Sitting of 2 May 1889

QUESTIONS.

  THE TOWER GARDENS.
  MR. MONTAGU: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that the public have largely availed themselves of the recently conferred privilege of access to the Tower Gardens, and that no case of disorderly conduct has been reported; whether he will extend similar facilities of access to the "River Side Promenade," to which the public were formerly admitted; and whether he will request the Tower officials to allow a Military band to play on Saturdays in the afternoon during the summer months, and to provide that two or three "beefeaters" should act as caretakers, with the view of reducing the cost of maintaining order in the Gardens and Promenade?
  *THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Mr. STANHOPE,): I am glad to be able to answer the first question in the affirmative. I am afraid, however, that I must adhere to the decision not to extend similar facilities of access to the Tower Wharf. There is no band at the disposal of the Tower authorities for the purpose suggested in the question.

  THE LIST OF GENERALS.
  SIR GEORGE TREVELYAN: I beg to ask the
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  Secretary of State for War whether he is now prepared to state the arrangement which he is prepared to make with regard to the list of Generals?
  *MR. E. STANHOPE: I am disappointed at not being yet able to state to the House my proposals with regard to the general officers' list. I do not think I should be justified in doing so until Treasury sanction has been obtained, and so many details are involved in the draft Royal Warrant that its technical preparation has taken longer than I expected. But I will certainly do it as soon as possible.

  POST OFFICE OFFICIALS.
  MR. DONAL SULLIVANasked the Postmaster General whether the following recommendation made by the late Mr. Fawcett to the Treasury, on 13th June 1881, and which was sanctioned by the House of Commons, "That payment as overtime work be given for all Sunday work performed by the indoor staff, whether telegraph or postal, which in a month of four Sundays may be in excess of eight hours, i e. an average of two hours per Sunday," has been strictly adhered to up to about six weeks ago; whether the Surveyor of the Leeds district lately issued a regulation which reduced the Sunday pay to less than one-half, and in many cases to nil; and whether this new regulation decides that every officer shall work 44 hours per week for night duty and 50 hours per week for day duty before any claim can now be made, whether performed on Sunday or week-days?
  *THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES,): I have received no representation in the usual manner from any officers of the Department on the subject referred to in the hon. Member's question, but I may say that his quotation from the late Mr. Fawcett's letter of 13th June, 1881, is correct as far as it goes. The paragraph, however, roust be read in connection with, and subject to, a preceding paragraph, which prescribes one period of ordinary night attendance for the week—namely, seven hours for the six nights, or 42 hours for the week, and two hours on Sundays, making 44 hours in all. In a few cases, postmasters have inadvertently overpaid certain clerks, paying for overtime on Sundays when

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  they have only given 35 hours' night attendance instead of 42. No new regulation has been made, but the irregular payments have been discontinued, so as to wake the practice accord with the decision of 13th June, 1881.

  GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS — OPERATIVE WEAVERS' STRIKE.
  MR. BROADHURSTasked the Secretary of State for War whether it is true that the female operative weavers employed by the firm of Messrs. Colbeck Brothers, of Averthorpe, Yorkshire, who are now on strike against a further reduction of wages, have been weaving cloth for the use of the War Department at wages of about half the rate given by other firms in Yorkshire for similar work; and whether Messrs. Colbeck Brothers obtained the contract direct from the Government or through some other agency?
  *MR. E. STANHOPE: The contracts held by Messrs. Colbeck, of Averthorpe, were obtained direct by open competition. The War Office has no cognizance of the relations between the firm and its operatives beyond the fact that a strike has taken place.

