Sitting of 12 April 1889

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  WESTMINSTER ABBEY (MONUMENTAL CHAPEL) BILL. (by Order)
  Order for Second Reading read.
  MR. HERBERT GARDNERmoved that the Second leading be deferred until the 3rd of May.
  MR. LABOUCHERE: hope we shall have an understanding that this Bill be proceeded with on the rd of May, or that the Order for the Second Reading will be discharged his is the fourth time that the Bill has Den set down, and although the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Brad-ford (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) was good enough to give notice that he did not intend to bring it on to-day, I think there should be an understanding that hen a private Bill is down on the Paper for Second Reading it should be proceeded with. A considerable number of hon. Members have come down on this and other occasions for the purpose of discussing the Bill.
  MR. E. ROBERTSON: I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Labouchere) has called attention to the inconvenience of the course which is frequently pursued in regard to private Bills. Much convenience is occasioned by private Bills—especially a private Bill so much disputed as this is—being repeatedly postponed without adequate notice having
  346
  been given to the House. The private Bill legislation of the House is one of the greatest curses we have to contend with, and I think it ought to be made more subservient to the convenience of the House. I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford is not present, but I hope that the remarks which have been made on this occasion will be taken notice of not only by him, but by all other Members in charge of public Bills. It is most inconvenient to come down here to discuss a private Bill and then to find that without notice it has been postponed.
  Ordered that the Second Reading be deferred until Friday the 3rd of May.

CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE (IRELAND) ACT, 1887 (IMPRISONMENT OF MR. JOHN FINUCANE, M.P., AND MR. DAVID SHEEHY, M.P.)
MR. SPEAKERacquainted the House that he had received the following letter relating to the Imprisonment of certain Members of this House:—
Ireland.
Limerick,
11 April 1889.
Sir,
I have the honour to inform you that at a Quarter Sessions for the County of Limerick, held before me on the 8th and 9th of April inst., on the hearing of appeals by the under-mentioned Members of Parliament against convictions under "The Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act, 1887," the convictions were affirmed by me, and the appellants were sentenced as follows:—
John Finucane, M.P., to be imprisoned for four calendar months in Limerick Male Gaol.

347
David Sheehy, M.P., to be imprisoned for five calendar months in the same Gaol.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your obedt. servant,
T. A. PURCELL,
County Court Judge and Chairman of the County of Limerick.
To the Right Hon.
The Speaker of the House of Commons.

MOTIONS.

  METROPOLITAN POLICE PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. Stuart Wortley, Bill to confirm a Provisional Order made by one of Her Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, under "The Metropolitan Police Act, 1886," relating to lands in the parishes of St. Giles, Camberwell, St. Marylebone, and St. John, Wapping, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Stuart-Wortley and Mr. Secretary Matthews.
  Bill presented, and read first time. [Bill 195.]

  LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL BILL.
  On Motion of Sir John Lubbock, Bill to amend "The Local Government Act, 1888," in relation to the London County Council, ordered to be brought in by Sir John Lubbock, Mr. Beaufoy, Earl Compton, Mr. Firth, Colonel Hughes, Mr. Lawson, and Mr. Howard Vincent.
  Bill presented, and read first time. [Bill 196.]

WORKMEN (WOOLWICH ARSENAL).
Select Committee on Workmen (Woolwich Arsenal) nominated of—Mr. Alfred Gathorne-Hardy, Mr. Walter James, Colonel Nolan, and Mr. John Talbot.

EAST INDIA (FINANCIAL STATEMENT).
Address for—
"Copy of the Indian Financial Statement for 1189–90, and of the Proceedings of the Legislative Council of the Governor General thereon."—(Sir George Balfour.)

ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSIONERS (INCOME AND GRANTS IN WALES).
Return ordered—
"Showing for the year 1888 the net income derived by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners from property in Wales from all sources, and the payments made by them to the Bishops, Chapters, and Archdeacons, &c., in Wales, and the Grants made by the Commissioners in augmentation of benefices in Wales."—(Mr. Thomas Ellis.)

QUESTIONS.

  IRELAND—ORANGE DISTURBANCES IN ARMAGH.
  MR. BLANEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if it was true that Mr. Thomas Carter, of Derryall, Portadown, county Armagh, recently repaired a cottier house and let it to a Catholic tenant named John M'Veigh; whether a band of Orangemen assembled and attacked the house on the night of 25th March, and smashed the windows and wrecked the house; if any report was made by the County Inspector of Constabulary, and if any efforts were made to bring the wreckers to justice; if recently the house of Mr. Hosey and many other Catholics in the Portadown district were wrecked, and if the police took any steps in the matter; if the Rev. Patrick M'Conville, C.C., of Derrymacash, was recently assailed with stones by a mob of Orangemen close by a police barrack; what steps were taken by the County Inspector in the matter; and if any report was made to him on the subject?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): The Constabulary Authorities report that Mr. Thomas Carter, of Derry-hall, Portadown, county Armagh, did recently let a house to a Catholic tenant. It is not the case that a band of Orangemen attacked the house, smashed the windows and otherwise wrecked it, nor does Mr. Carter, the landlord, who is himself a Protestant, allege that any malicious injury was done to the house. On the night of the 18th of March, on which date St. Patrick's Day was this year celebrated, an Orange drumming band played through the town of Portadown. Some stones appear to have been thrown from among the crowd accompanying the band, which broke one or two panes of glass, and, in one case, three panes in the houses of Mr. Hosey and 11 other Roman Catholics, as well as in the houses of two Protestants, but not one of the houses was wrecked. The police immediately made every effort to trace the persons who broke the windows, but the night was dark, and they have so far failed in identifying any of those concerned, No complaint has been received from the

  349
  Rev. Patrick M'Conville, the Catholic curate, as to his having been recently assailed, nor do the police believe that such has been the ease. Having seen the rev. gentleman riding home through the town on the night of the 18th, the police called on him the following morning to ascertain whether he had been interfered with, when he told them that some boys in the street had made a kind of shout or cheer as he passed, which caused his pony to go off at a sharp pace, and that he did not know of anything further having occurred on the occasion.

  TELEGRAPH CLERKS.
  BARON DE ROTHSCHILD (Bucks, Aylesbury)asked the Postmaster General whether he is aware that the prolonged universal agitation in 1880–81 amongst the Telegraph Clerks, was stated by the Postmaster General, Mr. Fawcett, to be chiefly caused by inadequacy of pay and stagnation of promotion; whether the Fawcett Scheme was intended to remedy this grievance; whether, in the Central Office, there are senior clerks at the maximum of their class, £190 per annum, who continuously perform the same responsible duties as assistant superintendents, without partaking of the latter's superior pay and privileges, or any extra remuneration; whether this deprives them, and consequently first-class officers, and others, of legitimate promotion; whether it is true, that the maximum pay of assistant superintendents which was raised in 1881 from £210 to £270 per annum, was again raised in 1887 to 1300 per annum, whereas the ordinary promotion from the first-class to the senior, which has gone on uninterruptedly at intervals of from 6 to 18 months since 1881, is denied to the clerks at present waiting at the maximum of the former class; and, whether, having regard to the long and faithful service, and the fact that they are fully qualified to perform the duties of the class above them, he will consider the claim of these officers to rise above £140 per annum, and thus carry out the spirit of settlement of 1881?
  *THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAINES,): Mr. Fawcett said that the agitation amongst the Telegraph Clerks was due, among other causes, to "inadequacy of pay,
  350
  arising to some extent From stagnation in promotion"; but in speaking of stagnation in promotion, there is little doubt that Mr. Fawcett had principally in view the telegraphist of the lowest class, who, at that time, could only attain the maximum pay of 27s. a week in the large provincial offices and £65 a year in London. Under the scheme proposed by Mr. Fawcett this class was amalgamated with the next higher class, and thus the grievance of stagnation at the point of 27s. and £65 was removed, the telegraphists being enabled to rise without interruption to a maximum of 38s. a week in the large provincial offices and of £100 a year in London. It is not the case that there are Senior Clerks in the Central Telegraph Offices who continuously perform the same responsible duties as Assistant Superintendents. Some of them do perform supervising duties of a less important character, and all of them are liable to be called upon to take the places of the Assistant Superintendents temporarily, during the absence of those officers. It is only in this way that they can prove their fitness for promotion to the class of Assistant Superintendents, and the practice does not deprive them, or any other officers, of legitimate promotion; on the contrary, it helps them to obtain promotion. The maximum pay of the Assistant Superintendents was raised to £270 a year in connection with Mr. Fawcett's scheme, at the same time that the maximum pay of the Senior Telegraphists was raised from £160 to £190. It was again raised to £300 a year in 1887, because, owing to the general extension of business, the responsibilities and duties of the Assistant Superintendents had become more onerous, whilst no similar change had taken place in the duties of the general body of telegraphists. Both the letter and the spirit of the settlement in 188I have, as far as I can ascertain, been carried out; and it is not in my power to promote officers to a higher class until vacancies occur in that class.

  IRELAND—LAND COMMISSIONNEWRY.
  MR. BLANEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he could say when the Land Commission intends hearing cases listed in the

  351
  Newry Union since November, 1887, for the fixing of fair rents?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The Land Commissioners inform me that a Sub-Commission will commence its sitting for that portion of the Newry Poor Law Union which is in the County of Down towards the end of the present or early next month. The list of cases will be issued in a few days. The date has not yet been fixed for a sitting for that portion of the Union which is in the county of Armagh.

  GUN WHARF BARRACKS, PORTSMOUTH.
  COLONEL COTTONasked the Secretary of State for War whether his attention had been called to a case of typhoid fever amongst the officers now quartered in the Gun Wharf Barracks, Portsmouth; whether these barracks had been for some years condemned as unfit for officers and soldiers to be quartered in; and whether he would investigate the case and take steps to have the sanitary arrangements amended?
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. E. STANHOPE,: Unfortunately it is not true that Lieutenant Desborough, R.A., has been removed from the Gun Wharf Barracks at Portsmouth suffering from typhoid fever. These barracks have never been condemned, but they are not in such a state of sanitary repair as modern ideas demand. -We will do what is immediately possible to remedy it. Some other barracks in the United Kingdom are in an equally bad condition, and the whole question of barracks has, for some time past, been receiving my most serious consideration. As I have already stated, I hope to make proposals to the House this Session dealing with the whole question.

  CRIEFF EPISCOPAL SCHOOL.
  MR. HALDANEasked the Lord Advocate whether the Scottish Education Department have finally determined to make an annual grant to the Crieff Episcopal School?
  *THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON,): The Scotch Education Department have placed the Crieff Episcopal School upon the list of schools to which annual grants may be made, having been advised that the
  352
  provisions of the Education Act did not warrant them in refusing recognition to that School.

  SHERIFF CLERKS.
  MR. CUNINGHAME GRAHAMasked the Lord Advocate if he could lay upon the Table a Return of the emoluments of the Sheriff Clerk Deputes of Lanarkshire, also the salary of the Sheriff Clerk and of the clerks employed by the Sheriff Clerk?
  *MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: I shall be glad to furnish the hon. Gentleman with the information he desires, but do not think there is any need of a Return.

  TRAVELLING TAX.
  MR. JAMESasked the Secretary to the Treasury if a letter had been addressed by the Solicitor of the Inland Revenue to the Secretary of the Travelling Tax Abolition Committee, in which he said—
  "The difference of opinion between the Government and the Travelling Tax Abolition Committee is as to the meaning of the word `railway,' as employed in 5 and 6 Vic. c. 79, and that it has never been asserted or even suggested that that meaning was limited by any subsequent Act or judicial decision;"
  and if he would explain in what manner the word railway in the above mentioned Act is limited, so as to exclude street railways, called tramways, laid down on public land, while railways made on private property are taxed?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON,): I understand that a letter of the Solicitor of the Inland Revenue, written in January of last year, contained the sentence quoted by the hon. Member, but it also contains the following paragraph:—
  "I beg, however, to refer you to the opinion given in September, 1880, by Mr. Watkin Williams, Q.C., and Mr. William Wills upon a case submitted to them, as I believe, by the Travelling Tax Abolition Committee, in which they state that tramways in general, as described in the case, are not liable to the railway passenger duty imposed by the Act.
  I am advised that the grounds upon which the opinion is based are that the Act confines the charge to receipts for passengers on a railway which is the property of some company or person, and does not cover the case of a tramway

  353
  laid down on land which is the property, not of some company or person, but of the public.

  SCHOOL BOARD AT TILBURY DOCKS.
  MAJOR RASCHasked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether the Education Department has any other reason for compelling the formation of a School Board at Tilbury Docks other than the fact that the existing buildings are not of brick or stone; whether the Department is aware that as Tilbury is below the level of the Thames, it is impossible to build with brick foundations; and, whether, as the schools are self-supporting, and no complaint has been made with regard to education or finance, the Department will cancel their Order?
  *THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir W. HART DYKE,): A final notice requiring additional accommodation for 130 children was published in March, 1888. The Department has never accepted an iron building as permanently satisfying the requirements of a notice, and no representations were made as to the difficulty of building in brick or stone at Tilbury; it is, moreover, understood that the Roman Catholic school lately built there is a substantial brick building, and that there are other brick buildings in the neighbourhood, among them a large block of lofty model dwellings for workmen. The order for the election of a School Board cannot be cancelled.
  MAJOR RASCH: I beg to give notice, in consequence of the answer of the right hon. Gentleman, that I will call attention to the matter on the Estimates, and move the reduction of the Vote in Class 4.

  POST OFFICE ARRANGEMENTS AT SCHULL.
  MR. GILHOOLYasked the Postmaster General whether, in view of the growing importance of Schull as a fishing station, he would have arrangements made to keep the Telegraph Office there open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. during the fishing season?
  *MR. RAIKES: In reply to the hon. Member, I have to say that inquiries are now being made on the subject to which he refers, and as soon as I receive the
  354
  necessary Report, I shall be glad to consider whether some extension of the hours of attendance at the Telegraph Office can be conceded.

  IRELAND—TRIAL OF MR. FINACUNE, MR. SHEEHY, AND MR. MORAN.
  MR. ROWNTREEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been called to the report of the trial of Mr. Finucane, M.P., Mr. Sheehy, M.P., and Mr. Moran, at Limerick, on Monday, from which it appears that, although Judge Purcell stated that Mr. Sheehy, M.P., and Mr. Moran might go out if they wished to do so, District Inspector Royse replied openly in Court, "I won't allow them to go out. I am responsible for their custody here," and that the Judge had to repeat his instructions before the constabulary permitted them to be complied with; if it is permitted to a District Inspector in Ireland to refuse to carry out the instructions of a Judge in his own Court; and if any, and what, communications have been made to Inspector Royse by the authorities with regard to his conduct on this occasion?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: District Inspector Royse states that the report mentioned is utterly misleading. The facts are that during the trial of Mr. Sheehy, M.P., and Mr. Moran, these gentlemen being about to leave, the District Inspector prevented them. They appealed to the Judge, who said they might be allowed to do so, and the Judge further stating, in reply to an inquiry from the District Inspector, that it was not necessary that they should be accompanied by an escort, they were at once allowed to leave the Court. There does not appear to have been any repetition by the Judge of his instructions, nor any necessity for such, the incident not having occupied a minute's time.

  THE CENTRAL TELEGRAPH OFFICE.
  EARL COMPTONasked the Postmaster General whether any answer has been given to the petition of the male staff (established) of the Central Telegraph Office, which was presented in January, 1888, praying for the removal of certain grievances; whether the present system of classification can be altered in

  355
  order to allow uninterrupted promotion of telegraphists up to a salary of £190; whether all pay is stopped during sick leave in the first, second, and senior classes, while the same rule does not apply to the higher paid officials; whether only one Bank Holiday, or an equivalent, is granted to telegraphists every 18 months; whether any change can be made in the system of long and short duties; what is the rate of pay for overtime work, and what is the largest number of hours in one day that a clerk may be kept at his duties; and whether Her Majesty's Treasury has been consulted as to any alterations in the present arrangements which may be considered advisable by the Postmaster General?
  *MR. RAIKES: On the 10th December last I gave the following reply to a question on the same subject which was put to me by the hon. Member for the Southern Division of County Down:—
  "The petition to which the hon. Member refers prayed that a previous one, to which an unfavourable reply had been given, should be reconsidered. It is, I think, detrimental to the interests of the service that, when a petition has been fully considered and an answer given, a fresh Memorial should be immediately presented in the form of a rejoinder. I am not in a position to hold out hopes of any change in the status of the Memorialists which would largely increase the expenditure of the Department; but the subject shall receive further consideration."
  I have now to inform the noble Lord that I am not prepared to alter the present system of classification so as to allow uninterrupted promotion up to a salary of £190. As to Bank Holidays, telegraphists can only to a comparatively small extent enjoy the privilege of being absent from duty on those days; but this is only one of the conditions of their employment which they accept when they join the service, and they are in no worse position in this respect than many other classes of the community. As far as possible, steps have been taken to meet the wishes of the staff in regard to the alteration of long and short duties. Such duties cannot, however, be abolished without an unjustifiable waste of force. The rate of pay for overtime is one-eighth of a day's pay for every hour during the daytime, and one-seventh of a day's pay for every hour during the night, with an additional rate of one-
  356
  fourth for any extra duty performed after three hours of extra duty. The number of hours in one day for which a telegraphist may be kept on duty is governed by the exigencies of the service. I do not consider that any alteration in these arrangements is practicable, and I have, therefore, not consulted Her Majesty's Treasury on the subject; but I may say that there remains one question—namely, that of payment during sick absence, which is still under my consideration. This question, however, is one which affects not merely the telegraphists of the Central Telegraph Office, but a large body of officers elsewhere.

  IRELAND—MEETINGS IN GWEEDORE.
  MR. HENRY J. WILSONasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is now aware that, after Deputy Divisional Commissioner Allan Cameron and District Inspector Concannon had ascertained, on the morning of Sunday the 17th of March, that the hon. Member for Holmfirth did not intend to address any meeting in the Gweedore district, a detective followed him during the afternoon; that he and his wife were closely watched, by a constable in uniform, on Sunday night, while walking up and down in front of M'Bride's Hotel; that he was followed, on Monday 18th March, from Middletown Barrack to Derrybeg Chapel by armed constables on a car; that the wife of John M'Cafferty, a car driver, was roused up at night, on Tuesday the 19th of March, by Head Constable Mahony, who desired to ascertain where the hon. Member for Holmfirth had gone, and when he would return; and on what authority it was stated that "as soon as it was ascertained who he was, and that he had apparently no intention of addressing any such meeting, no police supervision was exercised?"
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The local Constabulary Authorities report that they have made careful inquiry relative to the charges the hon. Member makes against the police, and find that he labours altogether under a misapprehension. It is not the case that he was followed by a detective on Sunday afternoon, March 17. The detectives obeyed the positive orders

  357
  which they had received from the District Inspector, that they should not watch the hon. Member after he had given the assurance that he would not hold a meeting. It is also not the case that either he or his wife was watched on that night by a constable in uniform. It is true that the police patrol mentioned proceeded on duty on Monday, the 18th of March, but it is not the case that it was following the hon. Member, the fact of its having proceeded along the same road having no reference to him. It is not a fact that Mrs. M'Cafferty was aroused at night on the 19th to ascertain where the hon. Member had gone. Her house, with a number of others, was searched for persons believed to be concerned in the murder of District Inspector Martin. The hon. Member's name was neither mentioned, nor was any reference whatever made to him.
  MR. H. J. WILSON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary if he will afford me any kind of means of testing the reliability of the utterly erroneous statement he has read? (Cries of "Order.")
  MR. SEXTON: My hon. Friend the Member for Holmfirth (Mr. H. J. Wilson) is not an Irish but an English Member; and will the right hon. Gentleman explain how it is he came to be deprived of his right, as a citizen, to address a public meeting? Did the police supply police passes, in order to give him facility of movement?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: My answer to the last question is in the negative. In regard to the other question, I presume the authorities were of opinion that a meeting of the kind indicated at that place and particular time might lead to a breach of the peace.

  ROYAL NAVAL ARTILLERY VOLUNTEERS.
  SIR WALTER FOSTERasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in view of the statements recently made with regard to Royal Naval Artillery Volunteers, their utility would be enhanced by the reconstitution of the corps as Royal Marine Artillery Volunteers?
  *THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (LORD G. HAMILTON, Middlesex, Ealing): Under the Act of Parliament which established the Royal Naval Artillery Volunteers provision
  358
  was made for their being employed either on land or at sea, as the Admiralty may direct, within certain limits named in the Act, so that I do not see that a re-constitution of the corps such as that suggested in the question would open out any fresh field of employment whereby the Admiralty could utilize their services. All land defences being under the War Office, the power of employing the corps on shore is practically a dead letter as far as the Admiralty are concerned. I understand the Royal Naval Artillery Volunteers have expressed a decided objection to transferring their services to the War Department, so that this source of employment does not seem likely to be available. I believe that a meeting of the officers commanding these Volunteers is likely to take place, and any proposals emanating from such a meeting will be carefully considered by the Admiralty.

  POLLUTION OF SCOTCH LOCHS.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the Lord Advocate whether he is aware that the opinion of the Dean of Faculty has now been obtained as to the possible proceedings for preventing the continued pollution of Loch Long and Loch Goil; whether according to that opinion there are serious technical obstacles to any proceedings by private individuals, which obstacles do not exist in the case of proceedings by the Crown; and whether the Government, as representing the Crown, which is the proper guardian for the public of the soil of the foreshore and of the bed of the Firth of the Clyde, will now take steps to prevent the continued injury to the foreshores and fishing by the wholesale pollution reported on to the House in 1887, and since persisted in?
  *MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: The private notice given me by the hon. Member was the first intimation I had that any opinion had been obtained upon this matter by the distinguished lawyer mentioned. I have not seen the opinion, but if the hon. Member will furnish me with a copy of the case, and of the opinion, I shall be glad to consider it.

  POSTAL DELIVERY IN ULSTER,
  MR. PINKERTONasked the Postmaster General if he will grant a Return of towns in the Province of

  359
  Ulster, having a population of 2,000 and upwards, in which there is no postal delivery on Sundays?
  *MR. RAIKES: In reply to the question asked by the hon. Member, I can inform him that there are seven towns in Ulster which have no Sunday delivery by postmen, the delivery being to callers at the Post Office, namely Antrim, Ballymoney, Belfast, Londonderry, Newtownards, Portadown, and Ballymena.

  MINE OWNERS AND WORKMEN.
  MR. BURTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if his attention has been called to the fact that great dissatisfaction has been caused by certain mine owners refusing to meet checkweighmen on deputations representing the workmen; whether he is aware that some employers who formerly received the checkweighmen on such deputations now refused to do so, alleging that the new Mines Regulation Act precludes them from doing so; and whether there is any section of the Act that has altered the law on this point?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. STUART WORTLEY,): Yes, Sir; the Secretary of State has been informed that in some instances complaints have arisen in consequence of the unwillingness of the owners or their representatives to meet checkweighers on deputations representing the men. If it is contended that the Coal Mines Regulation Act of 1887 has any bearing on the point the Secretary of State can only regret that such an erroneous impression should prevail, as that Act has made no alteration in the law, and in no way precludes mine owners from adopting a course which is likely to remove misunderstanding and to prevent friction.

  ARMY PRIVILEGES.
  MR. BUCHANANasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he can consider applications for the Indian Staff Corps and the Army Service Corps from Subalterns of the Royal Marine Artillery, who were appointed before the rule prohibiting any transfers was made, and who joined the Service in the full belief and expectation that they would be allowed the
  360
  privileges expressly declared by the Admiralty to be open to them?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: I fear I am unable to sanction any exception to the rule now in force, which was only adopted after its necessity had been proved. I should explain that the officers of the Marines have no claim or prescriptive right to these appointments, and the Admiralty must exercise their discretion as to whether or not they can spare officers or allow them to serve in corps unconnected with the Naval Service.

  THE BENGOLLYN.
  MR. HALLEY STEWARTasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware that the Bengollyn left the port of Liverpool on Wednesday the 20th March, encountering a furious gale the same evening; that on the day of sailing the barometer marked the very low reading of 29·02, and that it had been steadily falling for five consecutive days; that the warning north cone signal was hoisted at the port of Liverpool; whether anything has since been heard of the Bengollyn except that wreckage of the ship, including some seamen's chests, has drifted ashore on the coast of North Wales; and whether it is possible to frame any regulations, appealing to which captains will be able more readily to resist an owner's undue pressure to put a vessel to sea in the teeth of manifest peril to his own life and that of his crew?
  *THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Sir M. HICKS BEACH,): Inquiry has been ordered, and when the report which will deal with the points raised in the hon. Member's question has been received I shall be happy to forward it to him.

  IRELAND—THE SPECIAL COMMISSION—THE PRISONER TRACEY.
  *MR. M'CARTENasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the prisoner Thomas Tracey, before his removal from Belfast Gaol to Millbank, was supplied with dinners of the first quality, including beer or porter, daily, and if he was also daily supplied with a copy of the Free-man's Journal, containing the Reports of the Special Commission; whether he has recently been brought back to

  361
  Belfast Gaol; whether, since his refusal to swear what was required by Head Constable Preston, and since his return to Belfast Gaol, Tracey has been obliged to live on ordinary prison fare, the Police Authorities having discontinued the supply of such dinners to him; whether he will state the reason for the different treatment given to Tracey before he was brought to London as a witness, and since his return; and whether Tracey has been supplied with the Freeman's Journal during the present week, or since the examination of Richard Pigott; and, if not, why?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: With regard to the inquiry in the first paragraph, I beg to refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave to a similar question put by him on the 4th March. If he refers to Hansard he will find I said—
  "I understand that the Prison Authorities do not provide bail prisoners with food and drink of the nature indicated in the Question. The dinners supplied to Tracey at Belfast were not at the expense of the proprietor of the Times, nor had they any connection whatever with the Special Commission trial, but were provided by the Police Authorities in connection with a totally different matter. A newspaper was also supplied to the man under precisely the same circumstances."
  The prisoner has recently been re-transferred to Belfast Prison. As regards the third, fourth, and fifth paragraphs, from the date on which the man was removed from Belfast to London to give evidence before the Special Commission the police ceased to supply him with food or to afford him any other indulgence.

