Sitting of 26 August 1886

MINUTES.
NEW MEMBER SWORN—Sir Matthew White Ridley, baronet, for Lancashire (Blackpool Division).
SELECT COMMITTEES—Standing Orders, nominated; Selection, nominated; Kitchen and Refreshment Rooms (House of Commons), appointed and nominated.
PUBLIC BILL—Ordered—First Rending—Shop Hours Regulation * [40].
PROVISIONAL ORDER BILLS—Read first, second, and third time and passed—Local Government (No. 3) * [223]; Local Government (No. 5) * [237]; Local Government (No. 6) * [238]; Local Government (County Divisions) * [225]; Local Government (Gas) * [222]; Local Government (Highways) * [235]; Local Government (Poor Law) (No. 7) * [236]; Pier and Harbour* [201]; Tramways (No.1) * [195].
Read first and second time—Gas (No. 2) * [214]; Local Government (No. 7) * [256]; Local Government (No. 8) * [262]; Local Government (No. 9)* [262]; Local Government (No. 10) * [269]; Local Government (No. 11)* [277]; Local Government (Ireland) (Public Health Act) (No. 2) * [261]; Tramways (No. 2)*[208]; Tramways (No. 3)* [213].

Read first time
—Electric Lighting * [278]; Public Health (Scotland) (Urray Water)* [279].
Several Members took and subscribed the Oath.

QUESTIONS.

  PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS (IRELAND)—ASSISTANT REVISING BARRISTERS.
  MR. LEWISasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether the appointment of assistant revising barristers in Ireland this year was made by the Lord Lieutenant on the 2nd of August; whether that was many days after the resignation of the late Prime Minister; whether such appointment was made many days before the similar appointments were made last year; whether such appointments were made appointing the several barristers to particular constituencies, instead of leaving the barristers to arrange with the county chairmen, as prescribed by the Act passed in the last Session of Parliament; and, whether one of the assistant revising barristers so appointed was a defeated candidate at the recent General Election?
  MR. MAURICE HEALYasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether it had not been the invariable practice of successive Governments in Ireland, whether Liberal or Tory, to exercise, before going out of Office, any patronage they had in the way of existing vacancies; and whether, in relation to the last paragraph of the hon. Member's Question, to the effect that one of the Assistant Revising Barristers was a candidate at the recent General Election, it was not the fact that one of the Assistant Revising Barristers appointed

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  by the Conservative Government was also a defeated candidate at the General Election in 1885?
  MR. CLANCYsaid, he also wished to ask whether it was not the fact that last January several executive acts, such as the appointment of magistrates, were performed by the Government of Lord Salisbury up to the resignation of the Ministry?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. HOLMES): In answer to the Question which has been put by the hon. Member for Londonderry (Mr. Lewis), I have to say that the late Lord Lieutenant appointed 28 Revising Barristers on the 2nd of August, which was some days subsequent to the resignation of the late Prime Minister and some time before the date that similar appointments were made last year. One of the gentlemen appointed had been a candidate at the General Election. I am informed that the Lord Lieutenant's warrants appointed Barristers for counties generally and not for particular constituencies; but in some instances the letters enclosing the warrants stated that a Barrister was appointed for a particular division. In answer to the Questions put by hon. Gentlemen opposite I am not in a position to state what the practice of successive Governments has been, for my knowledge does not extend over many successive Governments, but I know that appointments have been made in the way suggested. As to the further Question as to a gentleman having been appointed last year who had contested a constituency, I am not aware that any gentleman who addressed a constituency as a candidate was appointed subsequently to his having done so. One gentleman who had acted as Revising Barrister was subsequently a candidate, but at the time he was appointed he had never in any way come forward as a candidate for Parliamentary representation, and I have his assurance for saying that at the time he accepted the appointment he had no intention of doing so.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: He was a member of the Constitutional Club.

  LAW AND JUSTICE (IRELAND)—GAL-WAY ASSIZES (SLIGO).
  MR. PINKERTONasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Why the rule adopted
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  in the other three provinces of Ireland, of holding the assizes in the chief city of the province, is departed from in the case of Connaught, where the assize is held in Sligo instead of Galway; and, whether the present arrangement will be altered?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. HOLMES)(who replied) said, that no such rule as that stated in the Question existed as to the places for holding the Winter Assizes, which depended upon considerations of convenience.

  ARMY—ORDNANCE DEPARTMENT—CAVALRY SADDLES.
  MAJOR RASCHasked the Surveyor General of the Ordnance, If he will state how many Cavalry saddles, pattern 1884, have been made, how many issued, how many returned, how many condemned, either returned or unissued; and, whether any steps have been taken to recover damages from the contractors who have supplied defective saddles; and, if not, why not?
  THE SURVEYOR GENERAL (Mr. NORTHCOTE): Of 1884 pattern 3,692 saddles were made. Of these 2,627 were issued, including 50 for Canada. None have been condemned as unserviceable. About 150 have been returned damaged by regiments. All the rest have been recalled. The issue of these saddles was made rather as an experiment than as a regular issue; some defects, however, were discovered when they came into use, and modifications and further trials have since been made. The saddles will be re-issued when the modifications of their present pattern, which are now under consideration, are finally approved; but as the present pattern was passed by its Inspectors the War Office is not able to recover damages from the contractors.

  SEEDS (IRELAND) ACT—REPAYMENTS.
  COLONEL NOLANasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether about ninety-five per cent. of the money advanced under the Seeds Bill has been repaid, and if the collection of the remaining five per cent. is attended with considerable difficulties to the unions responsible for it; whether the information in his possession shows that these difficulties are caused partly by the fact that the

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  inhabitants of the unions in debt are poorer than the average, and partly because the magistrates at Petty Sessions have some doubt as to their jurisdiction, owing to the lapse of time, while the Quarter Sessions, who have jurisdiction, require proof of delivery; and, if, under these circumstances, he would inquire as to what portion of the balance is fairly recoverable, and if he would request the Local Government Board to see if an arrangement could be made by which, on the unions paying a share of the balance owing, the remainder might be wiped out and the account closed?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): Between 92 and 93 per cent of the loan has been repaid. In many cases the difficulty in obtaining payment has arisen rather from indisposition on the part of the recipients of the seed than from positive inability to pay for what they received. No doubt, the inhabitants of some of the Unions still in debt are poorer than in Unions where the rate has been fully paid up; but there would be evident objections to selecting any particular Unions with a view to remission. I am not aware of any reason for such a doubt on the part of magistrates with regard to their jurisdiction as is suggested. Magistrates are bound by law to adjudicate on poor rate cases "at any time after the date of the warrant authorizing the collection." As for proof of delivery, the signed receipts of the recipients have been produced when asked for, but the Local Government Board are not aware of any general demand of this kind. My Predecessor in Office announced last March a concession on the part of the Treasury by which the uncollected balance will not be pressed for until the month of April next year.

  IRELAND—STATISTICS OF POPULA-TION—CORK COUNTY.
  MR. DONAL SULLIVANasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, What is the population of the county of Cork; what is the proportion of Catholics and Protestants in that county; what is the number of magistrates in that county; how many are Protestants and how many are Catholics; and, how long has Lord Bandon, the present Lieutenant of the County, held that office, and how many
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  Catholic and Protestant magistrates has he appointed during his Lieutenancy?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): With regard to the population and religious professions of the inhabitants of the county of Cork I fear I cannot add anything to the information already before the House in the Census tables. Also, with regard to the number of magistrates of each religious persuasion the House is in possession of all the information at the disposal of the Government, an elaborate Return having been presented in June last on the Motion of the hon. Member for South Kilkenny (Mr. Chance). The present lieutenant of the county has been in office for nearly 12 years, and of the magistrates now in the Commission who were appointed by him 118 are Episcopalian Protestants and 49 Roman Catholics.
  MR. CONYBEARE: In connection with the last Question may I ask whether the Return to which the right hon. Baronet referred distinguishes between those magistrates who were Protestant and those who were Catholic?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH: I believe it does. I believe that was the object of the Return.

  ARMY CONTRACTS—SUPPLY OF ARMY CLOTHING.
  MR. HOOPERasked the Secretary of State for War, What steps are taken to notify to manufacturers in Ireland periodically the intention of Government to receive tenders for the supply of Army clothing?
  THE SURVEYOR GENERAL OF ORDNANCE (Mr. NORTHCOTE)(who replied) said: In answer to the hon. Member I have to state that there are only two firms in Ireland who are known to be capable of undertaking contracts for the making up of Army clothing—one in Dublin and one in Limerick, and these firms are applied to whenever supplies are required. If any other competent firms wish to tender they have only to apply to have their names placed upon the list, when particulars will be sent to them from time to time.
  MR. HOOPERinquired whether it would not be to the advantage of the Public Service that the information should be furnished to all well known firms of manufacturers in Ireland; and

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  also whether the hon. Gentleman was aware that one of the most eminent firms in this branch of business was now excluded—namely, Messrs. Mahony and Co., of Blarney?
  DR. TANNERasked if he understood the hon. Gentleman to say that there were only two firms in Ireland capable of fulfilling contracts of this kind?
  MR. NORTHCOTEsaid, he stated that if any firms wished to tender for such contracts, and if they would signify their wish to the War Office their cases would be considered, and forms of tender would be sent to them from time to time. He was not aware of the circumstances with regard to the firm which the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Hooper) mentioned, but if the hon. Member would communicate any facts he would see that inquiry was made.
  MR. MAHONYasked if the hon. Gentleman would state what steps were to be taken by any firms who might consider themselves competent to tender for the supply of Army clothing, and to have their names placed on the list?
  MR. NOETHCOTEsaid, that in regard to all tenders the course adopted was to advertise in the local papers. There were also firms which were in the regular list of the War Office to which special notices were sent. If the local firms who saw the advertisements which appeared from time to time in the local papers would communicate with the Secretary of State for War, their communications would be attended to in the proper course.
  MR. MAHONYasked if they were to understand that in future all supplies for Army clothing would be advertised in the Irish local papers?
  MR. NORTHCOTEsaid, he had no reason to suppose that any course different from that which had hitherto been found convenient was likely to be pursued, which consisted in notifying from time to time as supplies were wanted in the principal local papers and to the firms which were accustomed to supply the Department.

  PUBLIC HEALTH—HYDROPHOBIA— M. PASTEUR'S RESEARCHES.
  SIR JOHN LUBBOCKasked the President of the Local Government Board, What pro-
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  gross is being made by the Committee appointed last Session to inquire and report on the subject of M. Pasteur's researches with reference to the prevention of hydrophobia; and, whether the Report of the Committee will be shortly presented to this House?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE) (Tower Hamlets, St. George's): I am informed that considerable progress has been made by the Committee. A Sub-Committee visited Paris, and had several long interviews with M. Pasteur, who explained to the members most fully and unreservedly the whole details of his treatment. The Committee examined a large number of the persons who had undergone treatment, and so far as this investigation is concerned the Committee were fully satisfied that M. Pasteur's treatment had been effective. They hope, before long, to be in a position to report the results of their investigation to the Local Government Board; but before doing so they are most anxious that time should be allowed for the Committee to ascertain that experiments on animals, conducted on behalf of the Committee, have yielded the same results as those detailed and demonstrated to them by M. Pasteur.

  INDIA (BOMBAY)—CASE OF MR. A. MORTON, PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT.
  MR. MURPHYasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether his attention has been called to the case of Mr. Andrew Morton, of the Engineering Service, Public Works Department, India, and who was, in 1884, employed on the Nizam of Hyderabad's State Railways; whether Mr. Morton was arrested on a charge of embezzling the Railway funds, and committed by a Colonel Dobbs for trial before the High Court of Bombay, where he was acquitted by the jury without calling on his counsel to reply to the case made against him; whether, subsequently, a Departmental inquiry into Mr. Morton's conduct took place under the presidency of Lieutenant Colonel Bullock, and whether the Committee of Inquiry reported that "the clerks in Mr. Morton's office had combined to deceive him;" that at the time the defalcations with which he was charged occurred "he was overwhelmed

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  with work," having "the duties of Manager, Traffic Superintendent, and Storekeeper, in addition to his other work," and that "his mind was distracted by a multiplicity of duties arising from the arrival and departure of the Viceroy;" and whether the Committee completely exonerated him from being guilty even of gross carelessness; whether, after many months' suspension, being reinstated in his office, he was obliged to proceed to a station in Northern Bengal at his own expense, and his increments of pay stopped down to the present time; and, whether the Indian Government will order that Mr. Morton's incremental pay be restored to him, and that he shall receive suitable compensation for the indignity which he suffered?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Sir JOHN GORST)(who replied) said: Mr. Andrew Morton, while employed on the Nizam of Hyderabad's State Railway, was arrested on a charge of embezzlement, and committed for trial before the High Court of Bombay, but the charge was afterwards withdrawn. A Departmental Inquiry took place with the result substantially as stated in the Question. The Committee of Inquiry exonerated him from "the charge of gross negligence," but considered that he had been unbusiness like in his dealings, especially in regard to documents on which payments of money had to be made. When released and reinstated in his office, the arrears of his pay and the expenses incurred in his defence were passed to him, and he was transferred in the same grade and on the same pay to Bengal. The Government of India, however, thought that his unbusiness-like method could not be passed over, and therefore left him to proceed to his new station at his own expense, and directed that his salary should remain stationary till further orders. The Secretary of State in Council saw no reason to interfere with the discretion of the Government of India in this matter.

  EDUCATION (IRELAND)—BOARD OF INTERMEDIATE EDUCATION.
  MR. CLANCYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, What proportion of the expenses of the administration of
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  the Board of Intermediate Education in Ireland bear to the total income of the Board and to the amount expended yearly in fees to schools and rewards to pupils; whether the two assistant Commissioners discharge duties which might be as efficiently performed by one secretary at less than half the cost; and, if so, whether there is any intention of filling up the vacancy at present existing in the office of assistant Commissioner?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): The proportions mentioned are respectively 10·6 and 21·6 per cent, as will be seen by a reference to the accounts of the Commissioners. The Board do not believe that the duties of the two Assistant Commissioners could be as effectively performed by one Secretary, and the Government agree in this opinion. However, we are in correspondence with the Board as to whether some economies cannot be effected without detriment to the Public Service.

  FISHERIES (IRELAND)—THE HERRING FISHERIES ON THE SOUTH COAST.
  MR. CLANCYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether the practice of fishing for herrings on the South Coast of Ireland before the month of June has been declared by the Inspectors of Fisheries for that Country to be highly detrimental to the fishing industry; and, if so, whether, as the Inspectors have no power to make a bye-law on the subject, he will procure an Order in Council prohibiting the practice complained of within twenty miles of the Irish Coast, thereby following the precedent set by the Order made and approved by Her Majesty on the 29th April 1869, whereby dredging for oysters between certain dates on parts of the East Coast was prohibited within twenty miles of the shore?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): The fact as to the opinion of the Inspectors of Fisheries is as stated by the hon. Member. I will look further into the matter during the Parliamentary Recess and see whether it would be practicable and desirable to promote such an Order in Council as is suggested.

  TURKEY—DISTURBANCES IN ARMENIA (VAN).
  MR. BEYCEasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether Her Majesty's Government have received, and can give the House, any information regarding the conflict between a body of Turkish soldiers and the Armenian population of Van, which was reported in the newspapers about three weeks ago as having occurred owing to the interference of the local authorities in the election of an Armenian bishop?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): From a Report received from Her Majesty's Vice Consul at Van, it appears that the disturbances to winch my right hon. Friend refers took place on the 4th ultimo, on the occasion of the election of Members to serve in the Armenian National Council of that city. I am glad to be able to say that Mr. Barnham states that the extent of the damage inflicted on both sides has been much exaggerated, and that no serious wounding and no fatality occurred. The interference by the Local Authorities was at the instance of the Acting Bishop. I shall be happy to show to my hon. Friend the Report of the Vice Consul.

  LAW AND JUSTICE (IRELAND)—THE BELFAST RIOTS—TRIAL OF PRISONERS.
  MR. MAURICE HEALYasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether, having regard to the excited state of feeling likely to exist for some time in Belfast, he proposes to permit the two men Walker, returned for trial for the murder of Head Constable Gardiner, to be tried before a Belfast common jury?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. HOLMES): I think that at the present moment Belfast would be a very unsuitable place for trying the cases referred to in the Question of the hon. Member; but it is to be hoped that the excited state of feeling there will not continue for any considerable time.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman say whether it is intended to try these prisoners at the coming Winter Assizes?
  MR. HOLMES: That is a Question which I cannot answer at the present time, because it is premature to take it into consideration.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: May I further ask whether the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not consider this a proper case for the exercise of his power of applying to the Queen's Bench to change the venue, as was done by his Predecessor, Mr. Attorney General Johnson, in an agrarian murder case three or four years ago?
  MR. HOLMES: I must repeat I cannot answer the Question at the present moment.

  THE WEST INDIAN COLONIES—A ROYAL COMMISSION.
  SIR THOMAS ESMONDEasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, How many estates, sugar and coffee estates principally, have been thrown up and abandoned in the West Indian Colonies by their owners since the introduction of Free Trade and of bounty-paid sugar to Great Britain from the Continent; how many estates have been sold by the Government of the West Indian Colonies under the Incumbered Estates Act; how many estates (with their extent in acres) have been sold by the Government of the West Indian Colonies for Land Tax unpaid; and, whether Her Majesty's Government intends to appoint a Royal Commission to inquire into the condition of those colonies?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. E. STANHOPE): I am not able to give the House much information with regard to the first three Questions. The Governments of the West Indian Colonies do not sell estates under the Incumbered Estates Act, but the sales are made by the In-cumbered Estates Commissioners on the application of mortgagees and others interested in the estates. A Return of the number of such sales could be obtained from the Commissioners if the House desires it. The other two Returns would be troublesome and expensive, and would have to be obtained from, the Colonies. Her Majesty's Government has no intention of appointing a Commission to inquire into the condition of these Colonies. A Royal Commission, appointed by right hon. Gentlemen opposite, and of which the hon.

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  and gallant Member for Portsmouth (Sir William Crossman) and my hon. Friend the Member for the Kirkdale Division of Liverpool (Mr. Baden-Powell) were Members, made an admirable Report on many of these questions in 1882–3.

  POST OFFICE—POSTMASTERSHTPS— THE WELSH LANGUAGE.
  MR. KENYONasked the Postmaster General, Whether, in filling up the vacancy in the Post Office at Ruabon and in other Welsh-speaking places in future, he will, where practicable, give the preference to candidates who have a knowledge of the Welsh language?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES): In answer to my hon. Friend, I may say that some days ago I caused inquiry to be made whether any of the candidates for the vacant postmastership at Ruabon could speak Welsh. There has not been time to obtain the necessary information, and the office will not be filled up till I have considered the point. And I may say, further, that I shall be sincerely glad if, consistently with the requirements of the Public Service, I can adopt the course suggested by my hon. Friend.

  CYPRUS—THE ANNUAL TRIBUTE.
  COLONEL BRIDGEMANasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether the Government propose to take any steps to capitalise the annual tribute paid by Cyprus to Turkey, in order to lighten the heavy burden pressing upon the inhabitants of Cyprus, and to relieve the English taxpayers of the annual Vote for the Grant in Aid?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. E. STANHOPE): This subject is one of great interest and importance, and is occupying our careful attention. My hon. and gallant Friend knows very well that, however desirable, it is surrounded with much difficulty, and I cannot yet say whether any practicable arrangement can be come to; but we are in communication with the Treasury upon the subject.

  ARMY—AGE RETIREMENT.
  SIR HENRY TYLERasked the Secretary of State for
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  War, To be so good as to state the precise rule or regulation of the Service under which officers are retired permanently from the Army on account of age; from what date that rule has been in force; whether it has been since that date of universal application; and, whether any exceptions have been made to it; and, if so, in what cases?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. W. H. SMITH): Rules as to retirement from the Army on account of age, including exceptions, are embodied in the Royal Warrant of June 10, 1884. They are numerous, and cannot well be given within the limits of an answer to a Question; but the information is within the reach of the hon. Member in the Library, and the Royal Warrant itself is obtainable from Messrs. Clowes, or through any bookseller. The Rules came into force, some in 1877 and others on July 1, 1881, and they have since been strictly followed. The retirement of captains by age has been recently suspended by Royal Warrant of August 10, 1886.

  BURMAH—INUNDATION OF MANDALAY.
  SIR HENRY TYLERasked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether he has yet received any information which he can communicate to the House in regard to the causes and results of the failure of the bund or embankment, and the flooding of Mandalay; and, whether he can state under what department of the administration and under what officer in particular the responsibility for guarding against such a serious source of danger was vested?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY or STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): The following information respecting the recent inundation at Mandalay has been received from the Viceroy:—The breach in the bund is 300 feet wide. Not more than a dozen bodies have been found, as people had plenty of time to clear out of their houses Total loss of life is probably under 25. No European seems to have been drowned. Much of food stuffs in the bazaar has been destroyed or spoilt; but piece goods were generally saved before the water rose. The obvious cause of the accident was an unprecedented rise of the river. When the flood assumed extraordinary propor-

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  tions danger was apprehended, and every effort was made to strengthen the embankment. It was also patrolled day and night; but, of course, precautions of this kind are not of much avail if the weight of water is greater than the earth can sustain. The whole of the low-lying parts of the town have been inundated. Arrangements were at once made to supply gratuitously food to persons rendered destitute; but very few applicants have presented themselves. The flood is subsiding. The water in the river being now lower than that behind the bank, the latter has been cut lower down stream in order to let the accumulated water escape. There is no suspicion of the accident having been occasioned by any malicious person. The Commissioner has been instructed, as soon as he has ascertained all further facts, to report them in detail.

  TRADE MARKS ACT—REGISTRATION OF "FANCY WORDS."
  MR. LOCKWOODasked the President of the Board of Trade, Whether, in view of three Judges having respectively decided that words divorced from their dictionary meaning become "fancy" words, entitled to be registered under "The Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883 "(46 and 47 Vic. c. 57), he will give to the Comptroller and other officials at the Patent Office instructions that the above-mentioned decisions be duly carried out?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE BOABD (Baron HENRY DE WORMS): Having regard to the desirability of obtaining an authoritative decision on the subject of the registration of dictionary words as trade marks, the Board of Trade have determined to present an appeal in the case recently decided. Meanwhile, the Comptroller will not refuse to register any word which has no connection with locality and cannot possibly be a word of description.

  INLAND NAVIGATION AND DRAINAGE (IRELAND)—THE DRAINAGE OF THE BANN.
  MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether the Ulster Canal question, in connection with the drainage of the Bann, will be referred to the proposed Royal Commission?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): I can only state generally that the References to the Commission on this head will, of course, be of a general character, and that it will be for the Commissioners to decide whether there is such a connection between the Ulster Canal and the drainage of the Bann as to necessitate that it should form part of the inquiry.
  MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORasked whether the Commissioners would have it within their discretion to extend the Reference made to them?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH: Of course they cannot extend the referece.

  ARMY—"APPREHENDED DISTURB-ANCES IN ENGLAND."
  MR. J. E. ELLISasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether his attention has been called to the following paragraphs, which appeared in The Times newspaper of Monday, 23rd August, page 7:—
  "Apprehended Disturbances in England.—Sir Evelyn Wood, the General Commanding the Eastern District, pursuant to instructions from the War Office, has issued orders to the Volunteers in his District to assemble for picket duty, and to hold themselves in readiness to assist in quelling rioting and disturbance. The order will probably continue in force throughout the ensuing autumn and winter.
  "The contingent selected from the Chelmsford Corps consists of one officer, one serjeant, two corporals, and twenty privates. Twenty rounds of ball cartridge have been served out to each man. Their duties are to parade twice a week near the Shire Hall, and to be prepared at any moment to turn out and assist the police if necessary. The picket will be changed once a month; but the present picket will remain on duty till the end of September.
  "It is understood that the order has been issued in preparation of apprehended dynamite outrages and Irish disturbances in the Northern and Midland towns;"
  and, whether there is any foundation for the statements contained in the paragraphs?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. W. H. SMITH), in reply, said, he was happy to inform the hon. Gentleman that there was no apprehension of a disturbance in England or in the Eastern district; that the General Commanding in that district had not issued any instruction of the kind referred to; and that probably the

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  paragraph in The Times originated in the fact that in February last the attention of commanding officers had been drawn to No. 447 of the Volunteer Regulations, which imposed upon Volunteer officers the necessity of taking adequate precautions for the safety of arms intrusted to their care.

  STATE OF IRELAND—CONSTABULARY FORCE AT MILLSTREET, CO. CORK.
  DR. TANNERasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Why so large a force of Constabulary is kept stationed at or about Millstreet; and, whether the district is extremely peaceful?
  An hon. MEMBER asked whether the neighbourhood of Millstreet had become more peaceful since the day on which speeches were delivered there by the hon. Member for Mid Cork (Dr. Tanner); and whether the right hon. Baronet would lay on the Table of the House the reports of the speeches which were made in the presence of the police, and forwarded by them to the authorities in Dublin?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): I believe the district of Millstreet has become more peaceable since the time alluded to by the hon. Member behind me; but I am not prepared to give any undertaking about the reports, because I have not heard of them until to-day. With regard to the Question put to me by the hon. Gentleman (Dr. Tanner), I have to say that there are 25 policemen at Millstreet, and their presence is necessary in order to afford protection to persons whose lives and property have, it is feared, been placed in danger by inflammatory speeches made in the neighbourhood, and other causes. There is a good deal of "Boycotting" and intimidation in the district, though actual outrage is kept in check by the presence of the police.
  DR. TANNER: I should like to ask the right hon. Baronet by whom these speeches were made? And as the hon. Gentleman opposite has made a personal accusation against me for a speech I am said to have made at Millstreet, I desire to tell the hon. Gentleman that I shall be only too happy to let him have a copy of the speech this afternoon.

  NAVY—DISCHARGE OF SHIPWRIGHTS AT HAULBOWLINE.
  DR. TANNERasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, What was the reason of the discharge of the shipwrights recently employed at Haul-bowline; and, whether, bearing in mind the great depression of the times, the Government will advocate there-employment of the men discharged, and the pressing forward of the works to completion?
  THE CIVIL LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT)(who replied) said: The hon. Member renews the Question he addressed to me on Tuesday. I can only repeat that the works will be completed in 1888, and that no other course is open to the authorities but to discharge the men gradually as no longer required.