  STAMP DUTY ON BONDS AND SHARES.
  MR. S. MONTAGUasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will state the amount received from the one shilling per cent stamp duty on bonds and shares to bearer from 1st July, 1888, to 31st December, 1888, and the amount so received from 1st January to 31st March, 1889; whether the receipts from this source are likely to decline in consequence of the issue of fully-stamped bonds in lieu of old bonds converted or paid off; and whether, in view of the small and possibly declining revenue from this duty, and of the great trouble and inconvenience entailed by affixing so many adhesive stamps, he will see the advisability of substituting a small pro rata tax on brokers' contracts for the purchase and sale of such securities to bearer?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,): Since I made my Financial Statement the results of the last quarterly stamp stocktaking have been received, and they somewhat modify the estimate then given by me iu a direction favourable to the revenue.
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  The receipts from the 1s. per cent stamp duty on bonds to bearer were from the 1st of July to the 31st of December, 1888, £66,600; from the 1st of January, to the 31st of March, 1889, £45,400, making a total of £112,000. The figures from January to March are still only an approximate estimate; but there is no longer room for much variation. I do not think that a decline in this duty is likely to take place. On the one hand, no doubt, bonds subject to the 1s. duty are paid off; but, on the other hand, it often happens that bonds not liable to the duty are replaced by bonds which are. The substitute for this duty which is suggested by the hon. Member was fully considered last year. I think the hon. Member would find that it would be even more strongly objected to than the 1s. stamp. Such, at least, was my impression last year.

  THE EDUCATION CODE, 1889.
  MR. JEFFREYS (Hants,)asked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether, in view of the difficulties which an immediate application of Clause 85 in the New Code would cause to voluntary schools (many of which have been built or enlarged with the approval of the Education Department to give an area of eight square feet to each child), the increased area of ten square feet will be required in existing schools or in new buildings only; and whether a difference could be made in the area required for country schools as compared with those in large towns.
  THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION (Sir W. HART DYKE,): There has never been any intention to give immediate application to Article 85 A in the New Code so far as existing schools are concerned, and in cases in which the Department has sanctioned a certain amount of accommodation for a certain number of scholars such arrangements will not be disturbed. I fear that such an arrangement as indicated in the last paragraph could not well be made.
  MR. J. MORE: May I ask whether in all cases the Board Schools will be treated on the same lines as the voluntary schools?
  SIR W. HARE DYKE: I cannot answer that question at this moment.
  MR. SAMUELSONasked the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education whether he would lay upon the Table of the House a statement of the objects intended to he effected by the various changes introduced into the Code and Schedule of 1889, as set forth in the "Appendix of Articles modified and new Articles," and to what extent these changes carry out the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Elementary Education.
  SIR W. HART DYKE: The object of the proposed alterations is simply to endeavour to carry into effect many of the changes advocated both by the majority and minority report of the late Commission. How far these objects have been attained is a matter which will be best elucidated by debate in this House.

  THE SUGAR CONVENTION.
  MR. BLUNDELL MAPLE: I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies if it is his intention to introduce a Bill prohibiting the importation of confectionery and sweetened provisions made from bounty-fed sugar?
  *THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Baron H. de WORMS, Liverpool, Toxeth): No, Sir.
  MR. KNATCHBULL HUGESSEN: Is it intended to prohibit the importation into this country of jams made from bounty-fed sugar?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: No, Sir.
  MR. BRADLAUGH: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the introduction of the Bill has been attended by a rise in the price of the sugar of the poor all over the country?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: I am not aware of that fact. I am aware that a rise in the price of sugar has taken place, but it is owing to the existence of the unfortunate Bounty System.
  MR. H. FOWLER: Will not the Bill prohibit the importation of confectionery and sweetened provision made from bounty-fed sugar?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: Certainly not.

  CONDENSED MILK.
  MR. CHANNINGasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Federal Council of Switzerland has approved a Bill giving a drawback of five francs per 100 kilogrammes of sugar contained in condensed milk; whether the Council have stated that the existing duty on sugar imported into Switzerland enhances the cost of condensed milk by three per cent., and places the Swiss product at a disadvantage of one franc 50 centimes per chest of 48 boxes in the English market, compared with the cost of production in a "free sugar" country like England; and whether, if the International Commission consider that part of this drawback acts as a bounty, the importation of condensed milk from Switzerland will be prohibited.
  *THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir J. FERGUSSON,): Her Majesty's Government are informed that although the Swiss National Council had adopted this Bill, the Council of States has rejected it. Accordingly the matter stands over until next Session in June.
  MR. CHANNING: Do not the facts stated in the second part of the question appear in the official reports of the Board of Trade?
  *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I am not prepared to answer, without reference, whether it is the case or not.