  IRISH JURIES.
  Mr. MURPHYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, whether he is aware that, when a Protestant gamekeeper, named Frackleton, was tried last week in Dublin for the wilful murder of a man named Kavanagh, a special jury, on the application of the prisoner, was empanelled; whether it is a fact that no juror was ordered by the Crown to stand aside while the prisoner exhausted his challenges; whether the result was a jury composed entirely of the co-religionists of the prisoner; whether the verdict was one of manslaughter; whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that the Attorney General asked Judge Murphy,
  362
  after the jury retired, to say "that there was not a shadow or a particle of evidence reducing the crime to manslaughter," and that the Judge, in sentencing the prisoner, said that he feared "lest in any way he had failed in placing before the jury the irresistible case made against tho prisoner of having taken away the life of one human being, and having all but taken away the life of another, without any provocation from the man Kavanagh now dead, or from the other victim of his drunken fury;" whether he is aware that the murdered man, Kavanagh, has left a widow and three children in a destitute condition; and, will the Government, following a precedent in a somewhat similar case, grant them a sum of money from the Compassionate Fund?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I proceed to answer those portions of the question to which a reply was not given yesterday. The jury was not a special one. The Attorney General did make the application referred to. The Judge did make the observations attributed to him. It is believed that Kavanagh left a wife and children; their precise circumstances are unknown. I am not aware of any precedent for the course suggested in the last paragraph, but if the hon. Member will supply me with the particulars, I shall be glad to consider it.
  MR. CLANCY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that two or three years ago in the time of Lord Spencer an Orangeman was murdered in Belfast and the Government of that day gave to the widow and family a sum of £100 out of the Compassionate Fund?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: That would not justify the Government in making an allowance in the present case if the circumstances are altogether different. If it can be shown that money has been given from a benevolent fund under similar circumstances, I shall be glad to consider the matter.

  SWAZILAND.
  MR. CHAMBERLAIN: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether King Umbandine has recently addressed any petition either to Sir Arthur Havelock or to the Colonial Office, praying for a British Protectorate of Swaziland; and,

  363
  if so, what reply has or will be made to his application?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Baron H. DE WORMS, Liverpool, Toxteth): No such petition has been received at the Colonial Office, nor is there any information of such a petition having been addressed to Sir Arthur Havelock. I may refer my right hon. Friend to the replies on this subject which I gave to the hon. Member for Leicester on the 25th of February and 8th instant.

  NAVAL DESIGNS.
  LORD CHARLES BERESFORD: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he will lay upon the Table of the House the Papers relative to the designs and building of what is known as the Admiral class of battleship?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: These Papers and Minutes are of a very confidential character, and could not be made public without detriment to naval interests. I may, however, state that full and frequent discussion took place, both in writing and conversation, between the different members of the Board before that type of vessel was introduced into the Navy.

  UNARMOURED BATTLESHIPS
  LORD CHARLES BERESFORD: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, considering the recent statements made by distinguished Naval Officers as to the possibility of the unarmoured ended class of battleships being put out of action by small gun fire without their armour being pierced, he will reconsider his objection to giving a fair and practical trial by perforation, in order to settle the doubt which exists as to the stability of these vessels with their unarmoured portions wounded; the names of the vessels referred to are the Ajax, Agamemnon, Anson, Benbow, Camperdown, Collingwood, Howe, Rodney, Colossus, Edinburgh, Inflexible, Sanspareil, and Victoria?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: I am not aware that any distinguished naval officer with a knowledge of modern ordnance has advanced the opinion stated, but even if that opinion had been stated it only alludes to one of the many possibilities that will occur in a
  364
  future naval action. To test this possibility and exclude all others would be a most misleading and mischievous experiment. I may add that in the opinion of my naval and technical advisers there is no ship afloat or building belonging to any foreign Navy of the same date as the vessels referred to in the question that has not an inherent weakness of some kind which will expose her in action to risks just as great as, if not greater than, those alluded to by my noble Friend.
  LORD C. BERESFORD: In consequence of the answer of my noble Friend I shall on the first possible occasion call attention to the necessity of removing the doubt as to these ships' stability under certain circumstances.

  IRELAND —JUDICIAL BUSINESS IN DONEGAL.
  MR. BLANEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether Moville, one of the most important towns in Donegal, might have the benefit of a County Judge's Court; and, if, on a former occasion, Government promised inquiry into the matter, and if result can be stated?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: In consequence of several memorials which were received, the Quarter Sessions for the County of Donegal were re-arranged by Proclamation of the 22nd May, 1885; but there was then no application from or on behalf of Moville. The last memorial received from Moville appears to have been some 17 or 18 years ago. At that time the matter was fully considered by the then Lord Lieutenant and the Privy Council, who did not feel themselves able to comply with the prayer of the memorial.

  THE LAND ACT (1887)—INSTALMENT ORDERS.
  MR. CHANCE: I beg to ask Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland. whether the procedure under Section 30 of "The Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1887," to obtain a stay of execution and. an instalment order in cases of proceedings for rent usually involves an appearance to the writ, a motion for judgment, a cross motion under the section, both moved on notice by counsel and grounded on affidavits, the marking and registering judgment, and the payment of court fees on the order;

  365
  whether the costs of a plaintiff in such case usually amounts to about £9, and the defendant's costs to about £5, both of which the tenant defendant has to pay; and, whether the Government intends to take any steps to secure the simplification of procedure and reduction of expense in such cases?
  MR. MADDEN: After the Easter Recess, perhaps I may be able to give an answer to the question whether it is possible to secure a simplification and reduction of costs in these cases.

  H. M. S. SULTAN.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: I wish to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether it is proposed to hold an inquiry as to the occurrences subsequent to the stranding of the Sultan, and the measures taken to save the ship; and, if so, what will he the form of the inquiry, and when and where will it be held?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: It will be necessary to hold a further inquiry into the occurrences subsequent to the stranding of the sultan in which the injury inflicted on the ship, and the working of the watertight compartments and other arrangements, will have to be investigated. I am not yet in a position to state what the form of the inquiry will be, nor where and when it will be held.

  IRELAND—SECRET POLICE CIRCULARS.
  MR. JAMES STUART: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether a circular was sent out to constabulary stations from the offices of divisional magistrates in November, 1888, headed "Very Secret Agrarian Crime," requesting certain particulars regarding all members of the National League and of the Land League convicted of agrarian crime since September, 1879; whether among the particulars requested in respect of such cases, were the "names and present addresses of witnesses generally, and what each can prove," and "any points of interest between League and offence"; and whether any of the information collected in consequence of this circular was placed in the hands of the solicitor for the Times newspaper?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I have always refused to answer questions as to such alleged private circulars, because they must either have become known through a breach of confidence or they must have no existence.
  MR. STUART: I suppose the right hon. Gentleman does not deny the existence of the circular.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I neither deny nor affirm it. That is the answer which I have invariably given to such questions, and which everyone who holds any office is, I think, bound to give.

  EVICTIONS IN WICKLOW.
  MR. M'CARTAN: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, with reference to the case of Charles Frizelle, Castlekevin, county Wicklow, whether he will state under what section of "The Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1881," the tenant could. have applied to the County Court Judge to stay the ejectment proceedings taken against Him by the landlord for the non payment of the old rent; whether he is aware that the tenant, having served his originating notice to fix fair rent before November 1887, was entitled to the benefit of the fair rent from 1st May, 1887, but, owing to the insufficient number of Sub-Commissioners appointed by the Lord Lieutenant, Frizelle could not get his fair rent fixed up to the time of the service of the eviction notice; whether the service of this notice converted him into a caretaker, and thus deprived him of the right to have his application to fix a fair rent heard; and whether he will make some provision to meet such cases of hardship where the tenant is willing to pay a fair rent, but is unable to get such rent fixed owing to the insufficient number of Sub-Commissioners?
  MR. BALFOUR: I am sorry I have not with me my memorandum as to this question. I will ask the hon. Member to put it on Monday.

  TELEGRAPHISTS.
  MR. M'CARTAN: I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether promotions from the maximum of the first-class to the senior class at the Central Telegraph Office have been accorded within the past three years to telegraphists who had only been waiting five months; and

  367
  whether there are telegraphists who have now been waiting over two years for promotion; and, if so, whether he will take their case into consideration?
  *THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES,): The facts are as implied in the hon. Member's question. In the one case there were vacancies; in the other there are not. As soon as vacancies occur, the claims and qualifications of the first-class telegraphists will certainly be taken into consideration.

  THE PILOTAGE BILL.
  MR. LLEWELLYN: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will inform the House how soon after Easter the Pilotage Bill will be introduced?
  *SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH: Some time ago I circulated a draft copy of this Bill, and I am now considering the suggestions received. I hope to be able to introduce the Bill about a fortnight after the Easter Recess. The hon. Member for Sunderland has a question on this matter on the Paper. In reply to him I may say I shall be happy to send a copy to any Member who desires.
  MR. HANDEL COSSHAM: I should like to have a copy, as I have received several letters in relation to the matter.

  THE MATTHEW ARNOLD MEMORIAL.
  MR. TOMLINSON: I beg to ask the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether the attention of the Committee of Council has been drawn to a circular which, from its contents, it would appear that it is intended to have circulated amongst teachers in public elementary schools headed, "Proposed Memorial to the late Mr. Matthew Arnold"; whether he is aware that the circular in question contains the following clauses:—
  "The Committee hope that managers, teachers, and children will co-operate in raising this memorial. It has been determined that the subscription of a teacher shall be from sixpence to five shillings, and that that of a scholar shall not exceed one penny. The Committee think that children should not be asked individually to subscribe, but they suggest that a general invitation to do so might be given to them to enable them to participate in the memorial;"
  368
  Whether the Committee of Council intend to take any steps to prevent any undue pressure being brought to bear upon teachers in elementary schools to induce them to subscribe to the memorial; and whether they will take some mode of expressing their disapprobation of bringing any pressure to bear upon teachers?
  *SIR W. HART DYKE: I have no knowledge whatever of the matter, nor should I be justified in assuming that any undue pressure was likely to be exercised in support of the proposed memorial. The teachers are well able to take care of themselves. The Department has no power to interfere.
  MR. TOMLINSON: I beg to give notice that I will call attention to the subject on the Education Vote.

  FOYNES HARBOUR.
  MR. MURPHY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he can give definite information if the Board of Works will afford the necessary facilities for passenger and fish traffic at Foynes Harbour, or permit railway and steamboat companies to make the necessary arrangements without imposing impossible conditions.
  MR. JACKSON: Yes, Sir.

  IRISH PRISON TREATMENT.
  MR. SEXTON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he will appoint to the Commission on Prison Treatment any Irishman acceptable to Irish public opinion; and, whether he can now name the Members of the Commission.
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: In answer to the right hon. Gentleman I have to say that it does not appear to me that the matters which the Committee on Prison Treatment will have to decide have any relation to public opinion on political matters. The reference of the Committee will be strictly limited to the points which I have on previous occasions indicated as being those with regard to which I thought a change was desirable, and certainly I have no inclination to frame the constitution of the Committee in a manner which is likely to preclude change, as my own personal opinion is in favour of it. If an Irishman were appointed upon the principle

  369
  suggested by the right hon. Gentleman, it would be necessary also to appoint an Englishman, Scotchman, and, I suppose, a Welshman on similar principles; and it is, in my opinion, desirable to restrict the number of the Committee, and to remove from it, as far as possible, any political flavour. The fifth name has not yet been settled.
  MR. SEXTON: I said nothing about political opinion. I wish to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will appoint men in whose impartiality the public will have confidence, and when the fifth name will be given?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: As soon as we have received the acceptance of the gentleman who has been asked to take the position, the fifth name will be given. With regard to the first part of the right hon. Gentleman's question, I would say that the Chairman (Lord Aberdare) is a man who entirely fulfills the conditions which the right hon. Gentleman has laid down. I will endeavour to see that the fifth man does the same.

  MR. O'BRIEN.
  MR. SEXTON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland what is the cause of the delay in presenting the evidence taken in the inquiry concerning the prison treatment of Mr. William O'Brien, M.P.; and when it will be presented?
  Mr. A. J. BALFOUR: The papers will be ready on Monday.

  THE ROYAL ARTILLERY BAND.
  CAPTAIN HEATHCOTE: I wish to ask the Secretary of State for War why H.R.H. the the Commander-in-Chief has refused to allow the Royal Artillery Band to play at a fete at Medeley; and if there is any regulation as to military bands being confined to their own districts; and, if so, on what occasions has this rule been relaxed in the case of the Royal Artillery Band since June, 1888?
  *MR. E. STANHOPE: The reason for the refusal to allow the band of the Royal Artillery to play at the fete in question was that the occasion was not considered of sufficient public importance to justify a departure from a rule laid down by the military authorities—that military bands are not, except under special circumstances, to play outside their
  370
  own military districts. On 23 occasions since June, 1888, engagements outside the Woolwich district have been allowed to be accepted by the Royal Artillery Band, or by portions of it.
  CAPTAIN HEATHCOTE: I should like to ask whether, considering that the rule has thus been broken 23 times in a little over nine months, the right hon. Gentleman thinks it is worth maintaining?
  *MR. E. STANHOPE: I hardly pre-same, not being a military man, to express an opinion upon it. But if my hon. Friend cares to have my personal opinion in answer to his question, I should say that the rule does not seem to me worth maintaining.

  LOCAL RATING.
  MR. JAMES: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury, whether, in accordance with the undertaking given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Committee on the Local Government (England and Wales) Bill, it is the intention of the Government to submit any measure during the present Session upon the subject of local rating, taking into consideration how the rates may be adjusted between owners and occupiers?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: The question would seem to imply that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had undertaken that the Government would deal with the subject of rating this Session. No such undertaking was given. What the Chancellor of the Exchequer said was that the whole question of rating would be considered by the Government. I am afraid, however, there is no probability of the subject being dealt with this Session.

  THE 1887 BURMESE CAMPAIGN.
  MR. GROTRIAN: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty when the medals for the campaign in Burmah of 1885 will be awarded to the officers and men of the Royal Navy and Royal Marines who participated in it; and whether he will explain the delay in issuing them?
  *LORD G. HAMILTON: The issue of these medals is dependent on their being received from the Government of India; but I understand that they will be supplied shortly, when immediate steps will be taken for their distribution.

  CUSTOMS AND BOARD OF TRADE—STATISTICAL RETURNS—PERU AND CHILI.
  MR. LABOUCHERE: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade, whether he can explain how it is that the nitrate and guano shipped from the provinces of Tarapaca and Atacama, which were ceded by Peru to Chili in 1883, are set down in the Statistical Returns of the Customs and Board of Trade as shipped from Peru; and whether he has observed that, in some financial newspapers, this error has been attributed to the fact that Her Majesty's Government does not recognise the cession of these provinces by Peru to Chili?
  *SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH: In the absence of official information respecting any changes in the boundaries of Bolivia, Peru, and Chili, no alteration in the list of countries and ports as distinguished in the Statistical Records has been made, but attention has already been given to the points to which the hon. Member calls attention, so that the necessary adjustments may be made in future.

  IRELAND — CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE ACT—TREATMENT OF PRISONERS.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether the Irish Members, Priests, and others at present in prison, under the Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act for speeches made or for the publication of speeches in proclaimed districts have, since the issue of the new Provisional Prison Rules, been subjected, like common criminals, to the plank bed, deprived of the means of occupying themselves with reading and writing, and compelled to clean out their own cells?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: In answer to the right hon. Gentleman, I have to say that the new Provisional Prison Rules have no relation to any of the points mentioned in his question.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I suppose they are been subjected to the plank bed, and other things to which I refer.
  MR. BALFOUR: They are subject to the ordinary prison discipline.

  THE SCOTCH LOCAL GOVERNMENT BILL.
  MR. BUCHANAN: Will the right hon. Gentleman the Lord Advocate have the Local Government Bill for Scotland circulated before the Recess?
  *MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: Every effort is being made to do so, Sir.

  THE CENSUS BILL.
  SIR J. LUBBOCK: I wish to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether, in view of the greatly increased labour that will be imposed upon the Census Commission in consequence of the numerous changes of boundaries brought about by the operation of the Local Government Act, 1888, it is the intention of the Government to introduce a Census Bill during the present Session; and whether, in view of the strong representations made to the Government, it is intended to make any provision for a more frequent enumeration of the people.
  *THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. C. T. RITCHIE,): The Government cannot undertake to introduce the Bill in question in the present Session; but all questions as to alterations of boundaries are now being considered and dealt with. All the representations referred to by the hon. Baronet will receive the consideration of the Government.

  DOG LICENCES IN IRELAND.
  DR. KENNYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether complaints have reached him that owing to the fact of the extensive areas of the Petty Sessions district in Ireland, and the difficulty which frequently exists of finding petty sessions clerks at there offices, much inconvenience is experienced by those desiring to pay the licence duty on dogs, he will recommend the Inland Revenue Authorities to make arrangements for the sale of dog licences at such post offices throughout the country as are money order offices, giving for their sale remuneration similar to that given for the sale of money orders?
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: No complaints have reached the Registrar of Petty

  373
  Sessions Clerks of inconvenience to the public arising from the causes alluded to with reference to the issue of dog licences. The duty on dogs in Ireland is a local, not an Imperial tax, and is collected throughout the country by the clerks of Petty Sessions, who are local, and not Imperial officials. A portion of their salaries consists of remuneration from the dog tax for the issue of dog licences. Having regard to these facts, I do not see that the course suggested in the concluding portion of the question would be either feasible or expedient.

  PUBLIC EXECUTIONS.
  MR. HANDEL COSSHAM: I wish to ask the Home Secretary if he is aware that the Press were excluded from the execution of the man Withers, and will he take steps to prevent such exclusion in the future?
  *MR. MATTHEWS: By law it rests with the Sheriffs or Visiting Justices to determine in their discretion what persons shall be admitted, and I have no doubt that in this case the local authorities exercised the discretion wisely. I do not, however, think it part of my duty to officially express any opinion.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  MR. SEXTON: I wish to ask whether, as the House is to re-assemble after the holidays on Monday the 29th, instead of Thursday the 25th, the Government will undertake not to proceed with the Irish Estimates on Monday the 29th?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: I cannot come under any obligation to that effect; but I will do the best I can, and I hope that hon. Members will assist in forwarding the necessary public business.

  IRELAND—THE BATTERING RAM AT EVICTIONS.
  MR. CLANCY: I wish to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant whether the new battering ram which he has provided is to be wielded by the police or by the emergency men?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The battering ram is to be used for the defensive purposes which I have before indicated. If any further information is desired I shall require notice of the question.

  SCOTCH BUSINESS.
  MR. ESSLEMONT: Will the First Lord of the Treasury be good enough to say he will not take Scotch Estimates on the day this House assembles after the Recess? It would be very inconvenient as many Scotch Members would be compelled to travel on Sunday.
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: I have no hesitation in giving the assurance that no Scotch business will be taken on the Monday after the holiday.

  STANDING COMMITTEES.
  SIR JOHN MOWBRAYreported from the Committee of Selection, that they had added to the Standing Committee on Trade (including Agriculture and Fishing), Shipping, and Manufactures the following 15 Members in respect of the Weights and Measures Bill:—Major Banes, Mr. Barclay, Mr. Coddington, Mr. Cremer, Mr. Firth, Mr. Hubbard, Mr. Lafone, Mr. Lane, Sir Frederick Mappin, Mr. Montagu, Mr. Jasper More, Mr. Rankin, Mr. Bryn Roberts, Mr. Royden, and Mr. James Stevenson.
  Ordered, That the Report do lie upon the Table.

MOTIONS.

  THE EASTER RECESS.
  Motion made, and Question proposed:
  "That this House, at its rising on Tuesday next, do adjourn until Monday the 29th April; that on Tuesday next the House do meet at Two of the clock, and unless previously adjourned, do sit till Seven o'clock, when the Speaker shall adjourn the House without Question put."—(Mr. William Henry Smith.)

  IRELAND—THE CONDITION OF DONEGAL.
  MR. PARNELL: I wish to take this opportunity to press further upon the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant the desirability of returning a straightforward answer to the question which was put to him by the hon. Member for Shoreditch (that with regard to a circular alleged to be issued to the Constabulary headed "Very Secret, Agrarian Crime"). I should have thought that that question was capable of a reply—yes or no.
  *MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Gentleman is not in order. It is most inconvenient to refer to questions on the Paper which have been disposed of.
  MR. PARNELL: I have always understood that on a Motion of this kind it would be in order to refer to any subject of interest which any Member of the House was desirous of bringing before the House. I have known such a practice as long as I have been a Member.
  *MR. SPEAKER: I was pointing out the inconvenience of going over questions that have been disposed of.
  MR. PARNELL: Unfortunately, on this occasion we did not receive any answer at all to the question. The right hon. Gentleman declined to answer, yes or no, to the question; and I submit, with great respect, that I am not out of order in pressing the right hon. Gentleman for an answer to that question. I fear very much that the refusal of the right hon. Gentleman to reply to the question indicates that the question is founded on truth and fact. I wish to say at once and most distinctly that I think the Government are perfectly entitled to apply to the police authorities or to their other agents in Ireland for the information described in the question by the hon. Member. But if this were to be done, I submit that it should have been done for the purposes of the Government, and that it should have been done without disguise, in an open and English fashion. In the time of the late Mr. Forster, when he was Chief Secretary—a much more troublesome time, happily, than this which now occupies our attention—a secret Circular of an objectionable character was issued by his Administration. Mr. Forster, when questioned, as the hon. Member for Shoreditch has questioned the present Chief Secretary, admitted that the Circular had been issued, and admitted its objectionable character, and promised to withdraw it. But the right hon. Gentleman who was then Chief Secretary was a straightforward man. The complaint that we make now, without going as far as to say, as we did in those days, that the Circular in question was rubbish, is that if the Government have been acting for the purpose of the Government, they ought not to be and would not be ashamed of admitting what
  376
  they have done. I trust that we may have from the right hon. Gentleman, before this Motion is agreed to, a reply—an English and straightforward reply—to the question which has been put to him. We know the position which the Government announced that they had taken up with regard to the proceedings before the Commission. But if this Circular has been issued it will be a token and almost a proof that the Statements of the Government with regard to their position in the proceedings before the Special Commission are untrue. I do not wish to find fault with the action of the House last night, but personally I regret that the First Lord of the Treasury thought it his duty to intervene and to ask the House to close the debate which was initiated by my hon. Friend the Member for one of the divisions of Donegal (Mr. Mac Neill). Several of my friends and I myself had taken notes and were desirous of saying something with reference to the matter. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had sat down a short time previously, after making the most unfounded and sweeping assertions against the Irish Members. It really looked as if it were intended to prevent any reply to those assertions being given. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary asserted against us on these Benches that we had never made any proposals for the advantage and benefit of these smaller tenants such as are in Donegal. The recklessness of the assertions of the right hon. Gentleman is, notorious to the House. But I think that even he out-Heroded himself on this occasion. If there is one question that we have had more at heart since the distress in 1879 and 1880, which first attracted our attention to these small tenants, it is the means and. remedy to be adopted for the relief of tenants of this kind. And the right hon. Gentleman has no right to tall us that we, forsooth, have never made any proposals for the relief of these tenants. I can recollect in 1880 that we produced a Bill for this express purpose—a Bill brought in by Mr. O'Connor Power, the then Member for County Mayo—which was adopted by Mr. Forster and first joined on to the Relief of Distress Act, and then was introduced as a separate Bill, though subsequently thrown out by the House of Lords. We