  LABOURERS' (IRELAND) ACTS, 1883 AND 1885—SCHEME FOR COTTAGES IN MACROOM UNION.
  DR. TANNERasked the President of the Local Government Board, Why, and for what reasons, the labourers' cottages which have been passed in the district of the Macroom Union are not being proceeded with?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): There has been no delay on the part of the Local Government Board in this matter. After necessary preliminaries the Guardians' petition for confirmation of their scheme was received by the Board on the 12th of June. The sanitary officer had omitted to send with it several indispensable documents. After these had been obtained from him, the usual inquiry, after public notice, was ordered to be held on the 27th and 28th of last month, and the result will be communicated to the Guardians at their next meeting.

  EMIGRATION—THE EMIGRANTS INFORMATION BUREAU.
  MR. RANKINasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether the arrangements for the establishment of the Emigration Information Office have been completed; and, if so, when the office is likely to be opened?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. E. STANHOPE):

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  The arrangements for the establishment of an Emigrants' Information Bureau are very nearly completed, and we hope to open the office during the month of October. My hon. Friend is, no doubt, aware that it is not intended that the Bureau should take any part in promoting emigration; but it will collect and circulate all the freshest and most accurate information possible with respect to emigration to all our Colonies.

  BURMAH—THE MILITARY EXPE-DITION—THE COST.
  MR. JAMES STUARTasked the Under Secretary of State for India, What is the total cost incurred in connection with the Military operations in Upper Burmah since the order for the Military expedition on the 11th of November last; and, what is the present rate at which cost is being incurred in these operations?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): According to the Revised Estimates for 1885–6 the cost of military operations in Burmah up to March 31, 1886, was 39 lakhs. The account of the actual expenditure has not yet been received. According to the Budget Estimate the cost of military operations for the current year is estimated at 30 lakhs. The Government have recently been informed by telegraph that this estimate will be exceeded, and are awaiting further information as to the amount.

  INDIA—MIGRATION OF THE PROVIN-CIAL GOVERNMENTS TO HILL STATIONS.
  SIR ROPER LETHBRIDGEasked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether it is a fact that of late years the provincial Governments of Lower Bengal, the Punjaub, the North Western Provinces, Madras, and Bombay, have followed the example of the Supreme Government of India by removing every summer to a hill-station; and, if so, how many persons, including members of council, secretaries, clerks, and other subordinates, accompany each Government in its migration; and, what is the cost of these migrations?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): The Provincial Governments of Lower Bengal, the Punjaub, the North-Western
  548
  Provinces, Madras, and Bombay, are accustomed to move to hill stations during the summer weather. There is no detailed information at the India Office as to the number of persons who accompany each Government in its migration, nor as to the cost; but the Secretary of State is now making inquiries from the Government of India upon the subject.

  IRELAND—DISTRESS IN THE WEST—MR. TUKE'S REPORT.
  MR. RATHBONEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether he will lay upon the Table of the House and print Mr. Tuke's Report on the Belief of Distress in the West of Ireland, undertaken by him at the request of the Government?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): Personally, I see no objection whatever to the Report referred to being presented, if the hon. Member wishes to move for it; but I feel some doubt to what extent I would be justified in regarding it as an official document at my disposal. As the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-on-Tyne (Mr. John Morley) stated in this House on the 8th of March, Mr. Tuke undertook, at his request, a work of benevolence in the West of Ireland in connection with seed supply, and he afterwards communicated to the right hon. Gentleman a Report on his labours. I think, therefore, it is rather for the right hon. Gentleman than for me to answer this Question?
  MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, he thought it would be greatly to the advantage of the Public Service that the Report should be printed.

  ASIATIC RUSSIA—THE FREE PORT OF BATOUM.
  SIR RICHARD TEMPLEasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Whether Her Majesty's Government will take any further steps, in concert with other Powers, regarding the recent infraction of Treaties relating to the free port of Batoum, as shown in Lord Rosebery's Despatch?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): Her Majesty's Government do not propose to carry the case beyond the position taken in Lord Rosebery's Despatch of July 3.

  BULGARIA—REPORTED ABDICATION OF PRINCE ALEXANDER.
  SIR RICHARD TEMPLEasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether Her Majesty's Government are able to afford information to this House regarding the origin and cause of recent events in Bulgaria, and regarding the development of those events as affecting the international position of the Bulgarian State?
  DR. TANNERasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, What further reports have been received from Her Majesty's accredited agents in Bulgaria, Servia, and Turkey, about the revolution alleged to have taken place on Saturday last, the 21st instant, which is stated to have resulted in the abdication of Prince Alexander; whether it is a fact that Russia, one of the Great Powers, has been an accessory in promoting the success of the popular undertaking in Bulgaria; and, what steps Her Majesty's Government purpose taking to vindicate British interests in the two recent infringements of the Treaty of Berlin by Russia, in Batoum and Bulgaria?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): In answering the hon. Member for Mid Cork (Dr. Tanner), I hope my hon. Friend the Member for South Worcestershire (Sir Richard Temple) will allow me to reply, at the same time, to his Questions on the same subjects. I have already stated to the House the occurrences of the 22nd of August—namely, the seizing of the Prince and his removal from the capital. It is now known that the act was committed by a small body of military officers with a detachment of soldiers. It was not till the evening that, after repeated attempts, a Provisional Government was formed. The Prime Minister, M. Karaveloff, firmly refused to take part in the movement. No communications of what passed could reach this country till Tuesday. It now appears that, on the regiments in the Provinces threatening to march on Sofia, the revolt, which Mr. Stephen, Her Majesty's Acting Agent and Consul Gene-
  550
  ral, calls "military," failed. The Provisional Government on Tuesday resigned; the military leader made submission to M. Karaveloff, who has resumed office, to save the honour of the country and preserve order, with full powers. On Monday loyal troops entered Sofia, the guard at the Palace was replaced, and the military conspirators were placed under arrest. News of public rejoicing was received from many quarters, especially from Philip-popolis, where the Consul General had reported on the 25th that the President of the National Assembly had published a general appeal to the loyalty of the nation, and universal enthusiasm prevailed. The Representatives of the Powers at Sofia mot on Tuesday and approved of the resumption of office by M. Karaveloff to preserve order. It is now known that Prince Alexander was placed on board of his own yacht in the Danube, and taken to Reni Russi in Bessarabia. We are informed by the Acting Consul General at Galatz that the Prince landed yesterday at 10 A.M., being given by the Russian authorities perfect liberty to proceed by such route as he preferred. The hon. Member for Mid Cork asks Questions which are based on the most inaccurate recital of the facts. The "undertaking" in Bulgaria has not, so far, been "successful;" it was not "popular;" and I do not know on what grounds he alleges against any Power an infringement of the Treaty of Berlin in connection with these events. My hon. Friend the Member for South Worcestershire will, I am sure, see that inasmuch as the events which I have described, as far as they are authentically known, were altogether in the nature of a surprise, I can give the House no satisfactory account of their origin and cause—and still less of their probable development. The quotation from The Times newspaper made by the hon. Member for Mid Cork (Dr. Tanner) appears to be a comment upon reports which had reached the writer. I do not think that the House will desire that I should express concurrence or otherwise in such comments or inferences. I have stated the facts as known to the Government. We have no knowledge of the report stated in the second Question. The third Question is one of anticipation of future events, and of the course of Her Majesty's

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  Government in a hypothetical case, which I cannot undertake to answer.

  NORTH WALES—COLLECTION OF TITHES.
  MR. DILLWYNasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, If his attention has been directed to the recent resistance to the collection of tithes in the parish of Llanarmon yn Yale, in North Wales; and, if so, whether he has reason to believe that such resistance was of an organised nature, and is likely to extend to other parishes?
  MR. KENYONalso asked the Home Secretary, Whether his attention had been called to a letter printed in The Bauer Cymrw of August 21, signed J. Jones, in the course of which the following extract occurred:—
  (Translation.)—"It is likely that the sale will take place some day next week. If so, we are inviting all the farmers in the country here that day. It will he a great day to remember. Preparation day for the disestablishment and disendowment of the Church in Wales will that day be;"
  and, whether that constituted a resistance to the law of an organized nature as described by the hon. Member for Swansea (Mr. Dillwyn)?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): Yes, Sir; my attention has been called to this matter, and I am informed by the Chief Constable of the county of Denbigh that the resistance to the collection of tithes in the parish of Llanarmon is of an organized nature; but that it is impossible for him to say at present whether it is likely to extend to other parishes. In answer to my hon. Friend I have to say that my attention has been recently called to a letter signed by John Jones, one of the farmers distrained upon; and as far as I can gather from the learned language in which it is veiled—the Welsh—it does indicate an organized resistance to the payment of tithe.
  MR. SEXTONasked whether it was the intention of the Government to send a military officer to take command in Wales?
  [No reply.]

  BOARD OF TRADE—THE LABOUR BUREAU—APPOINTMENT OF MR. BURNETT.
  MR. HOWORTHasked the Secretary to the Board of
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  Trade, Whether Mr. Burnett has been appointed to an official position in the Board of Trade, in connection with the Labour Bureau; whether he will state the nature of that appointment, with the qualification and salary attached to it; whether Mr. Burnett is the Secretary of the Society of Amalgamated Engineers; whether he is taking part at this moment in the International Trades Union Congress at Paris, of which he has been elected President; and, whether such post has been accepted with the knowledge and consent of the Board of Trade?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE BOARD (Baron HENRY DE WORMS): Mr. Burnett has been appointed to an official position as stated, and at a salary of £300 a-year. He is to assist in the collection and preparation of labour statistics, and in obtaining information as to the employment of labour. He is at present Secretary of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, but will resign that appointment when he takes up his duties at the Board of Trade on the 4th October. He is understood to be at present taking part in the International Trades Union Congress in Paris; but it appears to the Board of Trade that there is no reason why he should not fulfil the engagements he has made previous to his assumption of his official duties.
  MR. ADDISONasked whether it was not the fact that, at the meeting referred to in the last Question, Mr. Burnett had spoken against the Socialist views of the French and German Socialists, and deprecated the introduction of such matters at a Trade Union Congress?
  MR. BADEN-POWELLasked the Secretary to the Board of Trade, If he could lay before the House Papers explaining the scope and object of the new Labour Bureau, for the information of working men?
  BARON HENRY DE WORMS: In answer to the hon. and learned Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Addison), I believe that Mr. Burnett's words may bear the interpretation he puts upon them. I have received the private Notice of the hon. Member for the Kirkdale Division of Liverpool. If he will move for a Return or explanatory Memorandum, I will endeavour

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  to give him the best information in my power. Some details still require adjustment. I shall be glad if the hon. Member will confer with me as to the form of the Return.
  MR. MUNDELLA: As I am responsible for the appointment of Mr. Burnett, perhaps the House will permit me to supplement the answer given by the hon. Gentleman. In consequence of a Resolution of this House, I undertook to form a Bureau of Labour and of Statistics, in March last, which was to inquire into the organization, remuneration, and expenditure of the working classes, and I undertook the organization of the new Department under the superintendence of Mr. Giffen, the Chief of the Statistical Department of the Board of Trade. With regard to all questions relating to the organization and remuneration of labour, I know of no man in England so well-informed, or more thoroughly in touch and sympathy with the working classes, than Mr. Burnett. I appointed him without any solicitation on his part, or any of his friends. I have known Mr. Burnett for 18 years, and I regard him as one of the most remarkable men of his class in this country, and no man is more adapted to the post to which he has been appointed. I undertook to allow him to complete his engagements before he entered on his duties.

  BURMAH—PUBLIC WORKS— RAILWAYS.
  MR. DALRYMPLEasked the Under Secretary of State for India, If Her Majesty's Government have had their attention called to the urgency of prosecuting public works in Burmah; if there is any prospect of the railway near Mandalay, which has already been surveyed, being begun; and, whether an offer has been laid before the Secretary of State and the Government of India for the construction of the railway, the prosecution of which would greatly assist the administration of Burmah?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): The attention of Her Majesty's Government has been for some time directed to the urgency of prosecuting public works in Burmah, and they have addressed communications to the Govern-
  554
  ment of India on the subject. Of the railway from Rangoon to Mandalay—a distance of 416 miles—166 miles are completed, and 62 are under survey. Several offers for the construction of this railway have been submitted to the Secretary of State; but until an answer is received from the Government of India no decision can be arrived at.
  MR. DALRYMPLEasked whether it was not the case that the Government of India was waiting for the decision of the Secretary of State, and that while each waited for the other nothing was done?
  SIR JOHN GORSTsaid, he did not believe that that was the fact; but if his hon. Friend gave Notice of the Question he would inquire and ascertain.

  UNIVERSITIES (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  MR. CALDWELLasked the Secretary for Scotland, Whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to introduce a Universities (Scotland) Bill early next Session?
  THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): Yes, Sir; I do hope to introduce such a Bill next Session.

  PARLIAMENT—PALACE OF WESTMINSTER—VENTILATION OF THE HOUSE.
  MR. RADCLIFFE COOKEasked the First Commissioner of Works, Whether the seven recommendations of the Select Committee on the Ventilation of the Houses of Parliament, contained in the Second Report of the 31st of May last, are all or some of them, and, if so, which of them is being carried out; and, whether there is a prospect of the works involved in them being completed by the time Parliament re-assembles in February?
  THE FIRST COMMISSIONER (Mr. PLUNKET): The Committee on the Ventilation of the House has been re-appointed, and has held its first meeting to-day. I am authorized to state that the Committee is satisfied that its recommendations are now being carried out with as little delay as possible, and I hope that the necessary works will be in the main completed before Parliament re-assembles next year.

  ARMY (ORDNANCE DEPARTMENT)— MANUFACTURE OF NORDENFELT GUNS AT WOOLWICH.
  COLONEL HUGHES - HALLETTasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether it is true, as stated in The Admiralty and Horse Guards Gazette, that Nordenfelt rapid-firing shell-guns have been manufactured in the Royal Gun Factory at Woolwich for the inventor and patentee of those guns, the late Government charging the said inventor the sum of £150 per gun so manufactured and delivered to him in the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich; whether the Government subsequently repurchased from the patentee at £360 per gun these same guns which had cost him only £150 per gun; and, whether these guns were tried, proved, and accepted by the same authorities who manufactured them, and whether it has since been discovered that the cost of manufacture of the said guns to the late Government exceeded the cost charged to Mr. Nordenfelt; and, if so, by how much?
  THE SURVEYOR GENERAL OF ORDNANCE (Mr. NORTHCOTE)(who replied) said: The facts are not accurately stated by this paper. The quick-firing guns were not made at Woolwich. The circumstances were as follows:—A contract was entered into with Mr. Nordenfelt for a certain number of these guns with fittings and mountings complete, and, to facilitate supply, it was arranged that the barrels only should be made for him in the Royal Gun Factory. He was charged at the rate of £131 19 s. 5d. and a fraction per barrel, being the cost of production, plus 10 per cent; and, therefore, the price originally tendered by Mr. Nordenfelt—namely, £376 per gun and mounting complete—was lessened by this amount. The guns and fittings were like all guns for Her Majesty's Service, by whomsoever made, tried, proved, and accepted by the authorities of the Royal Gun Factories. As appears from the above, this cost of the barrels to the Government did not exceed that charged to Mr. Nordenfelt.

  EVICTIONS (IRELAND)—WEXFORD COUNTY.
  MR. WILLIAM REDMONDasked the Chief Secretary
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  to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the eviction of sixty-two persons, being the wives and children of thirteen small farmers on the estates of the Marquess of Ely in Wexford County; whether it is true that these people have been driven from their holdings into the workhouse, simply because they were unable, through bad seasons and fall of prices, to pay the rent demanded by the landlord; whether it is true that large numbers of farmers have been served with processes of ejectment under similar circumstances in Wexford County; and, whether it is the intention of the Government to take any steps to interfere in some way to prevent evictions during the coming winter?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): The persons referred to, who were 49 in number, were not the occupiers of agricultural holdings, as the hon. Member appears to suppose. They were the tenants merely of small houses, held at rents which, I am informed, were not excessive. They obtained other houses in the town of Fethard; but were compelled by the influence of the local branch of the National League to leave them and go to the workhouse. I believe it is the case that writs have been served on a number of farmers in the county of Wexford. We cannot prevent evictions; it is our duty to protect the officers of the law in its execution. I have already deprecated harsh action on the part of landlords.
  MR. WILLIAM REDMONDsaid, it was absolutely untrue that these people—[Cries of "Order!"]
  MR. T. C. HARRINGTON: I beg to give Notice that I shall ask the right hon. Gentleman—[Cries of "Order!"]
  MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member must give Notice of his Question to the Clerk at the Table in the usual way.
  MR. T. C. HARRINGTON: Perhaps the House will allow me to ask the Chief Secretary one Question, which I am sure he can answer now. It is, whether it is not the fact that the local branch of the National League have nothing whatever to do with the tenure of houses in towns; and whether the action which the right hon. Gentleman has referred to has not actually been taken by a

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  House League, and not by the National League?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH: If I have done injustice to the National League by mistaking its action, for that of a House League I should be very sorry; but the action of a House League is at least equally objectionable.

  CRIME AND OUTRAGE (IRELAND)— THE RIOTS AT BELFAST.
  MR. JOHNSTONasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If it is true that the congregation of the Albert Street Presbyterian Church, Belfast, on the recommencement of public service in their church on Sunday last were attacked by a Roman Catholic mob, and their pastor, the Rev. Henry Montgomery, insulted; and, whether the freedom of public worship in Belfast will be vindicated by the Government?
  MR. SEXTON: As the Member representing the Division of Belfast which is concerned in this Question, I beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman if he is aware that the earliest stage of any alleged disagreeable incidents in connection with this church came later to a series of attacks on the lives and property of Catholics and Catholic churches and schools in the same quarter of Belfast; and also, whether he is aware that on Tuesday last the Executive Committee of the Magistrates of Belfast held a meeting on the subject, having before them a letter from the Rev. Mr. Montgomery, and the Reports which had been made by the Resident Magistrates and other officers who were charged with the preservation of the peace of the district on the day in question, and whether he is aware that they unanimously agreed that the statements were in most cases exaggerated and in many cases altogether unfounded, and that having regard to the present excited state of the town the Committee of Magistrates were of opinion that any annoyance which individual members of the congregation suffered in going to or coming from the church were not of a serious character; and whether, under these circumstances, the freedom of public worship in Belfast needs any vindication from Her Majesty's Government?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): I am afraid it is impossible for me to
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  answer the Question of the hon. Member, of which I have had no Notice. I asked the hon. Gentleman the Member for South Belfast to postpone his Question the other day, because I observed that the reports published in the newspapers with regard to the occurrence were of a character which certainly was at variance with the reports I have received. The alleged occurrences have been closely inquired into by the Executive Committee of the Magistrates of Belfast, and I am happy to be able to inform the hon. Member that they were found to be greatly exaggerated. The Rev. Mr. Montgomery himself was good enough to meet the Magistrates, and he expressed himself as perfectly satisfied with the arrangements which had been made for protection and the manner in which the duty was performed, and he thanked the Inspector General for what had been done. He subsequently wrote to the Committee of Magistrates, stating that, while the Executive had done all that could possibly be expected for the protection of the congregation, yet in some cases individual members of the congregation had been insulted and some few assaulted, though not seriously, and he thought that the Constabulary had not been sufficiently energetic. This matter was specially considered by the Committee of Magistrates convened for the purpose, and the result was that they were satisfied that due precautions had been taken. I may add that the Committee of Magistrates consisted of persons representing the different phases of opinion in Belfast.

  COMMISSIONERS OF IRISH LIGHTS—ATTENDANCE OF LIGHTKEEPERS AT DIVINE SERVICE.
  MR. JOHNSTONasked the Secretary to the Board of Trade, Whether, as is done in Scotland by the Commissioners of Northern Lights, provision will be made for the attendance at Divine Service on Sundays of lighthouse-keepers on isolated rocks off the Irish Coast; and also for the education of their children, by increasing the number of relieving stations, or otherwise providing for the instruction of numbers of boys and girls growing up without elementary education?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE BOARD (Baron HENRY DE WORMS): I regret that I am unable at present to reply to the hon

  559
  Member's Question in the absence of the detailed information from the Lighthouse Authorities, which is again being pressed for.

  POST OFFICE—FEMALE CLERKS.
  MR. BAUMANNasked the Postmaster General, Whether the female clerks employed in the Clearing House Branch of the Office of the Receiver and Accountant General of the Post Office are frequently kept at work till seven P.M. and later, both on week-days and on the Saturday half-holidays, although their official hours are from ten till four on week-days, and from ten till one on Saturdays; whether it is true that, although this overtime work is nominally optional, the female clerks are not allowed to leave at their regular hours, and are led to believe that any refusal to do this extra work will be detrimental to their chances of promotion; whether it is true that, since October last, several female clerks in the Clearing House Branch have applied for sick leave; and, whether, if these things are the case, he will take steps to prevent the overworking of the women in question?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES): In reply to the hon. Member I have to state that, owing to the rapid increase in the number of telegrams, the work of the Clearing House Branch has been greatly augmented, and a considerable amount of overtime work is unavoidably imposed upon the staff until the arrangements for affording relief can be completed. The subject is one of considerable difficulty, as, although the employment of 82 extra clerks has been authorized since the reduction of the telegraph rate, the accommodation only admits of the employment of 62; and steps are being taken as speedily as possible to obtain new premises. I find that out of a staff of over 150 the number detained on extra duty up to 7 P.M. last week averaged four per day for the first four days; but 43 stopped on duty on Friday in order not to interfere with the Saturday half-holiday. The additional clerks already appointed are daily becoming more efficient, and are reducing the overtime work. Every effort is being made, by rotation of duty, to make the work as light as possible to individuals. It would be impossible to exempt the
  560
  female staff from the obligation to perform extra duty in times of emergency altogether without striking a very serious blow at the employment of female labour in the Post Office. The Returns of sick absences in this branch do not show any exceptional increase since October; and although there are two or three cases of prolonged absence these cannot well be attributed to pressure of business consequent on the reduced rate, as the absences date from a time preceding the pressure.

  LOCOMOTIVES ACT, 1878—BYE-LAWS OF ROAD TRUSTEES.
  MR. MENZIESasked the Secretary for Scotland, Whether his attention has been called to the recent prosecution of Messrs. Crichton, Burrelton, Perthshire, for contravention of a by-law regarding locomotives which had been approved by the Home Secretary in 1880, whereby Messrs. Crichton had. been fined for using waggons in Forfarshire, which it is legal and unobjectionable to use in Perthshire; if he will consider the question whether die power to pass a by-law for merely regulating the use of locomotives on roads includes the power to affect the construction of locomotives and waggons, which is carefully and minutely specified in a separate section of "The Locomotives Act, 1878," as regards locomotives, and in various Statutes as regards waggons; and, whether he will in future endeavour to aim at introducing greater uniformity into the by-laws made by road trustees when granting or withholding his approval to such by-laws?
  THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR), in reply, said, he was aware of the inconvenience that arose on account of the divergence of the bye-laws in different counties. Whether that inconvenience should be remedied by special legislation, or in a Local Government Bill for Scotland, was a question for consideration.

  ADMIRALTY—ENGINE ROOM ARTIFICERS.
  MR. CONYBEAREasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, If he will specify what consideration the Royal Naval Engine Room Artificers have received from the Board of Admiralty; and, whether any,

  561
  and what, steps have been taken to improve their position since their case was mentioned and supported by two Members of the present Government in the Debate on the Navy Estimates on the 18th of March last?
  THE FIRST LORD (Lord GEORGE HAMILTON): I stated the other day that the position and comfort of the engine room artificers will receive every consideration from the Admiralty, and to that statement I have nothing to add. Since the 18th of March the Admiralty have been in communication with the Treasury in reference to a proposed increase of these chief petty officers; but, with this exception, nothing else has been done to improve their position. The engine room artificers are a valuable body of men, and have done good service; but, so far from there being any difficulty in obtaining them at present, good candidates for entry have to be turned away as the list is full.

  MAURITIUS—OFFICIAL DISSENSIONS.
  MR. BADEN-POWELLasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, What steps he proposes to take in consequence of the unfortunate state of affairs in the Mauritius?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. E. STANHOPE): My hon. Friend may well describe the state of affairs in the Mauritius as unfortunate. It has had my very careful attention, and, having read the complaint of Sir John Pope Hennessy against the Lieutenant Governor, and of Mr. Clifford Lloyd against the Governor, I have come to the conclusion that the situation is one most prejudicial to the interests of good government in the Colony. In these circumstances, I have already addressed a despatch to Sir John Pope Hennessy, stating that the relations between himself and his principal officer are regarded by Her Majesty's Government with grave dissatisfaction, and that the responsibility for this state of affairs rests, not with one only, but with both of them. I added that the good government of the Colony and the restoration of friendly relations would be promoted by the immediate separation of the two officials, and I directed Mr. Clifford Lloyd to proceed at once to the
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  Seychelles, to take up the duties of Chief Civil Commissioner. What further steps, if any, it may be necessary to take in the interests of the people of the Mauritius I am not yet able to inform my hon. Friend, as I wish to reserve any final opinion until we are sure that we have before us all the facts necessary to a just decision.
  MR. T. P. O'CONNORasked whether it was not the fact that Sir John Pope Hennessy was not consulted before the appointment of Mr. Clifford Lloyd, and whether the traditions of the Service had not thereby been disregarded?
  MR. E. STANHOPEsaid, that such a thing happened occasionally in the Service, although he was not sure whether it was the case in the present instance or not.
  MR. T. P. O'CONNOR: The gentleman who was then Colonel Stanley made the appointment.

  BURMAH—THE MILITARY EXPEDI-TION—APPOINTMENT OF COM-MANDER-IN-CHIEF.
  MR. BUCHANANasked the Under Secretary of State for India, What has been the result of the communications stated by the Under Secretary on the 25th March last to be in progress between the Viceroy and the Secretary of State in Council, with a view to putting all the forces in Upper and Lower Burma under the Commander in Chief; and, whether the troops in Upper and Lower Burma are still under separate commands?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): The troops in Upper and Lower Burmah are still, as a temporary measure, retained under separate Commanders. As soon as the cool weather commences, when the troops in Burmah will be largely reinforced, Sir Herbert Macpherson, the Commander in Madras, will proceed to Burmah and take the personal command of the whole of the forces in both Upper and Lower Burmah.