  CHILD MARRIAGES IN INDIA.
  MR. SAMUEL SMITHasked the Under Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to the statement made by Dewan Ragunatha Rao regarding the existing state of the law in India with reference to infant marriages, and to his statement of a recent instance where "a child wife, aged eight years, was driven to attempt suicide rather than continue to submit herself any longer to the capricious tyranny and odius intimacy of her so-called husband, aged 47 years"; and whether Her Majesty's Government will communicate with the Indian Government and recommend some restrictions on child marriages?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Sir J. GORST, ): The attention of the Government of India has long been directed to the evils which arise from infant marriages in India, and they have made and will continue to make, all such efforts to correct those evils as are consistent with the pledge of the British Government to respect the religious am social customs of all classes of Her Majesty's Indian subjects. I may remind the House that one satisfactory result of these efforts is to be found it the Resolution of the Rajputana Chiefs in March, 1888 (quoted in a House of Lords Return of the 20th July, 1888 No. 227), as follows:—
  "As a rule, boys and girls are married at an early age, notwithstanding that the evils of such a custom are well known to all, and need no description. In inviting attention to the subject, it seems proper to lay down that boys and girls should not be married before the age of 18 and 14 respectively. As regards engagements concluded before this date, the marriage can take place as soon as the girl completes 14 years, irrespective of the boy's age."

  FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE.
  SIR EDWARD BIRKBECK: I beg to ask the Vice Chamberlain whether the Royal Agricultural Society of England have found themselves not in a position to accept the proposal of Her Majesty's Government, that they should send over to the Netherlands to inquire into the security afforded against the possible exportation of foot and mouth disease; whether the attention of Her Majesty's Government has been called to a resolution passed at a council meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society on the 16th instant, in which they desire to impress upon the Government the necessity of postponing from 1st June to 1st September the operation of the order to admit animals free from Holland, so as to give time for further inquiry; whether the Privy Council have received a Copy of the Report unanimously agreed to by the Council of the Central and Associated Chambers of Agriculture on the 30th April, censuring the admission of live animals from Germany while foot and mouth disease was known to exist in that country, and urging the withdrawal of the Netherlands order; and whether, in view of the present state of agricultural feeling on this matter, and the announcement that the propriety of
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  further legislation on the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts, with reference to the charge for compensation and the powers of the central authority, is under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government, the Privy Council will withdraw the order of the 1st March, or postpone its operation until a decision is arrived at with reference to the legislation proposed.
  THE VICE CHAMBERLAIN (Viscount LEWISHAM,): The subject was considered at a meeting of the Lords of the Committee for Agriculture yesterday; and an order was passed, the effect of which is to postpone the operation of the Netherlands order to September 1.
  SIR E. BIRKBECK: Have Her Majesty's Government given consideration to that portion of the Report referred to in my question, which indicates that the anxiety of agriculturalists cannot be dispelled except by the abandonment of the proposal to receive from a country of the geographical situation of Holland live animals without, at least, the precautions insisted on since the Act of 1878?
  MR. MUNDELLA: Is there any justification whatever for the exclusion of the healthy cattle of the Netherlands from free importation into this country at the present momen?
  VISCOUNT LEWISHAM: That is a question rather of debate. As regards the question of my hon. Friend, the subject was considered, and the decision arrived at is what I have already stated. If the hon. Gentleman wishes, I will communicate his desires to the Agricultural Department.
  MR. MUNDELLA: I must press the noble Lord for an answer to my question, namely, whether there are any known diseases in the Netherlands, and whether under the circumstances and under the Act there is any justification whatever for the exclusion of healthy cattle from that country.
  VISCOUNT LEWISHAM: Perhaps the right hon. Gentlemen will give me notice of the question.
  MR. CHAPLIN: Is it not a fact that disease is known to exist to a considerable extent in Germany and on the other side of the frontier line between the Netherlands and Germany?
  VISCOUNT LEWISHAM: It is a fact that disease is known to exist in Germany.
  SIR J. SWINBURNE: Is it not the case that a very few weeks ago a cargo of cattle was landed at Hartlepool from Holland suffering from foot and mouth disease?
  VISCOUNT LEWISHAM: No; a cargo of sheep suffering from foot and mouth was landed at Hartlepool from Germany. As far as Holland is concerned there has been no diseased animals landed.
  MR. CRAIG: In what part of Germany does the disease prevail?
  VISCOUNT LEWISHAM: Germany is a large country. I think that in 12 different parts of Germany there is disease, but without notice I cannot say offhand exactly in what portions of the country the disease exists.