  377
  produced a measure expressly for the relief of the small tenants. Again, in 1881 we pressed upon the House the necessity of settling this question of arrears intimately connected with the question of the position of the small Irish tenants. Again, in 1882 we brought forward another Bill which contained an arrears clause, and succeeded in obtaining from the Legislature the Arrears Act of 1882, which was of enormous advantage to this very district of Donegal, and which has kept that district in peace from that day to this, until the recurrence of distress and partial famine has forced on the present disorder. Again, in 1883 I obtained from the Legislature the introduction of clauses into the Tramways Bill for the express purpose of dealing with the congestion of these districts, where the holdings, as described by the right hon. Gentleman, are too small to enable the tenants to subsist. Those clauses, unhappily, were not successful, but they failed, not owing to our fault, but on account of the exorbitant prices claimed by the landlords for the land which we desired to buy especially for the purpose of these tenants. And certainly the right hon. Gentleman is not entitled to tell us we have not at all times and in every circumstance done our best and utmost to deal practically with this question of the relief of the congested districts. What has the right hon. Gentleman done himself? He has now been in office for three years—and the Government of which he is a Member has practically been in office for four years—since the autumn of 1885. What practical proposal has he or his Government made for dealing with this question? I admit that it is a very difficult question; that it is one requiring an intimate knowledge of the conditions existing in those districts. But it is not to be settled by the right hon. Gentleman as he tried to settle it last night—by hurling taunts across the floor of the House against us, and by—to show the inconsistency of the right hon. Gentleman's statements—in one breath talking of the Plan of Campaign as being the cause of all the trouble, and in the next showing, as he truly showed, that it is because the holdings are too small. What I wish to point out is this: that the right hon. Gentleman has admitted that the battering ram, which has been
  378
  introduced into Ireland for the first time—this Government battering ram—is to be used for defensive purposes by the police against the poorest and most distressed tenantry throughout the whole of Ireland, ten ants who, as he states himself, are paying rents of only 1s. or so per week. There might be some excuse for the use of the battering ram on the substantial stone houses of the strong farmers of Limerick or Tipperary, but surely the right hon. Gentleman must recognize the unfitness, the cruelty, the barbarity of the introduction of such a weapon, and its trial for the first time upon the miserable cottages which almost a touch would throw down. The right hon. Gentleman says that the difference between the Plan of Campaign and the offer made by the landlord is infinitesimal, and cannot affect the issue.
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): No, Sir. I do not wish to interrupt the hon. Gentleman unnecessarily, but what I said was, that the difference between the demands of the Plan of Campaign on this estate and the offer was infinitesimal from the point of view from which I was then speaking, and which was raised by the hon. Gentleman's argument—namely, the bearing which the annual rent which the people had to pay had on their comfort.
  MR. PARNELL: So I understood the reference of the right hon. Gentleman, and I did not intend to misrepresent him. I admit that it appears to be so; but if it is infinitesimal, if the difference is so small as to make it a matter of no practical importance, so much the more ought the right hon. Gentleman to have hesitated before he adopted those unusual methods in the interests of the landlords of this district. It is true that the rents of these poor creatures are small, and I should tell the right hon. Gentleman I have always said that I believe that if justice were to be done the tenants in these crowded districts ought not to be called on to pay any rent at all. I do not say that from the point of view of the land naturalizer, or from the point of view of the Socialist at all, but I say it from my own knowledge, that the only reason why any rent is payable in respect of those holdings at

  379
  all, the reason why any value whatever can be attached to them, is owing to the fact that they are occupied by such a class. If you remove the present occupiers from those crowded, barren districts, there is no other occupier or tenant who would give 6d. an acre for this land. No Scotch farmer would go over there and offer 6d. an acre for it for grazing purposes. It is unsuitable for any purpose, except as the place where the homes of those poor people are. If it were not that they had constructed those little cabins, if it were not that they had fenced round those little fields with stone walls—the stones abounding so much that sometimes the fields seem to be all wall and all stone and no arable land at all—if it were not that those bits of mountains and scraps of bog had been reclaimed by the labour of those people, and made useful for their habitation, if it were not the fact that these people go over to England and Scotland to earn annually enough to pay their rent, I say there is no other class of tenant that the ingenuity of the landlord could devise who would give 6d. an acre for the land, for which those people have frequently to pay 6s., 7s., 8s., 9s. and 10s an acre. From the point of view of justice, this land derives its entire value, in the first instance, from the labour of those tenants; and, in the second place, from the fact that they are a class of people who come across to this country annually to earn their living, and leave their wives and children behind in order to till the fields and gather in the scanty crops. This may be, and I believe it is, a partial distress. But I believe in my soul that it is not a gotten-up distress. We have been familiar with the disposition of previous Chief Secretaries to minimize distress. I recollect one of the predecessors of the right hon. Gentleman, now the hon. Member for the Isle of Thanet (Mr. J. Lowther), who was Chief Secretary in 1879, and who scoffed just in the same way as the right hon. Gentleman did last night at the notion of distress in Ireland, and we saw what followed upon it. But even then some mitigation was extended to those peasants. The outdoor relief rules of the Local Government Board were relaxed. The existence of distress having been denied for months, after a time, as I say, the out-door relief rules were re-
  380
  laxed, and permission was given to the Boards of Guardians to grant relief in the shape of food and fuel to persons outside the workhouse. I would urge on the right hon. Gentleman, in the present instance, the consideration of some such step. The outdoor relief should be extended to the grant of seed potatoes, so that the people might be enabled to put in their crops, and so that the calamity might not be intensified by the lack of any harvest next year. The supply of fresh seed has always been of great advantage to the tenants of those poor districts. The potato seed supplied in 1880 and 1881 secured for those seaboard districts a plentiful potato crop for many years subsequently, and we have no reason to anticipate the approach of any serious distress over large areas from that day to this. It sometimes happens, however, as in the case of Donegal, that parishes over large areas are afflicted with partial failure. And it is not asking too much from the great and rich English Government, that the Chief Secretary should direct his practical attention to this matter, and do what he can, apart from political considerations, and without hurling taunts at his political antagonists, to rescue the unhappy people of those particular districts. I have pointed out what was done in 1880, and I would suggest in addition, that the seed potatoes should also be given to those people in the shape of out-door relief under such supervision as will be necessary to prevent abuse. It is a small matter, and cannot entail any considerable expenditure on the Exchequer. I hope, in any circumstances, that the Chief Secretary will be more alive than he was last night to the state of the case, and to the duties incumbent upon him as the holder of his office.
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: The hon. Member has dealt with two very widely different topics, and I will take them in the order in which he has placed them before the House. The first point referred to is the answer which I gave to the hon. Member for Shoreditch (Mr. James Stuart) in reply to a question about an alleged confidential circular which that hon. Gentleman appeared to imagine existed. The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down appeared to think that I had invented that answer in order to screen the Government from

  381
  some accusation which might be made against them; and under his somewhat cold style of rhetoric ["Oh, oh!"]—well. I rather thought that by using that phrase I was paying a compliment to the hon. Gentleman—a compliment one cannot always pay to hon. Gentlemen opposite—under his somewhat cold style of rhetoric, I say, he made a distinct charge against me of want of straightforwardness—a charge which, I think, would have justified me if I had thought it worth while to rise to order, and ask for the protection of the Chair. He also compared my conduct with that of the late Mr. Forster entirely to my disadvantage. Well, Sir, I recollect the observations which used to be made about the late Mr. Forster, and I know very well that, though I have not, perhaps, been treated with great moderation of criticism by hon. Gentlemen, they have never said anything of me worse or as bad as they were in the habit of saying about Mr. Forster when he was alive. It seems that Mr. Forster's good qualities have been discovered by hon. Gentlemen subsequent to his leaving the office of Chief Secretary, and I am not without hope that, when I am relieved of my present duties, some traces and scintillations of merit may be found in my character even by hon. Gentlemen opposite. With regard to this particular charge made against me, I have only to say this. Since I have been Chief Secretary several questions have been put to me with regard to alleged secret circulars issued to the police, They were put to me long before the Times case was ever thought of, and I have invariably returned to those questions precisely the same answer in substance which I returned to the question of the hon. Member to-night. I would ask hon. Gentlemen what motive could I have in this case for concealing the truth, if the truth were that the circular had been issued? Why should the circular not be issued? If it had been issued, and if I thought it a subject which should be discussed in the House, I should have no hesitation in avowing it; I cannot conceive why the Government, if they see fit, are to be prevented from collecting and arranging information in their possession, or in the possession of their officials, "regarding all members of the National League, and of
  382
  the Land League, convicted of agrarian crime, since September, 1879." That is a perfectly legitimate subject of inquiry. All I say is, I am not going to answer in this House, under any provocation, questions about alleged secret circulars which, if they exist anywhere except in the fertile imagination of hon. Gentlemen opposite, must have been betrayed by a breach of confidence on the part of some official. So much for the least interesting part of the hon. Gentleman's speech. I now pass to the second part, which was in reality a continuation of the debate of yesterday evening, and a reply to observations I felt it my duty to make on that occasion. The hon. Member for Cork was not in his place when I spoke, and therefore labours under the disadvantage of having to consult the recollection of his hon. Friends, and such reports of my observations as appear in the daily journals, which, if I recollect rightly, were not first-person reports. The hon. Gentleman was very indignant with me for hurling taunts across the floor of the House at hon. Gentlemen opposite. This is a very singular observation for him to have made. As a matter of fact, I got up after the debate had gone on about two hours, and that period had been occupied not by me but by hon. Gentlemen opposite in hurling taunts of the most violent kind against the Government. When a reply was attempted by me, the hon. Member for Cork comes down and says I was the person who hurled taunts across the floor of the House. What were the taunts I was supposed to have hurled? The principle one was that I had accused hon. Gentlemen—this is the version given by the hon. Member for Cork—of never having suggested any solution of the difficulty connected with the congested districts in Ireland. I will remind the House of the arguments which led up to the statement which the hon. Gentleman has thus paraphrased. I was made the object of certain attacks because I was said to have supported the evictions to the best of my ability which are now taking place in Donegal. The hon. Member who dwelt upon this subject appeared to think, as the hon. Member for Cork appears to think, that the poverty of the tenants of this district was of itself a sufficient ground for not insisting that the law should be complied

  383
  with. The hon. Member attributed by inference, if not by direct assertion, as did the Seconder of the Motion, the poverty of those people to what he described as "landlordism." I stated distinctly in reply that the causes of the poverty of these people, which I did not deny and never attempted to minimize, wherever else they could be found, could not be found in landlordism, and I pointed out, as was, I have since discovered, pointed out on a previous occasion by the right hon. Member for the Bridgeton Division of Glasgow (Sir G. Trevelyan) that the question of rent was absolutely insignificant when you were considering the material prosperity of these people; and that, if the rent taken as a whole was absolutely insignificant, the difference between the terms of the Plan of Campaign and those of the landlord were, if possible, more insignificant. These rents are very often only 30s., £2, £3, or £4 a-year—many of them are less than 1s. a-week. These people are labourers living on allotments. There is no labourer living on an allotment in England who pays only 1s. a-week for his house, and those men, besides their cottages, have gardens from which they obtain a large amount of food for their support, and they are also able to raise a crop which they may sell, and for this land they pay an annual rent enormously less than that paid by any single agricultural labourer in England, however poor or undesirable his cottage and garden or allotment may be. I therefore felt myself justified in saying that, if the lot of these people was a hard one, and poverty existed amongst them, you could not attribute it, with any sense of justice or any apprehension of the obvious facts of the case, to the existence of what is absurdly called landlordism. I then said, "What have hon. Gentleman opposite done to provide a remedy for that state of things?" I said "They have done nothing." The hon. Gentleman traverses that statement, and he enumerates a number of measures—four or five measures—some of which passed, and some of which did not pass, which represent the efforts of hon. Gentleman below the Gangway, and, I suppose, represent the programme that they are going to carry out when they have a National Parliament in Dublin. What are those measures? The Compensation for Dis-
  384
  turbance Bill, which did not pass, in 1880; the Arrears Bill, which did not pass, in 1881; an arrears clause, which passed, in 1882; and a migration company started in 1883. With regard to the first of the two measures which became law, I do not deny that, in order to start the Land Act of 1881 on fair terms, a measure for dealing with arrears was necessary; but to describe that or any possible Arrears Act as a remedy or even a serious palliation of the poverty which exists in congested districts is absolutely to mistake the whole economical conditions which prevail in them. Are 'we to be told that, when the hon. Gentleman has uncontrolled management of Irish affairs, he is going to deal with the congested districts by triennial or biennial Arrears Acts? I tell him that he could not do a crueller kindness to these people. I say the only conceivable result of periodically passing of the sponge over those debts would be that the tendency to sub-divide and multiply, which is the primary root of the evils under which these districts labour, would be augmented and strengthened, and although it would be within the power of the statesmanship of the hon. Member to destroy all regard for obligations of law and contracts it would not, by such methods, be within his power to mitigate in the slightest degree the chronic distress which prevails in those unhappy parts of his country. Then, with regard to the migration company, which is the other remedy that was carried into effect, it is notorious, and was confessed by the hon. Member for Cork himself, that that scheme has been a total and absolute failure. The hon. Member said it was because land was too dear. I suppose that, when the efforts of his Friends have reduced the land of Ireland to prairie value, land may be cheaper there than it is now; but, judged by the price of land in every country in Europe, in England, Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, or Austria, the price of land in Ireland at this moment is low, and to be had in unlimited quantities.
  MR. PARNELL: Not unoccupied land.
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I do not know of any difficulty in the way of the hon. Gentleman getting what land he wants. It does not appear how he

  385
  intends to cheapen land in Ireland. Does he anticipate that when he is at the head of affairs it will he his duty to decrease still further the price of land in Ireland? So much, Sir, for the measures that were passed into law. With regard to the Bill for Compensation for Disturbance, which was not passed into law, I do not wish to revive the controversies which have gathered round that measure ever since its first inception. We know that the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian is never tired of referring to the rejection of that measure as the cause of many of the difficulties which have since arisen; but I do not intend to dwell upon that, because it is not relevant to the present controversy. It is not relevant, because, if it had been passed into law, whatever else it might have done, it would not have relieved congested districts in Ireland. If that Bill would have done anything, it would have made it difficult to evict. Now, eviction may be right, or it may not; it may be justifiable, or it may be unjustifiable; but, at any rate, no one can say that to make eviction impossible for a limited or even an indefinite period would by any possibility remove, in the slightest degree, the particular class of evil under which these districts are suffering. I have, therefore, gone through the four remedies suggested by the hon. Gentleman—the panacea which the hon. Gentleman and his friends wish to apply to Ireland. I have weighed them in the balance, and they are all found wanting; and I ask again, when I am reproached for enforcing the law in Donegal, what connection has that with the chronic evil of poverty prevailing in that district? How would that chronic evil be diminished if all law was cast to the winds; and what remedy have hon. Gentlemen opposite at their hand to apply to these distressed parts of Ireland? The right hon. Gentleman thinks it a shocking thing that a battering-ram should be used against the tenants of Donegal, because the tenants are poor. I do not see that the two subjects are connected. If hon. Members had studied the newspapers in the month of January, they would have seen that in this very district, and on this very property where the hon. Member for Cork tells us that the houses are so fragile that a touch would knock them down,
  386
  elaborate fortifications against eviction were erected, and resistance was carried on day after day, accompanied by attacks made on the police of so ferocious a character, that the officer commanding the troops was more than once on the point of giving the order to fire. Had he done so, that might or might not have been a source of gratification to those who live by disorder in Ireland; but I think it would have been a tragic and melancholy necessity; and it was because I desire to avoid any such necessity, and because I do not wish the police to be injured or possibly killed in the execution of their duties, that I took the course I did; and I maintain, in the interests of humanity, as well as in the interests of the law, that there never was a course more justifiable. I do not know that I have anything more to say, except with reference to the extent of the existing distress in Donegal. The reports I have received on the subject admit, what I have more than once stated, that the potato crop is in many parts a deficient crop. They tell me that the oat crop is a good crop, and that prices for cattle and produce have been good. They do not tell me that anything of the character of famine is imminent. They do not tell me that distress has reached an abnormal point. The question is what ought under these circumstances to be the action of the Government. The hon. Member says relax the Poor Law; give us a loan of money; give us seed potatoes. Now, I frankly admit that circumstances may arise, as they have arisen in Ireland, when steps like that become absolutely necessary. But I feel certain that every man in this House who really has the good of these poor people at heart will agree with me that the necessity is from every point of view a lamentable one—that the demoralization produced by these gifts is not conducive to their ultimate and permanent prosperity, and that, however they may tide over a few months of exceptional distress, you pay for that temporary relief by perhaps the permanent aggravation of the evils you wish to deal with. Therefore, nothing but the most overwhelming necessity ought to make the Executive revert to such measures. It would be an easy thing for the Executive to deal with the poor of Donegal by granting the boon, and, as far as I am concerned, nothing

  387
  would be pleasanter to myself. It would make my path in this House smoother and the administration of Donegal easier to me. But I am sure the hon. Gentleman, if he will think over this matter, not from a political point of view, but from the point of view of permanent benefit to these people themselves, will see that any Government which, in order to obtain any temporary relief for itself, passed measures of this kind likely to create permanent demoralization would be betraying its trust and neglecting its duty. I can assure hon. Gentlemen that I shall keep critical watch on what goes on in Donegal. We know enough of the history of public subventions, and I am not at all sure that the impartial observer of these eleemosynary grants is not forced to the conclusion that they have done more harm than good in the long run. I will refer anyone who chooses to the Parliamentary papers relating to distressed Unions issued by myself in 1887. The seed loan is usually quoted as showing what the Irish may do in favourable circumstances in paying back loans. I am far from denying that in a large number of cases the loans have been paid back with admirable honesty and punctuality. But I believe that one of the defaulting districts was this very district in Donegal, and under such circumstances to hastily or unnecessarily revive a public subvention which has thus once failed would not be to teach a lesson to these people of that kind which I am sure they ought to learn. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bridgeton (Sir G. Trevelyan) was subjected to savage reproach in 1883 because he referred to the existing Poor Law as the proper method of averting the consequences of poverty. I am sure he was influenced by the highest sense of public duty and the merits of the case, and I say that the relaxation of the Poor Law is not a thing to be done by the Executive Government, except in case of overwhelming necessity. If the history of the Poor Law teaches us anything, it teaches us this—that the reckless administration of it is more dangerous than any act of tyranny or oppression ever urged against the most oppressive Government which ever ruled in this country. I hope the House will feel that, while I am alive to all that is going on in Donegal,
  388
  I do not admit, from the information given to me, that the distress is of exceptional magnitude, and I am sure Gentlemen on both sides will support me in the line I have taken up—namely, that until an overwhelming necessity is demonstrated I should not be at liberty to carry into effect the suggestions made, I have no doubt with the best intentions, by the hon. Member for Cork.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: The right hon. Gentleman began his speech on the subject of the misery of Donegal by a sneer at the cold rhetoric of the hon. Member for Cork. I venture to think that the unhappy poor of Donegal and the people of Ireland, and, I will say, the people of England, will prefer on this occasion the touching appeal of the hon. Member for Cork, sneered at by the Secretary for Ireland—
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I did not sneer at that part of his speech, nor at any part; but when I was accused of stating what is false I thought the repartee moderate.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: We are accustomed—the prisoners in Ireland are accustomed—to the moderate repartee of the right hon. Gentleman. We now know what is meant by the moderate repartee of the Chief Secretary for Ireland. It means the placing of the Irish Members and Irish people under lock and key in prison, and knocking down the houses of the Irish tenants. I think the public will judge of the moderate repartee. I think the appeal of the hon. Member for Cork on behalf of these unhappy people will be preferred to the passionate invective of the Chief Secretary for Ireland urged in defence of evictions. Listening to that speech, and looking at it from end to end, I ask what is the policy of the Government with reference to this population of Donegal? What are they going to do for it? What assistance are they going to render to the population, which all admit is a most wretched and a most miserable reproach to the Government? What is the policy of the Government? It is, in one word, a policy of extermination. The Irish Secretary is going to destroy their hovels. He has invented a new machine—a machine which he says is to be the instrument of the law. It is not the instrument of the law but of the police. The police have this defensive battering-

  389
  ram, and the police are the servants of the Government. He says it makes no difference, and he objected, when I said that it made a difference, that the people are in a state of misery and wretchedness. I am speaking in the presence of English Gentlemen opposite, many of whom are landlords. I ask them if they agree with the Irish Secretary on that point? Suppose there were an English village with a few wretched cottages where the people could hardly tolerate existence. Would it make no difference to them if the persons to be evicted were wretched cottiers or well-to-do farmers? In the one case I can imagine them saying—"Here is a farmer who can pay his rent if he chooses, and against him I will invoke all the processes of the law." But I know no English gentleman who would say to the wretched cottiers—"It makes no difference to these poor creatures who are just on the point of starvation. It makes no difference to them, and, therefore, I will have my battering ram and level their houses over their heads." That is the doctrine of the Irish Secretary. It is nothing to him that the tenants are wretched and miserable. Eviction was made for them; that is his logic.
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: That has no resemblance to what I said.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: What is your argument? You say that poverty has nothing to do with the evictions. I appeal against that doctrine. I appeal to the people of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Poverty has everything to do with them, and that is why I uttered an exclamation of indignation when I heard the language which came from the lips of the Secretary for Ireland. To say that poverty is no element will, I am sure, shock the sentiment of every man. The right hon. Gentleman, in almost passionate terms, sneered at the notion that a plea of poverty should be a plea for mercy. The right hon. Gentleman says—"These men do not pay their rents; I will level their houses." That is his first moderate repartee. There has been harsh treatment enough of the people of Ireland for generations before. But it was left to the ingenuity of the right hon. Gentleman to invent a new machine for getting rid of the population of the congested districts. That is the first policy of the Govern-
  390
  ment—to level the houses of the people. We have not yet had the full development of the ram. What is the battering ram for? Is it meant to knock the people down?
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: For the protection of the police.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: For the protection of the police! Is it intended to knock the people down and not the houses? I have never before heard of a protective ram. That is a nice Irish bull for an English Secretary to invent. The right hon. Gentleman is, I believe, having an opportunity of ascertaining what this protective ram can do. It has been doing its work to-day, and we shall learn for what purpose. Eviction, then, is the first remedy the Government mean to apply, and the right hon. Gentleman stood up last night as the supporter of the evictions which are now going on in Donegal. That is the first part of the policy of the Government. The hon. Member for Cork made an appeal which might have touched the heart even of the present Irish Secretary. He said that these people are in distress and misery. Well, the right hon. Gentleman will not believe in their distress. He first of all says that the potato crop is deficient; but that is nothing; and he simply denies the distress. Of course, if there is no distress there is no need for assistance. I have before heard this Government making statements with reference to the rents of Ireland. I heard their statements in 1886–7, when the hon. Member for Cork and his colleagues brought forward measures founded on their knowledge of the condition of Ireland. And what happened? The Government appointed a Commission to inquire into the question, and it turned out that the Irish Members were perfectly right, for that Commission endorsed the accuracy of their statements, and showed that the statements made from the Bench opposite, on the faith of official representations, were altogether untrue. And that was their own Commission. Therefore, when the right hon. Gentleman, who knows nothing about Ireland but what is told him by his subordinates, makes statements in the presence of Irish Members, I prefer the statements of the Irish Members to his official information, and I will assume, therefore, that there is distress in Donegal.