  ENGLAND AND CHINA—TREATY REGARDING BURMAH.
  MR. BUCHANANasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether he will state to the House the terms of the treaty or

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  agreement concluded with China on the subject of the rights of suzerainty, tribute, &c, claimed by that Power over Burma; and, whether Papers will be laid upon the Table in connection with these negotiations?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): The substance of the Agreement respecting Burmah signed at Pekin on the 24th ultimo is as follows:—Her Majesty's Government agreed that the highest authority in Burmah should continue the customary ten-yearly Missions. China agreed that in all matters whatsoever appertaining to the authority and rule which England is now exercising in Burmah, England should be free to do whatever she deems fit and proper. China agreed to protect and encourage trade between China and Burmah, the frontier to be marked by a Delimitation Commission, and the conditions of the frontier trade to be settled by a Frontier Trade Commission. Her Majesty's Government consented to countermand the proposed Mission to Thibet, and the Chinese Government undertook to take steps to promote and stimulate trade between India and Burmah. A copy of the Agreement will be presented to Parliament as soon as it is received from Pekin in a formal shape.

  LAW AND POLICE (SCOTLAND)—BYE-LAWS AS TO BICYCLES AND TRICYCLES.
  MR. MENZIESasked the Secretary for Scotland, Whether he is aware that there is now a great want of uniformity in the by-laws of the different counties of Scotland applicable to bicycles and tricycles; and, whether he will introduce a Bill making the Secretary for Scotland the approving authority in the case of those by-laws instead of the sheriff of each county, or undertake to deal with the matter in some measure of a cognate nature?
  THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The answer which I gave to the hon. Gentleman's previous Question applies to this one.

  ARMY—CHARGES AGAINST THE ORDNANCE DEPARTMENT.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. W. H. SMITH): I wish to be allowed to supplement an answer which I gave to the hon. Member for Portsmouth on Tuesday last, with reference to the allegation that certain officers who have been engaged in the Ordnance Department have held shares in public Companies concerned in the manufacture of guns. I wish to read the following letter which I have received from Sir Frederick Campbell:—
  "August 25.
  "Sir,—With reference to the Question asked in the House of Commons yesterday as to my holding shares in the Sir William Armstrong and Mitchell Company, during the period I held the appointment of Director of Artillery and Stores, I beg to assure you I held no shares in the Company named while I held that appointment. I left the War Office in February, 1883; in April, 1883, I purchased 15 shares in the Sir William Armstrong and Mitchell Company, but sold them in October, 1883; and it was only during that period, and while unemployed, that I had any connection with the Company.—Your obedient servant,
  "F. A. CAMPBELL, General."
  The practice at the Ordnance Department is to require every officer connected with it to cease any connection with any firm likely to become War Office contractors. This rule includes officers in any capacity whose duties call upon them to arrange contracts, or to engage in any matter which may involve personal considerations.

  IRELAND (SOUTH-WEST DISTRICT)— SIR REDVERS BULLER.
  MR. E. R. RUSSELLasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, What will be the relation of General Sir Redvers Buller to the General commanding Her Majesty's Forces in Ireland; whether General Buller will have authority to direct and control the movements of the Military in his district without the intervention of the Commander in Chief; and, whether he will have powers to try and sentence persons charged as well as to pursue offenders?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH): I think the hon. Member is under some misapprehension as to the nature of Sir Redvers Buller's appointment. Sir Redvers Buller will hold a civil appointment in the counties of Kerry and Clare. As holder of that appointment, it will be his duty to superintend any general

  565
  operations whenever the military maybe called in to assist the civil power, and it will be his duty to regulate such operations. But he will not hold a military appointment at all, and he does not go to Kerry to establish martial law, as some hon. Members have suggested, nor even to strain the civil law. He is to act under the powers of the law, with a view to the organization of the arrangements for the restoration of order, and the detection and punishment of crime in Kerry and Clare. Sir Redvers Buller, like other persons holding the appointment of Divisional Magistrate under the Crown, will not act judicially in Petty Sessions.

  NEW RULES OF PROCEDURE—RULE 2 (ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE).
  Mr. E. R. RUSSELL, Member for the Bridgeton Division of Glasgow, rose in his place, and asked leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, viz., the Appointment of a Military Officer over an extensive district in Ireland, with undefined administrative and magisterial powers; but, the pleasure of the House not having been signified, Mr. Speaker called on those Members who supported the Motion to rise in their places, and, not less than 40 Members having risen accordingly:—
  MR. E. R. RUSSELL: I can assure the House I am very reluctant to interfere with the course of Business. I should not have done so, if I could have reconciled it with my sense of duty to acquiesce in an appointment which seems to me to be contrary to Constitutional principles, adverse to the future interests and peace of Ireland, and likely to introduce bad precedents into our own Government. I should have been glad if the answer of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) to the question I have just put would have enabled me to abstain from making this Motion; but I must say that, having regard to the great position of Sir Redvers Buller—to his undoubted military position—to the fact that a military position is the only one in which he is known to the country, and also to the circumstance that it was not exactly in the tone and spirit of the right hon. Gentleman who
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  has just answered my question that the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller, nor was it in that spirit that the appointment was spoken of in the House of Lords by the Chief of the Government—I feel bound to go on in the course I have determined to take in the matter. I feel also that it is very essential, considering what may be in store for us in the future, that Members should have an opportunity of formally protesting from the outset against a course which I am sure hereafter they will be very glad not to have gone into when it was proposed. I go on the simple principle that it is contrary to the genius and spirit of our institutions for military men to be called from their military duties to perform those of civil magistrates. I may have to contend, at the outset, with a feeling that the state of things in Kerry is so bad that it is scarcely becoming for anyone to interfere with any step that may be taken for mitigating the condition of that county. I yield to none in horror and detestation of what is going on in Kerry. It would argue a great lack of imagination, and also of heart, to hear of the circumstances in that county without such a feeling. The darkness, the sudden interruption in the night, the horrible association of violence and terrorism, the absolute confusion and cruelty of the whole business must strike us all with horror. But it is not the first time in the history of this country, or of other countries, that events and processes of this kind have been going on, and that it has yet been necessary to protest against the means by which the civil power endeavours to stop them. A very difficult and serious circumstance in this matter is that—as was stated the other night by a right hon. Gentleman who lately occupied a high Office in the Government of Ireland—there is every sign that the people of Kerry either sympathize with these proceedings, or are determined, as a matter of consulting their own interest, not to interfere with them. That produces embarrassments which we are bound to consider. But such things as these only exist in ill-governed countries. We cannot improve the government of a country by handing over its civil administration to military men. If the administration of the law in Kerry

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  is not efficient, it is our duty, as far as we can, to make it so. Now, the noble Lord at the head of the Government in "another place" has admitted that the administration of the law and police in Kerry is unsatisfactory. The system, he said, had drifted into an unreasonable shape, and that was a matter which required careful overhauling and inquiry, and probably entire re-organization. These are facts notorious to both sides of the House; but I believe they will not be met in the same spirit on both sides. We may test the spirit of the Administration by the manner in which the Marquess of Salisbury addresses himself to this difficulty. If we found the Prime Minister thoroughly re-organizing the Civil Staff—if we found him bringing into play all the resources of the great Civil Service of this country, in order to produce a better state of things in Kerry—then he would deserve in any result our praise; and it is our principle, on the Liberal side of the House, that he would be adopting the course most likely to conduce in the end, along with those greater measures we advocate, to the results we all desire. Instead of that, the noble Marquess goes beyond civil life altogether, and chooses a soldier. What soldier does he choose? Why does he choose that soldier? He told us that he desired the attention of minds which had been engaged in the solution of similar problems in other parts of the globe. What are those problems that Sir Redvers Buller has solved in other parts of the globe? How did he solve them? The answer to these questions leads us very close to the conviction that the policy of the Government at the present moment, by the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller—which I take to be by far the most important announcement of policy which they have made—is to degrade Ireland at once to the level of a savage and a barbarous country. The Government, it is true, do not say that—they do not formulate it—but it is the spirit and the effect of their measure. They are acting upon it. I think it must have struck many people who have watched the Irish discussions of the last few months that there has been a remarkable contrast between that private conversation and much of the writing in the Press upon which in reality their policy is founded, and the
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  spirit and the tone of speeches which are made in this House. Happily, the speeches made in this House, and the tone of our policy, is infinitely superior to what we hear at dinner tables and in clubs, and in mingling in general society. But this appointment of a military man to re-organize society in Ireland they announced to satisfy the unworthy feelings which prevail throughout a large part of the country against the Irish. And then, by the humane lips of the Chief Secretary for Ireland, they are enabled to say that the gallant General is taking up a purely civil position. I cannot bring my mind to believe that that is the case. I do not deny that the right hon. Gentleman professed—and I am sure with truth—that he would, under all circumstances, exercise any influence that he might have upon Sir Redvers Buller in a spirit of justice, humanity, and kindness. But that is not enough. The gallant General was chosen because he was a soldier, and he would not have been chosen—being a soldier—unless it had been thought there was work there fit for a soldier. I have no doubt the Government had fully persuaded themselves that Sir Redvers Buller had the qualities which exactly fitted him to undertake the task of restoring order in a thoroughly unruly and disturbed district. To do this was to adopt a principle contrary to our Constitution—flying in the face of all the principles of civil liberty in which we have been brought up. The statement of the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he introduced this matter to the House, was scarcely consistent with the idea of the subordinate position in which Sir Redvers Bullers is now attempted to be placed by the explanations of the Government. The importance of this officer, the rank he holds in the Army, forbids such a supposition. Of course, we all know perfectly well that it is a common thing for men who have developed in military command, or even service, qualities which the Army is well adapted to produce in men of good calibre and abilities—it is a common circumstance for them in the latter part of their life to undertake civil duties, and to perform those duties satisfactorily. But these men sacrifice their military positions—they sacrifice their military character—they become,

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  to all intents and purposes, civilians. They are under civil control. They do not expect to go back into the Profession. They part altogether with both the prospects and the associations of military life. The consequence is that they are not liable to the dangers and temptations by which Sir Redvers Buller will be beset. If the Chief Secretary for Ireland would whittle this matter down so that Sir Redvers Buller would be accepting this office just as a half-pay officer takes the Governorship of a workhouse, or the Governorship of a goal, then he would meet our views. But we know that would not have met the views of the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Marquess of Salisbury, and would not have met the views of Sir Redvers Buller. I think there have been times when a soldier would have thought this an undesirable function. I do not, however, pronounce on that. I hold that a good policeman is quite as respectable as a good soldier. The only thing is that a good soldier does not always make a good policeman; and the Constitution of the country has always assumed that no one in the position of a soldier should have to perform the duties of a policeman. Another question for us to consider is, what security will there be against great infringements of liberty when this new rule of Sir Redvers Buller begins? It is a great innovation. A precedent is being set. But we have a very bad example—not exactly of the same kind—which leads us to expect evil results. What occurred when Mr. Clifford Lloyd was employed in Ireland? Mr. Clifford Lloyd was a civil officer, and he was under a Coercion Law, but not under the Crimes Act. It seems to be pretty notorious that he resorted to very extraordinary excess of licence, and took great liberties with the rights of the people. It was said that he gathered together, on various pretexts, young men in rooms in a village, and that he then examined them on matters which were likely to get them into trouble in connection with a revolt against the Government of Ireland. Mr. Clifford Lloyd had not the slightest warrant for that. It was neither the regular law nor the extraordinary law at the time; but he was praised by a lamented statesman, and encouraged to adopt courses of that kind. If such things as those were done in the green
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  tree, what will be done in the dry? I, for one, in this matter, have learned the lesson of the Elections. I wish the institutions of England, Ireland, and Scotland in this matter to be similar; and if we are going to have Sir Redvers Buller and military magistrates, then I suppose we had better secure simultaneity. The noble Lord knows very well that if it were attempted in Lancashire, where I live, or in Lanarkshire, a great constituency in which I have the honour to represent, things would become so hot for the Government that the attempt would have immediately to be abandoned. The practice does not correspond with our institutions or our customs. It is contrary to the principles of liberty, to which we justly attach so much importance. A great soldier is a good servant; but he is a bad master, and we should be very careful not to put him in that position. I object very strongly to what I take to be an evasion of the Constitution in Belfast. I think no soldier should have a double commission. I think no soldier should be a Justice of the Peace, so that he should read the Riot Act over the people whom he is going to shoot. Why have we these old restrictions, if it is not for the preservation of liberty? Why are we to part with them at a month's notice when we have the admission of the Chief of the Government that the civil condition in Kerry is such that it ought immediately to be overhauled, and when Members, at any rate on this side, are deeply impressed with the fact that the whole business is the result of bad government and bad institutions? I have been asked what I think Sir Redvers Buller ought to do when he goes to Kerry. That has been asked me in a Dublin journal, which gives the following lively account of what Sir Redvers Buller will do.
  "Sir Redvers Buller," it says, "will act against the 'Moonlighters' precisely as if they were rebels in arms against the Queen."
  [Ministerial cheers.] Exactly; you cheer that. That is just an instance of the mess you will get into if you appoint military magistrates to exercise civil authority. What does this amount to? It simply amounts to suddenly and roughly, on an emergency, in a single county, setting up the doctrine of constructive treason. They find these marauders pursuing their nefarious prac-

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  tices, and then say they are to be treated as rebels against Her Majesty. I say nothing in their favour. They are persons against whom everyone on this side will gladly see the utmost penalties of the law enforced. But it is a bad beginning if hon. Gentlemen opposite are ready to cheer a wild statement of a wild newspaper correspondent, that Sir Redvers Buller, a General in Her Majesty's Army, is going to arrest "Moonlighters" and treat them as if they were rebels against Her Majesty. I was asked by the same authority whether I would have General Buller act in co-operation with the Land League? All I want to do to the Land League is to cashier it. I believe that good self-government in Ireland will cashier it. Our duty is to give Ireland self-government, which would put an end to all such outrages—to all such manners and customs—as the League is alleged to encourage. In the meantime, if we cannot do that at once, our duty is limited to making the civil system as perfect as we can make it with civil material. I venture to make an appeal to my right hon. Friends on the Front Opposition Benches. I know very well that, from their ex-official position, they must be in some embarrassment on such subjects; but the House heard, with great respect, the remarks made the other evening by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle (Mr. John Morley) upon this subject. Many cruel and injurious things were said about my right hon. Friend in that home of vulgar and un-Christian rancour—Belfast. But we who see him in the House know, and are deeply impressed with, the sensitiveness of mind with which he has addressed himself to all these problems. I am firmly pursuaded my right hon. Friend will never be deficient in the courage and sternness which are necessary for the enforcement of order in Ireland. But anyone who heard him the other night must have felt that there was a heaviness in his heart as he contemplated the dreadful conditions of life in the county of Kerry, and brought himself face to face with the issue—should he tolerate the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller in order that a better state of things might be introduced? I appreciate that, and honour my right hon. Friend for it; but I certainly think that, considering my right hon. Friend himself
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  prophesied that the efforts of Sir Redvers Buller would not succeed, because they were not adapted to the case—I think that, although he may not be able to vote for this Motion, he may, at least, give some expression to his opinion that it is most adverse to the interest of Ireland, and dangerous to the Constitution of the country, that this new military practice should be introduced. It will not succeed. If it does succeed it will cost us some of our most justly prized traditions of civil freedom. Therefore, I think my right hon. Friend and others on the Front Benches are entitled, if they please, to indicate an opinion which will support the rank and file of their Party, and also support five-sixths of the Representatives of Ireland in the wish they have that the Constitution should still be preserved. [Derisive laughter from Ministerial Benches.] It may be a very laughable matter that the Representatives of five-sixths of a country should wish to preserve its Constitution; but I should prefer the meaning of those laughs to come articulately—that some hon. Gentleman should get up and put into terms, which will be reported tomorrow and which will be quoted at the next Election, any sentiment conflicting with that which I have expressed. This is a sensational proceeding. It will only gratify that baser sort of politicians who live upon the prejudices of the British nation against the Irish nation. What is worse, it will draw into the net of disaffection the whole of the county of Kerry and a very large portion of the rest of Ireland, without reference to the justice or propriety of Sir Redvers Buller's proceedings, simply on the ground that the enforcement of law in Ireland will be identified with the introduction of the military into a position in which they have no right to be. It is most essential, for the restoration of the moral sense of the people of Ireland, that the opinion of the House on this subject should betaken. An important part of the moral sense of any community is confidence in the law under which they lived; and the Government are going to degrade the law by placing its administration in the hands of a distinguished soldier. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] Yes; I adhere to that, not because I take any adverse view of Sir Redvers Buller's character, but because it is the very

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  essence of law that it is degraded the moment the military element is introduced. The late Chief Justice Cockburn, who took such an interest in the question of martial law that he expressly took upon himself, out of the regular course, to go down to the Old Bailey and charge the Grand Jury in the Jamaica case, said, on that important occasion, that there were dangers more grave and threatening than even the duration of an insurrection, and that the eternal and immutable principles of justice could never be violated without peril to the true interests and well-being of a civilized community. I do not mean to suggest that the Chief Secretary would wilfully invade those eternal and immutable principles of justice; but I do say that the Government are introducing an enormous innovation when they militarize the personnel of justice. When they tamper with the civil integrity of the magistracy they open a door to the influx of the greatest evils. If you suffer the redcoats to administer the law, they will undoubtedly caricature it; and law can neither be caricatured nor perverted without at once endangering the stability and the happiness of the people.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—(Mr. E. R. Russell.)
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL): The hon. Member who has just sat down (Mr. E. R. Russell) has made to the House a learned and, I must say, also an exhaustive speech. He holds strong opinions, and he has proposed to the House a certain course which it should adopt. In his opinion, the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller to Kerry is a startling innovation in our Constitution, a serious blow to civil and religious liberty, a wilful invasion of the immutable principles of justice, and other things of that serious kind. He holds these strong opinions, and he prophesies the most alarming results. He declares that the result will be that all Kerry will almost immediately take an active part in the proceedings of the "Moonlighters,"—[Mr. E. R. RUSSELL: I did not say that.]—and that all Ireland will very shortly be involved in a general conflagration. Now, Sir, I do not complain of the hon. Mem-
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  ber holding these opinions; they are opinions he is perfectly entitled to hold and to express. What I want the House to do is to compare the opinions he holds with the course he suggests. What is the course which the hon. Member proposes? He proposes that the House of Commons should immediately adjourn. What will be the effect of that course upon Sir Redvers Buller or his appointment? Absolutely nothing. The House would adjourn if they agreed with the hon. Member, and, like the Emperor Titus, might exclaim that they had lost a day; but before the House met again Sir Redvers Buller would be well on his way to Kerry. That is the course which the hon. Gentleman proposes, in all seriousness, that we should adopt. May I point out to the hon. Member, with all respect, what I think would have been the proper course for him to pursue if he sincerely holds, as I am sure he does, these very strong and alarming opinions? Obviously he ought to have made a Motion in the form of an Amendment to the Address; because what would have been the results of this course if he had been successful? He would have put an end instantly, or, practically, instantaneously, to the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller; and, what is much more, I imagine that by his proposition he would have put an end to the Government responsible for that appointment. That is what. I imagine would have been a practical, rational, and sensible course to pursue. In replying to the hon. Member, I intend to make my remarks as brief and as few as possible; but I must diverge, for one moment, to notice one special observation which fell from him. The hon. Member stated that he had the strongest possible objection to the employment of military officers in civil positions, and that he had a special objection to this particular appointment of Sir Redvers Buller on account of his military experience, and, to some extent, civil experience, having been drawn from his treatment of savages, and his relations with savage tribes in various quarters of the world. That was the opinion of the hon. Member, and it is an opinion of which I do not complain for one moment; it is not an opinion which I should share myself altogether; but it is the opinion of a sensitive and highly - strung, nervous organization. What surprised me most was this—that

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  this opinion of the hon. Member was received with great cheering and approval on the Front Opposition Bench. Would the House be surprised to learn that this principle which the hon. Member has laid down, and for which I might say there is much to be said in the abstract, was violated in the grossest manner, not six months ago, by a right hon. Gentleman who sits opposite (Mr. Childers)? The right hon. Gentleman and his Friends cheered the hon. Member in his denunciation of the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller, a military officer, to a civil post. Are they aware that the late Government appointed Sir Charles Warren, an officer on the active list, liable to be recalled at any moment to military service, not to look after "Moonlighters" in Kerry, but after what I hope are the civilized inhabitants of London, curiously enough for much the same reason?
  MR. SEXTON: Have you made him a magistrate?
  LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Yes; he has magisterial power. Mark the analogy. The present Government are of opinion that there has possibly been some failure, same want of energy in the police arrangements in Kerry, and they select Sir Redvers Buller to detect whether there is any defect, and, if there is, to apply a remedy. That was precisely the reason why a distinguished officer, whose military experience has been gained in dealing with savage tribes, was selected by the late Government to superintend the police of the Metropolis. Therefore, when the hon. Member who made this Motion appealed to his own Leaders to support him on this Motion, he can hardly have been aware that by their conduct six months ago they are absolutely precluded from giving him the smallest support. But what I have to remark upon is this. This matter has been before the House for some days. I announced to the House the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller last Thursday. Nobody has censured the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller until now. ["Oh, oh!"] Well, I have not gathered, from the hon. Member for Cork or any of his Friends that they considered the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller a matter for distinct censure or charge—["Oh, oh!"]—however, I learn it now for the first time. Certainly, nobody on the Front Oppo-
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  sition Bench has made it a matter of distinct censure or charge. Comments have been made; but they have not been comments which would lead me to suppose that such strong opinions existed about the appointment as apparently do now. But now it seems the appointment must instantly be brought under the consideration of the House, although the Motion can lead to no practical result. Why is this Motion made? The hon. Member calls the appointment a sensational appointment. I venture to think this is rather a sensational Motion. There are rumours floating about the House—rumours which have reached me from various sources, rumours which I think, if they are baseless and unfounded, should be publicly and authentically contradicted—as to the reason why this Motion has been brought forward. I am told the Motion has been brought forward in order to interrupt the regular proceedings of the House of Commons, and with the special object of intervening between the House and the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Joseph Chamberlain). It is certainly a most remarkable thing that all these strong feelings as to the nature of this appointment should have bubbled and boiled in the breast of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite for a whole week, and should only have exploded just on the day when the right hon. Gentleman is about to address the House. All I can say is that, if it is true, it is the greatest possible compliment to the right hon. Gentleman; it shows that his opponents fear so greatly the damaging character of the remarks which he is to make that there is no expedient which they will not resort to in order to annoy and embarrass and inconvenience the House which is anxious to hear him. The House is in possession of the fact of the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller. The policy of that appointment, we hold, cannot be debated in this way, because there is no definite issue before the House, and none whatever can be come to. I have to announce that Her Majesty's Government will take no part whatever in the discussion. We utterly decline to discuss the merits of the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller now. If hon. Gentlemen opposite wish to raise the question of the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller, let it be raised in a

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  regular form. It can be raised in a regular manner—namely, by an Amendment to the Address; but in proceedings which I can only characterize as utterly irrational, in proceedings which I believe are only calculated to occupy in a most unprofitable manner the time of the House, and in proceedings which cannot possibly lead to any practical result and any public advantage, I, on behalf of the Government, decline to have the smallest part or concern.
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: The last announcement of the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I think, comes singularly from one who used to avail himself to an extent that we considered a great abuse of Motions for Adjournment, and who raised discussions upon every possible subject to the interruption of important Public Business. I have never myself taken part in these Motions for Adjournment. I objected when the Rule was originally made, and I objected in a recent Committee to that practice. I have never done what the whole of the Front Ministerial Bench has done more than once—risen to support a Motion for Adjournment upon the most trivial question. I remember perfectly well a Motion on some peculiar view entertained upon the Income Tax by an hon. Gentleman much respected in this House. It was stated to be a matter of urgent public importance that this question should be discussed to the interruption of the whole Business of the House of Commons; and every Gentleman who was then upon the Front Opposition Bench rose to support that Motion. Therefore, for the noble Lord to say he refuses on a Question of Adjournment to discuss the question brought forward is practically to fly in the face of the Rules of the House, and of the practice of hon. Gentlemen among whom he sits. There is another remark of the noble Lord to which I may advert. The noble Lord says that if this Motion for Adjournment were carried it would have no effect upon the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller. I venture to think it would have a very great effect, because I think it would probably adjourn the mission of Sir Redvers Buller. As to the substance of this matter, I think it is one upon which we ought to speak with very great caution and very great reserve. I only wish that that course
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  had been adopted from the first by Her Majesty's Government. I think that if the language, the very moderate language, employed by the Chief Secretary to-night had been used in introducing this appointment to the House there would not have been that anxiety—I may say that reasonable anxiety—in the public mind which has been produced by this appointment. I have only a question or two to ask with reference to that explanation, in order to show that I should not be dissatisfied with it. The great mischief which has been done is due to the tone, the language, and the spirit in which this appointment was announced to both Houses of Parliament. It was because the noble Lord chose to make of it a flourish of military trumpets, because he endeavoured to produce upon the public mind an impression that there was going to be something like that, which I confess I heard with astonishment and regret cheered from the Conservative Benches, and that Sir Redvers Buller was going to deal with the people of Kerry as if they were rebels. [An hon. MEMBER: Moonlighters.] I do not care who. Of course, Her Majesty's Government repudiate any such doctrine as that with indignation if they are fit to be British Ministers. Why, if they were murderers, you cannot shoot them down without trial, of course, unless you have a law to that effect; but you have not yet proposed it. Well, what does it mean treating ignorant men like rebels in arms? It means shooting them down without trial. Of course, that is not what the Government mean. If they meant anything like it they would deserve to be dismissed from their places. They do not mean anything of the kind. They have said that they have sent Sir Redvers Buller, not as an officer of the Army to deal with rebels in arms. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) has said exactly the opposite. He said Sir Redvers Buller is to be sent as a Civil Magistrate acting strictly according to the existing law. So far, of course, that is satisfactory. But how was it spoken of by the noble Lord in introducing it to the House on the first night of the meeting of Parliament? If he had told us that Sir Redvers Buller, who was a distinguished officer, was going to become a police magistrate that would have been dif-

