the forces of Russia have overcome the only enemy they had to fear; they have passed the most serious part of the desert which lay before them; she is
116
beginning the construction of a railroad by which all difficulties of supply will be removed; and she has secured the co-operation of Persia who, we have every reason to believe—without prying into the secrets of the Foreign Office—is a mere puppet in her hands. That is the danger. It has gone on constantly increasing, decade by decade, and year after year. Why should it stop? What reason is there for believing that the future will not be as the past? What reason is there for believing that the Power which has hitherto been arrested by no obstacles, and which has shrunk from no sacrifices, will hereafter find those obstacles to be insuperable and those sacrifices to be greater than she can bear? Well, the danger being there, the question which your Lordships have to ask yourselves is, what remedy, what defence is open to you; what protection can you trust to? Ten years ago, I think the Government of that day trusted very much to the promise of Russia that she would not interfere with the internal affairs of Afghanistan. I have not heard anybody to-night exactly say that he trusted to the promises of Russia. In truth, those promises have been unfortunate. There was a promise that she would not occupy Khiva, and she did occupy Khiva. There was a promise that she would not extend leer territory on the banks of the Caspian, but she has extended her territory on the banks of the Caspian. There was a promise that she would not interfere in the internal affairs of Afghanistan, and she has interfered in those internal affairs. In short, we can now see that the cycle of events is first that a promise is given, then that promise is broken, and then that a new promise is given on the top of it. In what particular stage we are now I do not exactly know. It is possible that the noble Earl opposite has got at this moment a promise in his pocket that Russia will not advance beyond Geok Tekke. The Russian papers which have been produced give us an insight into the causes why these promises cannot be relied upon. Never was a Power more afflicted with disobedient officers than the great and powerful Empire of Russia. There are old stories of the same kind, which those who have read the history of Afghanistan will remember, all of them illustrating this peculiar defect in the character of the

117
Russian officer. We remember how, in the old war, Vicovitch, having gone against his instructions, was made to blow his brains out when he went home; and how Simvuid, at the Court of Persia, in the teeth of what we were told officially were his instructions, urged the Shah to undertake the campaign against Herat. And when we carry on our view into Europe, we remember a few years ago the remarkable phenomenon of Turkey being invaded from Servia by an army headed by Russian officers, those officers being said to be acting in diametrical opposition to the instructions they had received. Then there is the case of Khiva. We know that the Russian Government desired not to occupy Khiva, and that it sent a trusty Minister to assure us that it would not be done. Nevertheless, the Russian officer was again too strong for the Emperor, and Khiva was occupied. And now we have had the last case of the Russian Embassy to Afghanistan. It is described as an Embassy which was sent there when there was the chance of war between Russia and England. If the Russian Government really intended that to be be their policy, then they must have had an odd idea of the time when there was likely to be a war between England and Russia, because General Stolieteff started from Tashkend on the very day after the Treaty of Berlin was signed. If he selected that day as the one on which it was most likely that there would be war between Russia and England, I can only say that we are never safe; and I hear with very much less satisfaction than I should otherwise have done the assurance which the noble Viscount opposite gave us this evening as to the good relations existing between England and Russia. I do not think that the noble Earl entirely did justice to the peculiar character of that letter of the 8th of October—according to the Russian, and the 20th according to our style—in which General Stolieteff urges the Ameer to pretend peace no to prepare for war against us, and to wait for the Mussulmans on the other side of the Oxus, to go to war along with him. That letter was written three months after the Treaty of Berlin, and it was not written from Afghanistan, but from Europe; and, as far as I can find out, on that very 20th of October, when General Stolieteff
118
was contriving that conspiracy against the honour of his Imperial master, he was actually residing at Livadia. With all these facts before us, I do not think that we can rely on any assurances from the Government of Russia to stay, even for an hour, the destined advance—for it is, I think, the destined advance—of the Russian troops to Afghanistan. There is another security, which was at one time a great favourite with the late Lord Lawrence and the men of his school, and is still a security, I think, with the noble Earl the First Lord of the Admiralty (Lord Northbrook)—namely, that India should not take precautions to defend herself, but should trust to the diplomatic or to the warlike action of the Government at home to arrest any action of Russia on the side of Afghanistan. I am not sure that the noble Earl who has just sat down (the Earl of Derby) did not allude to something of that kind; but it is popularly expressed by the phrase that if Russia advances to Herat we can make war upon her in every part of the world. What, my Lords, does that mean"? You can only make war with Russia by sea. Cronstadt is impregnable, and