  391
  The Government are asked, "Will you do anything to alleviate that distress?" and the right hon. Gentleman says "No," and that there are seed potatoes in the local markets. Now, the potato seed loan has been as well repaid as any loan ever was paid in Ireland. Yet the right hon. Gentleman rejects all remedies and will give no assistance. Was I not right, then, in saying that the policy of the Government for Donegal is a policy of extermination? They have now been, as the hon. Member for Cork says, three years in office, and at the beginning of their administration the noble Lord the Member for Paddington (Lord R. Churchill) proclaimed that they were going to bring forward large measures for the purpose of dealing with land in Ireland, especially in the congested districts. They have been in office three years. They have done nothing, proposed nothing. In the presence of this condition of things in Donegal, in the presence of the Bill of the hon. Member for Cork and the Irish Members, they say—"We have nothing to propose; we reject your proposals, and the remedy we are prepared to sustain is eviction, and nothing but eviction." That is the policy of the Government in reference to these miserable districts of Ireland, and I say that it is a policy of extermination and nothing else. As he is not now in the Chair, I may appeal to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bodmin (Mr. Courtney), who has written so many letters and accompanied them with so very little action. Let us know to-night what the right hon. Gentleman has to propose. He is one of the main supporters of a Government who have nothing to say and nothing to do for the people of Ireland. Is he for this negative policy, for this single policy of extermination? Is that the policy of the Party with which he acts, and in reference to which they give their support to the Government? After all we were told of what was going to be done, we see that nothing has been done. When we come to a condition of things such as that which now exists in Donegal, your only remedy is the state of terror which you have created at Gweedore and the ram which you have sent down to Letterkenny. Your policy is the policy of evicting an oppressed and distressed people by the most cruel means,
  392
  and that is the only remedy which the Secretary for Ireland suggests.
  *THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,): The House can see the colour which the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down gives to the speeches which have been made on this side of the House. Of all the many misrepresentations — unintentional, of course—which are made of the utterances of the Chief Secretary, I do not think there has ever been so glaring a one as that contained in the speech to which we have just listened. The right hon. Gentleman has said that the policy of the Government is a policy of extermination, and that this is the only policy of the Government. The right hon. Gentleman took good care not to examine the arguments of my right hon. Friend, but he spoke of the tone in which the Chief Secretary spoke, and, as usual, he said "the country will judge." But the country, unfortunately, cannot sit in that; Gallery. They can read what is said, but they cannot see the contrast of tone between my right hon. Friend and the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down. Hon. Members below the Gangway cannot for a moment say that my right hon. Friend did not speak with feeling on this question. ["No!"] Even at the risk of that misrepresentation which he knew he would receive, my right hon. Friend preferred that misrepresentation to doing that which he describes as being so easy, and to relieving himself of the calumnies made upon the attitude which he adopts. The right hon. Gentleman opposite, with his great debating ability, fixed upon the one point in the earlier part of my right hon. Friend's speech in which he justified the measures which are being taken. The right hon. Gentleman appealed to English gentlemen, and asked how they would act in such circumstances. No person who listened to him would believe that there exists in Donegal at this moment a Plan of Campaign, which was designed to disturb—and has resulted in disturbing—the whole relations between landlord and tenant, which has upset all the relations which did exist previously, and which has substituted a state of warfare for which hon. Gentlemen who sit below the Gangway are mainly responsible. I

  393
  believe the majority of the tenants have paid their rents, or a portion of them, to the trustees of the Plan of Campaign. I should like to know whether the right hon. Gentleman was aware of that? He spoke of the tenants as being so poor as not to be able to get a shilling to pay their rent. Now, the rent has been paid by the tenants; but in order to carry out the general design, individual tenants are sacrificed over and over again. If there is a policy of extermination, as the right hon. Gentleman calls it, it results from the war initiated by hon. Members below the Gangway. The evictions are taking place not because the tenants cannot pay, but because they have paid into other hands than those of the landlords, who are holding the rent against the landlords. That is a very different situation from that which has been depicted by the right hon. Gentleman opposite. Then the right hon. Gentleman asks—"What is this battering ram designed for?" and ignores the strong argument of my right hon. Friend, who showed that, if these houses are to be entered at all, it is far more humane and more likely to save life and limb to use a ram to smash a door than to pour boiling water on the police. The right hon, Gentleman prefers that a policeman's head should be battered rather than that a door should be smashed in by a battering ram. Hon. Members below the Gangway have no pity whatever for the police, whom they call the instruments of the Government. Their heads may be broken as much as they like. Indeed, they hold that the heads of the police ought to be broken. ["No!"] Then why encourage the people to barricade their houses and resent the officers of the law? If the police organize what is properly called a defensive arm as a means of defence against outrageous proceedings undertaken under the auspices of hon. Gentlemen, the country will judge whether it is a more humane and civilized course, when a house is to be entered, to batter in a door than to allow a limited number of police to be battered by persons in the house in defiance of the law. I ask whether my right hon. Friend has not shown conclusively that, if the Government do not think that hasty steps ought to be taken in order to supply doles and charity to the people of Donegal, it is because
  394
  it would be very demoralizing to enter upon such a course, and would only aggravate their condition. Hon. Members below the Gangway may think honestly that it is a wise plan continually to give relief out of the Exchequer, but it is not, and cannot be, the opinion of right hon. Gentlemen who sit on the Front Bench opposite. Right hon. Gentlemen opposite may agree with hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway that there are exceptional cases in which such relief may be given and would be given by any Government. But the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian and his friends know that there is no more dangerous proceeding than from time to time to assist by extraordinary charity. The distress has been watched by the Government with great anxiety, and will continue to be watched, and if it be necessary to afford relief certainly it will be our duty to do so, but we do not see any hope of applying such a system of charity as has been suggested. I rose mainly to protest against the tone adopted by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt), who accused my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary (Mr. A. J. Balfour) of callousness to the sufferings of the population, which excite the sympathy of this side of the House quite as much as it does of the other side. We cannot, however, shut our eyes to the fact that these poor people are being made the catspaw of the political aspirations of hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite, and that those relations between landord and tenant which in this country would come to the relief of distress, hon. Members have done their best to destroy.
  MR. WADDY: I do not rise for the purpose of making observations on the tone of the debate, although I cannot help remarking that we are constantly hearing a great deal from occupants of the Treasury Bench about the tone adopted by, and the vile intentions and wicked practices of Members below the gangway. The whole of the Irish mischief is constantly attributed to them, and the absurd statement is repeated so frequently that I really believe that those who make it are at last beginning to believe it. Now, Mr. Speaker, I wish to inform the House that the evidence of my own eyes is in direct and blank

  395
  contradiction to what has been said by speakers on the Treasury Bench. I understand the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A. J. Balfour) and the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Goschen) to say that the battering ram was used for the purpose of smashing the door and making an entrance. Now, Sir, the importance of this battering ram performance is that it marks an entirely new phase in principle as well as in action. What the police used to do was to stand on one side while a small army of emergency men did the work. But now the Government are supplying a machine by which the right hon. Gentlemen say entrance is to be made. It is no longer the engine of the landlord, but of the Government, and I congratulate the Government on the fact that after three years of their rule the peasants of Donegal are at this moment arrayed against them, according to their own account, in a state of civil war. I leave the world to judge of the success which has attended and the propriety which has actuated their movements. I wish to point out that the battering ram is used for the purpose, not of effecting an entrance, but of destroying the houses built by the tenants. When the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer drew a comparison between the English agricultural labourer and the Irish tenant he knew, or ought to have known, that it was illusory. You can not draw a parallel between the houses built by the tenant with his own money and his own hands and the houses built and paid for by the landlord. What is the result? The landlords in this country do not knock down the tenants' houses; they are their own. But in Ireland the battering ram is applied to one part of the house, and when a great gap has been made it is moved to another part, where it is used in the same way, and so on, until there is one wide gaping ruin and the roof must come down. I have seen this done, and it is done because it is the house not of the landlord, but of the tenant, because if you bring down the house you destroy the nest and make the birds fly; because you are determined to carry out completely what is rightly called by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt) the policy
  396
  of extermination. If there is any doubt about it, you may go and see for yourselves. Go, if you will, and look to-day at the house of Matthew M'Grath. I have seen it with these eyes. The whole wall is battered down, and the roof is drooping down to the ground, because there is nothing to support it. Go, also, and see a house at Kilrush, and also the house of Thomas Birmingham. That which moves the indignation of the people in Ireland, and ought to move the indignation of the people in England—and would do so if they knew the truth—is that this engine has been invented, not for the purpose of carrying out the law, but for the purpose of destroying the houses and rendering permanently homeless the people who lived in them. But there is another matter as to which I must join issue with the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary. The right hon. Gentleman has given no answer to the question of the hon. Member for Shoreditch (Mr. J. Stuart). When the Government has received confidential information, it has a perfect right to say that it believes it is for the best interests of the public that the information should be regarded as privileged. But that is not the point now. The question is whether certain information has been collected and then made use of. Has the Government handed over this information to the solicitor for the Times? It is suggested that the Government has sent out a circular not giving information, but asking certain questions, and they can do no harm in telling the House whether they have done so. Is it true that they have once more made themselves parties as far as they dare, to that of which they, in common with the whole world, are now thoroughly ashamed? Is it true that they have been assisting in a transaction which the whole civilized world looks upon at the present moment with nothing less than odium? If they have been giving information to the Times, will they, at all events, purge themselves of their partizanship by giving it also to the other side? That is a question to which the House has a right to an answer.
  *MR. CHAPLIN: I rose at an earlier period in the evening with the object of putting a few questions to the Government on a totally different matter, but I find it impossible

  397
  to hear the attacks which are being made on the Government, and which are constantly made on landlords in Ireland, and to abstain from replying to some of them. The last speaker referred to transactions in connection with the appointment of the Royal Commission now inquiring into the charges made against hon. Members of this House as things of which the whole world is ashamed. I take leave to tell the hon. Member that he is totally and absolutely mistaken. Speaking for other Members as well as myself, I have to say that we have nothing to retract, and that if the same transactions were to happen again we should take the same course. Since the appointment of the Commission there was not a single occasion on which I ever said a word in public upon the questions which the Commission is now investigating, and I regard the debates which we have had upon it as indecent and irregular in the highest degree. In reply, however, to a distinct challenge by the right hon. Gentleman the Attorney General for the late Government, I did upon one occasion, before the Commission was appointed, state the views which I held, and which I know are shared by the great majority of hon. Gentlemen sitting on this side of the House at the time. I said then, that "we desired to judge no man," and I stated in the House that the feeling on my own side was that we were bound to assume that all our brother Members were absolutely innocent of the charges until they were proved to be guilty. I repeated that statement twice over, and, in face of the attitude we thus took at that time, it is monstrous that charges and recriminations should be made against us for which there never was a shadow of foundation. There is, I wish also to say, no monopoly whatever of sympathy for the poor distressed people in the congested districts of Ireland on the other side of the House, as is constantly assumed by hon. Gentlemen opposite. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt) asked the Government what they were going to do for the congested districts. Well, I ask, did the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. Gladstone) do? He was practically in power for 15 years, when all these things were going on in exactly the same position as now,
  398
  except that at that time the difficulties of the Government were not increased by the operation of the Plan of Campaign. Over and over again public attention was called to the state of the congested districts in Ireland, and yet all through those years, when the right hon. Gentleman could do almost anything he liked, I am unable to recall to mind that the right hon. Gentleman and his friends and associates ever took any effectual measures for the relief of the congested districts. Under these circumstances, whoever else it may lie with it does not lie with any right hon. Gentleman on the Front Opposition Bench to taunt the Government with neglect of their duties in this respect. When the action of English landlords is referred to, I wish to point out again, in justice to Irish landlords, that their position is wholly different from that of landlords in England. Parliament has created the distinction by the legislation of 1881 and previous years, and it cannot too often be repeated that at that time the Government of the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian not only deprived the landlord of his power of control over his estates, but at the same time absolved him from his duties, and placed him in the position of a mere rent-charger and nothing else. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir W. Harcourt) ought to look nearer home, to evictions with which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. Gladstone) is not altogether unconnected. ["Oh!"] I fully believe that in circumstance such as those which are said to exist in the west of Ireland, English landlords would be very slow, as a general rule, to evict. What the circumstances connected with the Hawarden estate may be I am not in a position to state, nor would I impute to those connected with that estate conduct which which would reflect anything but credit on landlords in any part of the world. But the fact remains that evictions took place on the Hawarden estate because the tenants were poor and unable to pay their rents, and I say that the tenants on the Hawarden estate were in precisely the same position in that respect as the tenants about whom all this discussion is taking place. Therefore, when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby appeals to English landlords in this House and.

  399
  asks what course they would take under the circumstances referred to, he ought to apply to a right hon. Gentleman from whom he might receive the latest and most perfect intelligence, the Member for Mid Lothian. L" Oh "] I do not think that I have said anything which can justly be called either offensive or inaccurate in any particular. If so, I should be only too ready to withdraw it. It was certainly not my intention to be offensive, and I do not think that in anything I have said I have transgressed Parliamentary practice and manners in every respect. [An ironical cheer from Gladstone.] I am very glad to hear it. I remember it was said by the Member for East Mayo, in one of our debates not long ago, that such agitation as is occurring in Ireland would be impossible here. That is true at present no doubt, because the same means are not taken in England to create agitation as are pursued in Ireland. But I maintain that if the same means were taken, there would be no great difficulty in getting up agitation against landlords upon the estates either of the right hon. Gentleman or any one else. That is why these attacks on Irish landlords are unjust and ungenerous in the highest degree. When the hon. Member for the Brigg Division of Lincolnshire (Mr. Waddy) spoke of the battering ram being used because the houses are not the landlords' property he was incorrect in his statement, because, when the stage for eviction has been reached, the House, as I understand the law, is the property of the landlord. Whether the law is right or wrong I am not arguing, but that is a conclusive answer to the statement of the hon. Gentleman. Turning, however, to more prosaic matter, my right hon. Friend, the Leader of the House (Mr. W. H. Smith) the other day stated that the Government proposed to ask the Royal Agricultural Society to appoint some person or persons to proceed to Holland in order to inquire and ascertain whether, under all the circumstances, it was safe to import animals into the interior of this country from the Netherlands at the present time without being subject to slaughter or quarantine. Well, Sir, I have only to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he can give us any further information on this point—
  400
  that is to say, whether the Royal Agricultural Society have agreed to send somebody, and, if so, who has been appointed. I also desire to know whether we are right in understanding that until the inquiry has been made, and the report has been received, the Order in Council will not be allowed to come into operation. If the right hon. Gentleman can give me an assurance on that point it will be a matter of great satisfaction to the agricultural community throughout the country.
  MR. SEXTON: I will not trouble the House by referring to what the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down describes as "prosaic," but I will allude to the earlier part of his speech, which I suppose he would describe as "poetic." The right hon. Gentleman has proved on this occasion that, as usual, he is much more courageous than discreet; for, as a Gentleman of considerable experience and undoubted maturity, he possesses a considerable share of the rashness of youth. I think the right hon. Gentleman would have done better had he avoided the topic of the Special Commission, because, so far as it has proceeded, the Commission has unearthed, to the condemnation of the world, the foulest plot that was ever directed against the character of public men, or the hopes of a nation. It is idle for the right hon. Gentleman to say that he is satisfied with the result of the Commission.
  *MR. CHAPLIN: I did not say so.
  MR. SEXTON: Then the right hon. Gentleman is not satisfied with the result of the Commission?
  *MR. CHAPLIN: I beg to explain. I carefully abstained from expressing any opinion as to the proceedings before the Commission, because, as I said, I regarded the debates that had taken place with regard to it as indecent and irregular.
  MR. SEXTON: Then, in that case, the right hon. Gentleman is in the conspicuous, but undesirable, position of Satan reproving sin; for he takes advantage of a speech which has been delivered to the House on the subject for the purpose of making an elaborate retort. The fact is that the forged letters have been the very bread of life to the Tory party for the past two years, and they had flourished those letters upon every hustings in England, and there

  401
  are many hon. Gentlemen on the opposite benches who may be said to have been returned here with the writ in one hand and the forged letters in the other. The right hon. Gentleman has had the courage and audacity to ask the Liberal Party what they have done for Ireland, and, at the same time, he gave the House an idea of the code of ethics which govern his own mind when he said that a house which a tenant has raised up by his own capital and labour becomes the property of the landlord upon his eviction. It would be more just to say that if the right hon. Gentleman had run a horse in a race and had lost, that that horse became the property of the winner.
  *MR. CHAPLIN: Allow me to explain. I cannot believe that the right hon. Gentleman is intentionally misrepresenting me. What I said was that the law, whether it be right or wrong—on which I did not express any opinion—makes the house, under those circumstances, the property of the landlord.
  MR. SEXTON: Yes, the law which the right hon. Gentleman himself helped to make; the law for the iniquity of which himself and his Party are responsible, and every step to remedy which has been persistently and obstinately impeded by the right hon. Gentleman and his friends. I ask, how dare the right hon. Gentleman ask the Liberal Party what they have done for Ireland? Does he think that the memory of the past is obliterated and blotted out? Does he think that we know nothing of what has happened in Ireland since 1870? I know very well that perception is not a prominent quality in the mind of the right hon. Gentleman; but there seems to be no limit to his irresponsible and irrational daring. He asks the Liberal Party, forsooth, what they have done for Ireland. Why, Sir, I wonder how it is possible for the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. Gladstone) to listen to this in mere silent indignation. If the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian has failed to remedy the agrarian situation in Ireland so as to meet such crises as this, it is due to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sleaford and his associates on those benches, and his confederates in the House of Lords. Does the right hon.
  402
  Gentleman forget all that has been done by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian? Does he forget that the right hon. Gentleman introduced a Bill for the purpose of giving compensation for disturbance? Well, what happened to that Bill, which would have met the case of many of the tenants whose position called for such a remedy? That Bill passed this House in the face of the vehement and persistent obstruction of the right hon. Gentlemen opposite; but when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian, by an effort for which the Irish people will ever be grateful, passed that measure for the relief of the small tenants through this House, it was defeated by the associates of the right. hon Gentleman the Member for Sleaford in the House of Lords. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian passed a Bill which saved the homes of tens of thousands of poor tenants on whose behalf we plead to-day. He passed the Act of 1870 and the Act of 1881; and if those two Acts have not been—and they have not been—a complete and genuine protection for the tenants of Ireland, the defect is due, not to any fault on the part of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian, but to the persistent efforts of the Member for Sleaford and his friends to mutilate those measures, and render them less useful for the purposes they were intended to subserve. Within the limits of Parliamentary experience, it is impossible to cite an example of more measureless audacity than that displayed by the right hon. Gentleman to-night in daring to rise up in this House, and question the Liberal Party as to their efforts on behalf of the Irish tenants. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer has on this, as on many former occasions, constituted himself the Censor of Debate, for which position no man in this House is by temper and disposition worse fitted; for he invariably succeeds in lowering the tone of the Debate. But there is one sentence of the right hon. Gentleman with which I agree. He said "the country will judge." Yes, Sir, the country will judge, and the country is waiting for the chance of judging. We are willing to challenge you at this moment to proceed to a General Election. I should like to hear the hon

  403
  Gentleman who sneers at this say what was his majority at the last election. We, on this side of the House, call on you to go to a General Election. Who is it that fears the judgment of the country? It is the Government who are afraid to face the verdict of the country. It has been said that this Parliament will continue until 1893, and that nothing will induce the Party in power to appeal to the country, unless it be a hostile vote of the House. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer can argue pleasantly—such are his disposition and nature—over the woes of others; but, in this case, he is speaking of what he does not understand. He has referred to the Plan of Campaign in Donegal. Does the right hon. Gentleman know what has been the action of the Plan of Campaign? Will the right hon. Gentleman deny that on 57 estates in Ireland the Plan of Campaign has resulted in settlements under which the landlords have conceded the demands of the tenants? The moneys are lodged in a Trust Fund, and the moment that the landlord is willing to agree to the settlement, every penny of the money lodged in the Plan of Campaign will be ready and at his disposal. Is it not disgraceful, is it not painful that Irish Members, acquainted with the affairs of their country, should have to listen to such a speech as that of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, inspired by contempt for the Irish Members and for the sufferings of their race, and marked at every point by the most absurd ignorance of the state of affairs in Ireland? What does the Chancellor of the Exchequer know about these poor people in Donegal? Irish Members around me will confirm me when I say that this district was naturally rock, mountain, and marsh; the Ordinance survey and valuation of Ireland will confirm me; it was not worth sixpence an acre; it was not worth a penny until these poor squatters came upon it. The value of the land is due to them. They carried soil upon their back from the valley and they brought seaweed from the strand to improve the land; and when the Chancellor of the Exchequer speaks eloquently of the Irish landlords, does he think that we are ignorant of how these men have laboured to make the soil, and not only they but their fathers before
  404
  them? The experience of the Donegal district may be described in this way—that land, naturally worth nothing, spas made worth something by the penal servitude of the tenants. They made it worth something while the landlord, if I might borrow a phrase from the Chief Secretary for Ireland, critically watched from his chateau, or his club in London, until he saw the soil spread up the mountain side and over the rock, and then he raised the rent from 6d. to 1s., from 1s. to 5s., and even 10s. an acre. And after this revolting plunder, sanctified, I suppose, by law, carried on for years, and, in some cases, generations, the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer stands up at the Table and tells us that the rent in this case is an insignificant consideration. Little he knows how these people live, and how little they can live upon. Little he knows that the father leaves for the harvest in England, and that the whole family live meagrely that he may be able to use his wages thus earned to satisfy the landlord. I know of a family who depend for sustenance upon the enterprise of a poor girl, the daughter of the house, who, after buying thread, makes a pair of socks, and then, with bare feet, travels along the road to sell these socks for twopence. That is the way they live, and yet the rent of a shilling a-week is described by the right hon. Gentleman as insignificant. Why, these poor people live, many of them, on a shilling a-week. Had they lived under an equitable rent for 10 years, they would have been able to have put by the difference between that and the rack-rent, and would not to-day have been compelled to live on Indian meal. They would have been able to have satisfied the primitive wants belonging to a way of life undiscoverable by a gentleman with £18,000 a-year of private income and £4,000 a-year of salary. Now, Sir, the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Balfour) has said that he would critically watch the case. I think it is a revolting phrase, but I think it is one which very well tests his method of regarding Ireland. Does he know that seeding time has come; does he know that the fate of these people must be settled in a fortnight or a month? The right hon: Gentleman will stand criti-

  405
  cally by, he will analyze their sufferings, he will watch them in the extremity of their despair and of their hunger, and by the time his critical mind has come to a conclusion he will find that their homes have been levelled by his spiked battering ram—15ft. long, bought with Imperial money, hung upon chains, and surrounded by armour, made to ram horizontally in defence. And when their homes have been levelled by the battering ram, these people will be turned out to starve by the roadside, or drift into the workhouse. That will be the result of the critical examination of the Minister. What information can he give us? What Reports has he received? If he has got any Report, will he lay it on the Table of the House? We know the facts of the situation. People have been eating meal since last September, and the potato crop at that time was a quarter of the average crop. Does he consider what that means? The credit of the tenant is gone. The encouragement given by the right hon. Gentleman to the landlords to proceed to evictions has destroyed the credit of the tenants. They are eating seed potatoes in many instances. My hon. Friend the Member for Cork has asked the right hon. Gentleman whether he will provide some seed potatoes for this season. He has replied that he will give the matter his critical observation. Seed potatoes in Donegal are 6d. a stone—which is famine price—or more than 100 per cent in excess of the market price, 2½d. It means that seed potatoes are not in the market at all, that they have been eaten, and that the people have absolutely no seed potatoes. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to give us some assurance upon this subject before the debate concludes. Unless the people are provided with the means to seed their ground, undoubtedly there will be death from famine, and there will be a state of affairs which will cast disgrace upon the British Government, and on which the right hon. Gentleman, if he has any human feeling, could not look upon with equanimity. There is a gulf between the right hon. Gentleman and the late Mr. Forster. Mr. Forster, when he adopted a policy which was considered cruel, felt himself under the necessity of pursuing it, but I think Mr. Forster pursued that policy reluctantly, and I
  406
  have no doubt he never ceased to be a man of humane instinct. The right hon. gentleman on the other hand is a cold and deliberate inciter to cruelty. Another thing I will say of Mr. Forster, that when you asked him a plain question he gave you a straight answer. The right hon. Gentleman thinks that other Chief Secretaries have been worse treated than he. I do not think we could have another Chief Secretary whose character would display so revolting a combination. I call it a most revolting combination of human character to find the minimum of frankness associated with the maximum of cruelty. I should like for a moment to test the question of frankness. The right hon. Gentleman was asked to day with reference to the issue of a secret circular, about a month after the meeting of the Special Commission. The Chief Secretary has two ways of dealing with Irish affairs—either he point blank refuses to answer, or he gives an answer which is worse than misleading. He boldly refused to answer to-day the allegation about the circular. Now, I have the text of it before me. This circular was issued last November, when the Commission Court sat. It is headed "Very Secret; Agrarian Crime." It is unfortunate for the British Government in Ireland that under the present system, even that which is very secret immediately becomes public. This circular is not simply "private" or "confidential," it is very secret, and has consequently come into our hands. It is from Dublin Castle to the police—
  "Very secret! Agrarian crime! Please let me have as soon as you can the particulars asked for on the opposite margin regarding all Leaguers convicted of agrarian crime since September, 1879. Of course 'Leaguers' include members of the Land League as well as of the National League. Be very discreet in collecting this information. From the local knowledge of the police no difficulty is apprehended in the performance of this duty. (a) Where tried and. offence: (b) names of persons, addresses, and witnesses generally, and what each can prove; (c) names and present addresses of persons who can produce records of each conviction as entered; (d) remarks, showing nature of evidence given, and any point of interest showing connection between League and offences."
  That is the circular issued by the Government, which declared its determination to stand impartially between the parties. Would any honest man—I will not say Chief Secretary—desire to bring

  407
  into Court a case which he was not prepared to submit to the test of cross-examination? How were we to be prepared with the material for cross-examination when we were unaware that this circular had been issued? Although the right hon. Gentleman refused to answer, we know that his refusal was simply an admission of the existence of the circular. We can all appreciate the advantage it would have been to the Chief Secretary if he could have said, "No such circular has been issued." Why, he would have bounded to the Table if he could have made such a declaration. He could not do so; two things restrained him—a desire to keep within the lines of truth, and the second, a more binding, restraining influence, I imagine, was the knowledge that we had a copy of the circular in our hands. Now, I say, quoting the Chancellor of the Exchequer, "the country will judge." A 'Special Commission was given to us to enable us to clear our character. The Government were most anxious that we should clear our character. They loved us more than brothers; they desired that we should prove ourselves worthy of retaining our places in this Imperial Assembly, and, prompted by that desire, they directed the police to set about collecting not merely evidence, but rumour. Why, we had the result offered to the three Judges who form the Special Commission in the very form of this special circular. A District Inspector had a Return in the form of this circular; but the Judges refused to receive it, and the Court was plunged into inextinguishable laughter when the District Inspector was found to have included in his Return of reasons why Irish Members should be expelled from this House—perhaps for disfranchising Ireland—that in one case a Land Leaguer was alleged to be reasonably suspected of having been guilty of "furious driving." Yes; the country will judge as to this Circular, and as to the methods adopted by the Irish Government to assist us in the endeavour to clear our character in this inquiry, and as to the sincerity and frankness of the Chief Secretary. It is too late for the right hon. Gentleman to pretend that we never made proposals for an alteration of the condition of things in Donegal. The poor tenants of the district stand on a
  408
  special footing and must be dealt with in a special manner, and if we were responsible do not doubt but we should deal with the case promptly. We have made many proposals, in the form of compensation for disturbance, for dealing with arrears and on the direction of migration. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian kindly and compassionably assented to our proposal in the Bill of 1882, and those proposals have been effectual in saving these poor people in their homes. If hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite who are so ready to deride the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian, if the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sleaford (Mr. Chaplin) and others, had urged upon their Government the concession in the legislation of 1887, of our demand for providing for arrears, and a provision similar to that which the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian agreed to in 1882, the distress we lament and deplore to-day in Donegal would not have arisen. My hon. Friend the Member for Cork proposed a system of migration. The Chief Secretary says it is easy to get land. My hon. Friend when defeated in his efforts to embark upon legislation attempted by other means to effect his object and carry out migration for the relief of the crowded districts, but he was boycotted by the landlords; he could not get land at less than 25 years' purchase. If he could have got it at 20 years' purchase, if he could have obtained it on any terms that would not have meant a material loss, he would have bought it, and the question would have been disposed of. The Chief Secretary, who has done nothing to assist in a solution of the difficulty, says you can get land cheap, and I tell him you cannot. There is this special feature attached to these Donegal holdings that whatever value they have belongs to the tenants, and the landlord has no right to rent for such. The tenants cannot pay rent from the produce of the land, they come over to England every year, they labour in the harvest fields here, they carry home the bulk of the wages they thus earn, and out of this they pay the landlord's rent. When the Chief Secretary and the Chancellor of the Exchequer speak of the English labourer and his allotment, they simply display their ignorance, for there is no analogy in the cases.