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  ferent. I must refer, however, to the extraordinary, and—if I may say so without offence—the most shallow fallacy of the noble Lord in comparing this appointment with that of Sir Charles Warren, who has no military authority in London. He has no military capacity whatever; it is in abeyance. [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: So it is here.] If he remains on the active list, which I do not know, he cannot give a single order to a single soldier, or if he did so he would not be fit for his office. Is that to be the position of Sir Redvers Buller? [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Yes.] Can he give no orders to the military in Kerry? [Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: Yes.] Ah, then your comparison fails. [Home Rule cheers.] It is, I repeat, a most wretched fallacy. I gather from the noble Lord's attitude that he agrees that Sir Redvers Buller is to have no military authority in Kerry.
  LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILLsaid, he would be in the same position as any other magistrate.
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: If that be so, what was the meaning of the cheers from the Conservatives on the other side of the House? I am sure that if that had been understood it would, very probably, have disposed of this Motion. Let us see what the language of the noble Lord was on the first night of the Session. It was very different. The noble Lord said—
  "Her Majesty's Government have decided to appoint a special military officer … to the command of the disturbed districts, with such powers as we believe will enable him to organize arrangements for the restoration of order."
  I do not think it unnatural for us to have supposed that those were to be extraordinary powers.
  "And for the cessation of the reign of terror which there prevails. This general officer will be directly responsible to my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary; and the officer whom Her Majesty's Government have selected, and who has consented to undertake the duty, is Sir Redvers Buller."
  If instead of that the noble Lord had said that they were going to send Sir Redvers Buller as a magistrate to Kerry, I doubt whether it would have been received with so much enthusiasm, or created so much alarm on this side of the House. It is certainly of the spirit of our institutions in recent times that the
  580
  distinction should be carefully preserved between the civil action of the Civil Magistrates and the action of the military officer when it was necessary that the military officer should be called in to support the civil power. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) the other night referred rather in a spirit of taunt to my action with reference to the disturbances in Skye. [Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH: No.] I am glad to hear that. What was done in that case? I took care that the military should be used as a secondary force, the police being put in the forefront. I warned the authorities in Scotland that the moment the police or magistrates were withdrawn, the military would be withdrawn also, so that there should be no possibility of the military acting as a separate authority. If you think a distinguished military officer will make you an excellent magistrate, I have not a word to say against that; but then I think it most desirable that while so acting you should dissever him from his military character. I want to know, in the first place, is Sir Redvers Buller, when he becomes a Civil Magistrate, to remain a Military Commandant in that district? Does he supersede all the other magistrates in the district? And, in the next place, what is to be his relation to the Inspector General of the Constabulary in Ireland, because on that depends very much what would be the effect of his appointment on the Irish Constabulary? I heard with satisfaction from the noble Lord the strong and sound language he spoke out in defence of the Irish Constabulary in Belfast. I think the attacks made upon them have been most mischievous and most dangerous. But in what we do we must be very careful not to shake the organization of the Irish Constabulary. Though military in character it is a civil force, and if you import into it a military command you will very seriously affect the character of the Irish Constabulary, and if you import a person into a district of Ireland independent of, and superior to, the Inspector General, you very seriously shake his authority. Therefore I think we ought to be told what will be the effect of the appointment, if it is to be independent of the Inspector General of the Constabulary. If the Constabulary in Kerry are to be subject to the authority of the Inspector

  581
  General, exactly as any other constabulary in Ireland, then I think the objections taken are very much removed. I think it was a great pity in a matter of this kind this was not carefully explained, so as to remove misapprehension and alarm either in England or in Ireland. I do not want to use any inflammatory language—there has been too much on the other side—but it is very natural that an appointment of this kind, announced in this way, should cause commotion and comment. It is the natural consequence of the language used, especially by Lord Salisbury, with reference to the Irish people. ["Oh, oh!"] You cry "Oh, oh!" Do you think it has been forgotten that Lord Salisbury compared Irish people to Hottentots? I think in these matters it is desirable that an appointment of this kind should have been cautiously, carefully, and prudently introduced. All I can say is, that if I am correct in the interpretation which I have placed on the explanations given by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary—that Sir Redvers Buller stands in no other position and authority than that of an ordinary Divisional Magistrate in that district—I do not feel called upon to object, and I should not be justified in objecting, to the course the Government have taken. They incur a great responsibility. They are responsible for the preservation of peace in Ireland, and they ought to take the course which they think best for that purpose. But the noble Lord has entered into some speculations as to the reason why this Motion has been brought forward. I happened to be in the country last night, and did not hear that the Motion was to be brought on until I read something in the newspapers this morning to that effect. The noble Lord has made a most singular suggestion, not very dignified, coming as it did from the Leader of the House, as to the object of this Motion. I quite feel that my right hon. Friend the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Joseph Chamberlain) deserves all the compliments which the noble Lord has paid him. But really I think the noble Lord was laying on the flattery a little too thick when he resorted to such an explanation for a Motion of this character. The idea of a Motion of this kind being brought forward for any such purpose as that suggested seems to me so utterly preposterous as to be un-
  582
  worthy of notice. I do not see how the Motion is going to prevent my right hon. Friend from addressing the House, and therefore it is hardly worthy of the noble Lord to have used such an argument as that to us. I hope this debate will not be long continued, though I think the attitude which the Government have taken in the matter is one which is rather provoking. If the noble Lord had been wise enough to have followed the example of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary, and had given moderate explanations in this matter calculated to remove the anxiety felt, it would have been more in the interests of Public Business. I hope, however, in these circumstances, it will be considered that we will take rather the version of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary than the "flare up" of the noble Lord as to the real meaning of this action. That being so, I hope hon. Members will now give the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham an opportunity of addressing the House.
  MR. J. E. ELLISsaid, that, in his opinion, the matter would well bear a little further examination. It seemed to him as if the noble Lord opposite (Lord Randolph Churchill) attached very little importance to the discussion that had been raised, for he had intimated that the decision of the House upon it would be treated as waste paper. He (Mr. J. E. Ellis) did not think, by using such language as that, the noble Lord was likely to commend himself to the House as a worthy occupant of the position of its Leader. He (Mr. J. E. Ellis) most indignantly repudiated the suggestion of the noble Lord as to the reason why this Motion had been brought forward. He and the hon. Member for the Bridgeton Division of Glasgow (Mr. E. R. Russell) were primarily responsible for the subject being brought under the notice of the House; and neither he nor his hon. Friend was desirous of shirking the responsibility of raising a question which went to the root of our civil and religious liberty. The reason why the question had been raised at that juncture was because they learnt from the Press that Sir Redvers Buller was to proceed on his Irish mission to-morrow. The question was, therefore, an urgent one. He thought that the thanks of the House

  583
  were due to the Mover of the Motion for raising a discussion on so important a subject, and also for having afforded the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition an opportunity of explaining the relations between military and civil law in regard to this matter. The noble Lord had suggested that the Motion was brought forward to delay the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain). But it had certainly no such object, though there were some who thought that right hon. Gentleman was not quite the important personage that the noble Lord seemed to consider him. The right hon. Gentleman had a very small handful of followers in that House, and his position in the country was ridiculously exaggerated. He could, however, assure the noble Lord and the Member for West Birmingham that there was no thought of the convenience of the right hon. Gentleman, or of the time at which he was likely to address the House, when it was arranged to bring forward this Motion. He wished most emphatically to express his objection to the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller. He wished, in the most emphatic terms, to express his detestation of the sort of crime and outrage which appeared still to prevail in the county of Kerry. And, further, he would repeat in that House what he had said on the platform, a regret that the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell) and some of his Friends should have occasionally used language which was not of a soothing character, and he thought that what they had said in times gone by would have been better left unsaid. But he was ready to make allowance for the position in which they were placed, and he acknowledged the moderation that had characterized the speeches of hon. Members below the Gangway since the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian made his offer. The matter with which they were dealing went to the root of our Constitutional liberties, and there were special reasons at the present moment why they should look further into it. The Secretary of State for War (Mr. W. H. Smith) said, in answer to a Question from him (Mr. J. E. Ellis), that he was happy to inform him that there was no likelihood of any disturbance in the Midland or Northern counties. He represented a Midland and
  584
  Northern county, and knew the state of feeling there. He deprecated the fact that a paragraph should be put in The Times and other papers of such a provocative nature as that to which he had referred. It had also been stated in the Press that there had been a meeting up stairs of military Members of the House. He was sometimes surprised at the frequency with which, in replying from the Front Bench—
  MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! I must ask the hon. Member to keep strictly to the Question of the appointment of a military officer in Ireland.
  MR. J. E. ELLISsaid, he bowed to the Speaker's ruling, and hoped that the House would understand that the offence was due to inexperience. They really were not at all surprised at the appointment of General Buller, which was the outcome of the policy which had the authority of the Prime Minister, who, when he sat below the Gangway of this House as Lord Robert Cecil, speaking on the subject of Ireland, said—
  "You must teach the Irish people to fear the law before you will get them to obey it."
  That was precisely where the point of divergence between hon. Members opposite and the Liberal Party came in. That was the law of fear, and the rule of fear. Speaking at the Mansion House, on the 11th of August, Lord Salisbury had said—
  "It is our duty to restore in Ireland that social order, the loss of which is the only just cause of discontent which the people have."
  ["Hear, hear!"] That, again, was a point where they took issue. They said the loss of social order was not the only just cause of discontent. The Prime Minister meant what he said, and generally said what he meant.
  MR. SPEAKER: I am sorry again to have to interrupt the hon. Gentleman; but he is not confining himself to the Question.
  MR. J. E. ELLISsaid, he humbly apologized. The points which required further elucidation were the precise relation which this military officer would have in the civil government; was he to be a military man, or a Divisional Magistrate? Was he to have power to call the military to his aid. There had been, for all time, the most extreme jealousy of the interference of the military with

  585
  the civil power. One of the most vital parts of our Constitution was the absolute distinction it drew between the civil and military powers. The Army itself existed only by consent of the House of Commons given yearly, and only for a period of 12 months. Anyone who doubted, or did not fully appreciate, the extreme jealousy of military rule or operations known to our Constitution should read the great Charge of Chief Justice Cockburn in the case of the "Queen v. Nelson and Brand," arising out of the Jamaica riots of 1865. What they wanted to know was, whether General Buller was to be a general or a magistrate? They were sent to those Benches to perform a grave and Constitutional duty—to uphold the rights and privileges of their countrymen, as handed down by their forefathers. The noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his place, had told them that the Government would not condescend to argue the matter. They were not disappointed at that announcement; as, probably, the explanation was because the Government could not find reasons for the course they proposed to pursue. The public would judge between the two parties. They had heard something of a final and irrevocable verdict of the country. One verdict, at all events, had been finally and irrevocably given—that was, that Ireland should and must be treated in a different manner to that in which she had been treated during the last century; and he did not think that in the appointment of General Buller a step was being taken towards the satisfaction of the wishes and aspirations of the Irish people.
  MR. WADDYsaid, he desired to know whether the Government would undertake to lay on the Table the instructions and orders that had been given to General Buller? Would they let the House know definitely and distinctly what he was going to do and how he was going to do it? At present they had no distinct statement of what was equally important—namely, of what he was not going to do. Was he going to supersede County Court Judges? He must have civil power in that case. Was he to try common civil cases? Because he thought if they looked they would find that the statement now made was totally different from that previously made with
  586
  reference to the appointment both in this House and "elsewhere." It was now a purely civil appointment; but when it was first announced it was almost entirely a military one. They had been told by an eminent authority that it was the "absolute determination of the Government to use to the utmost all the existing powers of the ordinary law and all the powers of the existing Military and Police Forces." It followed that General Buller was to have the entire control, not simply as a Civil Magistrate, of the Military as well as the Police Forces. They were told, on the one hand, that the opposite side were not going to have coercion; but, on the other, that they were going practically to introduce martial law. He wanted to know the distinction. He wanted to know was it to be coercion, or was it to be martial law? It was not worth while spending many words over if the Government would only have the kindness to give them the information; but it was worth while spending a good many words about if the Government would not instruct them.
  MR. H. J. WILSONsaid, he desired to ascertain the grounds upon which the Government had selected General Buller. He believed the gallant General was a distinguished officer in the Zulu War. There was no doubt he distinguished himself on that occasion. But how did he distinguish himself? He was chiefly distinguished as the leader of a body of Irregular Cavalry that operated in the war; and the operations of that body were, he believed, very irregular even in war itself. He wanted to give only two illustrations of the spirit and style in which General Buller carried out the instructions and conducted the operations intrusted to him by quoting very briefly from letters of Mr. Archibald Forbes, the war correspondent, who, it was understood, was a great admirer of General Buller. In one letter Mr. Forbes said—
  "Here Buller joined us, but he was not very gay before he had taken his full toll of Zulu blood."
  In a subsequent letter occurred the following:—
  "Colonel Buller three days ago took out a strong detachment of that strange but wonderfully efficient force of indiscriminate ruffians who serve under him, under the name of Irre-

  587
  gular Cavalry, on a two days' expedition. … Reaching the bed of the White Umvolosi on the first evening, by daylight on the second morning he engaged in the annexation of cattle. The people in charge of these cattle made a feeble resistance and were not warriors, but policy demanded that a certain number of them should die for the sake of creating an impression, and about a dozen of them fell under the fire of Buller's men."
  Now, he believed the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) was at that time Colonial Secretary, so that he must have been aware of the character of these proceedings; and he should like very much to know whether it was for such services as those that General Buller had been selected for appointment to the present post?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Sir MICHAEL HICKS - BEACH): Sir, I should have taken no part in this discussion, because I had, as I think, already answered the questions which the right hon. Gentleman and other speakers have asked as to the terms of Sir Redvers Buller's appointment, but for the outrageous attack—for I can characterize it by no other epithet—which has been made upon that gallant and distinguished officer by the hon. Member who has just sat down (Mr. H. J. Wilson). It is perfectly true that I was Colonial Secretary at the time General Buller was engaged in active operations in the Zulu War; and it is also true, and there are many in this House who, knowing that gallant General well, will, in this, confirm me when I say that it is also true that General Buller is as humane as he is brave. And to bring forward such charges against General Buller in this House, on the word of a newspaper correspondent, without the faintest shadow of proof, is, I will venture to say, an outrage on the name and fame of that gallant officer. Sir, we have selected General Buller to go to Kerry because we believe from his experience that he will act constitutionally, justly, humanely, uprightly, and firmly in the task with which he is intrusted. I have stated what his appointment is in answer to the hon. Member for Glasgow (Mr. E. K. Russell), who, I think, would hardly have brought forward this Motion if he had previously considered the terms of my answer. I stated that General Buller had a civil appoint-
  588
  ment in Kerry, and not a military command. [Mr. WABDY: What civil appointment?] I stated, in answer to a previous Question of the hon. Member for Glasgow, that General Buller's civil appointment would give him the powers that are possessed in Ireland by other Divisional Magistrates, and I believe that those powers will be sufficient to enable him to do that work of reorganization for the detection and prevention of crime with which he is charged. The difference between General Buller's appointment and theirs is this—that his is a temporary mission, while theirs are permanent appointments. General Buller, having regard to the circumstances—the special and difficult circumstances—of this case, and to the fact that he may have to act at very short notice, is expected largely to act for himself; and he is only to report to and communicate to me in order to insure rapidity of action in any direction in which he may think it desirable to move. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir William Harcourt) asked a question as to the relations of General Buller with the Royal Irish Constabulary. I stated the precise official relations between General Buller and the Inspector General of Constabulary the other night. The right hon. Gentleman my Predecessor in Office (Mr. John Morley) knows very well that Captain Plunket, at this moment Divisional Magistrate of Kerry, is not under the authority of the Inspector General—no more is General Buller. But I should like to read what the Inspector General, without any previous communication from me, has telegraphed with reference to General Buller's appointment. He says—
  "General Buller will receive from myself and all the Royal Irish Constabulary officers the most hearty support, and it will be a great pleasure to me to co-operate with him to the fullest extent of my ability and power."
  DR. COMMINSsaid, no answer had been given to the question whether General Buller would have the whole civil and military command in the counties of Clare and Kerry? They had been told that General Buller's appointment was a civil one; but in regard to the military part of it the Treasury Bench would not say whether he still held it or not. He thought that the Government should tell the House whether General Buller had retired

  589
  from his military command, and also whether, by his civil appointment, he would take precedence of the Lords Lieutenant of Kerry and Clare, who in that capacity made out the Commission of the Peace for their counties, and whether he would be above the Sheriffs of those counties? If he held both these appointments, as a magistrate he would be able to read the Riot Act, and there-upon as a soldier he would have the command of the troops, and could order them to fire on the people if he thought right to do so without any control from the civil authority. If he was so minded, he could act exactly as he acted in Zululand; and that was the position which the Treasury Bench were trying to cloak. They knew that soldiers might he imported into Clare and Kerry and quartered upon the farmers, innkeepers, and others, who would have to maintain them; and he would like to know whether, under these two appointments, General Buller would not have the right of free quartering upon the people? He thought that the only precedent for such an appointment as this was the appointment by Cromwell of his Courts of Major Generals as the first step towards the despotism which he soon afterwards established over this country. Those Courts had been extended by Cromwell to Ireland when he had perfected the system in this country, and they had become known as Cromwell's slaughterhouses. He only hoped that the proposed proceedings would not get a title of that kind. He thought that the House should express a strong opinion upon the danger of such an appointment as this, which would only aggravate the evils which existed in those counties. He did not believe that the noble Lord would treat the opinion of the Irish people, as expressed by their Representatives, in the cavalier way he had in his speech. The appointment he held was an unconstitutional one; and he thought, in view of the feeling expressed by Members of the House, that the Government should withdraw from it. He reminded hon. Members on the opposite Benches that the Irish Police were really as much a portion of the Forces of the Crown as the Royal Guards, being directly under the authority of the Crown, and officered by the Crown, and were even called the Royal Irish Constabulary. He deprecated as much as any-
  590
  one the crime which existed, and he would like to see crime put down; but crime must be put down by the even-handed force of the law. The law was strong enough to put down crime by regular means; and crime could not be put down by irregular ways. Such irregular ways only gave excuse to people who committed crime; at all events, it got sympathy for them when otherwise they would have no sympathy whatever. He would also like to know the particular fitness of Sir Redvers Buller. Had he any skill as a policeman? Did he know the people of the district, or was he acquainted with the habits of the conspirators? He hoped the Mover of the Adjournment would take a division upon his Motion, and that the division would be such that the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Lord Randolph Churchill) would be forced to respect the opinion of the House.
  MR. ILLINGWORTHsaid, whatever might have been thought of this question when it was first started, there could now be no doubt whatever that one of the gravest Constitutional questions had been raised at a very critical moment. The proceedings of the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer to-night had filled him with indignation. A question of urgency had been submitted to the Speaker, and a large body of hon. Members had risen to endorse the view that the question was urgent. Under these circumstances, what was the treatment to which the Leader of the House subjected a large body of its Members? After a speech, in which he delivered himself of his own view, he intimated that the Government would have nothing more to say upon the subject, whatever other information might be laid before the House, or whatever opinion might be expressed. He regarded that as a most unconstitutional and most offensive treatment of the House. He believed they might look through the history of the Leadership of the House, whether under Liberal or Tory Governments, and they would fail to find an instance in which the House had been treated with such contempt. The foolishness and short-sightedness of the course taken by the noble Lord had already been made patent, for after his distinct declaration that, however long this discussion might be continued, no Member of the Government would take

  591
  part in it, the next most important Member of the Government, the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach), rose and expressed his surprise that the character of General Buller should be attacked, and that quotations should be made from newspaper correspondents as to the gallant General's antecedents. In this country, with regard to the conduct of military and naval officers in foreign countries, or in distant parts of the Empire, we were obliged, in the first instance, to depend—and very often we had to depend exclusively—upon the reports of independent witnesses writing for the Press for an account of what was happening in distant countries where our troops were engaged. While it might suit the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland to try to maintain the character of Sir Redvers Buller, the people of this country would look with anxiety and alarm at the antecedents of this English General, because they had been unable to learn from any Member of the Government that this English General had any other qualifications for the post to which he had been appointed. They were still in the dark as to an important part of General Buller's functions. They were to be told that General Buller was to be clothed with civil authority, and made a Civil Magistrate; but he was to be responsible to no one except the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary for Ireland. What they wanted to know was, whether he had been stripped of his military power? Was he to be invested with two authorities? Did he go as a double-barrelled gun, having both civil authority and military power in his hands? They were told that his appointment as a magistrate was only temporary. But how temporary? How did they know that the course the Government were pursuing, instead of extinguishing lawlessness or mitigating it, might not increase it? He remembered the time when there were riots in the North of England. The people then had this great safeguard, that the military force could not be employed except upon the authority of the magistrates known in the locality. If the substitution of civil authority for military authority had been proposed in the North of England, the people would have risen in arms against it. The noble Lord had suggested—and it showed the spirit in which he was
  592
  disposed to treat hon. Members of the House—that this discussion had been originated in order to offer embarrassment to the right hon. Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Joseph Chamberlain), and so prevent the House hearing him. Those who carried their noses low caught more disagreeable smells than other people. But the motive which the noble Lord attributed to many hon. Members of the House was one which had not entered into their thoughts for a moment. The Motion was brought forward because it was found out that Sir Redvers Buller was immediately going to Ireland. Whether the modern relationship between the noble Lord and the right hon. Member for West Birmingham had placed the noble Lord in possession of special information he did not know, but the noble Lord was in error. He could only augur the worst results as to the Leadership of the House from the way in which the noble Lord had conducted the Business of the House that evening.
  COLONEL BLUNDELLsaid, he knew General Sir Redvers Buller well. He was a man of remarkable ability and of tried administrative capacity and humane man, and as attached to the Constitution as any hon. Gentleman in that House; and, in his opinion, the Government had intrusted the administration of the law in Kerry to most capable hands. He could assure the House that if Sir Redvers Buller found that any landlord in Kerry was really abusing his power and authority he was just the man who would not be slow to tell him so. Therefore he sincerely trusted and appealed to hon. Gentlemen, if they wished that the state of anarchy which prevailed in Kerry should be put down without bloodshed or harshness, not to interfere with the arrangements which the Government had made, and to refrain from doing anything to prevent General Buller from carrying out and discharging his difficult duty, a duty which would probably be as unpalatable to him as it would be to any military officer or any man to whom it might be entrusted.
  MR. DILLONsaid, he had been strongly impressed with—and he agreed with the hon. Member for Bradford (Mr. Illingworth)—the impropriety of the tone the Leader of the House had adopted with reference to the

  593
  subject before it. The noble Lord amused the House and they had a hearty laugh over it; but he could assure the House that this appointment was not a subject for laughter to the people of Ireland. It was possible, it was likely, that before Sir Redvers Buller left Kerry it would be found to be no subject for laughter for the people of England. They had in Ireland precedents for proceedings like this, although they might not have had them in English history for a long time past; but he challenged any hon. Member in the House to look back to the history of Ireland and to see what were the results which followed in any single instance in which a military officer was employed to take a similar charge, and what had been done over and over again might be attended with similar results. Disturbances were aggravated, the people were possessed with fury, and martial law was rigorously enforced. It was such proceedings and the action of the military officers and the memories which these had left behind in the minds of the Irish people which made Ireland such a trouble to this country to-day. It had been said that they were sending Sir Redvers Buller because he was known to be an able and intelligent man. Were there no men of that description among the civil servants of the Crown in Ireland, who knew, moreover, something of the country, and in the great establishment of magistrates of Ireland men who had much special training in the repression of crime in Ireland, that they could not be got, but that the Government must go to the military and select this hero from Zululand? How, he asked, would the people of Kerry take the appointment? That was an important question, involving an objection sufficient to condemn the appointment in the minds of the people of Ireland, and he contended that their opinion was entitled to some respect on this matter. Englishmen ought to ask themselves the question how the people of Kerry would regard the appointment. Would the people look upon the appointment as an honest effort on the part of the Government to put down crime and restore order? Nothing of the sort. They would look upon Sir Redvers Buller as a man who, to use the words of the Prime Minister (the Marquess of Salisbury), was sent to take command of the district in the interests
  594
  of the landlords, and to put down by whatever force might be necessary every disorder which interfered with the exterminating policy being carried on there. Let them consider what possible reasons could be alleged in favour of the appointment of such a man as Sir Redvers Buller, or the appointment of any military man at all. What was the work that lay before him when he went down to Kerry? Would he find any force in arms against Her Majesty? Could any hon. Member of the House state a single instance of open resistance to the law in Kerry for the last 10 years? He defied anyone to do so. There had been no such resistance, and he defied the Government to bring forward a single case which General Buller would have to deal with which was not connected with a secret association, the offspring of a process of the worst oppression and tyranny which had ever been practised upon a civilized people. The people of Kerry had been tortured and oppressed by their landlords to such an extent that, although they dreaded and hated the "Moonlighters," they dreaded and hated the landlords more, and it was because of that that the people did not inform against "Moonlighters," and assist to bring them to justice, even when they could. The work to be done in Kerry was not to put down resistance to the law, because there was none, but to break up a secret association. Would any man in that House tell him that Sir Redvers Buller was by training and experience as a soldier the man to deal with a secret association? It was detective work that was required, and if General Buller was sent to Kerry because he was a good detective that only showed that he was not fit to be a soldier. The training of a soldier was rather calculated to incapacitate him for the work required. What was wanted in Kerry to put down this secret association was fair law and justice. Do justice to the people of Ireland and the "Moonlighters" would be heard of no more. He supposed General Buller would have power to call out the military, and to have military patrols in Kerry. Probably one of his first acts would be to have the roads patrolled at night by military. What security, then, was there that Sir Redvers Buller would not consider that every young man found outside his father's door at night in Kerry was a "Moonlighter," and that he