unless you are on terms of alliance with Turkey—a position, I fancy, you have abundantly succeeded in getting out of by this time—you cannot make war with Russia by way of the Black Sea. And what does this making war with her in all parts of the world mean if her force advances to Herat? You will be driven, after all, to take some precautions on your Indian Frontier from the very absurdity of attempting to control that Power which is placed in all other respects absolutely beyond your reach. Then, if you are able to resist any advance, be it military or diplomatic or a conjunction of the two, what place is best situate by nature to enable you to construct that defence? I imagine that there is no substantial disagreement among great military authorities, whatever their views as to the precise policy at this moment to be pursued, as to the enormous strategical advantages of Candahar. Candahar has been described by a considerable strategical authority as an isthmus surrounded by dry land, and that very forcibly depicts the value of its military position. It has a desert on the south that cannot be turned on that flank, and to the north it has a difficult,

119
desolate, and dangerous country through which no well - appointed army can march. The result is, that if an army wishes to approach India by the Passes, it must pass either close by or within striking distance of Candahar. Now, we are in possession of Candahar. I am very glad that the noble Earl who spoke last lent the weight of his authority to dissipate what seems to me the somewhat foolish and exaggerated language which has been used about the moral aspects of this matter. We are at Candahar by the right of conquest. The noble Viscount (Viscount Enfield) appeared to indicate that he thought it was a high exhibition of morality to deny the right of conquest, and to maintain that, having taken it by war, we are bound to give it up; but I would only point out to him, without entering into these difficult questions of morality which concern matters of war and conquest, that, at all events, his doctrine must be consistent—that if it is our duty always to give up everything that we have conquered, it is a contention which will lead us a great deal further than Candahar—and I am afraid there is no part of our Indian Empire which would escape the action of his ruthless morality. I shall not touch further upon that question than to say that, according to all the evidence I have seen, it appears to me probable that the majority of the population of Candahar, if they were allowed to speak their minds, would prefer our remaining to our going. That the Afghans, properly so called, wish us to depart is true. I imagine that in the last century, if the Highlanders had been asked what they thought of English government, and of police, and of regular administration, they would have taken a hostile view of them. That is very much the view the Afghans take of our Government. They are an eminently lawless race. We impose obedience to the law—and, on that ground alone, they wish us to go. There is, however, a much stronger ground for this feeling—and that is that the Afghans are Mahomedans of a singularly fanatic type. But what appears to be borne out by the majority of witnesses is that most of the population of Candahar are not Afghans that they are Persians, Hindoos, Beloochi—in fact, a mixture of races, who only wish to be allowed to trade in peace. No doubt, those who
120
trade and make money would desire our rule in preference to that of the Afghans. But a more serious objection to our remaining at Candahar is taken on the ground of finance. The noble Viscount opposite went into some detail; but I do not think even he accepted the violent estimate of Sir Henry Norman. The noble Viscount assumes that a garrison of 20,000 men will be required, and that that garrison will cost £750,000, Then he adds 100 per cent, without any calculation or investigation of details as to the further cost that would be necessary, for contingencies and additional supplies. This would increase the cost to £1,500,000. All these calculations are subject to enormous variation. I have seen a calculation of the number of men, sanctioned by one of the highest military authorities of the day, and one best acquainted with Afghanistan, and that calculation is that 12,000 or 13,000 men would be required. I have also seen a calculation as to the additional cost that would be brought upon the country owing to the distance from the source of supplies—it is put down at more than £350,000. Whether the troops themselves are an addition to the force of India or not is not a matter upon which I think the weight of military authority is in the negative direction. We have now a large force occupying the Frontier at three points—Jacobabad, Peshawur, and Rawul-Pindi. They are not there because those posts require a great force in themselves. When you move the Frontier forward, these troops will naturally leave these places and take up their new position on the Frontier that you have adopted. There are now about 12,000 or 13,000 at the three garrisons; or, at least, there were that number before the war began. Scarcely any increased force to the main Army of India will be required when these men have removed from the old to what will be the new Frontier. There is considerable military authority for saying that no material annual expense will be incurred for the force necessary to occupy Candahar. But I do not care to enlarge upon that point, because I really think that the calculation of the noble Earl who has just sat down (the Earl of Derby) has assumed too serious dimensions. He dwelt upon—and pointed it by illustrations—what he regarded as the deadly perils which en-

121