  409
  Is it the case that an English labourer builds his own house and gives his allotment whatever value it has? A comparison in cases fundamentally distinct is fallacious, and tends only to mislead. Does the House know what occurred in Donegal yesterday? There were seven evictions carried out, the battering ram standing by in a position of self-defence, and in these seven houses there was not found one potato or other food. I challenge contradiction to my statement. In one house broken into was a woman with a babe on her breast; her husband was absent. The first emergency man who entered after the door was burst, without warrant, gave the woman a violent push. The poor woman holding her babe with one arm stooped to seize a stool, and another emergency man gave her a blow on the face with his clenched fist, blood spurting out from the force of the blow. Here was a poor woman, her husband being absent, trying to defend her house against the brutal wretches who were executing a brutal law. She had not in the house a single potato or item of food whatever. With the aid of the battering ram the proceedings were carried out in pursuance of what has at other times been described as a policy of conciliation. I press for a reply before this debate closes. Will nothing be done by special grant of out-door relief, by provision of seed for the tilling of the farms for the present year, to save these people from starvation? What is the use of the right hon. Gentleman opposite standing upon the abstract letter of the law? What has been done has been a direct incitement to landlords to evict. The Government have incited the landlord not to come to a settlement with his tenants, for they have taken away from the tenants their guardian, their benefactor, their protector, their banker—Father McFadden. The right hon. Gentleman will not discuss the arrest of Father McFadden. Does he forget the case in which, the Attorney General having declined to proceed against a policeman who was accused on the finding of a coroner's jury of having killed a man at Middleton, the Chief Baron called attention to the failure of justice, and in the interests of justice the Attorney General was compelled to proceed before a magis-
  410
  trate? It is a question, in the case of Father M'Fadden, of the exercise of the functions of the Attorney General. What is he about to do? We have a right to know. The materials have been for many days before him; is he going to institute a prosecution or not? The imprisonment of Father McFadden means that the case of the other persons is prejudiced by the closing of the mouth of their principal witness. It means that the accused can make no adequate arrangements for their defence. It means there is no one to look after these poor starving women and children, no one to assist the tenants by endeavouring to promote a settlement with the landlord, should he be willing to come to terms. By your method of arresting Father McFadden you have done more than, in my memory, has ever been done by any Government to plunge the district into confusion and despair, to bring about breach of the law and peril to life and property. The police were planted about the church from an early hour. The warrant for arrest had been held for several days and no attempt was made to execute it—it was held over while Father McFadden went about the parish on his parochial duties. Why, if, as the Chief Secretary says, you are anxious that arrests should be made in a manner and at a time when they are likely to cause the least disturbance, did the police wait until the people were assembled on a Sunday morning? The police were there 100 strong from 7 in the morning, why did they not effect the arrest at an early hour? They waited until he passed into church and until Divine Service was over. Perhaps the House is not aware that on that day Father McFadden, with the near prospect of his own arrest, addressed the people from the steps of the altar with as powerful an address in the interest of peace and on the duties of self-denial, forbearance, and Christian church. Divine Service being over, Father M'Fadden walked out, wearing his soutane and biretta, and carrying his breviary in his hand. Outside the door the people were collected, and the authorities could not have chosen a psychological moment more likely to provoke a riot. Inspector Martin, whose tragic death no man can deplore more deeply than my colleagues

  411
  and myself—he was known to be a man of excitable disposition and should never have been sent on such an errand—came to the priest and seized him by the arm at the same moment drawing his sword, saying, "Come along with me." With the force used the priest's garment was torn, and as the sword flashed an excitable girl in the crowd cried out that the Inspector had struck the priest with his sword. Father M'Fadden asked for the authority for his arrest, and the warrant was produced. From that moment—and the evidence of the police is unanimous on this—Father M'Fadden did as he was desired, and went in the direction of his house, went on so fast indeed that he stumbled by the way. Father M'Fadden, as well as the officer, was struck in the burst of irrepressible uncontrollable fury which seized the people when, as they thought, they witnessed an attack upon their best friend and protector, whom they loved and almost worshipped. They rushed forward with the tragic result we all deplore. Father M'Fadden called out in English and Irish to the people to preserve peace and return to their homes. We have it from Father M'Fadden himself that in the course of his 10 years' administration of the parish he had never before in many crises found the people escape from his control, and the only occasion on which they failed to respond to his appeal was when he was powerless, because the people saw him made the victim of outrage. This holy priest, this devoted man who has given his time and his substance to the service of these poor and wretched people, stands charged with murder. Now, I beg the House of Commons to try and consider these things apart from all political feeling—I appeal to every Member, no matter what his political opinion, what is the possibility of convicting such a man, who all his life has behaved in the interests of peace and for the welfare of his people, of such a crime? The release of this priest is necessary for the preparation of the defence of the other persons accused, he is the one moral bulwark between the desperate people of his parish and the teachings of despair. I most unfeignedly declare that I have nothing but the interests of public peace at heart when I say that justice is outraged by the indefinite
  412
  postponement of proceedings. If the Attorney General, having the evidence before him, finds it is not sufficient to sustain the charge, let him fulfil the duty he owes at once to justice and to his Government and withdraw the charge, giving thereby the best security he can for the preservation of peace in Donegal. How long is the military occupation of the country to continue? Forty-six men have been arrested; you hold 23 of them in prison. Every reasonable man, every lawyer, must be aware that this is far in excess of any number that can be criminally concerned. Cordons were drawn around an area of 16 miles, and soldiers and police dragged the country into a net, searching every house, stable, and field for evidence. The ordinary course of procedure is subverted; instead of collecting evidence and making arrests as suspicion pointed, the police swept the country with a drag net, and having got their prisoners then searched for evidence. The whole thing is scandalous to the last degree. We had a drunken constable on the witness table giving his testimony in a matter of life and death, but the magistrates saw nothing wrong until his ribaldry became so intolerable they were obliged to censure him. We had a prisoner identified in the dock by a constable, and when the accused changed places with another, the constable a few minutes afterwards declared an entirely different person to be the same man. We have had a policeman who knew the names of prisoners telling them to the witnesses. We have had throughout the whole proceedings the most flagrant examples of that tendency among official witnesses to have less regard for truth and justice than esprit de corps, and the desire to procure convictions. What is to be the sequel? When is this system of oppression and military terrorism to cease? It is bad enough that these poor peasants should suffer hunger as the result of your system of rule; but if they must live in hunger, at least let them live in peace. Hunger and ease are the rights of a dog; but you not only condemn these poor people to starve, you deny them ease. The men have sought shelter in the mountains and caves, and so you institute a system of passes. I have heard of two men gathering seaweed being asked for

  413
  passes—for their authority to be at work. They had no passes; they were taken to the police station and examined, and subsequently set at liberty; but they were fined for working without permission, for when they came back the tide had washed away the result of their day's labour—the seaweed they had collected. We have heard of midnight visits to the house of a poor woman who was in that condition that ought to excite the sympathy of any man. Three nights before the birth of her infant was she visited, and again three nights afterwards. Upon her bed, which lay upon the ground, did the police trample in carelessness, in wantonness, or reckless search for something. The police went to the bed where the children were and turned down the clothes—we have all this on undoubted evidence—it is not sufficient to say it is not true—and finally they went to the bed of a girl of thirteen, and held a gun to her head while they put a series of questions to her. Is this conciliation? Is this civilization? Is this the Unionist policy for Ireland; or is it rank, undiluted, revolting barbarism? I trust, at any rate, the arrests are completed; that, under these conditions of hunger and destitution, the people are at liberty to live, and that we have heard the last of these military cordons, domiciliary visits, and passes. It is high time that a district so scourged by nature should have relief from the terrorism of man. I wish Members would pay a visit to the district and see these miserable houses, built of mud and wattles, which are being levelled to the ground by the battering ram of self-defence. There is not on the face of the earth a district more bleak and stern. It has been well described by the correspondent of the Daily News. Whoever sees the place must be convinced a policy is being there pursued unworthy of a statesman, of a Christian, of a man—a policy repugnant to the feelings of humanity and the sense of justice dominant in the breasts of Englishmen; and I believe the British people will yet avenge on the Chief Secretary at the first opportunity the contempt with which he treats those principles they hold sacred, and which they endeavour to carry into effect all over the globe wherever the British Empire holds sway.
  *THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN.): I do not rise to interpose for any considerable time between the House and the termination of this debate, but merely to make a few observations, having regard to the direct challenge or appeal from the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, to the Government, and especially to myself, and to make some statement with regard to the concluding portion of his speech. The right hon. Gentleman put forward a number of circumstances or alleged facts upon which in express terms he asked the House to conclude the innocence of Father M'Fadden. I only wish to point out that it is absolutely impossible for any Member of the Government to enter into that question at all. What is the position? We are invited to enter into the consideration of circumstances which are alleged to point towards the innocence of Father M'Fadden and other persons awaiting trial in connection with the lamentable murder of Inspector Martin. Let the House consider what the position would be if we accepted this challenge and entered into circumstances and considerations that might be considered as pointing to the guilt of the reverend gentleman or of any of the accused; surely every fair-minded man must see at once that would be in the highest degree improper? I think I may venture to say every fair-minded man on either side will understand why it is no Member of the Government can enter into a discussion of the matter in regard to which we have been challenged. Let it be clearly understood I do not in the least degree contend that the circumstances which the right hon. Gentleman has with power and eloquence brought before the House are unfounded in fact, or that they do not point in the direction in which he asks the House to believe they point; I say I am precluded in the discharge of my duty from discussing the question at all, or considering the hearings of any of the circumstances mentioned. But, before I sit down, there are one or two other matters as to which there is no such obligation of silence imposed. The right hon. Gentleman has brought forward two specific allegations, one in relation to the alleged treatment of men who were engaged in the collection of

  415
  seaweed, and the other as to domiciliary visits made by the police to make arrests or collect information. I merely wish to remind the House that both these allegations were made the subject-matter of distinct questions in the House, and both questions were answered by my right hon. Friend or myself upon information we obtained. That information satisfied us, and upon it we founded our statements that, in substance, the allegations were in their main features without foundation.
  MR. SEXTON: I repeat the statements deliberately and emphatically, and I challenge inquiry.
  *MR. MADDEN: The statements Laving been embodied in questions and put on the Paper in the ordinary way, inquiry was made, and we gave the result. Inquiry was made through the usual sources for obtaining information, and everyone must recognize that it is the only way by which a Member of the Government, whether it is the Home Secretary as representing the English Government, or the Chief Secretary as representing the Irish Government, can, when questions are asked, procure the necessary information to answer them. I do not ask the House to judge as between the statements in the questions and the answers given; but when those statements are repeated, as they have been, let the House remember that when those statements were made previously the information we obtained, in the only way in which we could obtain it, was in contradiction of those statements. Another reference was that in relation to what occurred after the Middleton inquest, and it is my duty to refer to this, as the right hon. Gentleman cast a distinct slur on my learned colleague the Attorney General for Ireland's conduct in the matter. The allegation was that the Attorney General was to blame in not putting a person on his trial in consequence of the result of a Coroner's inquisition, and it was suggested that the course taken by the Attorney General met with the disapproval of the Lord Chief Baron. I say distinctly, without wearying the House by going into details, the course taken by the Attorney General in refraining from putting the man on his trial on the Coroner's inquisition was in accordance with the practice which prevails both in this country and
  416
  in Ireland. He took a course which met with the entire approval of the Chief Baron—namely, that of having a magisterial inquiry into the facts of the case, with the result which is known to the House. The Lord Chief Baron at no time animadverted on the fact that the man was not put on his trial upon the inquisition of the Coroner's jury, and that was in accordance with the practice his predecessors had followed, and which is followed in England.
  MR. SEXTON: I did not say anything about the approval or disapproval of the Lord Chief Baron.
  *MR. MADDEN: The action of the Attorney General for Ireland was in no way the result of the debates in this House, neither has the Lord Chief Baron at any time animadverted on the fact that the man was not put on the trial on the inquisition of the coroner's jury. I must repeat that the course taken by the Attorney General in this case was the usual course. But I have simply risen to explain to the House, in regard to the portion of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Sexton) in which ho challenged me to meet certain charges, that, having regard to the circumstances of the case, the matter is one which cannot possibly be discussed in the House at this moment.
  COLONEL NOLAN: I should like to bring the discussion hack to what, I think, is the most important point of the statement of the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell), and which to a great extent has been lost sight of. The hon. Gentleman has specially warned the Chief Secretary that there is very great distress in the districts, and has implored the right hon. Gentleman to make some provision to meet it. I think it would be impossible for the Poor Law Authority in the district to find funds to afford adequate relief, and therefore it is imperative that the Chief Secretary should afford relief. The right hon. Gentleman has said that for the Government to afford relief would amount to an encouragement to what he called the congested districts. The right hon. Gentleman seems to have lost sight of the fact that there is no multiplying in the West of Ireland. The marriage and birth rate there is only about half what it is in England; indeed, there is no possibility of the population increasing. A second reason which the

  417
  right hon. Gentleman gives is that the original seed rate has not been paid. But of the £700,000 94 per cent has been repaid, and it is only in the exceptionally poor districts where the money has not been repaid.
  *MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I said the seed rate has been exceedingly well paid, compared with other Irish loans, but that it has not been particularly well paid in that part of Donegal.
  COLONEL NOLAN: Anyhow, all over Ireland 94 per cent has been paid, and there is every probability that another 3 per cent will be paid. A loss of 3 per cent on the whole loan is not very great, all the circumstances considered. Suppose you now advance £7,000 or £8,000 for the same purpose, and £4,000 or £5,000 was not repaid, I do not think that would be an extreme case. The right hon. Gentleman talks about eleemosynary aid, but I do not look upon the matter in that light at all. I never forget that we in Ireland contribute £8,000,000 to the Imperial Exchequer, and that we only get back for any useful purpose whatever about £2,000,000. Instead of asking for alms on this occasion, we are only asking for a small portion of our own money.
  MR. STUART: I rise to emphasize the fact that the Government's reply to what has been brought before it has been a reply of shreds and tatters. The Solicitor General for Ireland did not refer to the Circular about which questions have been put to the Chief Secretary. I put on the Paper a question upon the subject very reluctantly, because I felt that if the charge happened to be baseless, it was very undesirable it should remain on the Paper for even the short time a question may appear on the Paper. I made up my mind to put the question on the Paper owing to the circumstances under which the Circular came into my hands, and because I felt the Government would have an opportunity of denying its correctness. Up to this moment its correctness has not been denied. The Government, too, appear to be wanting in appreciation of the point raised by us. They say they will not deal with the case of Father M'Fadden. Why have we raised the case? Here there is a population in the extremity of distress; they cannot even get seed potatoes; and you will not do anything for them.
  418
  Who helped them in their trouble before? Father M'Fadden and Father Stephens, whom you are about to send to prison. When the people were evicted, who received them and comforted them? Father M'Fadden and Father Stephens. It is because you have removed what the people relied on. that you are called on and implored by us to take some steps for meeting the difficulties of the people. One would have thought from the remarks of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the Plan of Campaign commenced all the trouble in Donegal. That is not the case at all. The Plan of Campaign has helped to stop evictions not only in Donegal, but all over Ireland. Last night the Chief Secretary seemed to think that an attack on the right of private property is what I and others mean when we speak against the system of landlordism. He asked what I meant by landlordism. I can show by a short quotation what landlordism in Gweedore, with which the Government are identifying themselves, is. I hold in my hand a letter addressed to Father M'Fadden by a landlord in the neighbourhood of the Olphert estate.
  "It is useless," this gentleman writes, "to deal kindly any longer with these tenants. I may tell you that I would not now accept 99 per cent. of all rents and costs due to me, as I am going to clear out the two townlands, and it is my land I want now. Remember, they are merely living on my land as long as I let them, and I will not regard cost in carrying out my plans. I have ample private means and will set aside a sum yearly until all are out of that. In doing this I am only following out the Scriptural precept that 'a man may do what he likes with his own.' I am determined on this, and in five or at the most ten years' time there will probably not be a single family left there."
  This is an example of the "iron sleet of arrowy shower" which in my remarks yesterday I referred to, and against which Father M'Fadden has been a rock of defence, and it is an example of the unjust system which the Donegal peasantry have been taught by our administration to identify with the Government of the Queen.
  MR. T. P. O'CONNOR (Liverpool, Scotland Division): I wish to call the attention of the House to another estate on which the Government or their agents are acting in a somewhat different fashion. The Plan of Campaign has been raging on the Massereene estate some time, and there is still a dis-

  419
  pute there. In the Down Recorder an advertisement in the following terms has appeared:—
  "Vacant farms, important to Protestant tenant farmers and their sons. There are several vacant farms to let in the counties Louth and Meath in close proximity to the important seaport and market town of Drogheda. None but Protestants need apply. Special advantages offered to suitable tenants. For further particulars apply to Messrs. Dudgeon and Emerson, Land Agents and Solicitors, 14, Upper Sackville Street, Dublin."
  I think that advertisement might almost be left to speak for itself. I believe that four Protestant tenants have already gone down to the estate. so that actually the Government or their allies are endeavouring to break down the combination of tenants by appealing to the devilish passion of religious prejudice.
  MR. GILL: I hope the Government will pay some attention to the matter just brought under their notice by my hon. Friend. The Massereene estate is about to become the scene of one of the worst struggles that the country has witnessed since the régime of the right hon. Gentleman began. A number of Catholic tenants on this estate have been expelled from their holdings, to which Orangemen are being imported. This is a new policy, so far as the present crisis is concerned; but it is not novel in the agrarian history of Ireland. It is an attempt to work on the sectarian animosities which have wrought so much misery in Ireland. These sectarian animosities, wherever they have been fostered and not discouraged and put down with a strong hand, have always resulted in bloodshed and outrage, and scenes that every friend of Ireland and humanity must deplore. If the landlord of this estate succeeds in the course he is now pursuing, the result must be that the Catholic tenants will be driven to despair, because they will be deprived of that hope, and that self-confidence, and that aid which they now receive from being banded together — a fact which has served to keep their hands free from crime. This experiment has been tried in Ireland before. One of the most notorious cases of the kind was that of Lord Lorton in County Longford. Men were driven to despair, and the result was that a series of outrages and murders took place upon that estate
  420
  which wrought ruin to everyone concerned, ruin and death to the Protestant farmers who had come there, and ruin and crime to the unfortunate Catholics who had previously been at peace with the rest of the population. The experiment proved a failure from every point of view. Yet the Chief Secretary is now about to lend encouragement to a scheme ostentatiously insulting to the feelings of the people of one particular religion—and that the chief religion of the country. He proposes to lend his countenance to a scheme which involves the expropriation of tenants whose demands the Land Courts have admitted to be perfectly just. What has taken place during the last month has proved that we, the Irish Parliamentary Party, and those who have the control of the National movement in Ireland, would and do deplore as much as anyone the terrible consequences which must follow this policy, and I warn the right hon. Gentleman that terrible consequences must ensue if he allows a policy of this kind to be carried out. The Massereene dispute could have been brought to an end long ago if the right hon. Gentleman had not lent encouragement to the emergency agents of Lord Massereene. We have seen recently how, through the Plan of Campaign, settlements have been arrived at on several estates, and how willing the tenants have been to submit to arbitration. The Massereene tenants have been equally willing; terms could be easily arrived at, but it seems that the landlord intends to exclude certain of the tenants from the arrangement, and wishes to make victims of them. I say this is a case in which the Government should take some steps to bring the landlord to his senses—steps such as were successfully adopted by the immediate Predecessor in office of the right hon. gentleman the Chief Secretary. Now, Sir, I feel confident in the strength of the tenants' organization on that estate; I am sure that the proposed experiment cannot succeed, and I urge that it is the duty of the Government, in the interests of the peace of the country, to check the unjust and oppressive conduct of the landlord.
  MR. A. BLANE: On the estate of Lord Lurgan in my county, the tenants were recently invited by the landlord to purchase under Lord Ashbourne's Act, and I believe some of

  421
  them signed agreements to do so at 16½ years' purchase. Now one of these tenants was in arrears with his rent, and at the time I questioned the Chief Secretary as to this man's position and liability. The right hon. Gentleman would not answer me at the time, as he said a case raising a similar question was pending before the Courts. To-day I have received a communication to the effect, that this tenant was sent to Armagh Gaol yesterday because he resisted an execution for arrears which, certainly, was not contemplated under Lord Ashbourne's Act. This man's house was surrounded by constables with fixed bayonets, and because he resisted he was carried off to the county gaol. I think it was most unreasonable for the landlord to take these steps after the man had signed au agreement to purchase at 16 years' purchase. Why will not the Chief Secretary interfere to prevent action like this? 'We can never get any information from him; when we put a question in this House we are invariably met with platitudes and commonplaces; but if Lord Ashbourne's Act is to work successfully tenants must not be entrapped in this way. I do not think the Chief Secretary could have really understood the facts of this case. He allowed the law to take its course; the Attorney General directed the prosecution to take place; and when the appeal was heard, instead of the Government remaining neutral, they actively maintained the prosecution. I say it is a grave public scandal that a tenant should have been treated in this way. A certain Member of the Conservative Party was returned to this House for the express purpose of resisting every reform and maintaining every abuse, and I believe that not a few Members of the Party act upon that principle. In this particular case the Resident Magistrates said they had grave doubts as to whether the action taken against the man was legal. In England, I believe, the prisoner receives the benefit of the doubt, but in Ireland the reverse is the case, and the benefit is refused to the accused. I have no doubt in my own mind that this man was perfectly justified in resisting the execution, as he had signed a purchase agreement under Lord Ashbourne's Act. Lord Ashbourne's Act does not contemplate the collection of arrears at all. It is, however, rather a hopeless thing to
  422
  draw attention in this House to abuses in Ireland, because the Tory Party is interested in the maintenance of every abuse, and in resistance to every reform.
  Question put, and agreed to.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

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

  THE CONTROL OF THE PUBLIC EXECUTIONERS.
  *SIR E. LECHMERE: I beg to move—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, such persons who may from time to time be employed, in pursuance of justice, in carrying into effect the extreme penalty of the law by hanging should be placed under the direct control of the Home Office."
  I desire to draw the attention of the House to a very great scandal, and to suggest an easy method by which I think it might be put an end to. I may say that I am perfectly indifferent as to the term which may be used in describing the person who carries out the extreme penalty of the law. I do not care whether he is called an executioner or a hangman. What I contend for is that, as long as capital punishment by hanging is the law of this country, those who administer the law should be under the obligation of selecting and appointing proper persons to carry out the punishment so as to prevent the repetition of such scandals as have taken place. I think that the conduct of the person or persons who may be appointed should be under the immediate control of some official of the State, and I conclude that the Department of the State which is most fit to exercise that control is the Home Office. I have no intention of suggesting any interference with the ancient office of High Sheriff, part of whose duty it is to superintend executions. It may naturally he asked what is the present position of the common hangman. The present hangman, Berry, has not been selected or appointed by anybody. Calcraft, Mar-wood, and others of his predecessors were appointed by the Court of Aldermen of the Corporation of London with

  423
  a view of their carrying out executions at the Old Bailey. When executions had to be carried out in the provinces, Sheriffs found it convenient from time to time to write to the authorities at Newgate in order to obtain the services of the hangman. The executioner appointed by the Court of Aldermen received a retainer of £20 a-year, with an addition of £10 for each execution; the object of the retainer being to secure the first claim upon him whenever his services might be required. In the case of the present hangman, however, there has been no appointment whatever. He seems somehow to have slipped into the office after the dismissal of a man who was discharged for gross misconduct and drunkenness. It is a remarkable thing that there are no rules and no conditions laid down anywhere for the guidance of the executioner in the carrying out of his duties, with the single exception that, by the rules of the Home Office, he is bound to sleep within the precincts of the goal on the night preceding the execution. To show that this rule is by no means sufficient to ensure propriety of conduct on the part of the executioner, I may mention some circumstances connected with the present executioner that are already known to the House, as I have already put questions to the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) with regard to them. In May, last year, Berry had to hang two men at Hereford. On the night preceding the execution he went down to Hereford and was fêted at a smoking concert in one of the hotels, he himself being a performer. I put a question to the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) on this subject, and his reply was that the executioner was appointed by the Sheriff, and neither the Home Secretary nor the Prison Commissioners had any control over him. After hanging the men at Hereford, he went to Worcester, where there was the same sort of fêting at public houses, and where he held a kind of levée. The High Sheriff of Worcestershire, anxious to prevent unseemly conduct on the part of the executioner, similar to that which had occurred elsewhere, took special pains to speed Berry on his way to his home in Bradford, but instead of proceeding there he alighted at Kidderminster, where a scene occurred which
  424
  excited a great deal of scandal. I have here a letter from the Mayor of Kidderminster, which reads as follows:—
  EATHFIELD,
  WOLVERLEY, KIDDERMINSTER
  FEBRUARY 4TH, 1889.
  "DEAR SIR E. LEOHMERE,
  I have this morning a report from our Chief of the Police, to whom I had given instructions to furnish me with all facts bearing upon Berry's visit to Kidderminster.
  The gist of the matter seems to be this—he arrived in the town about 10.30 a.m., and left again by the 4.9 p.m. train. During that time he visited at least three public houses, at two of which he gave addresses of about ten minutes each, in one on 'Morality,' and in the other on 'Phrenology.' These were heard by Inspector Griffiths, the second in command of our Borough Force. At the public house where he lectured on Phrenology, the attendance might fairly be described as holding a levée. There is no doubt as to his distributing cards bearing his name as Public Executioner. We have tried to procure one, but have failed to do so, and it would be impossible now to obtain one without exciting remarks and suspicion. Berry was certainly sober whilst in the town, as the Chief Constable gave orders as soon as he heard he was in the place that he was to be watched and arrested if he became intoxicated. I may add, that at one of the houses he visited, he spoke of Crowther whom he had executed that morning. I hope these details will meet your requirements. I have every reason to believe them to be strictly accurate.
  I am, yours very sincerely,
  EDWARD J. MORTON,
  Mayor of Kidderminster."
  I have also a letter from a Town Councillor of Kidderminster, who says—
  "I have gone into this matter thoroughly, and find that he did visit public houses at Kidderminster, including the following;—"The Anchor Inn," Worcester Street; "Lyttleton's Arms," Park Butts; "Plough and Harrow," Bewdley Street. At the first he freely distributed his card, and held animated converse with all comers. One of such cards I enclose, but it must be returned to me. At the second public house he and his assistant were demonstrating in the presence of numerous men and women, and his language is described as foul and disgusting. The assistant above referred to is a barber at Kidderminster named Silcox, and was passed into the gaol by Berry under an assumed name as his pupil,"
  I thought it my duty to call the attention of the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) to these facts, and did so by means of a question in this House. I may say that I have no personal feeling in this matter. I believe that this man does his terrible work with all the skill, and, I believe, with as much humanity as men of that occupation have ever brought