  595
  should be treated as a rebel in arms? ["Oh!" and cheers.] With ominous cheers from the Ministerial Benches the statement had been received that he would deal with the "Moonlighter" as he would with a rebel found in arms. [Renewed cheers.] Again the statement was cheered, and by that cheer they mean to say that every young man in the county of Kerry who chose to go outside the door of his father's house after dark was to be shot down like a rebel. ["No, no!"] Everything was left to the discretion of General Buller. What power would General Buller have under the Act passed against his (Mr. Dillon's) repeated protest in that House? Under the Arms Act, he might billet soldiers in any house in Kerry. The power of billeting might be turned into a most cruel instrument of oppression. Under this Act, he would have power to break into any house in the county of Kerry under the pretence of searching for arms, and this power again might be used for purposes of oppression. One of the chief things that had embittered the Irish people against the administration of the English law was the unfair way in which the Arms Act had been enforced in different parts of the country. Thus, in the South of Ireland, people had been sentenced to three months' imprisonment under the provision of that Act for the illegal possession of arms, while no sentences whatever had been imposed upon the inhabitants of Belfast for similar offences, although many of them were proved to have not only illegally possessed arms, but to have used them for the purpose of firing upon the Queen's troops. This new appointment was no laughing or joking matter in Ireland. To the Irish people it was a most serious matter, and it was a matter well worthy the consideration of the House. The result of the appointment would be twofold in Kerry—it would increase and intensify the character of the disturbances, and consequently would increase and intensify the hatred that exists among the people to English law, while it would inspirit the Kenmares and the landlords of Kerry to carry on their campaign in Kerry. For 25 years before this exterminating campaign commenced in January, and 1,600 people had been sent to the hedges and ditches, there was no "Moonlighting" and no outrage.
  MR. SPEAKERsaid, he must remind the hon. Member that the state of Kerry was not the Question before the House, but the appointment of a military officer.
  MR. DILLONsaid, he bowed to the ruling of the Speaker, but thought his remarks were pertinent, as Kerry was the district to which General Buller was to be sent. He wished to know whether General Bullor would have the power of calling into the district extra military and extra police; whether the extra police would be charged on the people; whether he would have the power of quartering troops on the people of the district; whether he would have he power of ordering arrests; whether he would have power to examine prisoners in secrecy; and whether he would have any control over the magistrates in the infliction of sentences? These were questions the Government had not answered at all, and yet they were questions of the utmost importance to the people of the district. When Mr. Clifford Lloyd was in control of the district he surrounded whole villages with a large force of military and police, and arrested everyone whom he thought capable of doing any mishief. He held his Courts secretly in barns and other buildings, and excluded the Press, so that it was impossible to know what transpired except from the prisoners themselves. He refused bail in cases where the accused were entitled to it. He (Mr. Dillon) wished to know whether this sort of terrorism was to be carried out now, and whether General Buller was to order the magistrates of the country to refuse bail for certain classes of offences, where, in their own discretion, they would accept bail? He wished to know whether he was to have the power to direct the magistrates as to the infliction of sentences under the Arms Act? He could not but believe that the Government were only training General Buller for the Coercion Act which they were about to pass subsequently—that it was not Kerry they had in their minds, but the whole of Ireland. If General Buller had any reputation, he was most likely to leave it behind him among the "Moonlighters" of Kerry. General Buller had a tough task before him. He had won a reputation, and not a very enviable one, in Zululand; and he would have better

  597
  consulted his name, his honour as a soldier, and the character of the uniform he wore, if he had declined to place himself in the position of head detective to break up a secret society.
  MR. CALDWELLsaid, he would like to point out that the Government were responsible for the administration of law and order; and the Constitution of the country conferred upon the Government certain powers, among others that of appointing officials. On this occasion the Government were not proposing to ask Parliament for any special or exceptional powers. If they were, he could have understood why such a discussion should have arisen. But as they did not ask exceptional powers, the Government were responsible, in carrying out their powers, to keep within the limits of the law and the Constitution. The Irish need have no fear of any illegal act on the part of General Buller or the Government, because the Government, although they were the Government, could not go beyond the limits of the Constitution, and could not confer any rights or powers which the law did not confer upon themselves. That being so, he thought hon. Members on his side of the House must see the very inconvenient position in which they were placing right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Opposition Bench. Some day—and he cared not how soon in certain circumstances—the Gentlemen forming the Front Opposition Bench now might be occupying again the Front Bench opposite; and if such a question arose, would they not be the first to say—Why should the House of Commons interfere in a matter which the law had delegated to the Executive Government of the country, and for which the Executive of the country was alone responsible? He, therefore, held that so long as the Executive simply acted on the law as at present existing, so long as they did not come to Parliament and ask for exceptional powers, the duty of the House of Commons was to leave the administration of the law in the hands of those who, by the Constitution, were responsible for it. He felt that they would be adopting a precedent which would be most inconvenient and likely to seriously embarrass the procedure of any future
  598
  Liberal Government if they interfered in this matter.
  MR. T. C. HARRINGTONsaid, he had been a long time associated with the county of Kerry. He knew something of the history of the people, and of the causes which had led to the necessity for the appointment of Sir Redvers Buller. He should not be discharging his duty as an Irish Member if he did not enter his protest against the policy which Her Majesty's Government were pursuing in taking the administration of the law in Kerry and Clare out of the hands of the men who had ordinarily administered it in those counties, who knew those counties and knew the circumstances of those counties, and who had been associated with the administration of the law there for years, and placing it in the hands of a man who had never yet set foot in Ireland. What explanation did Her Majesty's Government give of the manner in which they cashiered Captain Plunket, the Divisional Magistrate who had charge of Kerry and Clare? One of the reasons why they (the Irish Members) objected to this appointment, regarded it with the gravest suspicion, and thought it dangerous to the peace of Ireland and likely to exasperate the people was that, while Sir Redvers Buller would exercise civil powers, he would continue to hold his military appointment. It was believed that Sir Redvers Buller had not been sought by the Government to go to Ireland; but that in pursuance of his military instruction, and in obedience to the gossip which he heard in London, he had volunteered his services for a duty which must bring him into conflict with the people. So far as he (Mr. T. C. Harrington) and his Colleagues were concerned, if Sir Redvers Buller went to Ireland with the intention of only addressing himself to the extermination of "Moonlighting" in Kerry, to restore social order, and if he discharged that duty in an impartial manner, he would have their heartiest support; but his (Mr. T. C. Harrington's) knowledge of the administration of the law in that country forced him to the conviction that when men of that class went to the country they placed themselves in connection with the local magistrates, who were all landlords. No one had more reason than he and his Colleagues to sympathize with any genuine effort to extirpate

  599
  crime. At risk and danger to themselves they had endeavoured to grapple with it. But the policy of the Government was not of that character. He warned the Chief Secretary that he had, to some extent, been made a dupe in this business, and that while he was to be responsible to him, Sir Redvers Buller was really sent to Ireland with wholly undefined powers—for the Government were not even agreed as to the powers he should possess—and for a purpose which the Chief Secretary did not know. The real men who had been at the root of all the evil, and who, during the last six years, had promoted outrage and crime by evicting more than 1,000 tenants, and who bred discontent in that part of the country, he would tell the Government were not the agitators, but the landlord class.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 146; Noes 241: Majority 95.

  AYES.

  Abraham, W. (Limerick, W.)

  Esmonde, Sir T. H. G.

  Esslemont, P.

  Acland, A. H. D.

  Farquharson, Dr. R.

  Allison, R. A.

  Fenwick, C.

  Anderson, C. H.

  Finucane, J.

  Atherley-Jones, L.

  Flower, C.

  Balfour, Sir G.

  Flynn, J. C.

  Biggar, J. G.

  Foley, P. J.

  Blake, J. A.

  Gane, J. L.

  Blane, A.

  Gilhooly, J.

  Borlase, W. C.

  Gill, H. J.

  Bradlaugh, C.

  Gladstone, H. J.

  Bright, W. L.

  Gray, E. D.

  Broadhurst, H.

  Harrington, E.

  Brown, A. L.

  Harrington, T. C.

  Burt, T.

  Hayden, L. P.

  Buxton, S. C.

  Hayne, C. Seale-

  Byrne, G. M.

  Healy, M.

  Campbell, H.

  Holden, I.

  Carew, J. L.

  Hooper, J.

  Chance, P. A.

  Howell, G.

  Channing, F. A.

  Hunter, W. A

  Clancy, J. J.

  Illingworth, A.

  Cobb, H. P.

  Jacoby, J. A.

  Commins, A.

  James, C. H.

  Condon, T. J.

  Jordan, J.

  Connolly L.

  Kelly, B.

  Conway, M.

  Kenny, C. S.

  Conybeare, C. A. V.

  Kenny, M. J.

  Corbet, W. J.

  Labouchere, H.

  Cossham, H.

  Lalor, R.

  Cox, J. R.

  Lawson, H. L. W.

  Craig, J.

  Leahy, J.

  Craven, J.

  Leamy, E.

  Crawford, D.

  Lockwood, F.

  Crawford, W.

  M'Arthur, W. A.

  Cremer, W. R.

  M'Cartan, M.

  Crilly, D.

  M'Donald, P.

  Crossley, E.

  M'Donald, Dr. R.

  Dillon, J.

  M'Ewan, W.

  Dillwyn, L. L.

  M'Kenna, Sir J. N.

  Ellis, T. E.

  M'Laren, W. G. B.

  600

  Mahony, P.

  Roe, T.

  Mappin, F. T.

  Rowlands, J.

  Marum, E. M.

  Rountree, J.

  Mason, S.

  Schwann, C. E.

  Mayne, T.

  Sexton, T.

  Molloy, B. C.

  Shaw, T.

  Nolan, Colonel J. P.

  Sheehan, J. D.

  Nolan, J.

  Sheehy, D.

  O'Brien, J. F. X.

  Sheil, E.

  O'Brien, P.

  Shirley, W. S.

  O'Brien, P. J.

  Simon, Sir J.

  O'Connor, A.

  Stuart, J.

  O'Connor, J. (Kerry)

  Sullivan, D.

  O'Connor, J. (Tippry.)

  Sullivan, T. D.

  O'Connor, T. P.

  Summers, W.

  O'Dohertv, J. E.

  Sutherland, A.

  O'Hanlon, T.

  Swinburne, Sir J.

  O'Hea, P.

  Tanner, C. K.

  O'Kelly, J.

  Tuite, J.

  Pease, A. E.

  Waddy, S. D.

  Pickard, B.

  Wallace, R.

  Pickersgill, E. H.

  Warmington, C. M.

  Picton, J. A.

  Watson, T.

  Pinkerton, J.

  Watt, H.

  Potter, T. B.

  Wayman, T.

  Power, P. J.

  Will, J. S.

  Power, R.

  Wilson, H. J.

  Provand, A. D.

  Wright, C.

  Pyne, J. D.

  Yeo, F. A.

  Quinn, T.

  Redmond, W. H. K.

  TELLERS.

  Reynolds, W. J.

  Ellis, J. E.

  Richard, H.

  Russell, E. R.

  Roberts, J. B.

  NOES.

  Addison, J. E. W.

  Burghley, Lord

  Agg-Gardner, J. T.

  Caine, W. S.

  Ambrose, W.

  Caldwell, J.

  Anstruther, Colonel R. H. L.

  Campbell, J. A.

  Chamberlain, R.

  Anstruther, H. T.

  Charrington, S.

  Ashmead-Bartlett, E.

  Churchill, rt. hn. Lord R. H. S.

  Baden-Powell, G. S.

  Bailey, Sir J. R.

  Clarke, Sir E. G.

  Baillie-Cochrane, hon. C. W. A. N.

  Coddington, W.

  Coghill, D. H.

  Baird, J. G. A.

  Commerell, Adml. Sir J. E.

  Balfour, rt. hon. A. J.

  Balfour, G. W.

  Cooke, C. W. R.

  Banes, Major G. E.

  Corbett, A. C.

  Bartley, G. C. T.

  Corbett, J.

  Barttelot, Sir W. B.

  Corry, Sir J. P.

  Bates, Sir E.

  Cotton, Capt. E. T. D.

  Baumann, A. A.

  Cranborne, Viscount

  Beach, right hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-

  Cross, H. S.

  Curzon, Viscount

  Beadel, W. J.

  Dalrymple, C.

  Bentinck, Lord H. C.

  Davenport, H. T.

  Bentinck, W. G. C.

  Davenport, W. B.

  Bethell, Commander G. R.

  De Lisle, E. J. L. M. P.

  Blundell, Col. H. B. H.

  De Worms, Baron H.

  Bond, G. H.

  Dimsdale, Baron R.

  Bonsor, H. C. O.

  Dixon, G.

  Bridgeman, Col. hon. F. C.

  Donkin, R. S.

  Duncan, Colonel F.

  Bristowe, T. L.

  Duncombe, A.

  Brodrick, hon. W. St. J. F.

  Dyke, rt. hon. Sir W. H.

  Brookfield, Col. A. M.

  Egerton, hn. A. J. F.

  Bruce, Lord H.

  Elliot, hon. A. R. D.

  Burdett-Coutts, W. L.

  Elliot, Sir G.

  Ash.-B.

  Elliot, G. W.

  601

  Elton, C. I.

  Kenyon - Slaney, Col. W.

  Evelyn, W. J.

  Ewart, W.

  Ker, R. W. B.

  Eyre, Colonel H.

  King-Harman, Colonel E. R.

  Farquharson, H. R.

  Knightley, Sir R.

  Fellowes, W. H.

  Knowles, L.

  Fergusson, right hon. Sir J.

  Lafone, A.

  Field, Admiral E.

  Lambert, I. C.

  Finch, G. H.

  Lawrence, W. F.

  Finlay, R. B.

  Lea, T.

  Fisher, W. H.

  Lechmere, Sir E. A. H.

  Fitzgerald, R. U. P.

  Lees, E.

  Folkestone, right hon. Viscount

  Legh, T. W.

  Forwood, A. B.

  Leighton, S.

  Fry, L.

  Lethbridge, Sir R.

  Fulton, J. F.

  Lewis, C. E.

  Gedge, S.

  Lewisham, right hon. Viscount

  Gent-Davis, R.

  Long, W. H.

  Gibson, J. G.

  Low, M.

  Giles, A.

  Lowther, J. W.

  Gilliat, J. S.

  Macartney, W. G. E.

  Godson, A. F.

  Macdonald, right hon. J. H. A.

  Goldsmid, Sir J.

  MacInnes, M.

  Goldsworthy, Major-General W. T.

  Maclean, J. M.

  Gorst, Sir J. E.

  Maclure, J. W.

  Gray, C. W.

  M'Calmont, Captain J.

  Grimston, Viscount

  Mallock, R.

  Grotrian, F. B.

  Marriott, rt. hn. W. T.

  Grove, Sir T. F.

  Maskelyne, M. H. N. Story-

  Halsey, T. F.

  Matthews, rt. hon. H.

  Hambro, Col. C. J. T.

  Maxwell, Sir H. E.

  Hamilton, right hon. Lord G. F.

  Mills, hon. C. W.

  Hamilton, Lord C. J.

  More, R. J.

  Hamilton, Lord E.

  Morrison, W.

  Hamilton, Col. C. E.

  Mount, W. G.

  Hastings, G. W.

  Mowbray, R. G. C.

  Heathcote, Capt. J. H. Edwards-

  Mulholland, H. L.

  Herbert, hon. S.

  Muntz, P. A.

  Hervey, Lord F.

  Noble, W.

  Hill, right hon. Lord A. W.

  Norris, E. S.

  Hill, A. S.

  Northcote, hon. H. S.

  Hill, Colonel E. S.

  Norton, R.

  Hingley, B.

  O'Neill, hon. R. T.

  Hoare, S.

  Parker, hon. F.

  Hobhouse, H.

  Pearce, W.

  Hodge, R. T. H.

  Pelly, Sir L.

  Holland, rt. hon. Sir H. T.

  Penton, Captain F. T.

  Holmes, rt. hon. H.

  Percy, Lord A. M.

  Hornby, W. H.

  Pitt-Lewis, G.

  Howard, J.

  Plowden, Sir W. C.

  Howard, J. M.

  Plunket, rt. hon. D. R.

  Howorth, H. H.

  Powell, F. S.

  Hozier, J. H. C.

  Puleston, J. H.

  Hubbard, rt. hn. J. G.

  Raikes, rt. hon. H. C.

  Hughes-Hallett, Col. F. C.

  Rankin, J.

  Hunt, F. S.

  Rasch, Major F. C.

  Hunter, Sir G.

  Reid, H. B.

  Isaacs, L. H.

  Ridley, Sir M. W.

  Isaacson, F. W.

  Ritchie, rt. hon. C. T.

  Jackson, W. L.

  Robertson, J. P. B.

  Jennings, L. J.

  Robinson, B.

  Johnston, W.

  Rollitt, Sir A. K.

  Kelly, J. R.

  Ross, A. H.

  Kennaway, Sir J. H.

  Russell, Sir G.

  Kenyon, hon. G. T.

  Russell, T. W.

  Salt, T.

  Sandys, Lieut-Col. T. M.

  602

  Saunderson, Col. E. J.

  Tottenham, A. L.

  Selwyn, Capt. C. W.

  Townsend, G. F.

  Seton-Karr, H.

  Tyler, Sir H. W.

  Shaw-Stewart, M. H.

  Verdin, R.

  Sidebotham, J. W.

  Vincent, C. E. H.

  Sidebottom, T. H.

  Walsh, hon. A. H. J.

  Sidebottom, W.

  Waring, Colonel T.

  Sinclair, W. P.

  Watkin, Sir E. W.

  Smith, rt. hon. W. H

  Watson, J.

  Smith, A.

  Webster, Sir. R. E.

  Smith, D.

  Webster, R. G.

  Smith-Barry, A. H,

  Weymouth, Viscount

  Spencer, J. E.

  White, J. B.

  Stanhope, rt. hon. E.

  Whitley, E.

  Stanley, E. J.

  Wilson, Sir S.

  Sutherland, T.

  Wodehouse, E. R.

  Swetenham, E.

  Wood, N.

  Talbot, J. G.

  Wortley, C. B. Stuart-

  Taplin, T. K.

  Yerburgh, R. A.

  Temple, Sir R.

  Young, C. E. B.

  Theobald, J.

  Thorburn, W.

  TELLERS.

  Tollemache, H. J.

  Douglas, A. Akers-

  Tomlinson, W. E. M.

  Walrond, Col. W. K.

ORDER OF THE DAY.
  ADDRESS IN ANSWER TO HER MA-JESTY'S MOST GRACIOUS SPEECH.

    ADJOURNED DEBATE. [SIXTH NIGHT.]
    Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Amendment proposed to Question [19th August]—[See Page 96.]
    And which Amendment was,
    At the end of the last paragraph, to add the words,—"And humbly to assure Her Majesty that we fear that, owing to the heavy fall in the price of agricultural produce, the greatest difficulty will be experienced in the coming winter by the Irish tenant farmers in the payment of their present rents, and many will be unable to pay these rents. That numerous evictions confiscating the rights vested in the tenants by the Land Act of 1881, causing widespread suffering and endangering the maintenance of social order will be the result. That we deprecate any attempt to transfer the loss likely to arise due to inability to pay the present rents, from the owners of land to the taxpayers of Great Britain and Ireland, by any extension of State-assisted purchase on the basis of rents fixed when prices were higher than they now are."—(Mr. Parnell.)
    Question again proposed, "That those words be there added."
    Debate resumed.

    TENANT FARMERS (IRELAND)—EVIC-TIONS FROM INABILITY TO PAY RENT.
    MR. FLYNNsaid, that the Amendment was the solemn expression of the opinion of the Irish people.
    Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members being found present,
    MR. FLYNN, resuming, said, Boards of Guardians and other public bodies in every part of the country had passed resolutions denouncing evictions, and calling upon the Government to put a stop to them; and the question for the Government now was whether they would take the advice of the hon. and gallant Member for North Armagh (Colonel Saunderson), or the advice of the Members who really represented Ireland? The noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when speaking on the Address, referred in flippant tones to the agricultural distress in Ireland, and to the fall of prices in agricultural produce; and other speakers who followed him from the same side of the House treated the matter in very much the same spirit. But this depression was very real, and if, in consequence of it, farmers were unable to pay their rent and were evicted, the injury would not fall upon one class alone, but upon all classes of the community. The landlord himself would suffer, because no one in Ireland would take a farm from which a tenant had been evicted—the land would fall out of cultivation. In such a ease not only would a large number of farms become vacant, and. a largo number of farmers ruined, but the demand for labour would be lessened, and the trade and commerce in the smaller towns, now stagnant, would become altogether destroyed. The hon. and gallant Member for North Armagh, in his speech the previous evening, compared the landlords of Ireland to traders, and contended that the debt of the landlord was the same as the debt of any other trader; but in the eyes of the law, and evidently in the eyes of the House of Commons, a debt due to a landlord was a much more sacred thing than any other debt, because the ordinary creditor would not destrain and evict a tenant. They contended that in the present state of Ireland the shopkeepers and merchants in the towns and villages would be victimized to a large extent if the landlords persisted in this policy of eviction, because the ruin of the farming classes meant also the ruin of the traders. Great stress had been laid on the fact that judicial rents ought not to be altered; but the Members of the Party to
    604
    which he (Mr. Mynn) belonged took great exception to the statements that had been made with regard to these judicial rents; and in endeavouring to controvert the statement that the payment of the present rents was in many cases an impossibility the Government and their supporters indulged in nothing but assertion and arguments of the most empty character. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had told the House that there was no such fall in the price of Irish produce as would justify a reduction of rents. What proof did the Government want that there was a fall in the price of Irish produce? It was to be seen in every newspaper in the United Kingdom. Did the Government imagine that the Irish Members, many of them men of business, would come to the House and say that there was a fall in the price of Irish produce of from 40 to 50 per cent, without proof of the statement? Such statements as were put forward by the Chancellor of the Exchequer were made for the purpose of controversy only; but they certainly would not satisfy men of business who went into the question. The noble Lord had stated that the fall in the price of Irish butter was due to the quality, and to adulteration. If the noble Lord had known anything about Irish butter, he would have known that the fall in the price had been most marked lately, and that, although there were complaints about the quality some years ago, it had markedly improved within late years. The price of butter in the Cork Market regulated the price all over Ireland, and in Great Britain. He would show there had been a steady decline in the price of Irish butter with a steady advance in the quality of late years; and he asked the House to take the word of business men, speaking on matters with which they were familiar, rather than the ipse dixit of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The difference between the prices for Cork butter in 1881-2-3 and 1886 showed that there had been a falling-off in prices between the first and the last of these years up to last Saturday of 33 per cent. Second and third qualities of butter had fallen off in a greater proportion during the same period, nor had this depression, been confined to butter. The falling-off in the prices of other products was almost as marked. It was for this reason that the Irish Members asked the House to stand between the Irish

    605
    landlords and their tenants in the coming winter. He asserted that there was in Ireland no disinclination to pay a fair rent; but the people could not pay a rent which was impossible. It was for this reason that the Irish Members asked the Government to take some action in the matter before the winter season. It was for this purpose that the Amendment was framed; and they hoped that the Government would accept it, and not take an infatuated course in the interest of one particular class. In warning the Government of the consequences that were sure to follow a certain course of policy, the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell) spoke in a tone of emotion, which it was most unjust to describe as "cold-blooded." If the Government, with their eyes, open ignored the warnings of Irish Members, they would incur a serious responsibility. Should any system of organized eviction be entered upon, the Irish Members would stand by their people in every legal effort they might make in resistance. Their duty was clear both in the House and out of it.
    VISCOUNT CRANBORNEsaid, the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had defended the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell) from the attacks made on him by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Dublin University (Mr. Plunket). That right hon. and learned Gentleman, however, did not attack the hon. Member for Cork because he prophesied that outrage and disorder would take place in Ireland during the coming winter, but because of the spirit in which those words were uttered. Nothing had been more instructive or astonishing in the course of the debate than the sympathy which had been shown in some quarters with those respectable gentlemen the "Moonlighters." ["No, no!"] The idea that they should meet with their deserts, and should suffer the penalty of death, which they had incurred, made the blood of hon. Members opposite run cold. They knew very well that it was the agitation which had taken place in Ireland during the last few years which had caused the disorder and outrages which had occurred. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) seemed to think there must be some legitimate grievance in Ireland, and that the government of England
    606
    over Ireland had, to a certain extent, failed. But he (Viscount Cranborne) must remind the House that it had not been the fate of the Conservative Party to govern Ireland for many years in this century, and if there had been failure in the government of Ireland, the disorder which had resulted could not be laid at the door of the Conservative Party. It never entered the minds of hon. Gentlemen opposite that no Government however good, that no policy however sound, could necessarily remove the discontent. A Government could insure that the law should be respected, and that all legitimate grievances should be removed; but it could not insure that all classes and ranks in a nation should be contented. That must depend upon the nation itself. The fact that discontent existed did not prove that the policy of the law was wrong. The murderer who was condemned to be hung was probably discontented; but that did not prove that the law under which he was going to suffer was wrong. And so in a civil suit. The party in a case against whom the verdict was given was probably discontented; but that did not prove that the verdict was wrong. Government could not insure that the people of Ireland should be contented. The best chance that that result would take place was that the Government should be respected, should be strong and firm in its policy. Depend upon it the sympathy of nine people out of ten was with the strong. The Conservative Party was far stronger than it had been for many years, and the people of England and Ireland would sympathize and support it. Hon. Members below the Gangway opposite had found great fault with the policy of the Government. It had been commonly said that the Government would not say anything at all about their policy, and hon. Members from Ireland had threatened a great deal of obstruction and protraction, because they thought the Government was going to say nothing about their policy; but the Government had said something about their policy, and yet he had found no difference in the loquacity of the Irish Members. But though Her Majesty's Government had announced their policy, which he believed was a sound policy, there had been a distinct attempt by Her Majesty's Opposition to force that policy, and the speeches of the Government that supported it, into a mean-