viron the finances of India. He spoke of the contingent and uncertain character of the opium revenue—yielding £8,000,000 of revenue—he led us to believe that no serious addition can be made to the Revenue of India; and he finished his picture by painting in the darkest colours the terrible fate which was reserved for a country, the population of which was rapidly increasing beyond all possible means of subsistance to maintain them. My Lords, the saving of £300,000 or £400,000, which it appears would be required for the occupation of Candahar, will be no material relief from such a calamity. But, on the other hand, you have to consider the financial loss which results from false economy in matters of this kind. What would we give now if the regiments in the Transvaal last summer had never been removed? No doubt, it was done from the best motives of economy. I am making no charge whatever—I am simply illustrating my point—but the result of the saving, from a most laudable motive, a small amount of money has been a very serious expense, both in men and money, to this country. What would we have given in the case of the Zulu War if it had been delayed a sufficient time to allow of an adequate force being at hand to carry out operations? Well, what is the course which the Government propose to pursue in regard to this new danger that has arisen on the North-Western Frontier? Remember that I am not asserting that it is probable any sane statesman in Russia contemplate the conquest of India; but what is a very possible achievement, and what may be a very reasonable object of Russian policy, would be to make Afghanistan so completely a Dependency of Russia, to bring it so far within Russian military and diplomatic influence, to train its troops by Russian officers, and to arm them with Russian arms, to hold a Russian force ready to support them in case of conflict, that a menace would be created on our North-Western Frontier of the Indian Empire—a menace which would paralyze and control your policy in any other part of the world. That is the policy to which Russian statesmen may fairly look forward, and which it is not impossible they may achieve. It is a policy by which, if they do achieve it, the fate of Constantinople will be sealed. If they can once apply such a threat to
122
your North-Western Frontier as to make you seriously concerned for the safety of your Indian Empire, no policy adverse to theirs can be pursued by this country in South-Eastern Europe. How do you propose to act in order to prevent them from establishing this supremacy and superiority in Afghanistan? I must confess that I do not quite understand the policy which the Government propose to themselves to adopt. Some people—I think among them Sir Henry Norman—some of the extreme advocates of the old policy which the noble Viscount advocates, are in favour of our remaining below the Indus and waiting there for the enemy to come. I have heard little to-night that leads me to suppose that that is a policy which any reasonable man would adopt, and I can only point at the terrible danger any Government would run who might propose to put it into execution. When Afghanistan is in hostile hands, and when the Passes are commanded by your enemies, do you imagine that no thoughts will arise in the minds of the Mahomedans that within the period of two long lives themselves have furnished the Rulers to India? I cannot believe that, with a formidable enemy in front, you can safely count upon the centre of your power in India remaining undisturbed; you cannot at once defend India and re-conquer it. But a more probable course, and one far more likely to be followed, is that which has been suggested by the noble Earl who has just sat down—namely, that whenever you anticipate great danger from the Russian advance in Central Asia, you should return and re-take possession of Candahar. But, as was very pertinently asked by my noble Friend who opened this debate, Can you do it? You must remember that, in such an event, Afghanistan will be hostile. A heavy veil will overspread that country, as has been the case before, and you will be absolutely ignorant of all that passes within it; while Russia, advancing closer and closer by the North-West, will have free access to it by Merv and Herat. Another question is, Will you meet with the same kind of Afghan Army when you return up the Pass of Bholan as that which you left behind? Will you not rather meet, if not with a European Army, with a Native Army with much of the skill and learning and discipline possessed by

123
that of Russia? Some people appear to lay much stress upon the moral effect which our evacuation of Candahar will have upon the people of Afghanistan. There is a strange idea prevalent with regard to the Afghan character, which hardly coincides with that which is entertained by those who have lived in that country. There is an idea that they are highly impressionable, and that they are very easily touched and gained upon by any striking act of self-restraint, and that if they see you retiring behind your Frontier their first impulse will be to fall into great ecstasies at this great act of moral and virtuous renunciation, and will swear to each other that thenceforward nothing shall induce them to listen to the bribers or to fear the intimidation of Russia. I am afraid that that scarcely coincides with what experience has taught us with regard to the Asiatic character. I am afraid that in Asia allegiance is merely the recognition of superior strength, and that the Afghans will, on the whole, ask themselves, when they are determining to whom their allegiance shall be given, which is the stronger Power—which is the Power that can protect their friends and punish their enemies—and I am afraid that they will conclude that the stronger Power is that which advances and never retreats, and not the Power which retreats and preaches all the way. Of course, there