  NAVAL INSTRUCTORS.
  MR. HERBERT KNATCHBULL-HUGESSENasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether it is the fact that, up to quite recently, it has been the practice in the dockyards for the instructors of apprentices to receive 2s. a week for their trouble; that this remuneration is now withdrawn in the case of instructors of apprentices who have served four years of their time; and that the men are expected to instruct these apprentices without the slightest remuneration; and whether he will direct that this payment be restored to the men.
  *THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (Lord G. HAMILTON, Middlesex, Ealing): The facts are as stated in the question. The decision to discontinue the remuneration for the in-instruction of apprentices, who have served four years of their time, was come to after very full consideration, it being clear that a course of four years' actual instruction was sufficient. I do not propose to rescind the recent orders issued in consequence of that decision.
  MR. H. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN: In consequence of the reply of the noble Lord I beg to give notice that T will call attention to the matter on an early day.

  HANSARD'S DEBATES.
  MR. PICTON: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether it is with the sanction of the Treasury that, under the new Hansard arrangements, abbreviated reports are given in the first person, thus making an erroneous impression that they are verbatim reports; whether he is aware that Members frequently decline to correct proof reports of their speeches, because it is impossible by any reasonable labour to bring them into such a form as to justify the insertion of an asterisk; and whether he will recommend a return to the former system of adopting the third person in abbreviated reports?
  SIR R. LETHBRIDGE: Before my hon. Friend answers that question will he permit me to ask another, of which I have given him private notice on the same subject—namely, whether it is true that no new arrangements whatever have been made in regard to the method of reporting for Hansard's Parliamentary Debates other than ordinary attempts to improve the details in accordance with suggestions made to the Editor by hon. Members; whether it is true that the majority of hon. Members who have communicated with the Editor have expressed a preference for reports in the first person; whether it is true that in the recent numbers of Hansard at least nine-tenths of the speeches are marked as having been revised by hon. Members; and whether means cannot be devised by which the Editor can be authoritatively informed of the general wish of the House in regard to this and similar details in connection with the reports?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON,): I must answer the first three questions of my hon. Friend in the affirmative, and in regard to the last, I believe that the Editor of Hansard is always very glad to receive suggestions from hon. Members and is most anxious to do the best he can to meet the general wish of the House. In regard to the question on the Paper, I may say that the Treasury have not given any directions about the adoption of the first person in the reports. The matter is within the discretion of the Editor.

  SUGAR IN BREWERIES.
  MR. PICTONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he could state the amount of sugar and of glucose used in the breweries and distilleries of the United Kingdom?
  MR. GOSCHEN: In the year to the 30th of September, 1888, the sugar and glucose (which cannot be separated) used in breweries amounted to 1,524,808 cwt. The sugar used in distilleries amounted to 39,237 cwt., or, together, 1,564,045 cwt. The molasses used in distilleries amounted to 210,621 cwt.

  THE TRUCK ACT.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the District Factory Inspector for the Burnley district was, on 5th April, aware of breaches of the Truck Act which had taken place at Higher-ford Shed, Barrowford; whether by inquiry, on an inspection on that day, he obtained primâ facie evidence of such breaches; and whether any, and what, steps have been taken to enforce the law for the infringement which has been found by the Inspector to have taken place?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. MATTHEWS,): The facts are as stated. The Inspector ascertained that the employers were deducting one halfpenny per week per loom from the wages of their weavers towards the expense of providing a man to oil the looms. I requested the Inspector to point out to the employers that such a deduction was contrary to the Truck Act, and I am informed that the system complained of has now been abandoned.
  MR. BRADLAUGH: Is not this one of the many cases in which the passing over of offences against an existing Statute tends to bring the law into disrepute, and ought not punishment to be enforced where there has been a distinct breach of the Act?
  MR. MATTHEWS: The hon. Member knows as well as I do that the Truck Act has been the subject of conflicting decisions in the Courts of Law, and it would appear that upon so me points the law is not thoroughly clear. I think the most desirable course would be, in the first instance, to call the
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  attention of employers to breaches of the law, and if they immediately comply with the representations made it is not necessary to prosecute.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware that breaches of the Truck Act by Mr. Haynes are alleged to be still taking place at Harpenden: whether, so far back as July last, Mr. Gould, the District Inspector of Factories, reported in favour of prosecution in this case, and with whom the responsibility rests of hitherto preventing the enforcement of the law; and whether the Treasury will commence a prosecution, and in the case of reluctant witnesses take the usual steps to enforce the attendance of such persons before the magistrate?
  MR. MATTHEWS: Yes, Sir. This matter was brought to my notice in July, 1888. Careful inquiries were then made by the Treasury Solicitor, the result being to show that proceedings would probably not be successful. The matter was again investigated in January of this year, but at that time it was found impossible to procure the necessary evidence. Fresh evidence has now been laid before the Treasury Solicitor, and proceedings will be taken, the usual steps being adopted, if necessary, with respect to reluctant witnesses.