    607
    ing which it could not be said to bear. The right hon. Gentleman who led the Opposition and his Friends and the hon. Member for the City of Cork appeared to know a great deal about the policy of the Government, and imagined there would be a vast expenditure of money, which they alleged the Government would take out of the pockets of the taxpayers of this country. On the Conservative side of the House they did not profess to know as much of the details of the policy of the Government as hon. Members opposite; but if it were true—which he imagined to be entirely contrary to the fact—that the Government were in the future going to place a large burden on the English taxpayer, itwould say a great deal for the Government's disinterestedness. They were constantly taunted with holding on to Office, and at the same time with laying on large burdens. Both these charges could not be supported. He believed himself that the policy of the Government would benefit Ireland, and that the Commission would tend greatly to the advantage both of this country and of Ireland. The reasons for the non-payment of rent in Ireland were patent to all. In the first place, and in the main, it was due to the agitation over which the hon. Member for Cork presided. But, undoubtedly, there were other difficulties in certain parts of Ireland, as there must be in any country, which would render it difficult for some of the inhabitants to meet the obligations into which they had entered. The number of those individuals, however, was exceedingly limited, and their failure to meet their obligations was also limited. The hon. Member for Cork had said that the tenants in Ireland had trusted to this Parliament; and was this Parliament going to desert them? There was no question of desertion. It was not proposed that the rents should be in any way increased. If the Party opposite were to be believed, the Government were going to be so foolish as to pay half the rent of the tenants they were going to desert. It was not only the tenants that had trusted the Parliament; the landlords of Ireland had trusted the Government. ["Oh, oh!"] They foolishly believed that when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone) passed his Bill in 1881 the small rents which were left to them would remain
    608
    secure; but, in view of what had happened, what other course could the Government take but to inquire? Unfortunately, in recent years there had been too much insecurity to the landlords of Ireland. They were like the Pashas of a Turkish Province. No doubt, hon. Members opposite would say that, though the tenants had in no sense been deserted by Parliament and the Government, yet, in the coming winter, they would be at the tender mercies of their landlords, which would end in wholesale eviction. ["Hear, hear!"] He could not understand how hon. Members made that out. Though the unfortunate Irish landlords, knowing the insecurity of their tenure, had been, in some cases, tempted to exact the uttermost farthing from the tenants, as a class they had resisted the temptation. [Laughter.] He repeated what he had said, and rejoiced that they had so resisted; but, after all, the insecurity of the landlords was the danger of Ireland. Restore once more security to the landlords. Let them know that the word of a Parliament and of a Government was not to be set aside for any light Parliamentary advantage. Let them know that at least one Party in the State was prepared to defend and fulfil the obligations into which the Parliament of this country had entered, and nine-tenths of the real agrarian grievances in Ireland would be at an end. If he wanted any proof of the real advantages and benefits of the policy announced by Her Majesty's Government it was the attitude of the hon. Member for Cork. ["Hear, hear!"] The irritation of the hon. Member was openly manifested. No doubt, the hon. Member was afraid when he saw a strong Government in power. [Laughter.] He did not mean merely strong in numbers, but strong in policy. He was well aware that if the Government succeeded in removing the last vestiges of real grievances in Ireland, they would have gone a long way to destroy the power of the hon. Member and deprive him of the support he received from the other side of the Atlantic. By this Amendment the House was asked to vote, practically, that evictions should be stopped in Ireland. Could there be anything more unreasonable than that, because a few tenants in one small part of Ireland were unable to meet their obligations, the landlords ail over Ireland should be de-

    609
    prived of the rent to which they might have a claim? For, of course, if this Parliament were to enact that evictions should cease in Ireland, it would for the time being put a stop altogether to the payment of rent in that country. That being the case, he did not think there could be any doubt in the minds of hon. Members, whether on his own side of the House or on the Benches opposite, provided they were not absolutely bewildered by partizan spirit and by irritation at the result of the late General Election, that his noble Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Her Majesty's Government should be supported in the division which he hoped would be taken that evening.
    MR. ALEXANDER BLANEsaid, that the distress in both England and Ireland was due to the fact that the people in both countries were divorced from the soil which they tilled. The people of Ireland protested, with all their might, against being made mere surface-holders. The Members of that House daily prayed that the earth might bring forth fruits, but for whom? Not for the tiller, but for the landlord. But the law was not always consonant with natural or Divine law. While the New Testament had said the tiller should be the first, British law said he should be the last, to share the fruits of the soil, with the result that the people were reduced to a state of comparative servitude. Everyone who was too lazy to work was, in fact, placed on the shoulders of the tiller of the soil. One of the reasons why the landlords were maintained by England in Ireland was because they were supposed to be a peculiarly loyal class; but that was not true. It was not true from 1641–5, nor in 1688–9, when it might be truly said that every time that British Sovereigns were driven from the Throne those men were found in the ranks of their enemies. Since 1841 4,000,000 of the people of Ireland had been done to death by the landlords of Ireland. The world was said to be the reflex of a man's own conduct. So, as it was with individuals, it had been with nations. If nations wanted the loyalty of the people subject to them, there was a way in human affairs by which men's hearts could be captivated. But what had the Parliament done to attract the loyalty of the people of Ireland, and what had they refused to do
    610
    for the landlords? There were now 50,000 British troops in that country, lent to the landlords to maintain the British law, contrary to the natural and the Divine law. There must be some consistency in the policy of the country. They could not vote £20,000,000 to rescue the negroes of the West Indies from slavery, and, at the same time, render the people of England and Ireland slaves. It was because the people of Ireland urged that the soil of the country should belong to them that English Governments were face to face so frequently with the Irish difficulty. Owing to the severity of foreign competition, the tenants of Ireland, as well as those of England and Scotland, were unable to pay the rents exacted by the landlords. In his opinion, the real cause of agricultural depression was the holding of large tracts of territory by men who rendered no services to the State in return. They did not labour, but merely received money which others had earned, investing it securely and profitably in stocks. It was said that Britons never would be slaves; but millions of the people of England were divorced from the soil, and with what result? There were the workmen of the City of London, who starved last winter, and whom he had seen scrambling for bread; while the Chancellor of the Exchequer wanted millions to be voted for the war in Burmah. Inquests were held in numbers last winter on men who were done to death in England through being divorced from the soil of their own country. They came to London to compete in a market already overstocked with labour, and the consequence was that they starved. In fighting the battle of Irishmen they were, in fact, fighting the battle for Englishmen. If that House did not remedy the present state of affairs, Englishmen, far faster than Irishmen, would remedy it for them. In these days, when steamers of 6,000 or 8,000 tons were constantly making the most rapid passages across the Atlantic Ocean, it was simply impossible that the cultivators of the soil in countries where rent was paid could compete with countries where no rent was paid. Talk of the depression of trade! The simple fact was that the agriculturists of England and Ireland were done to death by the American competition,

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    carried on in these large and rapid steamers, each of which carried a cargo equal to the produce of half a county. What was the cause of the depression of trade? It was the giving large tracts of land to people who returned nothing to the State, either in the payment of taxes or in the labour, which was the only source of wealth.
    MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! The hon. Gentleman is not speaking to the specific Amendment before the House.
    MR. ALEXANDER BLANEsaid, that he dealt with social order in Ireland, and that was connected with the Land Question.
    MR. SPEAKER: I must insist upon the hon. Member adhering to the terms of the Amendment—that of the hon. Member for Cork, to which I would call his attention.
    MR. ALEXANDER BLANE, after recapitulating his argument with regard to the effect of American competition upon the English and Irish cultivators, said, that he thought it not too much to ask an Assembly like that to say that the tiller of the soil should, according to the New Testament, be the partaker of the fruits thereof. But the present system was sweeping away the breadstuffs from before the eyes of the man who produced them in order to support landlords. In conclusion, he most energetically complained that the landlords of Ireland were the administrators of the law and the judges in their own cause, a state of things which, he contended, was most unfair, and contrary to all the principles of justice. He appealed to the Radicals in the House, whose cause the Irish Members were fighting as well as the cause of the poor, oppressed people of Ireland, to vote for the Amendment now before the House.
    COLONEL WARINGsaid, he had no intention to prolong the debate; but he wished to correct a slight misunderstanding that appeared to exist with regard to the remarks of his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for North Armagh (Major Saunderson) on the previous day, as to the propriety of the English people putting their hands into their pockets for the benefit of Ireland. His hon. and gallant Friend had not expressed a desire that English money should be forthcoming in aid of Irish landlords, but had simply asked that
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    England should aid in the development of Irish industries, as a compensation for the injury done in past times by the crushing of the industries of Ireland. He (Colonel Waring) held quite as strongly as hon. Gentlemen opposite the view that, in that respect, England owed a debt to Ireland, and ought not to forget that certain industries in Ireland were extinguished by English jealousy. Those were industries which were instituted by the ancestors of the present English Colony, those who were afraid that they would be dealt with in a very summary manner by an Irish Parliament. ["No, no!"] He did not know whether hon. Gentlemen opposite were responsible for the utterances of Mr. Davitt. Mr. Davitt certainly said so.
    MR. O'HEArose to Order, and said Mr. Davitt had emphatically repudiated the statement.
    MR. SPEAKER: No point of Order arises on that.
    COLONEL WARING, resuming, said, if Mr. Davitt had repudiated it, it was his misfortune not to have seen the repudiation; but, unfortunately, repudiations were pretty common. However, there was no doubt as to the establishment of these industries in the South and West by men of the same blood as those in the North, who were spoken of as the English Colony; and if they had been permitted to exist and thrive, and had not been extinguished, it was quite possible that, at the present time, from the South and West of Ireland Representatives might be sitting on his side of the House. They now simply asked Parliament to give to Ireland what was her due. Turning to the Amendment, much was said about the cruelty of evictions by the landlord; and he would admit that in the poorest parts of Ireland, where chronic poverty prevailed, the people might be unable to pay the judicial rents; but it was a different case with reference to the rest of Ireland. The hard times were undoubtedly felt by the tenants; but so they were by all other classes. It was hard that the landlord in these times should be forced to retrench, while the tenant showed no disposition to economize; and he feared that whilst the landlords had done their best to economize and retrench their expenses, many of the tenants had been going on living in the same way as they did in the good times.

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    He knew an instance which occurred recently. A landlord was driving into a country town with his wife, and he saw a very smart young lady whose dress his wife very much admired. The young lady proved to be one of the three daughters of a tenant of his who owed three years' rent. On that young lady's back was the equivalent of at least a quarter of a year's rent, and that quarter multiplied by her two sisters and her mother as well would have made up precisely a year's rent. The result was that the landlord had to go without his rent, whilst these young ladies got their dresses from Mantalini's, or elsewhere. That kind of thing proved that if care was exercised the tenant would be enabled to pay his debts. He admitted that eviction was a terrible thing, and, personally, he had never put it in force; but whether it might not be right to do so, under certain eventualities, he would not undertake to say. It was very difficult to arrive at a conclusion as to whether the tenant could or could not pay, and eviction was often the final test. There was, however, hardly a landlord in Ireland who would evict a tenant whose inability to pay arose from real misfortune. But the fact was that until eviction proceedings were begun, it was impossible in many cases to know whether the tenant could really pay or not. It was wonderful what hidden resources were disclosed at the appearance of the Sheriff's officer. He was sure that the great bulk of the landlords would accept what the tenant could pay in good faith, and would not press for the remainder. The House might remember, however, that there were evictions of various kinds. A landlord might find himself under notice of ejectment if he did not meet his engagements, and who was to protect him? What was sauce for the goose was sauce for the gander; and if evictions were to be prohibited on behalf of the tenant, they should be prohibited with reference to the landlord and his creditors. He would be bound to say that there were more evictions in London in a month than there were in all Ireland in the course of the year, and nothing was said about them. He could speak on the question with some freedom, as he had the honour of having been spoken of by an hon. Member from the Benches opposite as a model landlord. He did not see that it signi-
    614
    fied much whether a man was turned out on the roadside of Kerry or on the pavement of Whitechapel. He heard of no proposition to suspend evictions in England, and he might suggest to English Liberal Members that they might take that point into consideration before they began to be so very liberal with other people's property in Ireland. He observed that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Chamberlain) had now entered the House, and therefore he would at once conclude his remarks, so that he might not stand between the House and the right hon. Gentleman, whose speech the House was awaiting with interest.
    Mr. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAINrose, with Mr. ARTHUR O'CONNOR, to continue the debate.
    MR. SPEAKERcalled upon Mr. Joseph Chamberlain.
    MR. ARTHUR O'CONNOR: I wish, Sir, to make an appeal to you upon a point of Order. I wish to know whether it is not the recognized practice that the debate should be resumed by the hon. Member who moved the adjournment on the previous day? If the hon. Member who had so moved the adjournment failed to be in his place at the resumption of the debate, is he entitled, at a subsequent period, to precedence over other hon. Members who have been here all the evening, and desire to speak?
    MR. SPEAKER: If the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain) had been in his place at the commencement of the debate, he would have claimed his right to address the House; but I see nothing to debar him from rising to address the House at a later period. I have called upon the right hon. Gentleman.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: I am very sorry, indeed, if, on the present occasion, I stand between the House and any other hon. Gentlemen who think that they have a better right to address it. I understood, however, that there were some of my hon. Friends—I understood it from their earlier statements in the course of thisdebate—and that there were many other hon. Members who thought that they were entitled to require of me a statement of my views on the policy which has been proposed to us by the Government, and I certainly thought that

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    I should probably consult their convenience best if I did not rise during the dinner hour, but took the earliest opportunity after that time, in order to make the few remarks I desire to make. I think that the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell)—I do not know whether intentionally or not—has placed those who follow him in a position of considerable embarrassment. He has proposed an Amendment which I venture to say is incomplete and inconclusive. He has introduced it in a speech which was very powerful, very full, very frank, and very complete. But, Sir, by the Rules of the House, inasmuch as that speech travelled very widely beyond the terms of the Amendment, we are unable to deal with many important portions of it, and we are confined absolutely to matters which are relevant to the terms of the Amendment. Sir, the Amendment consists of two parts, to neither of which, treated solely as abstract propositions, have I myself any great objection. The first part of the Amendment expresses, in somewhat hesitating language, an apprehension that there may be considerable difficulty experienced during the coming autumn and winter in the payment of rent, that it may lead to evictions, and that evictions may endanger public order. Well, Sir, the only remark I have to make upon that is that I think, having regard to what we have been told in the course of this debate as to the enormous prices that are still being paid for the tenant right of those properties, that the terms of the Amendment are a little too general. I do not think it can be asserted that the tenants of Ireland, speaking of them as a class, are unable to pay their rents in consequence of the fall in prices. But it may well be—and I should not myself see the slightest objection to expressing an apprehension that it may be—that a portion—a minority, at all events—of these tenants may be placed in a position of considerable difficulty. But what I object to is, that it is unnecessary and superfluous to make statements of that kind in answer to the Speech from the Throne, and I say that because I think it will be agreed that it is not the practice of the House to make affirmations of that kind, unless we are prepared, at the same time, to recommend some remedy for the state of things which we fear. The case of the Irish tenants is
    616
    not the only case in regard to which similar apprehensions might be expressed. There are many cases that suggest themselves to hon. Members. I will only mention one. We might address Her Majesty and say that during the coming autumn and winter, the depression of trade which has continued so long will lead to increased lack of employment, and that that want of employment, in turn, may be productive of great suffering, and may endanger social order. That may be perfectly true. My only objection to put an addition of that kind to the Address to the Throne would be that it would be useless and improper to do so, unless, at the same time, the House was prepared to deal with the subject-matter, and to find a complete and satisfactory remedy. The second part of the Amendment of the hon. Member is in the nature of what I may call an anticipatory repudiation of a policy which finds no expression whatever in the Queen's Speech, and the existence of which I understand is denied absolutely by the Members of Her Majesty's Government in this House. We know perfectly well what is the meaning of the last paragraph of the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Cork. It has reference, no doubt, to a paragraph in a speech which is reported to have been spoken in "another place" by the Head of the Government. Well, Sir, according to the Rules of this House, we are not entitled to discuss matters which pass in "another place;" and I admit for the very good reason that the speakers are not here to answer for themselves, and to give the necessary explanations and corrections of their reported utterances. All I can say in addition, at the present moment, in reference to this last paragraph is, that I also deprecate any attempt to transfer the losses which may fall on the landlords owing to the circumstances of the season and other causes to the pockets of the British taxpayers. I have deprecated it before, and I deprecate it again. I do not believe that the Government would be so foolish as to make any proposition of the kind. If ever they do, all I can say is that by whatsoever Government, or under whatsoever circumstances it may be made, I shall be bound by everything that I have said in the past, and by the opinions I hold at present,

    617
    to offer it the most strenuous opposition in my power. But, Sir, that is one thing. As an abstract proposition it may be all very well; but, on the other hand, I beg to say that I am not going to vote for an Amendment, the carrying of which would be equivalent to a Vote of Censure on the Government.[Cries of "Hear, hear!" from the Home Rule Members.] I quite understand that cheer. I do not wish that there should be, in the slightest degree, any mistake; I am not going to do anything to turn out this Government, as long as the Government which is to take its place is committed to a Separatist policy, which I believe would be injurious to the best interests of Ireland and of Great Britain. And, certainly, I am not going to do that on an Amendment of this kind, which is not only vague and inconclusive, but, in my opinion, is disingenuous, and which I believe may properly be described as an unnecessary affirmative and a gratuitous negative. Now, Sir, one thing that I want to know is, are my Friends who belong to the Liberal Party, who are described as Separatist Liberals, going to vote for this Amendment? [Cries of "Yes!"] Well, I observe that my right hon. Friend the late Prime Minister, who, unfortunately, is no longer with us, declared before he left the country that if he had remained he would not have voted for it. I beg my hon. Friends with whom I disagree on this one point of Irish policy to consider very carefully what they are doing. They are going, I hear some of them say, to vote for the Amendment. By so doing, they will give, no doubt, a hypothetical condemnation of a policy which, with more or less authority, is attributed to Lord Salisbury. That I dare say they will not object to; but, Sir, they are going to give an emphatic, and definite, and unequivocal condemnation of the policy of their own Leader, and of the late Government. [Cries of" No, no!"] They say "No!" but they cannot get out of it. I beg to call their attention to the words of the Amendment. The words of the Amendment are these—
    "And we deprecate any extension of State-aided purchase on the basis of rents fixed when prices were higher than they now are."
    What was the Land Bill of the late Government? The Land Purchase Bill of the late Government contemplated an
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    extension of the system of State aided purchase. [Cries of "No, no!"] There are some Gentlemen apparently who will contradict anything. I am quite sure that none of my right hon. Friends, who speak with any sense of responsibility, will deny that the Land Purchase Bill of the late Government was a Bill for the extension of State-assisted purchase—that is to say, that the price of purchase was fixed on the basis of rents fixed when prices were higher than they are now. Therefore, I say that hon. Members behind me who vote for this Amendment are giving a Vote of Censure on the late Government very much more emphatic.[Home Rule cries of "No, no!"] Well, Sir, there are none so blind as those who will not see. In my opinion, they will be giving a Vote of Censure much more emphatic and decided than upon anything that can properly be attributed to the present Government. Well, Sir, I should like now, if the House will allow me, to consider for a few moments what is the present position of the Liberal Party with regard to this great question of Land Purchase. What is the position of the Leaders of the Liberal Party with regard to the question? Has my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone) abandoned the policy of the Land Bill which he introduced into the last Parliament? He was challenged to answer that question again and again in the course of the last Election, but he never answered it. He has made two speeches in this House during the present Session, but he has not said anything upon that subject. I know that there are Liberal Members below the Gangway who have insinuated that my right hon. Friend is prepared to abandon this policy in the future, because he has found that it hampered him in the promotion of the Bill for the Government of Ireland, and that, in the future, we shall hear no more of it. Have my hon. Friends forgotten that my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian declared his Bill for Land Purchase to be an obligation of honour? What could be more insulting to my right hon. Friend than to suggest, as some of his followers have dared to suggest, that for Party purposes he would abandon an obligation of honour? But if my right hon. Friend—even if it were to be supposed, which I cannot suppose—were

    619
    to change his opinion on the subject, what is the position of Lord Spencer?—what is the position of my right hon. Friend the late Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. John Morley)? They have made no secret of it whatever. They were bold, honest, and consistent through-out the Elections in this matter. Lord Spencer said, again and again, that it would be unfair to the landlords of Ireland to hand them over entirely to the popular Party, or to the decision of the popular Party, and that they ought to be protected by some such scheme as that proposed by the late Government. My right hon. Friend the late Chief Secretary for Ireland has said, again and again, that the settlement of the Land Question was, to his mind, a necessary preliminary to, or, at all events, that it must accompany, any provision for the better government of Ireland by Home Rule. My right hon. Friend, in one of his latest speeches, said he would never be a party to handing over to a new authority in Dublin the settlement of the Land Question; that he held it to be an evil legacy which we were not entitled to leave to them; that in the interests of the tenants, as well as in the interests of the landlords, it was the duty of England to deal with the matter in the interests of the tenants themselves before creating a separate Parliament in Dublin. Very well, Sir, I am speaking in the presence of my right hon. Friend, and I am sure that he will say that I am not misrepresenting him. How is it possible, in the face of circumstances of that kind, that he could accept the abandonment of the policy of the Land Purchase Bill? Without speaking of details, I maintain that the fact that he is pledged to a great system of State-aided purchase of the land as a necessary preliminary accompaniment of any measure of Home Rule is as clear as the day, and it is dishonouring to my right hon. Friend the late Prime Minister and his Colleagues to suggest that they would be false to everything that they have stated on this subject in the course of the Election. But then I should like to know, if this is the position of the Leaders, what is the position of those whom I am obliged to allude to—I know they do not accept the term, but I do not use it offensively—but whom I am obliged, for the purposes of distinction, to call the Separatist Libe-
    620
    rals? ["Oh, oh!"] Well, what is their position? As far as it has been expressed in the course of the debate theirs is a position of uncompromising hostility to any scheme of Land Purchase. ["No, no!"] Oh, yes, as far as it can be gathered from the course of this debate. Let the Gentlemen behind me who are in favour of the Land Purchase scheme of the late Government get up in their places and say so. There are precious few of them who will dare to say so to their constituents. In this House Member after Member got up and said he was opposed to it, although he was in favour of the Home Rule Bill. During the Elections, of course, every Member was opposed to it, and hoped that he would hear of it no more, and said that the landlords had had their last offer, and so on. But I want to point out to these Gentlemen that their position is a very perilous one. They are in a very "parlous state." They are Dissentient Liberals. I beg them—I beg my hon. Friends to take warning by me. I am to be expelled from the Liberal Party. [Cries of "Hear, hear!" from the Borne Rule Members. It is not the Irish Members who will be able to do it. I am to be ostracized, because I, unfortunately, was unable to support the two Bills that were brought in by my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian; and here we have Gentlemen who oppose one of them. Well, is it to be held that it is a capital crime to oppose two Bills, and that it is only a venial eccentricity to oppose one? No, Sir, unless my hon. Friends are prepared to swallow the Land Bill they must go out of the Party too, and a very small Party will remain. If my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Labouchere), the new Leader of the Party, upon whom Elijah's mantle is to fall, but who, I think, will be found a little too small for that extensive garment—if he is to have his way the Liberal Party will become "small by degrees and beautifully less."
    MR. YEO: I rise to Order, Sir. [Cries of "Oh!" and "Order!"] I wish to point out that the right hon. Gentleman is not speaking to the Amendment.
    MR. SPEAKERtook no notice of the interruption.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAINagain rose, amid loud cries of "Order!"