are several ways of putting a retreat. I recollect, during the American War, when the Federals were compelled to execute that disagreeable operation, their Generals always spoke of this action as a strategic movement to the rear. Her Majesty's Government chose to describe it as a high moral act of renunciation. But these are all delicacies of civilization. The Afghan has to judge by experience of his own country and race, and his experience is that people who stand are the stronger, and the weak are the people who give way. I fear that when you have undertaken to execute this manœuvre, on which so much reliance is placed, of coming back to Candahar when you hear the Russians are at Herat—and I suppose commencing, by the way, to construct a railway at the same time; and, perhaps, after much debate at home and discussion in Parliament, and possibly a General Election intervening—I fear
124
that when the salutary movement is resolved upon, you will have to meet something even more dangerous than the Russian Armies, and the alienation of Afghan allegiance and obedience. You will have to meet the general belief in that country in the decay of our own national power. Depend upon it, Candahar is no trivial or unimportant city. Its strategic value and its great historic importance make it the object of the attention of the whole nation; and the Power that is seen to give up Candahar will, in the words of a great living Statesman, be thought to be "a Power that has lived." The noble Earl spoke very contemptuously of those who fear to be thought afraid. The Rulers of India, who are attempting the stupendous task of governing 250,000,000 men by 250,000, do well to fear that they should be thought afraid. With them reputation for courage and strength, if it be not a substitute for the possession of that strength, is, at all events, a safety and protection against unnumbered evils which must accompany the repression of disorder in such an Empire as your Indian Empire. But, think for a moment—when you cast a fatal doubt on this reputation for strength, which is so essential, if not to your existence, at all events to your peace and tranquillity—what is the particular crisis at which this is done? Are your Armies in all parts of the world so strong and so successful that you can afford, at this particular time, to have it said that, struck down by a terrible blow in Africa, you are compelled to abandon the conquest you have made, and leave Afghan territory to those whom you conquered? My Lords, if you regard financial considerations, or, for the sake of deferring to the fantastical opinions of a particular clique of politicians or religionists who are not unrepresented in the present Government, if you take a course such as this, you, at the present time, suffer a doubt to be cast in the minds of millions of the Asiatic population on the strength and power of your military force, and you will have sacrificed that position, that reputation for tenacity, for resolution, on which your splendid Empire was originally based, and by which alone I venture to say it can be held.
THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK: My Lords, it seems to me somewhat strange

125
that the noble Marquess who has just sat down (the Marquess of Salisbury) did not devote some part of his speech to answering the very temperate speech of the noble Earl (the Earl of Derby) who has just addressed the House. As far as I was able to follow the speech of the noble Marquess, he did not attempt to answer the arguments of the noble Earl, but contented himself with a few criticisms on minor points which were alluded to. In some respects I can say, from my own knowledge, that the statement of facts made by the noble Marquess were inaccurate. For instance, he stated that General Stolieteff started from Tashkend the very clay after the signature of the Berlin Treaty; but I know that he left on the day following that on which the Conference at Berlin commenced.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYsaid, he had taken the dates from the Blue Books laid before Parliament. If the noble Earl would look into the Blue Book, he would see that the date was July 14.
THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK: I reassert my statement, and leave it to the noble Marquess to contradict it if he chooses after a further examination of the Blue Book. Then, again, the noble Lords opposite were, many of them, Ministers of the Crown at the time when most of the events under consideration happened, and it is not for us on this side to take up the cudgels or to apologize for Russia or the Government in power at the time of which I speak. The noble Earl who commenced this debate (Earl Lytton) was good enough to spend a full hour of his speech in making an attack upon the bumble individual now addressing you. In reference to that part of his speech I will only say that I have no intention to bring up again the old stories discussed in this House two years ago, or to enter on a disquisition as to the frame of mind of Shore Ali Khan in 1876. When I heard him read letter after letter from General Kaufmann to Shore Ali Khan, I was reminded of the story of Serjeant Buzfuz, who, having dwelt on the remark in Mr. Pickwick's letter that he wished to have prepared for him a dish of chops with tomato sauce, added the instruction to Mrs. Bardell, "Don't trouble yourself about the warming pan." I cannot understand that the expression of the
126