  HOURS OF LABOUR.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he would, through the Department of Labour Statistics, cause inquiries to be made as to the number of hours per day averaged in different kinds of employment throughout the Kingdom, and whether in any and what cases double shifts prevail, and how far the hours of labour in this country are longer or shorter than they were thirty years since, and how the hours of labour in this country compare with those of other European countries in like industries; and whether he would lay the result of such inquiries upon the Table of this House?
  MR. C. GRAHAM: Will the right hon. Gentleman at the same time cause inquiry to be made as to how it is that trades in this country, which work shorter hours than the same trades in foreign countries, nevertheless manage to hold their own.
  *THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD of TRADE (Sir M. HICKS BEACH,): I do not think that any inquiry I can make would throw much light upon the matter referred to by the hon. Member for Lanarkshire, but with regard to the question of the hon. Member for Northampton (Mr. Brad-laugh) I may say that the Royal Commission on Trade Depression caused inquiries to be made, amongst other things, as to changes in the hours of labour in different employments in the previous twenty years, and a large amount of information on this head in reply to their circulars is contained in the appendix to the Report. They also obtained similar information as to foreign countries. The Return as to wages for fifty years recently laid before Parliament by the Board of Trade, and the Annual Report of the Trades Unions by the Labour Correspondent of the Board, also contain information as to hours of labour. If the hon. Member will make any definite suggestion for adding to this information, I shall be glad to consider it, and in any case special attention will be given to this subject in the annual General Report for next year, by the Labour Correspondent of the Board.

  GRANTS IN AID OF LOCAL TAXATION.
  MR. ROBERT SPENCERasked the President of the Local Government Board when the substitution for the Government Grant hitherto received in aid of local taxation will be paid to the county authorities; and if he can state what the amounts will be.
  *THE PRESIDENT OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. RITCHIE,): I am very desirous of meeting the convenience of the County Authorities in this matter, and I hope to arrange that an instalment shall be paid in July, and a second instalment in October or November next, the two together making up an amount not much less than one-half of the sum which it is estimated that the authorities will be entitled to receive in the course of the year. A further instalment will be paid to the counties in February or March following, and the balance in May, when the precise amount collected from
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  licences and the Probate Duty Grant will have been ascertained.

  EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY BILL
  MR. AIRDasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he can now state when the Government propose to bring forward the Employers' Liability Bill?
  MR. MATTHEWS: I am unable at present to name a day when it will be possible to bring forward the Employers' Liability Bill; but the earliest available opportunity will be taken.
  MR. AIRD: Is the Bill which the right hon. Gentleman proposes to bring in drawn on the lines of the Bill which passed through the Standing Committee last year?
  MR. MATTHEWS: When the Bill is brought in it will be based on the lines of the Bill of last year.

  FRENCH TRAWLING VESSELS.
  SIR EDWARD BIRKBECKasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether his attention has been called to the fact that upwards of twenty French trawling vessels have been fishing during the last ten days on the north coast of Norfolk, off Blakeney, Shoring-ham, and Cromer, within the three-mile limit, and committing serious depredations; and whether he will at once order a gunboat to proceed to the fishing grounds in question for the protection of the local fishermen?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: Some French trawlers having been noticed within the three mile limit off Blakeney, a gunboat was ordered to cruize in that neighbourhood. At no other place within British limits have French trawlers been reported. The Coastguard Officers on the Norfolk coast have not heard of any depredations or damage being done. One of the gunboats attached to the North Sea Fisheries is now cruizing off the Norfolk coast for the purpose of protecting the fishing interest.