  425
  to bear on the work they have to do. But he himself has stated that he is absolutely without any conditions or rules. As long as he is the servant of the High Sheriff he is under the orders of the High Sheriff, but before and after the execution he is under no authority or rule or control. The feeling of Grand Juries and Courts of Quarter Sessions on this subject is known by a considerable number of presentments. Grand Juries in Surrey, Dorset, Westmoreland, Leicestershire, Worcestershire, the City of Worcester, Lincolnshire, Gloucestershire, Durham, the City of York, and elsewhere have all expressed themselves in favour of the Resolution I have ventured to propose to the House. Two Judges have expressed their opinion on the subject—namely, Lord Chief Justice Coleridge and Mr. Justice Denman. The Lord Chief Justice, in receiving the presentment of the Grand Jury at Worcester, said—
  "The Judges were deeply interested in the right and duly decorous administration of the law, and there was not one of them who would not heartily sympathize and do everything in his power to enforce the recommendation."
  Mr. Justice Denman expressed a different view when the York City Grand Jury handed in a presentment respecting the appointment of a public executioner; his Lordship said—
  "He would forward the recommendation to the proper quarter, but he did not think that such a subject should be put into the hands of the Government. He would suggest, as a better plan, for the Visiting Justices to appoint a person connected with the gaol who was a thoroughly respectable, praiseworthy, and efficient man, who should be set apart to carry out the work of execution, in consideration of which he should have an addition to his salary quite independent of the Government of the day. He did not think it desirable that the Sheriff should have to hunt up a man from other places, but any particular gaol might furnish some person from amongst the warders who might perform the office. That was his opinion. It might be wrong, but such gentlemen as those of the Grand Jury would be more likely to come to a right decision on the matter."
  With all deference and respect to Mr. Justice Denman, I contend that the employment of persons connected with gaols as executioners would be anything but conducive to good discipline. Let me, on that point, quote the words of a very excellent Prison Governor, Lieutenant Leggett, Governor of Worcester Gaol:—
  426
  "I cannot too strongly protest against the suggestion of employing the officers of any prison in such a capacity. I could not believe that any one with actual experience of prison life and duties could have seriously entertained such an idea for a moment. Now, more than ever, is it desirable to raise the standard of a prison officer's status. If he were liable, as a part of his duties, to be called on to officiate as assistant to the common hangman, or, in his absence, as principal, how should such a man be looked upon in the future by his brother warders, his relatives and acquaintances in his immediate neighbourhood? Such an arrangement, in my humble judgment, would be highly unpopular throughout the prison service."
  I think that very likely the House is very little acquainted with the Report of the Committee appointed by Lord Cross some years ago, and of which Lord Aberdare was Chairman, to consider certain circumstances mainly arising out of a lamentable miscarriage of justice which had taken place a short time before. One of those who gave evidence before the Committee was Colonel Cowan, one of the Sheriffs of London. He said, with reference to the appointment of hangman—
  "I think leaving it to the discretion of the Sheriff to select a person is not so perfect, and not so good, and it is not so likely to be a good appointment as would be the case if the authorities selected the man and gave him the necessary amount of instruction."
  Colonel Cowan also said—
  "The great practical object is to secure a fit man for the office who shall conduct it with skill, and at the same time be a fairly respectable man who is not likely to do anything to disgrace an office which, in itself, is not too much respected."
  Another witness, and a very important one, Dr. Carte, who spoke from experience, as having been medical officer to one of Her Majesty's prisons, said—
  "I am of opinion that there should be a regularly appointed hangman under the control of the Home Office, or whatever office the post would properly come under. I deem the manner in which Sheriffs bargain with an ignorant hangman for his bungling services most objectionable. Not only would I have a regularly appointed hangman, but I would have certain rules laid down for him to follow."
  An hon. Member called attention to the fact that there were not forty Members present. The House was counted, and, forty Members being in their places,
  *SIR E. LECHMEREcontinued: Should the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) be

  427
  willing to make any change, I think that the hangman should be properly appointed and should be certificated. He ought to possess a certificate to the effect that he was well qualified by his conduct to perform the duties. I believe also that there should be an assistant executioner, so that when two executions take place on the same day in different parts of England, there may be two men capable of performing the duties. I think that the men should be paid by the State, in accordance with a custom which is almost universal. In France and Germany the executioner is paid by the State, and even in our small dependency of Malta the same system is adopted. In conclusion, I would ask the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) if he does not think that any grave constitutional principle is involved, to support my Motion. I believe that no constitutional principle whatever is involved, and that the change I propose would be not only beneficial to the State, but approved by the public at large, and by those who are interested in carrying out the administration of justice in the country.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words, "in the opinion of this House, such persons who may from time to time be employed, in pursuance of justice, in carrying into effect the extreme penalty of the Law by hanging, should be placed under the direct control of the Home Office,"—(Sir Edmund Lechemere,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. LOCKWOOD: I rise to second the Motion, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary (Mr. Matthews) will see his way to accept it in the terms in which the hon. Baronet opposite has moved it. I would point out that it does not propose in any way to interfere with the duties which High Sheriffs, through their Under Sheriffs, are, in the present state of the law, called upon to perform. It merely asks the Home Office, as a responsible body, to see that persons are appointed who are qualified to carry out the terrible work, and who will he responsible to some office with regard to the way in which executions are carried out. I am aware that a Report of a Committee of
  428
  the House of Lords, published in Tune, 1888, suggested that the High Sheriff should be relieved of all responsibility in connection with the execution of criminals, and that the opinion was expressed by that Committee that the penalty of death should be enforced by the authority which now has charge of all prisoners and controls the execution of other penal sentences. I see very grave objections to that recommendation being carried out, and I do not think that we should ask the Home Secretary, upon the consideration of a Resolution such as this, to pledge himself to any such sweeping arrangement. What the hon. Baronet has asked for is that the Home Office should grant certificates to properly qualified persons, and that the certificates should he held subject to the work being done in a proper manner. No doubt many hon. Members, and a large number of persons outside that House, hold strong views on the question of capital punishment. Some are of opinion that it should be abolished altogether; but every one will agree that if capital punishment continues to form a part of the Penal Code of this country, it should be carried out with decency. There have been grave scandals in connection with executions. I have heard of scenes such as the hon. Baronet has described. Receptions have been held the night before executions, and the man who was to carry out the sentence of the law was the hero of the hour. The terrible implements of death were shown—I suppose for the purpose of satisfying some morbid curiosity—and after the sentence of death has been carried out there has been another reception. Then there have been descriptions of that which the law says should be kept private. And, also, an exhibition is made of the mode in which the wretched criminal has been prepared for his death; but I will not go further into this disagreeable subject. I will only say that I regard the Resolution of the hon. Baronet as a possible means of putting a stop to such scandals in the future. Now what, I ask, is our present system? It is the duty of the High Sheriff to take over into his custody the criminal who has been convicted and sentenced to death. This is a duty which, however, is performed by the Under Sheriff, and I believe it is necessary

  429
  that the Under Sheriff should be present when the sentence of death is passed, and also when it is carried into execution, for the purpose of indentification. Moreover, if the Under Sheriff is not able to secure the services of anyone willing to discharge the terrible functions of the executioner, that officer, according to the dreadful traditions of our law, has to perform the duty with his own hands. Under these circumstances, we can imagine how it is that the Under Sheriffs—and here T must not be taken as finding fault with the way in which they, as a rule, perform their duty, for I believe they do it well—are willing to accept anybody who offers himself as prepared to carry out the last sentence of the law. Were the Resolution of the hon. Baronet carried into effect, the result would be that a certain number of men would be appointed who would hold certificates and licences from the Home Office, and, if I may call the attention of the Home Secretary to the 7th section of the 31st Victoria, chap. 24, he will see there is no doubt that the Home Office has power to grant these certificates or licences, for by that section it is provided that—
  "The Home Secretary, under this Act, may from time to time permit such rules and regulations to be observed in the execution of the judgment of death as he may from time to time deem expedient for the purpose."
  These words, it appears to me, are wide enough to give the Home Secretary the necessary power, supposing he does not possess it otherwise, as I think he does; but if he has no discretion in the matter, I venture to think that under that section there is ample authority to him to grant such certificates and licences. The subject is not an agreeable one to enlarge upon. and I have said what I have to say upon it; but I would appeal to the right hon. Gentleman, in the interests of the community, to lend a favourable ear to this proposal. In the Courts of Justice, from the highest official down to the lowest officer who disturbs the proceedings by calling "silence," everyone has a responsible duty to perform; but in the case we are discussing, the man who carries out the last terrible sentence of the law, and on whose conduct so much depends, is an irresponsible individual. I trust the Home Secretary will be able to accept this Resolution, in
  430
  order that those employed in the office of executioner may be responsible instead of irresponsible persons.
  MR. MORRISON: I am prepared to go as far as the recommendation of the Select Committee of the House of Lords, because I think that the hangman should be appointed under direct responsibility to the Home Office. This goes further than the Motion of the hon. Baronet, and would recognize what is in fact the present practice—namely, that the apparatus of the executioner should be provided by the Home Office. It will be admitted that it is a very odious thing to throw on the gentleman who holds the office of High Sheriff of his county the duty of making provision for carrying out the sentence of death. I am not quite prepared to accept the Motion of the hon. Baronet, and would point out that if the suggestion I have made were carried out it would get rid of the greatest scandal of all—namely, that although the High Sheriff engages the executioner for individual executions, he has no further control over him after the executions are performed. I would only further endeavour to enforce what has fallen from the hon. Baronet as to the extreme inexpediency of having the executions performed by the regular staff of the gaol. Such a duty would be very unpopular among the governors and warders of our prisons. I believe it is the opinion of the most experienced governors of our gaols that to adopt such a proposal would tend to interfere with the authority of the warders over the prisoners, and would also have a tendency to prevent good men from applying for the post of warder, it being eminently necessary, when one remembers the difficult, delicate, and responsible duties those officers have to discharge, that every care should be taken to secure that really good men should be induced to offer themselves for that position. I think that the appointment of the hangman should be directly in the hands of the Home Secretary, and I think we should derive further advantage from following up the practice which has lately been adopted of excluding reporters from executions.
  MR. H. COSSHAM: I think we are much indebted to the hon. Baronet for having called attention to this question as to the execution of

  431
  the extreme penalty of the law—a subject which tends to produce in the public mind a considerable amount of feeling, One of the unfortunate circumstances connected with the position of executioner is that the man who has to do the work of carrying out the law is frequently regarded by a certain section of the public rather in the light of a hero. It was my misfortune the other day to come to London in a train which brought the public executioner up from the West of England, and it was a matter of horror to me to find, when we got to Swindon, that that man became a centre of attraction for the people there assembled, and was pointed at by almost everyone as a man of importance, who was to be looked at. I think there can be nothing more morbid and lowering to the public taste than a feeling of that sort. I hope the House will recollect that in all the cases in which hanging has been abolished, the crimes fur which it used to be the penalty have decreased in number. This would seem to be a point in favour of the abolition of capital punishment altogether, rather than in the direction indicated by the Motion of the hon. Baronet; but at any rate, if capital punishment is to be retained, the execution should be carried out in such a way as to cause the least amount of shock to the public mind and public taste. Therefore, I shall support the Motion of the hon. Baronet as far as it goes, but I would invite him to walk in the more advanced path of endeavouring to obtain a better mode of treating criminals than that of hanging them. During the last few days a man was hanged—I have no doubt with perfect fairness—after memorials from something like 20,000 or 30,000 persons had been sent in in his behalf. If any other method of punishment were adopted, I have no doubt there would be far less sympathy than is now awakened on the part of the criminal, rather than on behalf of the law, and the fact that there is this sympathy with the criminal leads me to think that the law cannot be a wise one. I hope the House will take every opportunity of keeping awake and deepening the sentiment which has been aroused in the public mind against capital punishment; and, while supporting the hon. Baronet as far as he goes, I ask the House to look for some other mode of dealing with
  432
  the question rather than that of merely mitigating the existing evil in the small way now proposed.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: It seems to me that the Resolution of the hon. Baronet goes too far on the one band, and not far enough on the other. At present the Sheriffs are entirely responsible for the effectual and decent carrying out of all executions, their responsibility including all the necessary arrangements, and the selection of the persons on whom the success of these grand proceedings depends. It seems to me that the Resolution of the hon. Baronet would, if adopted, place us in an illogical position, because, while it would continue to leave the Sheriffs responsible for the execution of the last penalty of the law, it would still place those officers under the obligation to employ, as the chief instrument in the proceedings, a person whom they do not appoint, and over whom they do not have full authority. I think there are only two logical courses open to us—the one being, to leave the matter where it now is, and the other to transfer the entire responsibility and control over the arrangements for executions from the Sheriffs to the Home Office. Now, I hold that if this were entirely a new question, this House could not hesitate long as to what would be the proper course. I have always regretted the passing of the existing Act, and had I been a Member of the House of Commons at the time, I should have used every legitimate means to prevent its being passed. But, as we have to face the fact that all the persons engaged in the execution of every other sentence of the law are under the control of the Home Office, it is futile and idle for us to stickle at the transfer to the Home Office of the execution of the ultimate penalty of the law. And there is another consideration which weighs with me in this matter. We have recently had attention called to a case in which the Press were excluded by the local authority from being present at the execution. My hon. Friend reminds me that the instance to which I refer occurred at Bristol. Much may be said for excluding the Press—as much may be said for admitting the Press. There seems to me, however, one,

  433
  thing which is absolutely indefensible and untenable, and that is that the practice throughout the country should vary according to the personal opinions of the Sheriff. Where the public eye, acting through the reporters, is most required, is at executions; otherwise, you have no check whatever upon the proceedings of the officials If the recommendation of the Motion were adopted, and the control over the proceedings were transferred to the Home Office, we should, at all events, secure uniformity either in one direction or the other. For these reasons, Mr. Speaker, although I do not at all sympathize with the Resolution on the Paper, and I shall not vote for it, yet I think the balance of argument is rather in favour of the transference of the entire responsibility to the Home Office.
  *THE HOME SECRETARY (Mr. MATTHEWS): Sir, the various speakers have developed a diversity of views, which is always the danger attendant upon a discussion of this sort. One speaker advocates the abolition of capital punishment altogether, and another pointed out the Resolution was not a logical consequence of the reasons given in support of it. With much that has been said by the Mover everybody will be in entire sympathy; but I must at once offer emphatic opposition to the suggested transference of responsibility for the execution of the sentence of death from the Sheriff to the Home Office, for such transference, I think, would be a great mistake. As long as we retain capital punishment it is a matter of considerable consequence that the responsibility for carrying it out should devolve upon local officers rather than upon Government officers. The presence at an execution of such an officer as a Sheriff is an assurance to the public that there will be nothing unfair; that no undue partiality will be shown to the convict, no matter what his rank, position, political antecedents, or status in society may have been. It is important to have a local officer to take care that the right man is executed. If the responsibility were transferred to the Home Office I would be bound to send down an official high in rank to be present when the sentence of death was passed, so as to be in a position to take care of the minor though not unimportant detail that the right person was
  434
  really executed. Every Under Sheriff at present is responsible for the identification of the unhappy man who is to suffer. You could not leave this and the general responsibility with the Sheriff without leaving him also the free choice of the agent for carrying out the execution. Then as to the presence of the Press, I think that is essentially an open matter, and judging from the way in which the Bristol Press seems disposed to treat so melancholy an event as an execution, I can well understand that there are reasons for excluding the reporters of the Press. On the other hand, there may be other cases in which such reasons do not exist; and the law, to me it seems properly and wisely, gives discretion to the local authorities as to whether or not reporters shall be admitted. The discretion is now vested in the Sheriff or Visiting Justices. It would be perfectly impossible for the Home Secretary, without knowing the local circumstances, to exercise that discretion. These are duties which are properly fulfilled by the local authorities. Inasmuch as I am afraid there must occasionally be mishaps and failures in carrying out executions without those instruments, allusion to which would distress a man of feeling, so long as those contingencies are inevitable, then I cannot help feeling that if a Government Department were made responsible, those failures in carrying out executions might be made the ground of Party attacks of the most intolerable and regrettable description. If, as I understand my hon. Friend, he does not mean to take the responsibility from the Sheriff, then as the cautious logic of the hon. Member for Bethnal Green pointed out, you cannot control him in the choice of the executioner who is to take part in the most terrible part of the melancholy function. It would be inconsistency to insist on the responsibility of the Sheriff and to deprive him of the choice of the means for fulfilling that responsibility. But the person who seems most warmly in favour of the Motion is Berry himself. Berry has written me a letter which would really "draw iron tears down Pluto's cheek," in which he urges me, "as a Conservative Member of Parliament and a gentleman of sound education, to kindly assist Sir E. Lechmere to carry his Resolution through the House

  435
  of Commons." Therefore, Berry is one of the persons supporting it. If satisfactory to my hon. Friend, I am willing to give a partial undertaking. It would not be an easy thing for the Home Office to select some officer who might be considered capable of conducting this terrible function skilfully, and at the same time be a man of respectability who might be trusted to abide by the conditions imposed upon him; but if such a man can be selected he might be tendered to the Sheriff to be employed if the Sheriff thought fit, just as at present a scaffold is offered without in the least insisting that it shall be used. No doubt this plan would give security against such misconduct and painful incidents as attention has been called to. In the Kidderminster case Berry acted in defiance of the express agreement with the Sheriff—that he was not to go to any place of public entertainment after the execution, but was to proceed direct to the railway station accompanied by a warder. He violated these conditions, and there might be no security that an official from the Home Office would not equally yield to the temptation, which seems to be offered by a morbid curiosity, except it were the risk of forfeiting his employment. I will consider whether it is possible for the Home Office to select some fit and well-conducted person. It has been pointed out that many persons regard this as a hateful office, the holder of which, so far from being an object of interest, should be abhorred, and there are few respectable men who would undertake the office unless the temptation is made larger than can be offered. But it by no means follows that I could not find a fitting person who might be confidently recommended to Sheriffs. I will undertake to consider the matter and see whether it is possible to find such a person. The suggestion of Mr. Justice Denman that a warder in every gaol should be selected for the duty seems to be quite impracticable. At some gaols there is not an execution in 10 years; and it would be au extravagant undertaking to appoint an executioner at each gaol. I have no corps in connection with me from which I could obtain a man to accept so ungrateful and unwelcome a post; but I am prepared to endeavour to carry out my hon. Friend's views in the direction he has stated;
  436
  but it must be clearly understood that I could only tender the services of the man so selected to the different Sheriffs, leaving it to them to employ him or not as they thought fit, just as scaffolds and other appliances are offered to prison authorities and the Sheriff, leaving their responsibility entirely untouched. I hope my bon. Friend will be satisfied with this offer, and will not press the Resolution to a Division.
  *SIR E. LECHMERE: I am to a certain extent satisfied with the undertaking of the right hon. Gentleman, who may probably in carrying it out draw up rules and conditions which will have the effect of securing the object in view. I would, therefore, ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
  Objection being taken, the Speaker put the Motion, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question," which was agreed to.
  Main Question again proposed.

  THE INHABITED HOUSE DUTY.
  LORD HENRY BRUCE: Mr. Speaker, Sir, I beg to call attention to the subject on which, if the forms of the House had permitted, I intended to submit the following Motion—
  "That the laws regulating the levying and collecting the Inhabited House Duty as at present applied to banks, warehouses, institutions, professional, business, scholastic, lodging, private, tenement, and other houses, be amended, and, where necessary, repealed, in order to remedy the unjust and anomalous conditions relating thereto."
  Sir, I refer to this subject under a full sense of the old saying, that threatened, perhaps, I might say doomed, men live long. There can be no question of the antiquity of the Inhabited House Duty, though we may not quite say that it is "as old as the hills." It was first imposed in 1696, in the reign of William and Mary, and it was continued under various titles until 1834, when it was repealed. But I think I may safely say that previous to that time, in 1803 and in 1808, in the 43rd of George III., Schedule B, was passed, and under its provisions the Inhabited House Duty was re-imposed and is still levied with few exeptions. By the Act of 14 and 15 Victoria, cap. 36, private and professional

  437
  houses, institutions, schools, banks, fire and life insurance offices, and lodging houses are charged 9d. in the £, but I would call attention to this fact, all places of business—hotels, restaurants, and shops of every description, public houses and market gardens—are charged 6d. in the £. It was on the 30th June, 1857, that the tax was re-imposed—the year in which the window light duty was repealed—and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian then spoke of the impost as "irrational," reminding the House that it was only the old tax of 1834 reinstituted with all its injustices. The right hon. Gentleman on that occasion said that "He, for one, could not regard the house tax as resting on a secure foundation, seeing that it re-introduced the very objectionable features which had once before been the cause of the abolition of the tax." I observe that in the list of those who took part in the division at the time were the names of Lord Beaconsfield (then Mr. Disraeli), Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Sidney Herbert, Lord Henry Bentinck, and the Right Hon. J. C. Herries. Well, from time to time, certain modifications have been made, and it may be said that the question has been "well tinkered." Nearly 20 years ago, the present Chancellor of the Exchequer moved that the tax should be devoted to local purposes, and not, as at present, to Imperial purposes. In 1871 the inhabitated house tax yielded £1,200,000, whereas now its amount is £1,933,000. The late Lord Iddesleigh, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, received a deputation on this subject in 1874, again in 1876, and in 1877. On each occasion the deputation pointed out to him the anomalies experienced in the operation of the tax, and the grievances it carried, and Lord Iddesleigh expressed sympathy with them in their object. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Goschen) has done much the same thing. A deputation waited upon the right hon. Gentleman in May, 1887, and, in reply to their representations, he admitted—
  "That the anomalous position of the house tax justified a great deal of the murmurs and complaints which are made against it. He looked forward to a large measure abolishing exemptions, and placing the whole tax on a
  438
  more satisfactory footing, and should look for the support of all the hon. Members of the House of Commons present to aid him."
  As regards the question of caretakers, that subject was brought before Lord Iddesleigh (then Sir Stafford Northcote) in the years 1874, 1876, and 1877, and a Bill was brought in by him and passed dealing with this particular branch of the subject. The Act received the Royal Assent in 1878. The measure was brought in under the Customs and Inland Revenue Bill. It was, unfortunately. supplemented by an Act promoted by Somerset House, which had the effect, I doubt not, of stultifying the effect of Sir Stafford Northcote's Act. This particular Act I allude to defines a caretaker as a person obedient to the employer or occupier of the premises, and enacts that if an officer or porter in such employ is kept as a caretaker of the premises, such a use of him renders the premises liable to the duty. Therefore you must employ a person entirely separate to look after your premises. I cannot understand how it is that the house duty is charged upon persons who only employ one servant, who is not employed otherwise than domestically. Not only does it affect business and professional men, but it affects thousands of others. But, Sir, there is another old-standing grievance, that no distinction is made between occupiers who let apartments for acknowledged business purposes, and those who occupy premises for dwelling purposes only. The entire abolition of the inhabited house duty is not only a popular measure, but a just one. Furthermore, this is a tax on the working man. There are fifty times as many houses rated below £50 as there are houses rated above that amount. I will give the House an illustration. A landlord holds part of a street where the rents are from £36 to £40, the tenant paying the taxes. The property tax of 6d. falls on the richer man, but the house duty falls upon the poorer man, the tenant, who has to let part of his house in single rooms, and has to charge proportionately. I maintain that houses which are building or may be built, and existing houses which have been or may be converted into tenement dwellings for the working classes—whether such tenements be self-contained or not—should be free from in-