learned Serjeant was more apropos to the issue in "Bardell v. Pickwick" than were the references of the noble Earl to alliances between illustrious houses as based upon the correspondence between Shere Ali Khan and General Kaufmann. The noble Earl has a perfect right to give an account of his own administration of India, but he has tinged that account with pretty much of Eastern romance. The noble Marquess has followed very much in the same line. I shall not follow either of the noble Lords, but confine myself entirely to considerations based upon the wisdom or the unwisdom of retaining possession of Candahar. I am in this difficulty, my Lords, that the different arguments in favour of the withdrawal from Candahar have been so exhaustive—those of my noble Friend behind me (Viscount Enfield), of the noble Earl (the Earl of Derby) below the Gangway, and the military argument of my noble and gallant Friend opposite (Lord Chelmsford)—that I would be but repeating their arguments if I went into the question. I contend that the noble Earl who brought forward this Motion was quite wrong in saying that we have reversed the policy of our Predecessors. What did we find when we came into Office? We found that the noble Earl hail determined to leave Cabul without much caring whether he made an arrangement with Abdurrahman or anyone else for preserving order there. We found that his Government had determined to hand over Herat to Persia—an arrangement which had broken down. And was the policy of the noble Earl to annex Candahar? By no means. The late Prime Minister gave your Lordships a solemn assurance that no such intention existed. The noble Earl selected a man of very considerable merit—the late Wali—to be Governor of Candahar, to be supported by a considerable British force. But within six weeks of the noble Earl leaving Office the troops of the Wali mutinied, the result being a disaster to the British arms. It then became apparent that it would be impossible to retain the Wali at Candahar, and that, therefore, the whole policy of the late Government had broken down. We had then to determine what was to be done with Candahar—and it is, therefore, to put the case the wrong way to say that we have

127
departed from the policy of our Predecessors, for within a few weeks of our taking Office there was no policy of theirs which we could carry out. It seems to me, therefore, that we should have had some stronger reason than any given by the noble Marquess for a new policy—namely, the annexation of a district as large as Great Britain, and involving responsibilities which he has greatly underrated. Well, my Lords, the question may be argued in two ways, and it is constantly argued in both. It is sometimes said that Russian invasion is a bugbear—that Russia would not be so foolish as to think of invading our Indian Empire. By other advocates of annexation it is said that it is necessary to retain Candahar in order to protect British Possessions in India against Russian aggression. I shall not go into that matter further; but it will be admitted that there are high military authorities on both sides of the question. Some, like my noble and gallant Friend Lord Napier of Magdala, think that Candahar would be a very important strategical point in case of any contemplated attack by Russia. Others, equally high in point of authority, think that it would not. I take it that the Department of the War Office who have considered this question and come to a conclusion upon it deserves some notice. The whole Intelligence Department of the War Office, representing the scientific branch, under his Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief, have come to the conclusion that the retention of Candahar as a strategical point is highly undesirable; and, therefore, my Lords, there is no preponderance of military authority in favour of its retention. The noble Earl below the Gangway (the Earl of Derby) asked, would it be wise, in the event of war, to have so large a force as it would be necessary to keep at Candahar held in that isolated position—one from which they could not be withdrawn for any other service? In the opinion of Her Majesty's Government that is one of the strongest considerations against the holding of Candahar at the present time. But, my Lords, the argument most used to-night was that by occupying Candahar we should be able to increase our influence and diminish the influence of Russia in Candahar. I admit frankly that the observations of the noble Marquess were
128
perfectly correct in one respect. It is quite correct to say that by the advance of the Army of Russia against the Turkomans, Russia has got nearer to Afghanistan. But the question is, whether the occupation of Candahar is or is not likely to diminish Russian influence and to increase our own. I have always thought that one of the results of this war was a demonstration that the feeling in Afghanistan is hostile to Russia. It is the universal belief that what the Afghans desire is simply their own independence; and I am of opinion that they only wish to be left alone by England and Russia alike. The nation that interferes with Afghanistan, that endeavours to annex Afghan territory, whether it be England or Russia, will be the nation to which the Afghans will be hostile. Therefore, I consider that to occupy Candahar would be the surest way to extend Russian influence in Afghanistan and to open the road to the danger apprehended by the noble Marquess. The noble Earl (the Earl of Lytton) made some charges against the Government of breaking faith. In reply to them, I may refer your Lordships to the despatches of the present Secretary of State for India, in which the desire is deliberately expressed that faith should be kept in every case where pledges have been given to any person or tribe in Afghanistan. If, after the speech delivered by the noble Earl (the Earl of Lytton) in the Legislative Assembly of Calcutta, when he said that the British Government repudiated all views of conquest; after the Proclamation issued by the noble Earl to the Sirdars and people of Afghanistan; after the promise of the noble Earl to respect the independence of the Khan of Khelat—Ministers of the Crown should countenance and advise the retention of Candahar, what faith would Princes and Chiefs in India be likely to place in the solemn assurances of English Ministers? As to the moral aspect of the case, I am not one of those who would for a moment say that if the annexation was absolutely necessary to maintain the British Empire, we should not be justified in making it; but it is, at least, as noble Lords opposite will admit, a debatable point. As regards the question of expense, I have to say that in my opinion no reasonable man could put the number of troops that would be required for the retention of