  SOUTH AFRICA. POLICY OF COLONIAL EXTENSION.
  SIR G. CAMPBELLasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if the attention of Her Majesty's Government had been drawn to a telegram in the papers of 30th April, purporting to give the substance of a speech of Sir Hercules Robinson,

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  Governor of the Cape and High Com. missioner for South Africa, in which he advocated strongly the policy of Colonial extension and the eventual handing over native territory to the Cape and Natal, and used these words—"No place remains in further South Africa for direct Imperial rule"; and whether Her Majesty's Government had adopted that policy; or, if not, whether the could permit a high functionary to go sc far in promoting a policy not yet determined, or would ascertain if there be error in the telegraphic report?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: In answer to the hon. Member, I have to say that it is undesirable to take any action upon a telegraphic summary of certain portions of a speech, and that Sir Hercules Robinson sailed for England yesterday morning for the purpose of discussing fully with Her Majesty's Government the policy to be pursued in future in regard to the native territories in South Africa.

  THE COLLECTOR OF ROAD ASSESSMENT, CREICH.
  MR. ANGUS SUTHERLANDasked the Lord Advocate whether he was aware that the collector of road assessment for the parish of Creich, county of Sutherland, failed to account to the Road Trustees for certain moneys collected by him in his official capacity; and, whether the said Road Trustees reported the matter to the proper authorities at the time or since; and, if so, why no action had been taken by the Crown authorities with regard to it.
  *THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. P. B. ROBERTSON): I am informed that no complaint has been made to the criminal authorities in Sutherland against the Creich Road Assessment Collector. If the hon. Member will furnish me with specific information, inquiry will at once be made.

  THE NEW TONNAGE BILL.
  MR. DONKINasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, in the event of the new Tonnage Bill becoming law, British ships being treated retrospectively, and the tonnage of many being increased, foreign shipowners who have practically adopted our system of measurement by the Act of 1854, will be also compelled
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  to have their ships measured under similar circumstances, and the tonnage of such ships be similarly increased?
  *SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH: In the event assumed by the hon. Member's question, foreign ships which have on application of their owners been measured under the Isabella ease in this country, would certainly be liable to re-measurement, and to be treated in the same manner as British ships, if they again come to a British port.
  MR. DONKIN: My question refers only to the Act of 1854. The Isabella decision arose out of the Act of 1867.
  *SIR M. H. BEACH: I do not understand the hon. Member's question.

  THE STEAMSHIPS ANGLESEY AND DUCHESS OF SUTHERLAND.
  MR. T. W. RUSSELLasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he would lay upon the Table of the House a memorandum showing in detail the calculation by which the net register of the S.S. Anglesey was brought down to the figure of only 45 tons, by deductions and allowances from her gross measurement of 827 tons; and similar figures for the Duchess of Sutherland, showing how, with an original gross measurement of 908 tons, and net register of 446 tons, when she was a paddle steamer, her net register is now brought down to only 111 tons since her conversion into a screw steamer?
  SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH: If the hon. Member will move for the Return, it shall be given.

  PAYMENTS TO HIGHLAND PARISHES.
  MR. HUNTERasked the Lord Advocate for what purpose £22,317 8s. 10d. was paid to 232 parishes in the Highlands, as stated in the Return dated 4th March, 1889.
  *MR. J. P. B. ROBERTSON: The money was paid to the Highland parishes in aid of the expenses incurred for the relief of the poor.