  439
  habited house duty, if let as provided by Section 12 of the Working Classes Act, 1885:—
  "In any contract made for letting for habitation by persons of the working classes a house or part of a house, there shall be implied a condition that the house is at the commencement of the holding in all respects reasonably fit for human habitation."
  All persons of the working classes naturally thought that they would get some benefit for this provision. It is unnecessary, however, to enlarge on the roaring trade which the jerry builders have done through the anomalies of the Act. But the working classes surely should have some compensation in respect of the clause which I have quoted, and what I maintain is, if the tax were abolished, that one penny in the pound on the income tax would be sufficient to meet the deficiency, and the income tax is very often 6d. in the £, whereas the inhabited house duty is 9d. in the £. Another grievance is that the duty is assessed on the gross rental; and yet another grievance is that the collectors of this tax are not paid by salaries instead of by poundage. M. Turgot, a celebrated French financier, once said that the "art of taxation was to pluck the goose without making it cry." But in the present case they make it cry because of the imposition of the tax, and interference with many of those personal liberties which Englishmen think they ought to possess. But it is never too late to mend; and let me hope that the Chancellor of the Exchequer will take a new departure, and, if the duty cannot be abolished, let an attempt be made to investigate its anomalies, and also let it be a local tax, and not devoted to Imperial purposes. No tax is more universally condemned, and yet none is more tenaciously stuck to by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Many trades and professions have appealed against this duty — warehousemen, manufacturers, officers of Her Majesty's Services, solicitors, auctioneers, mining, professional, and practising engineers, and scores of brewers, wine merchants, and hotel keepers. Really, the tax inflicts injury on to many trades and professions; and it brings in so very little money, that I feel quite sure that any Chancellor of the Exchequer who would either modify it or abolish it altogether
  440
  would earn the gratitude of the vast majority of this country.
  *SIR GUYER HUNTER: I rise with much pleasure to support the noble Lord in his protest against this duty. The inhabited house duty has been protested against by almost every class of Her Majesty's subjects. It falls particularly heavily on certain members of the medical profession, because, wherever a medical man has a surgery in connection with his house, he has to pay at the rate of 9d. in the £, instead of 6d. On May 3, 1887, a deputation waited on the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who admitted that the anomalous position of the house tax justified a great deal of the complaint made, and promised to put the tax on a more satisfactory footing. The protest against the inhabited house duty has been supported by 60 or 70 Members on both sides of the House, and I trust the Chancellor of the Exchequer will soon be able to fulfil the expectations he held out in May, 1887, to which I have just alluded.
  MR. W. H. JAMES: I do not want to enter into the varied topics which have been referred to in the speech delivered by the noble Lord, but there is one matter in connection with this tax with regard to which I introduced to the Chancellor of the Exchequer a deputation from the North of England. It is a matter which, no doubt, very largely affects the general domiciliary condition of the poor in those industrial communities which have sprung up somewhat rapidly in recent years. There is nothing of greater importance to the general welfare of the community than a tax—be it local or Imperial—which affects the dwellings of the people. Fully aware, as I am, of the very great difficulty arising in connection with this matter, still I hope the subject will not be overlooked, and that the Secretary to the Treasury will be able to give us some indication of the course likely to be taken by the Inland Revenue Authorities in regard to the specific point which, in November last, we had the honour of laying before the Treasury. There are two classes, speaking broadly, of property owners. There are a large number of old houses and dwellings which have been let out in rooms, and the condition of the inhabitants of

  441
  which is, no doubt, very far from satisfactory. They have been designated as rookeries. Now I have no wish to claim any exemption whatever for these rookeries from the payment of this duty. These places are often in an insanitary condition; families often occupy one room, high rents are extracted, and it is the worst possible condition of rack renting that can be imagined. But there are other property owners who have devoted themselves to improving the condition of the poor, and who have erected houses which are let out in what are known as flats. The Inland Revenue Authorities have laid down a regulation that the inhabited house duty shall be imposed in all cases where there is not a separate entrance. It is very difficult to elucidate this matter fully without the aid of a plan, but as plans have been frequently submitted to the Treasury the Secretary to the Treasury will no doubt understand. In April or May, 1884, a debate was raised in this House by Mr. Lawrence in which the question was discussed of the position of private individuals and large societies owning industrial dwellings. At that time the First Lord of the Treasury, referring to smaller tenements, said that an invidious distinction existed. Since that time large companies who have erected these dwellings have been exempted from this duty in cases where the separate tenements were below £20 annual value. I think private individuals who have made exertions quite equal to, if not greater than, those put forward by the managers of these large societies, should not be put in a less favourable position than the public companies. I am quite aware of the difficulty that if some distinction were not drawn, old, insanitary houses, the "rookeries" which exist in London and some other great towns, would be exempted; but I cannot believe that the ingenuity of the Inland Revenue Authorities and the Government is unequal to the task of drawing some line of demarcation which would be adequate to the equity of the case. I should like to know from the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is able to hold out any hopes that this will be done. I trust that the Government will do their best to extend the exemption given to public companies to private individuals, who have done much to-
  442
  wards improving the domiciliary condition of the poor.
  *COLONEL LAURIE: I should like to say a word in favour of the claims of lodging-house keepers in large watering places. They carry on a business perfectly well defined, and pay 9d. in the inhabited house duty. In regard to this duty the shopkeepers are placed on far more favourable terms. They pay 6d. only, and compete with the lodging house keepers in letting apartments. I am perfectly aware that the question of exempting lodging-house keepers is surrounded by great difficulties, but it was suggested by a deputation in which I took part last year that these difficulties might be obviated by a system of registration. I hope that the Secretary to the Treasury, when he replies, will allude to the somewhat unfair treatment of lodging-house keepers in these places.
  *MR. KELLY: The inhabited house duty has been long universally condemned, and, if it be continued at all, this should only be done on a graduated scale. When in 1877 it was first imposed by Lord North, it was on a graduated scale; and when re-cast in 1778 by him, it was further graduated, the scale being 6d., 9d., and 1s., and it therefore bore less heavily on the poor than it now does. I am quite aware that a house under £20 annual value does not pay the tax at all, but representing, as I do, a Metropolitan constituency I know how impossible it is, either in London or in any large town, to put up a house of so low a value, so high is the price of land. I think exemption should be given to those who furnish excellent dwellings for the poor in the shape of industrial blocks. We know that, thanks to the advocacy of the First Lord of the Treasury, some five years ago, companies industrial blocks were (as had previously only been the case with the Peabody buildings before) exempted from the duty. Sir, in recent years there has been a great movement for providing the poor with dwellings in what are called tenement houses. A great many people have strong objections to living in industrial blocks; some of the rooms are very high up, while there are others where light can never penetrate, and which are consequently most unhealthy for sick persons and children. Therefore, in the interests

  443
  of the poor, those who have built streets of houses in tenements have done, as I believe, a great work, and have accomplished not a little to solve the problem of the proper housing of the working classes. The difficulty as to these houses practically resolves itself into this—that they are not so constructed as to come within the Treasury Minute as to having only one door opening on to the passage. There is also the difficulty that they have front doors opening directly on to the street. I agree with the hon. Member for Gateshead that the last thing to be done is to encourage rookeries. I should deplore the grant of any concession which should in any way benefit owners of rookeries; but, if these rookeries are to be done away with, it is only by an extension of tenemented houses for the poorer classes. We do not want the concession to extend to any houses which have been altered for the habitation of the poor. The concession may be safeguarded by requiring from the landlord a declaration that the tenements were built for and are bona fide occupied by one family—and one family only. In conclusion I should like to say it seems to me that if this great question of the proper housing of the working classes in our great industrial centres is to be solved it can only be by making it worth people's while to build proper houses in tenements, and the greatest inducement that you can offer to those persons is to reduce their rates and taxes as far as possible.
  *THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. W. L. JACKSON,): I hope my noble Friend will not be disappointed if I do not go at any length into the very important question which he has raised. I am bound to point out at the outset that the light and airy way in which my noble Friend spoke of £1,900,000 revenue will hardly commend itself to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He appears to think it would be easy to raise this revenue by putting an extra penny on the income tax, but I am not sure that that would be more popular than the present tax. There is, of course, one very strong objection to the abolition of this tax. We have, in the first place, a very limited area of taxation, and I think any Chancellor of the Exchequer would hesitate a good deal
  444
  in the present day before he entered upon any scheme which would tend to limit the area of taxation, and I do not deny for a moment—and the Chancellor of the Exchequer would, if he were here, he prepared to admit—that there are anomalies in connection with this tax which he would be very glad to remedy, and which, I hope, he will in some future year have the opportunity of remedying. The hon. Member for Gateshead, I know, has taken considerable interest in this question, but I am not quite sure that he would entirely agree with the hon. Member for Camberwell, who apparently is willing that any concession which may be made should not apply to any dwellings which have been altered, but should apply only to dwellings built for a special purpose. As far as I remember his previous application to the Treasury, it went rather in the direction of some concession to dwellings which have been altered, and which certainly would not come within the category advocated by the hon. Member for Camberwell. I hope that my noble Friend who has brought forward the Motion will be satisfied to obtain the expression of opinion which he has elicited. I can assure him that it has been several times under the consideration of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and, although I am not in a position to say that he will immediately deal with it, I am quite sure that he will not lose sight of it, but if it is possible for him to remedy some of the anomalies which do exist, he will be glad indeed to have an opportunity of doing so. I cannot admit that this is a tax which presses very heavily on the poor, as the House is aware the tax is not assessable to any separate property of a less value than £20 a year. I think the House will cordially endorse the sentiment of my hon. Friend that it is not desirable to extend or give any facilities for the extension of buildings which are known as rookeries. There is a great difficulty in defining what is a lodging house, and I admit possibly that there may be something in the claim put forward by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Bath, on behalf of the very deserving class of lodging house keepers at watering places. But I fear that an exemption of lodging houses—without some very strict definition—would mean

  445
  the exemption of every rookery in Drury Lane, because they would all come under the definition of lodging houses. I am quite SW e the House would not desire to encourage that kind of dwelling, nor would its sympathy be in the direction of granting additional facilities for them. However, I can promise my hon. Friends that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will give the matter careful consideration. It is not for me to anticipate what he will say on Monday, but I hope he will be able, if not now, at any rate on some future occasion to at least rectify some of the anomalies which exist.
  Motion by leave withdraw.

  SUPPLY—REPORT.
  Resolutions (11th April) reported.

  CIVIL SERVICES.
  MR. J. G. BIGGAR: I beg to ask a question of the Secretary to the Treasury. The hon. Gentleman said I think, last night, that he expected a very substantial increase in the charges under the head of Tramways in Ireland. Now, the hon. Gentleman must be aware that the tendency is to decline. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has reduced the rate of interest for Consols from 3 to per cent, and it seems to me that if money is only worth 2¾ per cent it is rather extravagant that the ratepayers in baronies should have to guarantee a larger amount of interest on these undertakings. Cannot the hon. Gentleman see his way to lower this guarantee of interest of from 4 to 5 per cent and make it more in conformity with the present value of money? If he does not do so I fear there is some danger of the baronies repudiating their liability. I think some scheme of conversion should be arranged. When the Tramways Act was first passed by this House the Government proposition was that 4 per cent should be the amount of the guarantee, including the Government subvention, but an Amendment was moved by Captain O'Shea to raise the guarantee from 4 to 5 per cent in the interests, I have no doubt of friendly company promoters, who paid him a fee for his action, and the result was that the unfortunate ratepayers in these baronies now pay 3 per cent, whereas they would only have been called upon
  446
  to pay 2 per cent for these guaranteed railways if the Bill had been passed in its original form. There is another matter to which I should like to call the attention of the hon. Gentleman, and that is in regard to Foynes Pier, in the county of Kerry. On a recent occasion he explained that he had no responsibility as to whether or not the money granted for this undertaking was misspent: all he had to do was to see that the Treasury got proper security for it. That may be so from a strictly legal point of view, but as it is the ratepayers' money which is lent for these works there should be some supervision over the expenditure of it. Government money may be foolishly or badly laid out if there is no supervision, and then there may be no return to the ratepayers. I see in this Estimate there is a sum of £3,500 for the Ulster Canal. What is the position of this canal at present? Is this £3,500 a final gift? Do the Government intend, and have they undertaken, to lend any sum for this canal? If any has been lent how has it been expended? If the hon. Gentleman will answer these questions I shall be very well satisfied. I hope he will be able to say he will save the interest of the taxpayers and protect the guarantors of railways in various districts.
  *MR. W. L. JACKSON: Speaking for myself, I cannot hold out any hope of the adoption of a scheme by which the rate of interest on guaranteed lines—lines guaranteed by certain baronies, can be reduced. I should like to point out that this is an obligation which has been deliberately entered into and which is legally binding, and there is no power on the part of the Government to alter or reduce the rate of interest. The hon. Member has hinted that, in his opinion, the taxes out of which these loans are guaranteed by the baronies will be repudiated. I am exceedingly sorry that he should give utterance to such a sentiment. I do not believe that these loans which have been so guaranteed will be repudiated either by the barony which guaranteed them or by the taxpayer; on the contrary, these railways are conferring considerable benefits on many districts, and I hope that before long many of them will be much nearer paying their working expenses than they are a present. I stated the

  447
  other night that some of the shares stood at a premium in the market. Of course, the amount of interest guaranteed is of importance to the barony, but I imagine that in the future, in consequence of the cheaper rate at which money can be obtained, no barony will give a guarantee in excess of 4 per cent. I have every reason to believe that the extension of these lines in Ireland will prove of great advantage to the districts intersected, and therefore to the taxpayers who are called upon to pay the burden. As to the question of Fenit pier and harbour, I pointed out the other night that the Board of Works in Dublin, who lend the money, only have authority to inquire as to the security offered them, and I think it should rest with the Pier and Harbour Commissioners who borrow the money, to investigate the expenditure and see that full value is obtained for it. I should strongly deprecate any interference on the part of the Government Department, except such as is necessarily part of its duty, and I am strongly in favour of local self-government in that sense. The hon. Member also asked about the Ulster Canal, and if the £3,500 is a final gift? Yes, Sir, it is a final gift, so far as I am able to say, and I have no reason to say that it is otherwise. It is the whole of the money which the Government has promised for the undertaking, and the most stringent conditions have been inserted to secure what the hon. Member very properly desires: that the money shall be spent on the improvement of the canal. The hon. Member also asked, whether the money which the Government undertook to lend has been lent. Sir, the Government has undertaken to lend no money. The hon. Member will recollect that I was called upon to give evidence before the Select Committee that inquired into this question, and I then stated that no promise had been made to lend money, but if a loan were made it would be on the merits of the security offered. I cannot pledge myself to say that under no circumstances will the Government make a loan supposing that the security offered was satisfactory. As a matter of fact, no application has yet been made for a loan, and the £3,500 is the total sum which the Government intend to give.
  MR. M. J. KENNY: Sir, as a rule, these guarantees are equivalent to 5 per cent on the amount borrowed, but in some cases, where the amount is 4 per cent, the guarantee is in perpetuity; when it is 5 per cent it is sometimes only for a period of 35 years. As a matter of fact, in some of the cases the railways guaranteed cannot by any possibility pay for the next 25 or 30 years, and they never will be able to pay the full amount of interest charged on the loans. Now, my hon. Friend has said that, in his opinion, some of the baronies are so taxed that they may be induced to repudiate their debt. Of course, repudiation is a very strong measure, which cannot be successfully accomplished without a very great effort. If the barony had an opportunity of contracting itself out of the debt, repudiation would be a very improper measure, but they have not that opportunity. The baronies are not rated by the Grand Jury. The presentments come before the Barony Sessions, which are composed of persons nominated directly or indirectly by Dublin Castle, and in no sense represented the ratepayers. Under the circumstances, the ratepayers have every reason to protest against the attitude of the Treasury in not affording them any relief.
  The Resolutions were agreed to

  WALTHAM ABBEY GUNPOWDER FACTORY BILL (No. 175.)
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. Brodrick.)
  MR. PICKERSGILL: The gist of this Bill is to extinguish an immemorial right of way through some fields which are at present a picturesque resort of the people of Waltham Abbey, as well as the best means of communication between two points. Of recent years, at all events, this House has manifested the greatest possible interest in the preservation of open spaces and public parks; and, therefore, I think it will scrutinize this Bill with great jealousy. No doubt the Government will rely upon the Report of a Select Committee which sat upon this Bill last year. I dissented from the conclusion of that Committee, and even taking the decision of the Committee as

  449
  it stands, what does it amount to? It amounts to this, that the Committee found that assuming that upon the fields to which I have referred a gunpowder factory is to be erected, this park cannot continue to exist with any regard to the public safety, and the Government knew before they purchased this land that there was a right of way through it, and now they come to the House and ask us to take away an immemorial right. An effectual stop should be put upon proceedings of this kind. The law has provided a tribunal before which questions of right of way are to be tried, and it further provides that if anyone desires to close a public path, he should obtain the certificate of two Justices, which certificate shall be confirmed at Quarter Sessions. The Government originally proposed to go to Quarter Sessions, but subsequently, when opposition was manifested, and it was known that those who object to the closing of this path would be professionally represented at Quarter Sessions, they abandoned that mode of proceeding and have now come to the House. Up to a few moments ago it was quite my intention to challenge a Division upon this question by way of protest, but I am very much interested in a Bill which stands lower down on the Paper, the progress of which has already been somewhat impeded, and I am not anxious to join in stopping the progress of that Bill further. It may be to the convenience of the House that I should not challenge a Division now, but I will do so upon the Third Reading.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Bill read 2a and committed to a Select Committee of seven Members, four to be nominated by the House, and three by the Committee of Selection.
  Ordered, That all Petitions against the Bill presented three clear days before the meeting of the Committee be referred to the Committee; that the Petitioners praying to be heard by themselves, their Counsel, or agents, be heard against the Bill, and Counsel heard in support of the Bill.
  Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records.
  Ordered, That three be the quorum.

RELIGIOUS PROSECUTIONS ABOLITION BILL.— [No. 1.]

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  *MR. BRADLAUGH: Mr. Speaker, the Bill, the Second Reading of which I have asked the House to pass, is directed against prosecutions, which are partly prosecutions at common law, and partly prosecutions by Statute. The Statute is the 9th and 10th William III., chap. 35, and that Statute enacts that any person convicted of blasphemy shall, for the first offence, be adjudged incapable and disabled in law, to all intents and purposes whatsoever, to have, to hold, or enjoy any office or offices, employment or employments, and shall, for a second offence, be adjudged disabled from being a plaintiff or defendant in any suit, or from being the guardian of his own children, or from being capable of receiving any legacy, and shall be liable to imprisonment for the space of three years. That Act has been held to be supplemental to the common law. I may best describe the Statute by using the words of Lord Coleridge, uttered in a case which was tried six years ago. In the course of the defence, the Statute had been described as shocking, and Lord Coleridge said—
  "Some old things, and amongst them this Statute, are shocking enough, and I do not defend them."
  In a judgment which Lord Justice Lindley delivered in 1885, His Lordship spoke of this Statute as cruel in its operation against the persons against whom it was directed. The Statute of 6th of George, chapter 47, which applies to Scotland, makes the offence punishable by 14 years' transportation. Now, Mr. Justice Stephen in his "History of the Criminal Law," which was written and passed through the Press in 1882, although it was published in 1883, wrote—
  "Offences against can hardly be treated as an actually existing head of our criminal law. Prosecutions for such offences are still theoretically possible in a few cases, but they have in practice become entirely obsolete."
  Unfortunately, whilst the History was passing through the Press, several prosecutions were initiated, one of which was tried at Maidstone, two which where tried at the Old Bailey, and two, in one of which I was myself the defendant, which were removed by certiorari to the High Court, and were tried before the present Lord Chief Justice of England. Here are two views of the law which it

  451
  is my duty to submit to the House, one, the view taken by the present Lord Chief Justice of England—namely, that it is only the manner of a blasphemous libel which should be censured, and that a calm, and clear, and cool statement of views would not bring a person within the operation of the laws relating to blasphemy; and, the other the view which, with all submission to the great Judge who has expressed the contrary opinion, I am afraid is the real view of the law—the other, the view which was formed by Mr. Justice Stephen and Mr. Justice Hawkins sitting in the Queen's Bench Division, which was mentioned in the charge of Mr. Justice North in the trials at the Old Bailey, and which was formed in the case of the "Attorney General v. Bradlaugh," reported in the Weekly Reporter, vol. 433, especially by Lord Justice Lindley. It seems to me that the real state of the law has been very fully explained by Mr. Justice Stephen in an article which appeared in the Fortnightly Review, and which was published in examination and criticism of the charge of Lord Coleridge to the jury in the case of the "Queen v. Foote, and others." Mr. Justice Stephen urges that the law as it now stands is a bad law, and recommends the very measure which I am bringing before the House to night. It is right, however, I should state Lord Coleridge's view—the view that it is the manner and not the matter of the blasphemous libel which should be considered, before I put what I conceive is unfortunately the real view of the law. Lord Coleridge says: —
  "It is clear, therefore, to my mind that the mere denial of the truth of the Christian religion is not enough alone to constitute the offence of blasphemy,"
  and he goes on to point out that all prosecutions for blasphemy, according to his view, tend to failure. Further on in his judgment Lord Coleridge says:—
  "Persecution, unless thorough-going, seldom succeeds. Irritation, annoyance, punishment which stops short of extermination, very seldom alter men's religious convictions. Entirely without one fragment of historical exaggeration, I may say that the penal laws which 50 or 60 years ago were enforced in Ireland were unparalled in the history of the world. They existed 150 years ago; they produced upon the religious convictions of the Irish people absolutely no effect whatever."
  452
  I submit to the House that all kinds of enactments which are in the nature of persecution for opinion are enactments which fail in doing anything except driving the expression of opinion into its worst and roughest forms, and, therefore, ought not to be desired by anyone who has in any degree any faith in any kind of liberty. Mr. Justice Stephen, reviewing the charge of Lord Coleridge, a charge which he praises in language not too strong, says:—
  "My only objection to it is that I fear that its merits may be transferred illogically to the law which it expounds and lays down, and that thus a humane and enlightened judgment may tend to perpetuate a bad law by diverting public attention from its defects. The law I regard as essentially and fundamentally bad."
  Now when a learned Judge, who is now engaged in trying cases, can thus describe this portion of the law, I think I can submit there is something like a prima facie case for its appeal. Lord Justice Lindley in delivering judgment in the case of the Attorney General v. Bradlaugh says—
  "It is a mistake to suppose, and I think it as well the mistake should be known, that persons who do not believe in a Supreme Being are in the state in which it is now commonly supposed they are. There are old Acts of Parliament still unrepealed by which such people can be cruelly persecuted."
  And it was because Lord Justice Lindley found this law on the Statute Book, that he said he felt constrained to hold as he did in the case then before him. What is the state of the law? I prefer to put it in the words of Mr. Justice Stephen than in my own. He quotes in support of his statement a large number of cases, and he says—
  "The result of the examination of the authorities appears to me to he that to this day Blackstone's definition of blasphemy must be taken to be true; and, if this is the case, it follows that a large part of the most serious and most important literature of the day is illegal—that, for instance, every bookseller who sells, every one who lends to his friend, a copy of Comte's Positive Philosophy, or of Renan's Vie de Jesus, commits a crime punishable with fine and imprisonment. It may be said that so revolting a consequence cannot be true; but, unfortunately, this is not the case. I suppose no one will, or indeed can, deny that if any person educated as a Christian, or having ever made profession of the Christian religion, denied that the Bible was of divine authority, even by word of mouth, he would incur the penalties of the 9 and 10 William III. c. 32. I will take a particular instance by way of illustration of this. The late Mr Greg was not only a distinguished author, but an eminent and useful member of

  453
  the Civil Service. I suppose he was educated as a Christian, and no one could have a stronger sympathy with the moral side of Christianity In every one of his works the historical truth of the Christian history is denied; and so is the Divine authority of the Old and New Testament If he had been convicted of publishing these opinions, or even of expressing them to a friend in private conversation, his appointment would have become void, and he would have been adjudged incapable and disabled in law to hold any office or employment whatever; in a word he would have lost his income and his profession. Upon a second conviction, he must have been imprisoned for three years, and incapacitated, amongst other things, to sue or accept any legacy. About this there neither is, nor can be, any question whatever."
  And after a long and careful summary of the law, as laid down in many decisions, Mr. Justice Stephen winds up—
  In my own opinion the practical inference is that blasphemy and blasphemous libel should cease to be offences at common law at all, that the Statute of William III. should be repealed, and that it should be enacted that no one except a beneficed clergyman of the Church of England should be liable to ecclesiastical censures for 'atheism, blanphemy, heresy, schism, or any other opinion.' Such an abolition would not only secure complete liberty of opinion on these matters, but it would prevent the recurrence at irregular intervals of scandalous prosecutions, which have never in any one instance benefited anyone, least of all the cause which they wore intended to serve, and which sometimes afford a channel for the gratification of private malice under the cloak of religion."
  I ask this House to give effect to what the learned Judge has said. I know there are one or two arguments which may be used to weigh heavily against me. One is, that the class for whom I speak is a comparatively small class. [Mr. DE LISLE: "Hear, hear."] There would be no reason in denying liberty to one man, even if he stood alone. Every opinion, in every age, has been at some time small, and those who hold opinions which within 100 years have been the subject of cruel persecutions within this realm should be the last to endorse the doctrine of persecution against those weaker than themselves. It may be urged that the severe penalties of the law are seldom enforced. It is only about 50 years ago that under this Act one man suffered nine years and 8 months' imprisonment in this country, and was also condemned to pay an enormous fine. It did not check the issue of the literature by him against which the prosecution was directed. It only had the effect of endearing him to a large number of people, and of making
  454
  many purchase the writings he issued who might otherwise not have done so. I hardly like to seem to be thrusting my personal case upon the House, but I may be permitted to remind the House that the declaration has been made very formally in print that the prosecution which was directed against me was initiated for the direct purpose of disqualifying me under this Statute for the term of my natural life from taking part in the political work of the country. I submit to the House that, ruling as it does over 330,000,000 of human beings, of every kind of faith or lack of faith, it is our duty to treat all alike. What is the effect of the law as it stands. Two years ago a legacy was left to myself and a gentleman in Manchester for the purpose of endowing an institution. We were all persons who might have been indicated as blasphemers under the law. The legacy was left for purely educational purposes, but the legacy was set aside, first of all in the Court of the Palatine of Lancaster, and next on appeal, on the ground that a bequest for such a purpose was an illegal bequest and voidable. It may be said "we would not object to you being allowed to utter your views, but we object to you uttering your views in an offensive language." But if persons utter their views in an offensive manner, and so as to provoke a breach of the peace they are punishable under the law as it now stands. The fact that the law is not always enforced, the fact that it is seldom enforced, the fact that Mr. Justice Stephen in his "History of the Criminal Law," describes the law as obsolete, the fact that Lord Justice Lindley has referred to the law as cruel in its operation should tend, I submit, to induce the House to grant the Second Reading of this Bill. I can quite understand it is possible that people will say that views which are different from their own, should not be offensively urged, but that brings in the question of the manner of the advocate rather than that of the matter, and I put it to persons who hold this view, whether the keeping on the Statute Book of this harsh and cruel law, does not deprive any of us, who may wish to tone and temper argument, of any fair reason for checking harsh or hasty speech or utterance. Again, let me point out that the word blasphemy