129
Candahar and for the necessary supports between that place and the Indus at loss than 20,000 men. We cannot reasonably calculate the expense consequent upon the retention of Candahar under 1,500,000 per annum chargeable upon the Indian revenues. There would also be large expenses for barracks, fortifications, and railroads, amounting probably to £5,000,000. The question of expense is a serious one—and it must be borne in mind that it is dangerous to impose additional taxation on the people of India. That was the opinion of Lord Mayo, and it is shared by many eminent men. If the large sums which I have mentioned are spent in the retention of this territory, the development of works of public utility in India will be impossible. The noble Earl opposite says that our prestige will suffer if we withdraw from Candahar. I should like to ask why our prestige would not equally suffer by our withdrawal from Cabul? I think that the noble Earl might have taken a lesson, if I may be allowed to say so, from my noble and gallant Friend Lord Strathnairn, whom I do not see in his place. That noble and gallant Lard said that the prestige of British arms in Afghanistan would be secured to the posterity of that country by the gallant action fought by General Roberts at Candahar; and I think that the noble Earl would have been better advised than to imply that our prestige will be diminished because we think it right to withdraw from Candahar. The noble Earl then said a good deal about Native public opinion in India. I do not doubt, my Lords, that there are in India many Natives—and Mahomedans especially—who are not well-affected to this country. But as regards the general opinion of the Natives of India, I believe that the noble Earl opposite is entirely mistaken; and I draw my conclusions from the opinions expressed in the Native Press, condemning the policy of the late Government, and advocating the early abandonment of Candahar. My Lords, this question cannot be discussed altogether without reference to authority; but I am not going to quote opinions to your Lordships, as it is, in my opinion, unadvisable to go further into that branch of the question. I want your Lordships to consider for a few moments what has been, up to the present time, the prevision of the noble
130
Earl late at the head of the Government and the noble Earl near him as to the management of the affairs of Afghanistan. Have their anticipations been correct or have they not? I take the noble Earl the late Viceroy first. He anticipated that the Mission of Sir Neville Chamberlain to Cabul would be successful, and that there would be no need for resorting to hostile measures or going to war with Afghanistan. A very few days after the expression of that opinion we were at war with Afghanistan. I take another case. The noble Earl the late Prime Minister, on the 5th of August, 1879, speaking at a banquet at the Mansion House, explained to the Lord Mayor what the Government which he represented had done in Afghanistan. He said—
"My Lord Mayor, you have reminded me that it was to the City of London that I first announced the determination of Her Majesty's Government to secure for our Indian Empire an adequate and scientific frontier: I have now the gratification of reminding you that that object has been accomplished and achieved with a rapidity and a precision of execution which cannot easily be paralleled in the annals of war."
That was spoken on the 5th of August, 1879, and it was on the 3rd of September that Sir Louis Cavagnari and his escort were murdered in the city of Cabul. If that is political prescience with regard to the affairs of Afghanistan, I should like to know what political prescience really is. And where is the scientific frontier now? It is painful to ask what, according to these Papers, has become of the scientific frontier to which the late Prime Minister and the late Viceroy of India attached such vast importance. From the last Blue Book we find that the question was asked whether it would be possible to keep British troops in one of those positions—namely, the Kuram, which was so much advocated at one time. There was not a single officer, from General Sir Donald Stewart and General Sir Frederick Roberts downwards, who did not state that that position would be utterly untenable. What was the next political programme from the noble Earl opposite? We had a policy of revision. What has become of all the arrangements that were made by the noble Earl? Just before the Dissolution we heard from the noble Earl

131
opposite a violent attack in the Legislative Council of Calcutta on the Prime Minister, because he saw that the Financial Estimates put forward by the Indian Government did not show the real expenditure. And these are the Advisers that ask your Lordships to agree to an extension of your Empire—an extension which, I am bound to say, as I have said before, would be to the advantage of Russia, if Russia ever, by intrigue or by force, desired to damage the British Empire.
Moved, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(The Viscount Cranbrook.)
Motion agreed to.
Debate adjourned till To-morrow.
House adjourned at half-past Twelve o'clock, till To-morrow, a quarter before Five o'clock.