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    and "Chair!" from the Home Rule Members.
    MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! I call upon Mr. Chamberlain.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN (resuming): I say, Sir, that one by one, in squads and sections, the Liberal Party will disappear, and at last it will be reduced to the condition of a sect of which I remember to have heard in my youth, and which also bore the ominous name of "Separatist." It consisted of only two persons—a man and his wife, and the wife was heard to say at times that she had grave doubts whether her husband would be saved. And now, Sir, I turn to the Unionist Liberals. What is their opinion with regard to this question of Land Purchase? My noble Friend the Member for Rossendale (the Marquess of Hartington) has expressed his views on the subject. Everyone will recognize that he said nothing that would commit him to oppose an extensive system of State-aided Land Purchase. It is supposed by hon. Gentlemen who are good enough to quote me, although, not accurately, and who refer to my opinions in the past, apparently without ever taking the trouble to read what I have said—it is asserted by them that I at least am committed, by what I said at the Elections, to absolute opposition to all State-aided purchase of land. That is exactly the reverse of the fact. On the contrary, I am committed by everything I have said to support, cordially and heartily, a large system of Land Purchase. [Cries of "No!"] Refer to Hansard, See what I said on the second reading of the Land Bill. I said then that I was in favour of a large scheme of Land Purchase. Why, it is made an accusation against me by some of my hon. Friends, who appear to know Cabinet secrets without being in the Cabinet, and who have made it an accusation against me, that I brought forward a large scheme of Land Purchase which was a scheme almost as extensive in principle as the scheme of my right hon. Friend, but more dangerous, and with less security to the British taxpayer than that of my right hon. Friend. However, that is a point I will not argue now; but I will argue it at the proper time. I only point to it now, in order to show that, by the confession of everyone who knows best, I have always, in private and
    622
    public, been in favour of a great scheme of Land Purchase. Why did I object to the scheme of my right hon. Friend? I have always held that at the bottom of this Irish Question is the Land Question. You cannot deal satisfactorily with the Irish problem unless you can settle the agrarian problem first. I believe no settlement can be found in the system of dual ownership. It is only by the creation of a great scheme of peasant proprietorship, and doing what Germany, Russia, Bavaria, and other countries have done, that you can settle the Irish Question. You cannot create a peasant proprietorship in Ireland, except by one of two ways—either by a vast confiscation of the property of private individuals, which, as far as I know, is not advocated by any single Member of the House of Commons, or by a great scheme of State-aided purchase. That is the only practical alternative; I have never denied it, and of that I have always been in favour. But I was opposed to the scheme of my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian, because it involved a risk so tremendous that it amounted to a certainty of loss. [Cries of "Hear, hear!"] My right hon. Friends around me are coming over to my opinion very quickly. ["No, no!"] Ah! but I will show you. When I argued this question in the last Parliament, I pointed to the statement which had been made that there had been a great fall in the price of produce. I said that if that fall in the price of produce were established, the Irish tenants would say that they were unable to pay the rents which were the basis of the scheme. If they paid less than the rents upon which the scheme was prepared, there would be a deficiency in the security, and the taxpayers would have to make it good. At that time my right hon. Friends vouchsafed no answer whatever to that representation. Now, it appears, they are equally convinced with myself that there is great danger that the fall in the price of produce, which undoubtedly has taken place, will have its effect upon Irish rents. Well, my right hon. Friend the late Prime Minister in his speech the other night referred, I think for the first time—I do not remember that he referred to it during the debates in the last Parliament—to an additional security which he said

    623
    made his scheme absolutely safe, and that was that it was backed up by the whole of the Revenue of Ireland, which was pledged for this purpose. My right hon. Friend the late Chief Secretary for Ireland says the land revenue—[Mr. JOHN MORLEY here interposed a remark.] Yes; that, of course, was the result. That is my contention—namely, that it was backed, by the land revenue, and by nothing else. Let me examine this. My right hon. Friend says it was backed by the whole Revenue of Ireland. The only portion of the Revenue of Ireland over which this House could have had any control under my right hon. Friend's scheme was the Customs and Excise. Over them we have an absolute control, according to his scheme, and they were pledged in security for Irish rents. [An hon. MEMBER: A portion.] Yes; but there was a first mortgage upon them. My right hon. Friend and my hon. Friends behind me seem to have forgotten that. And what was that first mortgage? It was, in the first place, the whole of the share of Ireland of the National Debt; in the second place, the whole of the fixed share of Ireland towards the payment of the Army and the Navy; and also, in the third place, £1,000,000 a-year towards the cost of the Constabulary; and when all those are paid, and when the first mortgage is cleared off, what remains? Only a few hundrds of thousands. [Mr. HENRY H. FOWLER: Millions.] Nonsense! I beg my right hon. Friend's pardon; but the expression escaped me in the heat of the moment. My right hon. Friend is a great authority on this subject; but, with all deference to him, I beg to say that I cannot accept his statement. My conviction is this—that the balance of the Customs and Excise, after payment of all these things, which are the first mortgage upon it, amounted only to a few hundreds of thousands of pounds—and that is a balance which is perfectly useless for our purposes—perfectly useless as a security. The slightest variation in the collection of the Revenue, the slightest variation in the consumption of whisky, or in the payment of the duty in the locality in which the payment takes place, would destroy absolutely that security itself. I agree with the late Chief Secretary for Ireland that the land revenue was the security. Yes; but the land revenue was made up by
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    those rents which my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) now tells us cannot be paid in the case of five-sixths of the tenants of Ireland. When did my right hon. Friend first come to that opinion? He and his Colleagues are in this dilemma—if they knew it at the time they introduced the Land Bill, why did they not tell us? Why did they not give us some intimation that the security they proposed was open to this great deduction? They could not have known it at that time. It is impossible that they could. They could not have withheld their information from the House of Commons if they had known it; and, therefore, it comes to this, that we have to place what confidence we may on the information which has only been obtained since they left Office—which is only at their disposal since they lost all access to official information. Well, Sir, but I took another objection to the Land Bill of my right hon. Friend. I said I would not be a party to lending any British money at all to what was going to be practically a foreign country. Now, that is the point to which I want to call the attention of the House and of my hon. Friends. It is one thing that the whole resources of the Empire should be devoted to adding to the happiness and prosperity of those for whom the Imperial Parliament is directly responsible, and another thing altogether to lend money to a foreign country. I will take the case of Canada. I ask whether the House would lend £150,000,000, or £15,000,000, or £1,500,000, in order to buy out the Canadian landlords? The thing has only to be stated in order that you may see the absurdity of it. But I do not want hon. Members to think because I am opposed to lending money to a self-governing Colony, or to Ireland, if it is placed in the position of a self governing Colony, that therefore I am opposed to lending money to Ireland if it remains an integral portion of the United Kingdom. Why, Sir, what was the general controversy to which I devoted myself? I am afraid now it will appear with very little advantage in the course of the autumn. What was that controversy which was described by our opponents as concerning three acres and a cow? Why, it was a large and a just proposal that municipalities throughout the United Kingdom should be em-

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    powered compulsorily to obtain land for the purpose of creating allotments and small holdings, with the view of aiding in the creation of a peasant proprietary, and that they should be backed in this work by the credit of the State. What I would do for England and Scotland, of course I would do for Ireland, so long as she remains an integral portion of the Empire. Under these circumstances, what I have to say in conclusion on this branch of the subject is, that I wait for the definite proposals of the Government, but that I am prepared to give a favourable consideration—I would say further, a cordial support—to any proposal they may make for the establishment of a peasant proprietary in Ireland, provided that the whole arrangement is under the complete and effective control of the Imperial Parliament, and provided that it is secured by the intervention of municipal authority. Well, Sir, the Government do not propose to confine their inquiry entirely to the question of Land Purchase. They propose to inquire into judicial rents. They propose to inquire into the subject of public works; and they propose themselves to act as a Commission during the autumn and winter for the purpose of inquiry into the subject of local government. Well, I do not think that some of my right hon. Friends are justified in the ridicule which they have cast upon these proposals. The late Government came into Office as a Government of Inquiry. Does it lie in our mouth to complain that the present Government is also a Government of Inquiry? My right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) referred very wittily to these projects of Commissions, and reminded us of the ancedote about the red lion. But my right hon. Friend has been a great artist in red lions himself. He has proposed to the House more than one Commission, and I do seriously say—
    MR. YEO: I rise to Order, Mr. Speaker. I wish to ask you, Sir, whether the right hon. Gentleman is speaking to the Amendment?
    MR. SPEAKER: If the right hon. Gentleman is proposing to allude to other Commissions about to be issued by the Government, I think that would be travelling out of the particular terms of the specific Amendment now before the House.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: On the point of Order the course of my argument is this. The hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell) proposes to declare the existence of certain grievances and his apprehension of certain evils. He does not himself propose in his Amendment any remedy for those evils; and I imagine that I am in Order in considering the remedies which he did propose in his speech, or any other remedies which may meet the grievances to which he refers. ["No!" and "Chair!"]
    MR. SPEAKER: It is the practice in our Parliamentary procedure, that when an hon. Member moves an Amendment to the Address, before he reaches that Amendment he may deviate into other matters, To a certain extent he thus places himself in an advantageous position; but when he has moved a specific Amendment, according to the Rules of the House, that specific Amendment becomes the substantive matter before the House.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: Mr. Speaker, I was well aware that the position was, to some extent, an embarrassing one, especially if the House is not willing to extend to me the indulgence which was asked for and granted to my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone). Sir, I will endeavour to pass over any point which you may consider to be outside the scope of the Amendment. I had intended to refer to the Commissions, and to see how far the work of these Commissions was likely to affect a state of things which is described in the Amendment of the hon. Member for Cork. But if you think that in doing that I shall be out of Order, of course I shall be bound to obey your ruling. I was saying—I will not refer to the personal question—I was saying this, and I really think it is a general observation to which no exception can be taken, that I do not think it is desirable, on either side of the House, that we should ridicule the idea of proceeding by inquiry. It seems to me that in all these very important matters Royal Commissions are of the greatest service to the Governments of either Party. The only exception that can be made, and the only objection that can be fairly taken to a Royal Commission, is when it is appointed for

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    the purpose of shelving some question—
    MR. W. MACDONALD (Queen's County, Ossary Division): Mr. Speaker, I rise to Order. I want to know, with all respect, whether the right hon. Gentleman is in Order in alluding to these Commissions, and to the whole policy of the Government?
    MR. SPEAKER: I do not think the right hon. Gentleman would be in order in discussing the whole policy of the Government; and it will be in the recollection of the House that I have already restrained other Members from doing so. That liberty which, in the exercise of my duty, I have denied to other hon. Members, of course, as far as I am concerned, I cannot extend to the right hon. Gentleman.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: Then, Sir, I think I shall put it to the House whether they will be good enough to extend to me the indulgence which they have already extended to other right hon. Gentlemen? I will promise, if they will, that I will deal very briefly with this part of the subject, and. I only want to allude to it to make my argument clear.
    MR. SPEAKER: I must distinctly repeat that the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman must be confined to the specific Amendment before the House.
    MR. SEXTON: On the question of Order, Sir, may I respectfully submit to you that if the right hon. Gentleman, by his argument, proposes to show the danger or loss to the British taxpayer, he is not entitled to proceed.
    MR. SPEAKER: The question is not one to be argued after what I have already stated.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: In deference to your ruling, Sir, I will not refer to that part of the policy of the Government which is contained in the proposal to appoint the Royal Commission. I will turn to the argument of the hon. Member for Cork. What is the remedy which he proposes for the state of things which he describes in his Amendment? He has told us candidly that, in his opinion, the only remedy—the only satisfactory and complete remedy—is the establishment of an Irish Parliament in Dublin. But the hon. Member seems to forget that, even if
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    this view were accepted, it would not in the slightest degree meet the crisis which he anticipates in November. We have to deal in the Amendment with a crisis which is declared to be imminent, with a general inability to pay rent, with numerous evictions, with consequent suffering, and with great danger to social order. How would that be met by an assertion, supposing such an assertion could be obtained from Parliament, of its intention to establish, at some future time, an Irish Parliament in Dublin? Sir, upon that point the hon. Member made a very remarkable statement. He said, in effect, that the Irish people would have accepted the Land Bill of the late Government, although they objected to the extravagance of its proposals, and that they would have paid to the uttermost farthing, so that the British taxpayers would have lost nothing, if it had been accompanied by Home Rule. Then, Sir, what becomes of the inability of the Irish people to pay taxes?
    MR. T. P. O'CONNOR: He never said anything of the kind.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: What becomes, I say, of the inability of the Irish tenant, under these circumstances, to pay taxes? The hon. Member well knows that it is impossible to obtain from this Parliament any assertion of the kind. He expressed himself very well satisfied with the Election, and he looks forward with confidence to another appeal to the country. ["Hear, hear!" from the Home Rule Members.] Well, Sir, that is not a very hearty cheer; but if hon. Members are satisfied, so am I. I remember the hon. Member for Liverpool (Mr. T. P. O'Connor), and many others in the last Parliament, thinking and saying that the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian would sweep the country. I ventured to warn them that they were counting without their host, and I told them, from my own knowledge, that the result would be very different from what they anticipated, and that the Unionist majority in this House would be increased. It has been increased—it has been quadrupled. I only wish to I warn them once more that, if they appeal again on this subject, they may take my word for it that the result will be the

    629
    same; and if they persist in going to destruction on their own account, it will be worse for them than the last Election. Well, Sir, the hon. Member for Cork made a more practical suggestion than that we should establish a Home Rule Parliament. He made this suggestion, as I understood him, that judicial rents should be revised periodically according to a sliding scale. I thought for myself that it was a very taking suggestion. I do not know how far it may be practicable; but I may say that I have received many letters from Ireland from persons who are well qualified to speak on such a subject—[Cries of "Name!"]—from land agents, from landlords —[Laughter from the Home Ru'e Members]—yes; and from tenants, who seem to think that in the suggestion of the hon. Member for Cork there may really be found a solution of the present difficulty with regard to judicial rents. Well, Sir, I know that it is very difficult for an English Member to judge these Irish questions, and I have never attempted to dogmatize about them. ["Oh!"] I must say that hon. Members below the Gangway are a little unreasonable. They interrupt me when I disagree with the hon. Member for Cork. They now interrupt me because I am agreeing with him. In reference to this question of Irish opinion, I acknowledge that I should like to refer to a statement which particularly concerns myself, and which was made by the hon. Member for Cork. The hon. Member said, and said truly, that I had intended to visit Ireland and see for myself, as far as I could, the condition of the country, and consult local opinion; and he had the good taste to say that I was deterred from that visit because Mr. Healy threatened to duck me in a horse-pond. I do not believe that statement; I do not believe that Mr. Healy ever made use of any such coarse and vulgar threat. At all events, I am not aware of it. It is true that I did receive threats at that time—threats from people who told me that I should be murdered if I went to Ireland; but I did not pay much attention to them. I thought they were merely evidences of ill-restrained enthusiasm, very much of the same kind as that of the hon. Member from Ireland who spoke yesterday, and who admitted that he had, in the course of a speech, spoken
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    of shooting landlords like partridges, but who explained that this was not to be taken seriously, because he objected to shooting even partridges. But, Sir, I did not go to Ireland for a different reason. I did not carry out my intention to proceed there because the persons who had promised me introductions to leading members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy and the representatives of the National opinion withdrew their promises. I found that if I went to Ireland I should be "Boycotted"—that I should be obliged to consult one side only, and that I should be unable to make the impartial inquiry which I had contemplated. I only refer to this in order to point out the inconsistency of hon. Members. Again and again, since I have been in this House, I have heard them taunt English Members and English Ministers with taking no pains to visit Ireland and make themselves acquainted with the condition of that country, and with not visiting Ireland, although they were in the habit of visiting the Continent. And then, when two Ministers proposed to devote their holiday—the first opportunity they had—to the consideration, on the spot, of these questions, hon. Members who profess to represent the majority of the people of Ireland do everything in their power to render their visit impossible and useless. But there is another point in connection with that. Hon. Members on this side of the House have referred in the course of this controversy again and again to a speech which I delivered, and in which I spoke in very strong language of the system known as Dublin Castle, and compared it with the bureaucratic system of Austria and Russia. But they quoted that as if I were in favour of a Statutory Parliament. [Cries of "Question!"] I am referring to a personal allusion that was made by the hon. Member for Cork. I say that my visit to Ireland was planned immediately after that speech, and the opposition of the hon. Members from Ireland to that visit shows that they did not, at that time, accept me as a convert to their views. Now, I want the House to consider what are the facts with regard to this question of judicial rents. I want hon. Members to look at it from both sides. In the first place, it appears to me that there are two strong arguments in

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    favour of those who hold that the judicial rents should be maintained. There is, in the first place, the fact that when the Land Act of 1881 was passed it undoubtedly took from the landlords a legal estate and transferred it to the tenants, and that it was held out to the landlords that this sacrifice on their part would be a final sacrifice, and that the measure was one which would be absolutely adequate for the purpose of giving peace to Ireland. That was the contention of the author of the Land Act. Well, I confess it is a rather hard doctrine that the same men should be told within two or three years after the passing of the Act that it is altogether insufficient, and that the whole question must be re-opened. Then there is another point also in their favour, and that is that we are not certain, in this matter of rent, that inability to pay is the only factor in the case. We want to know whether there is a willingness to pay; and we want to know when there is a willingness to pay, whether there is any interference with that willingness to pay from any outside authority. Well, Sir, we know perfectly well—I do not believe that there is anyone who is acquainted even superficially with the state of affairs in Ireland who does not know, on good authority—of cases in which tenants have brought their rents secretly to their landlords because they were honest men, and because they were afraid lest the National League should know that they were honest, and should punish them for it. And now we want to know, in considering this question of judicial rents, are the tenants to be free to pay, if they are willing to pay, or are they to be coerced by outside agencies? The hon. Member for Cork has shown that he can exercise great influence. He has exercised it; he has undoubtedly exercised it during the last 12 months, and I believe it is owing to his means that crime has greatly decreased. Does he intend to exercise that influence in the same direction, or does he intend to provoke the people? [Cries of "Oh!" and "Withdraw!"] I am asking a question. [Renewed cries of "Withdraw!"] I certainly shall not withdraw the question, but I shall wait with great interest for an answer. We are told to look at the Chicago Convention, and we have been told in this very debate that there is a proof of the great moderation of the
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    Irish people. Well, Sir, I should be very glad to see the signs of moderation in that Assembly. I admit that it is of great importance, for I know that where the funds are there the policy is. I have read every word of the report of the proceedings at that Convention, and what do I find? I find that one of the delegates of the Irish Parliamentary Party, specially sent over by the hon. Member for Cork—namely, Mr. John Eedmond—made a speech, which was reported verbatim, on the concluding day of the Conference. That speech, we are told, was not an impromptu speech, but carefully prepared, and in it he said—"It will be the duty of the Irish Members to make the government of England in Ireland impossible." Do you adopt that? Why do you not answer? I want an answer. Do you adopt it?
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: I rise to a point of Order. I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman, with the leave of the House, whether he will be good enough to give the context of that speech, inasmuch as it is possible to take a single sentence from any speech and distort its meaning?
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: Mr. J. Redmond is reported to have made what all the reports call a fiery speech. It contains many other statements equally strong.
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: Read the whole speech, then.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: I thought that the intention of the hon. Member was bonâ fide. I was going to say that the immediate context of the passage I have quoted was that—"It is impossible for England to govern Ireland;" and then there follows the paragraph which I quoted—"It will be our duty to make it impossible."
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: That is, not England alone.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: It is open to the hon. Member to read the whole speech if he likes, and as far as I am concerned I hope he will do so. But, in the meantime, I ask the Irish Members seriously to consider the question—"Do they adopt that policy of their delegate, or do they repudiate it?" If they adopt it, then I say we shall look with suspicion at the accounts which may come to us in the autumn of the inability of the tenants to pay the rent.
    MR. WILLIAM REDMOND: Read the whole speech to us; we do not want a bit only.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: If the Irish Members repudiate the speech they must repudiate Mr. J. Redmond also, and they must likewise repudiate the money which is subscribed on the basis of this statement. Well, Sir, these are the main points which seem to me to be in favour of the contention that the judicial rents should not be disturbed. But there are very strong arguments on the other side. I do not think anyone will deny that there has been a great fall in the prices of almost all the chief produce of Ireland since the judicial rents were fixed. That fall may be variously estimated; but I, myself, should think that it represents from 20 to 30 per cent. Now, in case the judicial rents were fixed upon the basis of the prices at the time when they were fair rents, then they must necessarily be unfair rents now. On the other hand, it is alleged that the Commissioners took into account the possibility of a reduction. [An hon. MEMBER: No.] And I think it is probable that what the Commissioners did was to fix what I should call a fair average rent, having regard to ordinary fluctuations. But, Sir, that is not a sufficient answer. Is the present an ordinary fluctuation? Do you believe that the present fall is permanent, or only temporary? If it is a permanent fall, then, clearly, the rents are not fair, because unless you suppose the prices will be as much above as they have been below the average, the average will never be reached. Unless some day or other the prices will be much higher than I am afraid they are now below the average, the average will not be reached. If, on the contrary, you believe that such a fluctuation is likely in the future, and the present prices are temporary and exceptional, then I do not see why you should object to the principle of a sliding scale, which would give immediate relief to the tenant in time of need, and would give a prospect of future profit to the landlord. The conclusion I come to is this. I do not contend, in the face of insufficient information, that it would be possible to do what the hon. Gentleman suggests—namely, establish immediately a sliding scale throughout the whole of Ireland. It would be necessary to make careful inquiry before
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    any arrangement of the kind could be carried out. But I do hope the Commission will give the matter careful consideration, and I, for one, should not be at all sorry if the suggestions of the hon. Member for Cork were finally adopted. At all events, I do not admit for a moment that there is any sanctity about judicial or any other rents. If rents cannot be paid so as to leave a fair subsistence to the tenants, there is no doubt the landlord must bear the loss. It is imputed to the Government that they have said that under no conceivable circumstances will they touch judicial rents, even if the Commission were to report in favour of reduction. But my own impression is quite different. I have not understood that the Government pledge themselves in such a way as to the future. It would be very unreasonable that they should do so. I am quite certain that if any Commission reported in the sense I have suggested, no Government would take the responsibility of maintaining judicial rents which the Commission reported, after full inquiry, to be too high. All I understand the Government to say is that in the meantime, pending inquiry, it is their business to maintain the authority of the law. If that is a crime, there are no greater criminals than those who sit on this Bench. The Governments of which I have been a Member have again and again expressed the same doctrine—my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt), Lord Selborne, and the late Prime Minister himself, in reference to Ireland, and the circumstances connected with, the Crofter movement, laid down the doctrine that, pending inquiry into an alteration of the law, it is the prime duty of every Government to maintain the law. Well, Sir, the hon. Member for Cork said—and this is a thing which made a great impression on the House—that evictions would go on, and that while these Commissioners were considering the crisis would arise, and that we should have difficulties upon us before we had considered how to remedy the evil. The hon. Member for Cork proposes, in order to deal with this state of things, that evictions should be stayed upon certain conditions which he laid down. I was rather surprised to find that he was supported in this contention by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-

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    on-Tyne (Mr. John Morley). My right hon. Friend has come to the conclusion, after carefully considering the question, that it would be wise to give to the Courts which are charged with the duty of issuing process for eviction some equitable jurisdiction to decide whether an eviction ought to take place or not. I am glad my right hon. Friend has come to that conclusion, and that the hon. Member for Cork has adopted it. But why did they not give me more encouragement when I proposed it in the month of April? In the month of April I proposed a plan of staying evictions—I do not say whether I was right or wrong—but I proposed that evictions should be stayed, and I had in my mind exactly the same idea as my right hon. Friend has put forward—namely, that it should be done by giving the Court some kind of equitable jurisdiction. I proposed at the same time something else to which very likely a greater objection would apply. In order to facilitate a proposal of that kind, I suggested that in the meantime to such landlords as might require it a portion of the rent due should be lent to them as a first charge on the land. That might have involved a loan of a million or two, or by extreme calculation it might have reached £4,000,000. I think it would have been as certain as Consols, as I only proposed that a portion equivalent to a fourth of the year's rent should be advanced, because I only proposed that a portion of the half-year's rent should be advanced. No one could say that would not be a safe security, and it was proposed in order to meet a difficulty. But that was not an essential part of the scheme. How did my right hon. Friend the late Chief Secretary receive that proposal? He described it as "the most extraordinary ever propounded by a man of my eminence and character." My right hon. Friend said I proposed first to pass an Act to stay evictions, which would not be passed in a hurry. That statement was received with loud cheers and laughter by the Home Rule Members. My right hon. Friend added that the Act I proposed was to remain in force for six months, and at the end of that time, if things were not quiet, another Act was to be passed. That was not my proposal, but it was attributed to me by my right hon. Friend. The landlords, meantime, he said, were to
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    have their rents lent to them out of our money. Now, what I want to know is this—I think my right hon. Friend hit the blot in my proposal. I think the proposal was a just proposal. I am of the same opinion still. I wish the Government could have seen their way to treat the proposal for giving some equitable jurisdiction, so as to satisfy the people of England that if evictions took place they only occurred in the case of men who can pay and will not pay and are unwilling to pay, and not in the ease of unfortunate men who are unable to pay. My right hon. Friend put his finger upon the blot in my proposal when he said that to pass legislation of that kind would be no slight difficulty in the present temper of the House. If the proposal were made what security was there that it would be accepted? I recollect what happened at the time of the Compensation for Disturbances Bill, when, in similar circumstances, a demand was made to us by the Irish Members to interrupt the course of Business in order to introduce a Bill dealing with a temporary difficulty. We consented, but what happened? Throughout the progress of that Bill we received from the Irish Members no assistance. There was continual obstruction and opposition, and at last they moved an Amendment against the third reading of the Bill. The Bill was introduced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone). There was no gratitude for it although it was brought in in compliance with their demand. They rendered no assistance in passing it, and only made it a peg on which to hang continued and excessive discussion. I cannot help saying that, although I regret very much that the Government are not able to deal with this matter, I cannot blame them for it. In the face of such a precedent as that I cannot expect them to undertake complicated legislation of this kind, which would involve them and the House in protracted debates, which in the end might possibly, after all, prove entirely fruitless. Well, Sir, in conclusion, I venture to think that, at any rate, this controversy has brought the real issue clearly before the House. You have, on the one side, in reference to the whole of the Irish difficulty, those Irishmen and Englishmen whose object it is to establish a Statutory Parliament in Ireland, or, as

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    some of them prefer, to make Ireland an independent country, and whose policy it is to make, in the meantime, the administration of affairs in Ireland by England impossible. I think that if any section of the Liberal Party shall be found permanently to commit itself to such an unpatriotic policy as that, it will suffer seriously in the opinion of the constituencies, and that it will wander for many years in the wilderness before it sees the promised land. On the other side, you have those who—to whatever Party they belong, or in whatever part of the House they may sit—believe in the supreme necessity of maintaining the effective Union between the Three Kingdoms, and who, with that object, are prepared to sustain the verdict of the constituencies. For my own part, I would say that if ever the people of this country should weary of the excessive burden of the mighty Empire that has been bequeathed to them by their ancestors, if they should ever be ready to acknowledge their incapacity to fulfil the obligations which attend upon such an inheritance, then I would rather a hundredfold that, instead of halting between two opinions, they should accept the logical sequence of the humiliating position, that they should yield wholly to their victors, that they should let Ireland go and become what the hon. Member for Cork once said he wished to make her—namely, independent among the nations of the world. Yes, Sir; but if the people of this country are not so craven in spirit, if they are not so willing to repudiate the obligations of a great nation, if they are not willing to betray those who have trusted to their good faith and honour, then I say that it is our duty—it is the duty of this Imperial Parliament—to recognize the position, and while, on the one hand, maintaining the cause of social order in that great contest between law and sheer lawlessness which was once so eloquently described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Lothian in the speech he delivered at Leeds—while doing that, on the one hand, to endeavour, on the other, in every way to promote the material prosperity and the happiness of the people of Ireland, and to do for that people, as forming part of the United Kingdom, all or more than all that an Irish Parliament sitting in Dublin could reason-
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    ably and justly be expected to do. It is because I believe that the policy of the Government, as it has been shadowed forth to us, tends in this direction, and has these objects, that I am prepared to wait until it has been fully developed, and that, when it has been developed, I am prepared to give it a fair and a favourable consideration.
    SIR CHARLES RUSSELL: Mr. Speaker, my right hon. Friend suffered some inconvenience, which I regret, from the interruptions which prevented him from delivering his speech before the dinner hour. I hope he considers that he has been more than recompensed by the cheers with which he has been greeted from the opposite side of the House. My right hon. Friend's speech seemed to me to be much less concerned with the Amendment which is before the House than full of endeavour to justify himself for his separation from the late Government, and for the course which he took—I believe one of some considerable importance in the weight of the support he gave to hon. Gentleman sitting on the opposite side of the House. But, Sir, I say, and I say it with all seriousness, that I doubt whether any hon. Member can recall any other speech made in such circumstances as the present that was so clearly marked by a tone of personal bitterness. It was a speech—I am sorry to say this, but I say it because I feel it—it was a speech in the course of which my right hon. Friend seemed to seek for and obtained the cheers of hon. Members opposite by language insulting—[Cries of "No!" "Withdraw!" and "Order!"]—insulting to his former Colleagues and Friends sitting on this side of the House. I do not desire to say that my right hon. Friend intentionally pursued that course. It may be that he was betrayed into it by the intensity of personal feeling which possesses him, and it may also be that he has been sinned against himself in the same way in other places. But I think it is too much to expect forbearance from those who sit on this side of the House when my right hon. Friend selects a word to characterize the great bulk of the Liberal Party, to which Party he still professes to belong, which he must have known to be the most objectionable which he could have applied to them. [Interruption.] I shall