  455
  for which you punish to-day, has been an ever-changing word. It is only 240 years ago that a man, Naylor, the Quaker, of the same faith as the man (Mr. Bright) all of us in this House honoured, was tried for blasphemy. George Fox, William Penn, and scores of their co-workers were sent to gaol, or whipped at the cart tail as blasphemers. The Unitarians, had they lived even later than the times of which I have just spoken, would have come within the penalties of this Statute which Lord Coleridge says gives a ferocious power against people, and which Lord Justice Lindley condemns as an essentially bad law. I feel that this is not a time of night to trespass unduly on the attention of the House. I can only appeal to the generosity of the majority, but I would point out to them the position in which they put those who differ from them when they lack generosity themselves. I have sometimes tried to argue with my friends in France against the strict enforcement some of them have put on the Anti-Clerical laws; they have answered me "the Church shows us no mercy." It is that kind of unfortunate spirit which treats opinion as if it were a crime and thought as if it were a crime, when the very honesty of the utterance of that thought, that expression of opinion, shows you that the persons against whom you direct your Statute have at least the virtue of honesty to redeem their action from being classed as that of the ordinary criminal. It is against this unfortunate spirit I am arguing; it is for these people I am pleading to-night. I am pleading for many who have found trusts for their children cancelled, as was the case with a Member of this House, honoured while sitting in it because of the family to which he belonged, and for the great name and greater traditions associated with it—I mean Lord Amberley. He found his trust for his children cancelled because the man whom he honoured enough to give the trust that might have been brought within the scope of this statute. it is too late to-day to keep these penalties on the Statute Book. The Bill may not receive sanction for its second reading tonight, but it is something—and I thank the House for it—that the House has listened patiently and generously to an appeal made on behalf of an
  456
  unpopular minority; and one day or other justice will have to be done, and I ask the House to do it whilst those for whom they are asked to do it are few and weak, rather than leave us to win, as win we will, that outside public opinion by the ballot, which determines what the law shall be.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  MR. ADDISON (Ashton-under-Lyne): I cannot help thinking that the hon. Member to whose speech we have just listened with very great interest has not attempted in the Bill he has drawn or has had drawn for him to grapple with the difficulties that surround this question. He has alluded to a number of Acts that he himself admits are practically obsolete and never enforced, and he has taken care in the illustrations he has given of recent prosecutions to avoid telling the House that none of these prosecutions have been under any of these Acts.
  *MR. BRADLAUGH: Pardon me; I thought I expressly read from Lord Justice Lindley's judgment in the Attorney General v. Bradlaugh a passage, in which the learned Judge said his judgment was determined by the fact that these were old Acts of Parliament still unrepealed, by which such people can be cruelly prosecuted, and he went on to say that whether the state of the law ought to remain so or not was not for him to express an opinion, but he was bound to have regard to the fact that these Acts remained unrepealed.
  MR. ADDISON: Surely, so acute an interpreter of the law as the hon. Member will see that the remarks of the learned Judge exactly bear out my position. Lord Justice Lindley remarked there were a number of old Statutes still on the Statute Book, but, having in view that fact, he did not think the Common Law had been altered or tampered with. But what I was saying, and what I still point out, is this, that neither the hon. Member nor any other of the people prosecuted in recent times for what is called blasphemy, have ever been prosecuted, or indicted, under any of these Acts, certainly not under the Act of Edward VI., certainly not under the Act of Elizabeth, against defaming the Prayer Book, certainly not under

  457
  the 9 and 10 William III., nor the Act of Geo. IV., in regard to blasphemy. The hon. Member has had a very large experience in these matters, and if he were able to contradict me on this point I am sure he would do so. If he does not it shows I am right, and that not one of these obsolete Statutes during 20 years has been brought into action for any prosecution whatever.
  *MR. BRADLAUGHI quite admit there has been, so far as I am aware, no indictment whatever under the Statutes, but it is also true that in eight or nine cases, argued in bancv, these Statutes have been quoted in support of, and as explaining, the Common Law.
  MR. ADDISON: That is exactly my position, that learned Judges, who have explained what the Common Law is, have also shown that the mind of the Legislature is expressed by there being so little inclination to tamper with it that they have not repealed any one of these Acts. But it still comes back to the point I make—that all the Acts which the hon. Member has commented upon, pointing out what terrible things they are, and how persons may be sent to prison for this, or Quakers to prison for that, under none of these has anybody, in recent times, been prosecuted or indicted. But the real difficulty in dealing with this matter is that if these Acts are abolished, it will be necessary for the House that makes the abolition to deal with the matter further, and say what should be allowed and what should not be allowed in the way of attack upon religious institutions and the feelings of decent people. The same principle applies to indecency as to blasphemy—they are both matters of the utmost difficulty; and whoever has drawn this Bill has not attempted to deal with the difficulties, but has framed a Bill that goes far beyond the provisions of these Acts of Parliament, avoiding difficulties instead of meeting them, for it provides that in future in this country every blasphemy or blasphemous libel—however insulting to religion — however hurtful to the feelings of decent people, however corrupting to our youth and injurious to the community—are to be made lawful. After the passing of this Act, no criminal proceedings shall be instituted against any person for—amongst other things—schism, heresy, blasphemous libel, blasphemy at Common Law, or atheism. Now, one asks
  458
  at once what is blasphemy at Common Law? I will quote from a book well known to all lawyers, and from an old edition not intended to put a modern gloss on the definition, "Wharton's Law Lexicon"—
  "Blasphemy is an offence against God and religion by denying to the Almighty His being and providence, or by contumelious reproaches of our Saviour Christ; also all profane scoffing at the Holy Scriptures, and exposing them to contempt and ridicule."
  This, then, is what blasphemy is. The hon. Member for Northampton proposes that this shall not be punishable by any criminal proceedings whatever. Now, see what the effect of that would be. Hon. Members must be struck by this, that there must be matters which in any decent well organized community, whether the majority or the minority believe in religious principles, ought to be protected. If religious people are in the minority—instead of being, as I believe they are, and as I hope they always will be, in an overwhelming majority—if they are in a minority, their feelings are fully entitled to be respected out of common decency, if out of nothing else. Now, the hon. Member says that vile pictures, and caricatures, and offensive publications exposed in the streets or in shop windows and which might have a tendency to provoke a breach of the public peace, might still be punishable if his Bill were passed; but I cannot help thinking as a lawyer, that would not be so, because such publications would cease to be blasphemous libels, and no criminal proceedings could be maintained in respect to them. What is called tending to a breach of the peace is only the form of theory on which prosecutions for libel are founded, but if you say nobody is to be prosecuted for libel, you abolish the whole doctrine about breach of the peace. So I say the hon. Member has not attempted to grapple with the difficulties that were present to the minds of Lord Coleridge and Mr. Justice Stephen; he does not say what should be lawful, but that everything shall be lawful, however injurious, or irritating to the feelings of the community. The hon. Member quotes France, and he has considerable acquaintance with the laws, manners, and customs of France, so ho must know that French legislation has done that we do not attempt to do. Notwithstanding the opinions of a large

  459
  minority, although these old-fashioned obsolete blasphemy laws do not exist in French law, yet, in the Penal Code there is an Article making it an offence punishable by fine or by imprisonment up to five years to insult or outrage any recognized religion in France. Now, does the hon. Member propose there should be something of that kind here? What does he propose to establish in substitution of the laws he would abolish but unbounded liberty and licence of every kind? What reason has he given for this? He says opinion should be free. Well, opinion is free, and nobody in England is prosecuted for his religious opinions or the want of them.
  *MR BRADLAUGH: Yes; I was indicted.
  MR. ADDISON: I do not like to enter into a personal controversy with the hon. Member, but surely he does not mean seriously to maintain that. I pass on from his to another case, "The Queen v. Foote." It was not for religious opinions that in that case the very severe sentence was passed; it was for the publication of caricatures of the most outrageous kind calculated to excite the greatest possible ill feeling in the whole neighbourhood where they were exhibited. I have only just come from the library, and happened to miss the interesting discussion on the House Duty, while reading Professor Huxley's article in the Nineteenth Century. Professor Huxley shows clearly enough that opinion is perfectly free in this country so long as it is nothing more than an honest attempt to express opinion and not to insult other religious opinions. The hon. Member has made no case for the Bill, although I admit that there is very great difference of opinion, as he says, between Judges as to what the law is. Lord Coleridge holds that it is the manner and intention to insult and annoy rather than the matter that should be considered in relation to attacks on religion, and others who wish the law altered, press Mr. Justice Stephen's view and make it more strong. Yet, whether on the one side or the other, everybody admits that if the matter is dealt with at all it should be dealt with not only negatively but positively. We ought to know from those who propose this Bill on what principle they intend to go. If we allow free unfettered licence we shall be below every other
  460
  civilized country in the world. I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time this day six months.
  Amendment proposed to leave out the word "now" and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months (Mr. Addison.)
  MR. HUNTER: I do not intend to occupy the time of the House at this late hour for more than a few minutes, but I must entirely join issue with the hon. and learned Member who has just spoken of the statement he has made in regard to the law of blasphemy. There are two views in respect to the Common Law, but there are not two views in respect to the Statute Law. It is perfectly clear that by the Statute Law any expression of opinion struck at by the Statute, in whatever language such expression may be couched, is punishable as an indictable offence. In regard to Common Law there are two opinions, that of Lord Coleridge, and that of Mr. Justice Stephen. Lord Coleridge takes the view that the mere denial of the prevailing opinion and conviction on religion does not in itself constitute a crime, but in practice I can draw no distinction between the denial of all right to express an opinion and the right to send a man to prison because he has expressed his opinion in a manner not agreeable to 12 men of the jury. What happened in the case of Foote? He was tried by three juries, and two disagreed; but when the jury did agree he was sentenced to a year's imprisonment. And why? Mr. Justice North did not attempt to conceal his bigotry, for in the plainest, if not the politest language, he said that Foote must be punished because he had "dedicated his talents to the service of the Devil;" which, in plain English, meant that he held opinions on religion differing from those of Mr. Justice North. If the hon. and learned Member represents, as I believe he does, correctly the general sense with respect to this subject of religious prosecutions, it does not seem to me it would be at all difficult if the Bill were read a second time to reconcile his view with that of the hon. Member for Northampton. I look for a solution of the difficulty to the Indian Penal Code, in which eminent Englishmen have had to deal in instituting a law for India with this

  461
  very question of religious irritation. They had to frame a law for circumstances and institutions far more difficult than anything existing in this country, where, indeed, there are few occasions for trying the question, and where very few persons derive any pleasure or satisfaction from deliberately wounding or insulting the religious feelings of his neighbours. But in India among a violent and fanatical people we from time to time hear of terrible riots breaking out from such causes at the season of the religious festivals, when the religious feelings of the people are vehemently excited. In India therefore, we had to provide for the same difficulties that the hon. and learned Member has suggested as existing here in a modified form. I ask the attention of the House to the manner in which this question has been dealt with in the Indian Penal Cede. The section runs thus—
  "Whoever, with the deliberate intention of wounding the religious feelings of any person, utters any word or makes any sound in the hearing of that person, or makes any gesture, or places any object in the sight of that person "—this covers the case of pictures, etc.—" shall be punished with imprisonment, with or without hard labour, for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both."
  I would suggest that if there exists any bona fide desire to settle the question on fair lines, by which I mean on lines which on the one hand will give a guarantee of religious freedom and on the other hand will afford adequate protection to the religious feelings of the community, then I think a solution might be found in the section of the Indian Penal Code I have read. I would suggest that hon. Members might allow the Bill to pass its Second Reading, and in Committee I would move the insertion of this section as an Amendment that I think would meet the difficulties of the question. I trust the suggestion may meet with approval, and the Bill will then remove what is undoubtedly the cause of great difficulty. I think I can refer to no higher authority than the Indian Penal Code, than which no document in the English language was ever prepared with more careful consideration and ability.
  MR. S. SMITH: To a large extent I agree with what has been said in favour of the Bill. The feeling is unanimous that the age of religious persecution is passed, and no
  462
  one should now be punished for holding or not holding religious opinions. We are all of one mind upon that. But still I feel that, if we pass the Bill, we shall open the flood-gates of the country to a vile tide of ribald and blasphemous literature of which few in this House are aware. For a few years past I have been making some feeble efforts to stop the irruption of foul, corrupting literature in the country, and so I have become aware of the circulation in increasing quantities of literature so loathsome—so obscene—that those who provide it, and those who habitually read it, must be degraded to the level of beasts. It is extremely dfficult to draw the line between what is blasphemous and what is obscene, the two things run one into the other. If we absolutely take away all power of prosecuting for blasphemy, we may legalize the publication of literature of the most revolting kind. Hon. Members would scarcely believe that such papers could be printed as these of which I have several specimens, which have been issued in London, and some of them, I believe, by a gentleman whose name has been mentioned in the course of this debate—they shock and outrage all feelings of decency beyond description, and woodcuts are attached that turn into contempt the noblest things of the Christian religion. Just to give hon. Members an idea of what would become legal under this Bill, let me mention that one depicts the Almighty dancing a lewd dance with the Devil. It soils one's lips to say such things. I am sure the House does not wish this sort of thing to be legalized. I am told by lawyers that these infamous productions may be made the subject of prosecution, but not if this Bill passes. There are societies supported by a considerable amount of money whose business it is to circulate this infamous literature, and I am advised that if the Bill becomes law abominable publications of this class could be distributed at the doors of our Sunday schools and churches—publications that turn into ridicule and contempt the holiest things of the Christian faith, and the law could not touch them. I have every desire for liberty of opinion, but to remove every restraint upon publications of this kind is liberty carried to madness. I believe that of the whole nation, 99 out of every 100 would

  463
  repudiate the idea. I am disposed to think that with an amendment such as has been suggested by the hon. Member for Aberdeen (Mr. Hunter) the Bill might become a valuable addition to the Statute Book. I quite agree that these obsolete laws should not be maintained. No one nowadays would wish to prosecute a man for holding opinions or for expressing them in a rational, sober manner, but on the lowest ground, I hold it is contrary to all ideas of civil society, that the holiest, deepest, and strongest convictions of men and women should be affronted in the rudest manner possible without there being any redress at law. I hold that our duty as a country goes beyond that, and that we owe obligations to Almighty God the Sovereign Ruler of mankind to uphold in all lawful and proper ways the authority of his laws. I will not insist on that argument now, but I do insist that we shall not give the stamp of legality to atrocious caricatures and literature, such as I have mentioned. I believe the hon. Member for Northampton (Mr. Bradlaugh) has no wish or desire that such literature should be legalized or circulated, but I would point out that the effect of passing the Bill will be to give the stamp of legality to such things. I support the Motion that the Bill be read a second time this day six months.
  *THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir E. CLARKE.): I should be glad if the House were able, after this short debate, to dispose of the Bill tonight, but whether it is able to do so or not, I am anxious to say on the part of the Government that they give it their most decided opposition. The hon. Member for Aberdeen has suggested certain adaptations from the Indian Penal Code, and the last speaker has accepted the suggestion. But were this proposal given effect to, it would be the creation of a new Bill. It would mean the striking out of the only effective clause in the Bill, and the substitution of something entirely different. The Bill proposed by the hon. Member for Northampton is about the most unpractical suggestion which could possibly be. The hon. Member has treated the House to a dissertation as to what is the true common law in this country on the subject of blasphemous libel. It stands thus—that in the case
  464
  mentioned the Lord Chief Justice laid down the law in regard to blasphemy and blasphemous libel in terms which the hon. Member says he wishes truly expressed the law. He says he should be glad if the decision in the case of "The Queen v. Ramsey and Foote" did correctly represent the law; but because another learned Judge, writing a magazine article, suggested that the Lord Chief Justice was wrong in his exposition of the law, the hon. Member tries to persuade the House that it ought to pass a Bill in order to alter the law.
  *MR. BRADLAUGH: I thought I had expressly quoted a passage from another Judge. I referred to a citation given at Nisi Prius by Justices Stephen and Hawkins from a dictum of Mr. Justice Lindley in the Court of Appeal.
  *SIR E. CLARKE: The hon. Member does not appreciate the point I am putting. He said in his speech that the law is the subject of dispute—that there are two views of it, one being that expressed by the Lord Chief Justice in the case I have mentioned. which judgment was afterwards revised by the learned Judge and published in a corrected form, as he was anxious that his opinion on the subject should remain clearly defined; and the other view of the law, that of Mr. Justice Lindley. I say that the judgment of the Lord Chief Justice at present represents the most authoritative exposition of the law on this subject. So long as it remains, it will be idle to ask the House of Commons to pass a Bill in order to put the law even into that condition which the hon. Member desires. If the Bill would put the law into the position in which the hon. Gentleman desires to see it, then I should say the House has other and better things to do than to pass a Bill to declare that to be the law which has been pronounced to be the law by the Lord Chief Justice. But this Bill would go much further. It would sweep away the whole law, Common or Statute, by which blasphemous libel can be punished. It has been said that there is no prosecution now for the expression of religious opinions. I am astonished that the hon. Member for Northampton should have said that he himself has been prosecuted for the expression of opinions. I am certain that in that prosecution on which the hon. Member was convicted—
  *MR BRADLAUGH: I never have been convicted on a prosecution for blasphemy.
  *SIR E. CLARKE: If the hon. Gentleman had waited until the close of my sentence he would have seen that I am stating the fact. The prosecution on which the hon. Member was convicted, although the judgment was afterwards quashed on a technical objection, was not a prosecution for the expression of religious opinions. Another prosecution was in respect of the circulation of those very scandalous publications to which the last speaker referred. I have some knowledge of the filthy and wicked publications which have been referred to by the hon. Member, and the character of which the hon. Member cannot even indicate to the House. They were issued week after week, but there is a natural reluctance to institute prosecutions which would have the effect of advertising these publications. They contain grossly indecent suggestions with regard to matters which are regarded as sacred by Christian people. If this Bill were to pass, while anyone would be liable to criminal prosecution for the smallest imputation on the character of an individual, people would be free to scatter broadcast the most scandalous and shocking suggestions with regard to sacred things of religion without being subjected to any prosecution. This is enough to make the House reject the Bill with indignation. One knows perfectly well the terrible mischief which is done when one of these publications comes into anyone's hands, whether it be a child, a young person, or a man. The thing cannot be forgotten. It has existed and it has defiled. If this Bill became law there would be absolutely no law whatever in this country to suppress this wickedness. Some of the Statutes which it is proposed to repeal are obsolete Statutes. They might just as well be erased from the Statute Book, because they are obsolete; but their simple repeal is not the object nor the effect of this Bill. The hon. Member would not waste his time in presenting a Bill simply to get rid of the Statutes. There has been no prosecution under the Act of William III., and no prosecution for heresy since 1640. These Statutes might very well be repealed in a Statute Law Revision Bill; but as it is not the object of the
  466
  Bill to get rid of these innocuous Statutes, I hope we shall have time to divide against the Second Reading of the Bill.
  MR. MAC INNES (): In the fewest possible words I desire to say why I intend to vote against the Second Reading of the Bill. I cannot say, with the Solicitor General, that I regard the Bill with feelings of indignation; on the contrary, I feel, to a certain extent, in a dilemma. By voting against the Bill I shall be classed with those who seem still to wish to perpetuate prosecutions for expressions of opinion, and nothing is further from my thoughts and wish. Nothing, I trust, is further from the thoughts of the great majority of the Members of this House. The day for such prosecutions has passed, and, I firmly believe, passed for ever. No one here, I am sure, wishes ever again to prosecute a man for opinions in regard to religion. Many of us on both sides of the House regret the prosecutions to which the junior Member for Northampton was subjected, but we are unable to support the Bill, looking at the form in which it is presented and at the fact that it would legalize those scandalous productions to which reference has been made. The House, however, will feel that we have for this hour and a half had a very useful discussion, and that before long, from some quarter or other, we shall have a measure which will deal with the matter in such a way as to get rid of these obsolete enactments, and at the same time, preserve the people from contamination by this offensive literature.
  *COLONEL SANDYS: It had been my intention, but for the intervention of the hon. Member for Ashton, to move that the Bill be read a second time this day six months, but the matter has been so well dealt with by him, as well as by my learned Friend the Solicitor General, that I shall intervene for a very few moments only between the House and a Division. The law in this country is, that those who kill the body shall be punished without mercy; but if this Bill is passed, it will be tantamount to allowing those who would kill the souls of the people to do so with impunity. On that ground I certainly shall vote against the Bill, and I would remind the House

  467
  that under the law of Moses blasphemers were led out of the camp and stoned to death by the people. I do not think, therefore, that the penalties under these Acts can be regarded as excessive at the present time. I hope the House will reject the Bill by a handsome majority, in order to show that it considers itself insulted by having such a measure brought before it and being asked to sanction it at all.
  MR. WADDY (): If this measure were one to do away with the Statutes aimed at what is called schism or heresy, I should not have a word to say against it. But if this Bill is passed I believe that my children might be compelled to see on the walls of this city as they go along the streets things which I would rather they should die than see and take into their minds. It behoves us to stand up boldly for those things which we hold most precious both in time and eternity—which stretch beyond this world into the next. Under these circumstances, and with a feeling of the profoundest responsibility, I declare that though I should he prepared to vote as earnestly as any man for anything that will promote religious and civil liberty, yet, as I believe that this Bill would open the flood-gates of the vilest and most terrible iniquity that it is possible to perpetrate, I shall speak and vote against it on every possible occasion.
  *MR. BRADLAUGH: I wish to say that a phrase used by the Solicitor General might possibly be understood as putting on me some kind of moral responsibility, in connection with the illustrated publications to which the hon. and learned Gentleman referred. I do not suppose that the hon. and learned Gentleman intended his words to convey that meaning, but if he did, I must say that all the evidence adduced at the trial went just the other way.
  *SIR E. CLARKE: I did not think that my words had been misunderstood. The quotations I gave were from the words of Lord Coleridge to the effect that the defence was grounded on the contention that the publication was not by the hon. Member's authority.
  *MR. PICTON (Leicester): After the speeches that have been delivered against this Bill, as my name is on the back of it, I wish to say I intend to vote for it purely on religious principles. I read not one word in the New Testament
  468
  in favour of supporting the infliction of any legal penalty on account of the utterance of any religious or irreligious opinion, I read rather that when the disciples of the Great Master desired to call down vengence on those who differed from them, they were reminded that they knew not what spirit they were of. It is because I feel more strongly on this religious point than the hon. Members who oppose the Bill that I am going to support it. If it were possible for the sense of decency of religious people to be outraged under the Bill as at present framed of course I would in Committee support any amendment which might be necessary to remove that blot.
  MR. CHANNING: Will the hon. Member for Northampton accept the suggestion of the hon. Member for Aberdeen, in the sense that will make distinctly illegal insults to the religions feeling of the community, and the outrage to the community offered by publications such as those referred to by the hon. Member for Flintshire.
  *MR. BRADLAUGH: I should be quite ready to accept something in the direction of the clause from the Indian Code. It will, however, be quite time enough to deal with a particular illustration when it comes before me.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 46; Noes 111.—(Div. List, No. 75.)
  Main Question as amended put, and agreed to; Second Reading put off for six months.

  FRIENDLY SOCIETIES ACT (1888) AMENDMENT BILL.— [No. 193.]
  Bill read 2a, and committed for Monday, 6th May.

  COLONIZATION.
  Ordered, that a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into various Schemes which have been proposed to Her Majesty's Government to facilitate Emigration from the congested districts of the United Kingdom to the British Colonies or elsewhere; to examine into the results of any Schemes which have received practical trial in recent years, and to report generally whether in their opinion it is desirable that further facilities should be given to promote emigration; and, if so, upon the means by and the conditions under which such emigration can best be carried out, and the quarters to which it can most advantageously be directed.—(Mr. Ritchie,)
  House adjourned at ten minutes after Twelve o'clock till Monday next.