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    feel obliged to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James) if he will refrain from indulging in stage whispers. Sir, my right hon. Friend says that we are the party of Separatists. Hon. Members opposite may be entitled to say that. We have always regarded them as our political opponents, although we may not always have carried on our controversies with freedom from recrimination; but I want to know what right has a former Colleague and Friend of Gentlemen on this Bench, whose intentions and motives he must know, to dub that Party with a phrase which he knows to be considered by them insulting? Sir, we are not Separatists. We believe that you (pointing to the Ministerial Benches) and your allies are the Separatists; and so far as my right hon. Friend is concerned, if he were less assured of his own complete wisdom than he is, it might have given him some momentary doubt in that wisdom to note the fact that by three to one the Liberal Party in this House are opposed to him. But, Sir, my right hon. Friend did not stop at doing all he could to give pain to his former associates; he went further. With the zeal of a new convert he out-Heroded Herod, and he defended the policy of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite along the whole line. ["Hear, hear!" from the Ministerial Benches.] Nay, more, he protested against being confined to that part of the defence of the policy of the Government which was ruled to be at all relevant to the Amendment. [Renewed Ministerial cheers.] I am glad to see that hon. Gentlemen opposite appreciate the position. My right hon. Friend betrayed an almost parental fondness for a particular part of that policy. He defended that policy with so much cordiality and so much tenderness as to make one suspect that his relationship to it was of the very closest and most intimate character. Now, Sir, as regards the Amendment before the House, my right hon. Friend said very little, but what he did say was very remarkable. He said that the Amendment was divided into two parts, to neither of which had he any objection in itself, but the Amendment was incomplete, and therefore he could not support it, for it led to no definite object; and then he went on to say, in very emphatic language, that he would support no Amendment, whatever that Amend-
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    ment was, which would have the effect of displacing the Government opposite, and replacing it by a Government which he designated the Government of the Separatist Party. May I suggest respectfully to my right hon. Friend that he might have saved the House and himself some time, for his position is that he intends to vote for the Government and against any proposition which comes from this side of the House, however just and right and politic that proposition may be. My right hon. Friend might have declared his policy in a single sentence, and that is that he will vote against his Party and with the Party opposite. My right hon. Friend has condescended to submit to the House his views as to the issue of the late Elections. It would not be proper for me in that regard to follow him at any length, beyond saying this—that, looking at the difficulties with which this question of the government of Ireland is surrounded, the comparative suddenness, I must admit, with which the policy of the late Government was introduced, the amount of ignorance or want of knowledge which prevailed, the fruitful theme that it presented for misrepresentation, aye, and for appeals to prejudice of race and of religion, it is to me a marvel, not that that policy was for a time delayed—for I cannot say that it was defeated—but that so large a number of the political minds of England gave their adhesion to it. My right hon. Friend went on, in some little detail, to criticize the Amendment, and, as I am arguing upon the Amendment, let me recall the attention of the House to what it is. It consists, as has been said, of two parts, the first of which refers to and alleges a fall in the agricultural prices, and then it goes on to state that—
    "The greatest difficulty will be experienced in the coming winter by the Irish tenant farmers in the payment of their present rents, and many will be unable to pay these rents. That numerous evictions confiscating the rights vested in the tenants by the Land Act of 1881, causing wide-spread suffering and endangering the maintenance of social order, will be the result."
    I wish to ask permission to say a few words, and only a few words, on the closing paragraph, and I will endeavour, as far as I can, to avoid repeating what has been said by previous speakers. First of all, is that statement true? and, secondly, is it politic and right that the words should ap-

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    pear in the Address in the reply to the Speech from the Throne? Well, Sir, it is hardly denied that the statement is true. [An hon. MEMBER: No.] I hear one hon. Member say "No." I said it is "hardly" denied that the statement is true. That is proved first, so far as the authority of my right hon. Friend is concerned, by the admission of my right hon. Friend himself. But he did not carry his admission to the extent that he did in April last. In April last, in a speech to which he has referred, he stated that the fall in the prices of agricultural produce was from 20 to 40 per cent.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: I said 20 to 30 per cent.
    SIR CHARLES RUSSELL: I beg my right hon. Friend's pardon if I am wrong; but I am not referring to my right hon. Friend's statement to-night. In April my right hon. Friend certainly spoke of a fall of 40 per cent. My right hon. Friend went further on that occasion, because he gave his own opinion, and he gave what seemed to me good reason, or, at all events, a strong reason, for that opinion—that the bottom had not, so to speak, been reached, and that a future fall might probably be expected; and he pointed to the insecurity of an arrangement based on the foundation of existing rents. Further, let me call the attention of hon. Members opposite to evidence from Ireland itself, and not evidence from the Southern and Western parts of the country only, or from hon. Members below the Gangway. I am sorry not to see the hon. and gallant Member for North Armagh (Colonel Saunderson) in his place; but I may state to the House that over the whole of Ulster there are associations for the protection of the rights of the tenants—not portions of the Land League, though I believe that, too, has its branches—and that these associations for the protection of the rights of the tenant farmers in Ulster—Presbyterian and Protestant tenant farmers principally—have passed resolutions declaring that the judicial rents are, in the circumstances of this time, excessive and impossible to pay. But I wish to point out one fact which, I think, has not been mentioned in this connection, but which seems to me to be very important to bear in mind, and it is this—the reductions that have
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    been made by the judicial process in Ireland may be said to be about 17 to 18 per cent. Now, from what rents were those reductions made? I wish the House to note this fact. They were made from the rents fixed at the time when, by the admission of Parliament, the landlord and tenant were not able to deal on equal terms, and from rents fixed at the time when the landlords were claiming and were exercising the right of increasing the rents upon the tenants' avowed improvements; in other words, the rents which the Judicial Commission applied themselves to reconsider were rents based, in large measure at least, upon a comprehension and inclusion of the tenants' improvements. When you take that fact in mind, and take also the fact that in England voluntary reductions have been made to a much higher figure and to a very large extent, it will be apparent that reductions in England of 15 or 20 or 30 percent upon the rents which the tenants paid, the landlords having at the same time to pay out of their own pockets yearly, or as occasion may arise, towards the maintenance and erection of farm buildings and other like improvements, it will be seen that reductions in England of 20 per cent will be equal to reductions in Ireland of 30, or above 30, per cent. That seems to me to be a consideration of some importance, especially when it is borne in mind—and I hope the House will forgive me for just dwelling upon this for one moment—that the Bessborough Commission found the fact to be that of the whole of the improvements which are made upon Irish agricultural land some 89 per cent are made by the tenants, and 11 per cent only by the landlords. Well, Sir, to return to the Amendment, can it be doubted that in circumstances such as these the judicial rents are too high? Can it be doubted that if the landlord insists upon his full pound of flesh the evictions which would follow upon that course would be a source of serious danger to the public peace? I think none of these things can be doubted. Then, is it politic that these facts should appear in the form suggested in the Amendment to the Address in answer to the Speech from the Throne? I think it is right and. politic that they should, and I will tell the House why. It is not proposed by

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    the Government to bring in a Bill of the nature which my right hon. Friend in April last suggested—I mean a Bill for the temporary staying of evictions throughout the country. I believe that was a generous and well-meant proposition on the part of my right hon. Friend, although I cannot forget that it was a bid made by my right hon. Friend in opposition to the Bill for the Better Government of Ireland and the Land Purchase Scheme of the late Government. I admit that there are great difficulties in the way of a general measure of that kind. If that be admitted, and if it be further admitted that the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant would have great difficulty in refusing the aid of the Executive in carrying out legal processes, except, indeed, in the very gravest extremity, in which he would be justified in coming to this House and asking for an indemnity for what he had done—if these two things be admitted, is it not right that in some form or other an expression of this, the representative House of Parliament, should go forth to Ireland, that in the circumstances of the present time the rights of the Irish landlords, according to the letter, should be exercised with moderation and with forbearance? Sir, I regard this Amendment very much as standing in the place of the appeal which Lord Carnarvon, to his credit, made to the Irish landlords in 1885. I consider it the more necessary, because of the language used by the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Lord Randolph Churchill) in unfolding the policy of the Government. I do not desire for one moment to have it suggested that by what the Chancellor of the Exchequer said he wished to urge the Irish landlords to exact their extreme rights—I do not think he did—but I am speaking of the effect of what he said, and. I do not doubt for one instant what the effect of what he said will be upon the minds of a great many j Irish landlords. They will say—"Whatever the local opinion in Ireland is we regard it not; we look to the public opinion in England." And if they find leading public opinion in England telling them that they are to be secured in their legal rights, and that England will stand by them with the full force of the Executive, the effect upon them must be to prevent them using that forbearance and that withholding of their full powers
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    which otherwise they might exercise. Well, then, it is said that the law in Ireland is much more favourable to the tenant than the law is in England. The payment of rent has been treated by some hon. and learned Friends of mine as a strictly legal obligation. They say—"You must either pay the rent or go; you must either pay the rent, or let someone else come in to pay it. I do not know how it strikes hon. Gentlemen opposite; but I think if they dwell upon the question it will strike them as it strikes me, that in the mind of every man who considers the question of the rent of agricultural land there is a justifiable distinction to be drawn between an agricultural rent contract and other contracts. It is this—that at the bottom of the sentiment of the public mind there is a recurrence of that which is the true economic foundation for the payment of rent—namely, that the landlord is entitled, not to absolute payment in all events, but to a proportion of the produce of the land, the support of the man who tills the land being the first charge upon the land. That is the principle which hon. Members opposite know is the Common Law of Scotland to this day, which is the law in many parts of Europe to this day, and which, whether we wish it or not, has unquestionably affected the public mind in England, as shown by the transactions in relation to land in England, and the forbearance of landlords in England, who take into consideration, not whether the tenant is absolutely able to pay out of his own private resources, but whether the land is able to pay the rent. When I come to consider the policy suggested by the Government in relation to this matter I have great difficulty in appreciating it. And here let me say, with all sincerity, that I do not in the very least, by anything I am now saying, or by the support I am giving to this Amendment, desire to embarrass the Government on this occasion. I think, if the truth were spoken, the Government would perhaps recognize that in the free criticism which has proceeded from this side of the House upon the foreshadowing of their policy observations have been made which may be of considerable value to them. When the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach), explaining in more detail the policy of the noble Lord the Chancellor of the Exche-

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    quer (Lord Randolph Churchill), distinguished between judicial rents and non-judicial rents, I confess I did not follow the aim and object of the policy he propounded so far as any relief of the Irish tenantry was concerned. As regards judicial rents, there is to be an inquiry; but that inquiry is not to be with a view to the revision or remission of those judicial rents. In some way which I do not quite understand, and on which we have only an imperfect light shed by the statement attributed to the I noble Marquess the Prime Minister (the Marquess of Salisbury) in "another place," if it should turn out that the judicial rents have been fixed too high, whatever happens to the tenant the landlord is not to lose. This is the only clear idea I have of the policy of the Government. How this can be said to be any relief to the tenant, how it can be said to meet the case of exceptional fall in the price of agricultural produce, I entirely fail to see. Well, then, as regards rents which, for distinction, may be called non-judicial rents, fixed by ordinary agreement, the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary says there is a section in the Act of Parliament which enables the tenant to apply to the Court to stay. Has the right hon. Baronet inquired in how many cases that section was availed of? I think that if he consults the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland (Mr. Holmes) he will be told that in the case of those who most need protection, the small tenants, there has not been one application to the Court; that the applications under the staying section have been exceedingly few; and that in the cases in which applications have been made the Court, owing to the wording of the section, has often found itself unable to grant the prayer of the applicants. But, further, the practical answer is that the expense and delay involved have rendered the section of no avail as a means of protection to the tenant. Then my right hon. and learned Friend the First Commissioner of Works (Mr. Plunket) certainly advanced a still more extraordinary argument. Pointing to the statement made by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell), that the important time of the year—a critical time it was called—would occur in November, my right hon. and learned Friend said—"Oh, that it quite a mistake, because no decree could be ob-
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    tained for the November rent until the following January." Let me point out the entire misconception under which the right hon. and learned Gentleman labours. The arrears will be accumulating if the tenants cannot pay the rent, and the Act applies to the rent in arrear now, for which ejectment can be brought if one year's rent be in arrear. Then, it is said, the landlords in Ireland may be trusted to do what is right. I have never made an indiscriminate attack upon the Irish landlords; and I will only say of them that the legislation of this couutry—the legislation of 1870 and 1881, and the proceedings which followed upon it—have shown that, in the opinion of Parliament, the Irish landlords were not to be completely trusted. The fact is that in part they are the victims of a state of things which was not of their creation. They are suffering to-day for sins not of their committal. Many of them are impoverished themselves, and are unable to make concessions which men of larger means would make; but there is—upon which I lay great emphasis—there is an absence in Ireland of that strong local, searching, and thorough public opinion which is stronger than the law in England, and which controls the exercise of literal legal right. This public opinion is an important factor in social life in England; but, for reasons which I will not here dwell upon, it is wanting in Ireland. I now leave the first part of the Amendment, and I will say, with the permission of the House, only a word or two upon the second branch of it. That branch is one which deprecates any attempt to saddle any loss which may arise to the owners of land by the inability of the tenants to pay the present rent upon the taxpayers of Great Britain. I will take leave to say that my right hon. Friend the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Chamberlain) did go out of his way—I will not say intentionally, but unnecessarily out of his way—in dealing with this Amendment to have a fling at the Purchase Scheme of the late Government; and in doing so I think I shall show the House, and oven satisfy him that, in some important particulars, he has mis-stated what that scheme was. In the first place, what is this clause in the Amendment of the hon. Member for Cork? What relation I has it in any way to any State-aided

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    Purchase Scheme of the late Government? What is said here is this—and this is in reference to a statement attributed to the Prime Minister (the Marquess of Salisbury) in "another place"—that if, after inquiry into the judicial rents, it should be found that the judicial rents are too high, then, where there are any remissions to the tenants, in the scheme of purchase by the State there shall be payment to the landlord upon the basis of the unjust rent. Now, will my right hon. Friend say that that is a sound proposition? He cannot. It would be utterly inconsistent not only with what he has said on previous occasions, but with his argument to-night, because it would be, in effect, compensating the landlord for the fictitious and untrue value put upon his property by excessive judicial rents. Well, but my right hon. Friend says, in reference to those rents—"Oh, the Commissioners were appointed, and I have no doubt they looked to the average." There is no doubt they did look to the average; but then, if they looked to the average, it must have been to the average of what had gone before; it could not be the average of what was to follow, and that is explained very clearly by the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Mahony) sitting below the Gangway, who was formerly a Sub-Commissioner himself, and who said that what the practice had been was to take the average of five or six years preceding the fixing of the rent. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Mahony) went on to show, by figures, that from the average of agricultural produce for those six years, contrasted with the present time and the two or three years which have succeeded the fixing of the judicial rents, there have been falls of from 20 to 42 per cent. Well, but my right hon. Friend mis-stated, as I conceive, the effect of the Land Purchase Scheme of the late Government. He seemed to think that the Land Scheme was necessarily based upon purchase at the judicial rent. My right hon. Friend will excuse me for saying that is not correct. It was not taken upon that basis absolutely. There was unquestionably what I may call a maximum of 20 years' purchase upon the net rent, and there was a minimum so low that no mention was made of it—it might have been two, three, four, five, or six years' purchase. I pass from that, and have one or two other words only to say. I am not going into a defence of the Purchase Scheme of
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    the late Government. I never felt entirely in love with that scheme, and I have not expressed a very ardent affection for it here or elsewhere; but I did think—and I think still—that it was practically free from risk to the British taxpayer; and, even if it were not entirely so, I thought that, for the settlement of a great national, as well as a great social, question, it was worth making an effort, even if there should be appreciable risks to be borne by the English and Scotch and Welsh taxpayers. I think, further, that my right hon. Friend (Mr. Chamberlain) might have accepted the correction of my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. H. H. Fowler) upon the question of the margin of security. It was, no doubt, subject to prior charges, but it was practically the security of the whole Revenues of the country and of the whole land of the country. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone), in introducing the Land Scheme of the late Government, said the land rents which the State authority would levy would amount to a net rental of £2,500,000; and he pointed out that there was the highest possible security for vigilance in levying the rents—firstly, in its sense of right; secondly, in its sense of prudence; and, thirdly, in its sense of necessity. In my opinion, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. H. H. Fowler) was justified in saying that after the prior charges had been defrayed there would be left a margin of somewhere about £2,000,000.
    MR. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN: I think my hon. and learned Friend (Sir Charles Russell) did not understand what I said, and I am bound to say I did not understand the interruption of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wolverhampton; but I think he will admit I apologized for any hasty expression of mine in reference to it. What I said was this—that the late Prime Minister said, and said truly, that the whole of the Revenues of Ireland were security for these rents; but then I pointed out that of those whole Revenues only the Customs and Excise were under the control of the Imperial Parliament, and it was only those to which I can refer as bearing the slightest security, and it was upon them I said it was a first mortgage which left only £200,000 value.
    SIR CHARLES RUSSELL: My right hon. Friend forgets that there was a provision in the scheme to the effect that so long as indebtedness to the British Treasury continued, all the payments were to go through the hands of an Imperial authority—namely, the Receiver General. Allow me to say in this connection that the great merit of that scheme—a merit which I think will be more recognized hereafter than now—was that so far from following the precedent of previous land schemes in dealings between the English Executive, representing the British Treasury on the one hand, and individual tenants and individual landlords on the other hand, for the first time it created a central Local Authority which was, if I may use the expression, a buffer between the landlord, and tenant on the one hand, and the British Executive on the other—a Central Authority which for the justification of its own existence, not to say of its credit in the face of the world, was placed in a position in which it was bound to exert, and must exert, on the local public opinion in Ireland the strongest moral pressure for the fulfilment of the obligations under it. But we are not discussing that measure, and I will just make this concluding comment upon the general outline of policy sketched by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I have never thought—I do not think it now—fair to attempt to pin the Government to the details of a policy which has only been sketched. I think the noble Lord who leads this House probably is himself to blame for his indiscretion—if it is indiscretion—in inviting criticism by the statement of policy which enlarged and amplified the Queen's Speech. Certainly, this policy of the Government is marked by one extraordinary feature. I do not say that this feature is one which is peculiar to the present Government, for I am afraid it is to be found in the policy of many preceding Governments. We are here dealing with a system of government by representation, which we all prize; and yet in the case of Ireland you are inaugurating a policy which, so far as you have sketched it, has not received the approval of a single Representative from Ireland—of those who represent the great majority of the Irish people. Your policy has not been approved by any one of the Representatives of four-fifth
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    of the Irish people—nay more, in your search for information, in your wide field of Commissions, I have not heard it said that you have made arrangements, or contemplate arrangements, for the representation of the Irish Members upon those Commissions. No; you are following the old and fatal policy of fashioning for yourselves a policy for Ireland. You are giving Ireland what you in your wisdom think she ought to take, and not consulting those who ought best to know her wants and wishes. Well, Sir, the noble Lord the Member for Rossendale (the Marquess of Hartington) said—"Why should my Friends on this side of the House be impatient for the policy of the Government; why should they not wait? If the policy which they maintain and contend for—namely, the policy of the right of the Irish people to govern themselves—be just and true, that policy must and will prevail." We agree with the noble Lord. We believe our policy to be just and true. We believe it will prevail. We believe that the mists and clouds of prejudice will be soon dispelled; and I, for one, believe that the day is not very far distant when we shall be looking back upon the settlement of this question with amazement—amazement that we should have given way to such dire forebodings, just as you look back with amazement at the forebodings of your Predecessors when any great Constitutional change has been effected. I will say this only in conclusion. My right hon. Friend, in his peroration, spoke of the day—the dismal day, I think he called it—of humiliation, when a craven policy of despair will have taken possession of the minds of British statesmen, and when the Irish demands will be yielded under that feeling of despair. Despair of what? I hope it may be a policy of despair indeed, but a policy of despair of the old methods; a policy of despair of the methods by which you have set at naught and disregarded the great popular will and the great popular wish; despair of a policy by which you have thrust your rule on the people by force and fear; not a policy by which you have sought to win the Irish people to the side of law, and by which you might rule them through affection. And how are you to do that best? By carrying out that which I maintain to be, notwithstanding what my right hon. Friend may now say and think, a true Liberal principle, respect-

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    ing the wishes and wants of those over whom you rule. When my right hon. Friend talks of humiliation, I ask if it would have been a humiliation had the Advisers of George III. recognized the rights of the Colonies of America to govern themselves? Was it a humiliation to give to the Canadians the right to rule themselves? No, Sir; there is no humiliation in doing justice; and when a demand is made, as this demand is made, in a spirit of friendly feeling with England, in a spirit in which it is hoped that bygones may be bygones, and that the ill-treatment of years may be forgotten, is not the statesmanship of England, is not the spirit of public men on both sides, equal to the task of devising a policy by which the Irish people may be permitted to govern themselves—a policy which would not imperil, but would give added strength and dignity to the Empire?
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Sexton.)
    THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Lord RANDOLPH CHURCHILL): I am bound to say that I feel in a difficult position as regards this Motion. I would be most anxious myself to avoid even the commencement of anything like a wrangling controversy with any Party in this House on Motions for Adjournment; but I feel bound to remind the House of the leading facts of the case. The Amendment was moved on Tuesday, and I think I shall not be contradicted when I say that all Parties in this House have very fully laid their views with regard to it before the House; and, of all Parties, I do not think that the Irish Party can say that their views have not been fully placed before us. But what the Government feel strongly is this—having regard to the period of the year at which we have arrived, and the very large amount of Public Business which still remains before the House, and which it is indispensable that the House should get through, they would be very reluctant to consent to any further prolongation of the debate, unless, either by appealing to the right hon. Gentleman who leads the Opposition, or to any hon. Gentleman below the Gangway who is able to speak with authority as to the intentions of those who follow the hon. Member for the
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    City of Cork—unless we can get from one or other of those Gentlemen a clear and honourable undertaking that if the Government do not resist the Motion for Adjournment they may count on the debate on the present Amendment terminating to-morrow evening. Without that undertaking I must ask the House to continue.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: The noble Lord has said truly that the debate on the Address has extended to a considerable length, although I think not to a greater length than has been the case in former years. But the noble Lord must not blame the House for that. I am not going to say anything against the course taken, which, no doubt, has been taken for reasons which appeared to them sufficient; but it was open to them to have said—"Parliament meets in February next, and we intend to reserve till then any statement as to our policy." That course they did not take, and I have no doubt they had good reasons for not taking it. But a noble Lord in "another place" stated in very definite outline the whole policy affecting Ireland, both in the present and in the immediate future. Under the circumstances, then, it was almost inevitable that the character of that policy should have led to a very extensive debate. Certainly, however, so far as I, and I believe most hon. Members on this side of the House are concerned, there will be every desire to confine the debate within reasonable limits. I think the proposal of the noble Lord's a fair one, and that it should be accepted—namely, that the debate on this Amendment should be brought to a termination to-morrow night.
    MR. SEXTON: There is no one below the Gangway competent to pledge the Leader of this Party in his absence. But, for my own part, I think the proposal of the noble Lord a fair one, and, with the consent of my Colleagues, am willing to agree to it.
    MR. PICTON: I beg to state that it is not alone the Representatives of Irish constituencies who are concerned in this question. There is a considerable number of Radical Members who have not yet been able to express their views upon the Amendment.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Debate further adjourned till To-morrow.

  PRIVATE BUSINESS.
    PARLIAMENT—STANDING OEDERS.
    Select Committee on Standing Orders nominated of,—Mr. DWYER GRAY, Mr. HALSEY, Mr. WILLIAM LOWTHER, Sir JOHN MOWBRAY, Colonel NOLAN, Mr. CRAIG SELLAR, Mr. STANSFELD, and Mr. WHITBREAD.
    PARLIAMENT—SELECTION.
    Committee of Selection nominated of,—Dr. CAMERON, Lord EDWARD CAVENDISH, Mr. CUBITT, Mr. ILLINGWORTH, Mr. JUSTIN M'CARTHY, Sir ARCHIBALD ORR EWING, Mr. WHITBREAD, and the CHAIRMAN of the SELECT COMMITTEE on Standing Orders.

    SHOP HOURS REGULATION BILL.
    On Motion of Sir John Lubbock, Bill to regulate the Hours of Labour in Shops, ordered to be brought in by Sir John Lubbock, Mr. Barry, Mr. Burt, Mr. Cameron Corbett, and Mr. Macnaghten.
    Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 40.]

    KITCHEN AND REFRESHMENT ROOMS (HOUSE OF COMMONS).
    Committee appointed, "to control the arrangements of the Kitchen and Refreshment Rooms, in the department of the Serjeant at Arms attending this House:"—Committee to consist of Sixteen Members:—Mr. A. H. ACLAND, Mr. AGG-GARDNER, Mr. BIGGAR, Mr. WILLIAM CORBET, Baron DIMSDALE, Mr. FENWICK, Mr. FLOWER, General GOLDSWORTH Y, Mr. HERBERT, Viscount LEWISHAM, Mr. LONG, Mr. MARJORI-BANKS, Mr. RICHARD POWER, Baron de ROTHSCHILD, Mr. SHEIL, and Mr. YERBURGH nominated Members of the Committee; Five to be the quorum.—(Mr. Akers-Douglas.)
    House adjourned at half after Twelve o'clock.