  THE BOARD OF TRADE STEAMER GADFLY.
  MR. SUTHERLANDasked the President of the Board of Trade if he could state the number of seamen sent to their homes from the Clyde through the Board of Trade steamer Gadfly during the last three

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  years; and the total annual cost of maintaining this steamer, including all charges; and whether the work connected with carrying out the transmission service on the Clyde could be accomplished more economically by the staff of the Mercantile Marine Office in Greenock than under the existing system?
  *SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH: The following is the number of seamen sent to their homes from the Clyde through the Gadfly in the years ending March 31st, 1887, 1,024; March 31st. 1888, 1,078; and March 31st, 1889, 1,400, at a cost of £1,418 6s. 8d., or an average of £472 15s. 7d. per annum. There is also a staff of River Police at Gourock, whose cost during the last year was £886 10s. 4d. A small percentage of the work only could be done without the Gadfly, unless row boats were substituted for her, and the cost of maintenance of the ship and of the working of the scheme would not be reduced by transferring the work to other management. I must add that the transmission service is only a part of the services on which the Gadfly and her staff are employed. For instance, to facilitate the trade of the Clyde, the staff connected with the Gadfly witnessed the engagement of over 1,500 seamen on board ship during the year. She and her staff are not instituted with reference to the requirements of Greenock alone, but of the whole trade and seamen of the Clyde.

  NAVAL RESERVES.
  MR. GOURLEYasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he was aware that no Report since that of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh has been issued relative to the condition of the Naval Reserves. And, whether he would cause a Report of the Admiral last in command to be laid upon the Table of the House?
  LORD GEORGE HAMILTON: No general report has been since made on the condition of the Royal Naval Reserves. The information now given in various returns shows the precise condition of the force, and the new regulations recently issued contain all the decisions which have been arrived at on any proposed modifications, and the arrangements made for the well-being of the Naval Reserves. Under the
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  circumstances a special periodical report has been considered unnecessary, especially as the Admiral Superintendent of Naval Reserves is in direct personal communication with the Admiralty.

  THE MERCHANDIZE MARKS ACT.
  COLONEL EYREasked the Secretary to the Treasury whether his attention had been called to the fact that the English "patent" is often used on goods of foreign origin, thereby inducing the belief that they are of English manufacture. Whether the use of such word without the addition of the name of the place of origin was an infringement of the Merchandize Marks Act. And, whether he would cause the attention of the Customs Authorities to be called to this practice, with the view of steps being taken for its prevention?
  MR. JACKSON: There are two classes of goods covered by the question of the hon. Member. First, goods which are marked patent in this country, and secondly, articles so marked as referring to another country. As to the first, the use of the "patent" or "registered" is governed by the "Trades Marks Act," but as to the latter, the Commissioners of Customs do not see how they can interfere when the word is used in conjunction with an intimation of foreign production.

  THE INTERNATIONAL LABOUR CONFERENCE.
  MR. CUNINGHAME GRAHAMasked the President of the Board of Trade if the Government had made up its mind as to sending representatives to the International Labour Conference summoned by the Swiss Government at Berne?
  *THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH,): Communications are passing in reference to this subject, but no result has yet been attained.
  MR. BROADHURSTasked the First Lord of the Treasury whether the Government was in possession of any proposal from the Swiss Government with regard to a Conference between the two countries on the question of the hours of labour of females and young persons; whether there was any correspondence on the

  985
  subject between the two Governments which could be presented to the House; and, whether, if such a conference was contemplated, what other European nations would be invited to take part in it?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: I think the hon. Gentleman must have understood from answers to previous questions that this subject is under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government, and no decision has yet been arrived at.
  MR. BROADHURST: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to keep the House well informed on this subject, and especially those who are chiefly interested and who consider it a matter of great importance?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: As soon as a decision is come to upon the communications now passing, information will be given to the House.

  SALVATIONISTS IN SWITZERLAND.
  MR. JAMES STUARTasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention had been called to the ease of Miss Sterling, a member of the Salvation Army, who was, on 17th October, 1888, sentenced in the Canton of Vaud, in Switzerland, to 100 days' imprisonment, for inviting children, without their parents' consent, to a Salvation Army meeting? Whether he was aware that it was stated in her defence that, on the occasion in question, the children were only allowed to enter the meeting on giving their word that they had their parents' consent, and that after Miss Sterling had undergone about half of her imprisonment she WAS liberated on bail, pending an appeal to the Federal tribunal as to the constitutional character of the law under which she was convicted? Whether his attention had been called to the judgment delivered by that tribunal on 15th March last, affirming the constitutional character of the law? Whether, under these circumstances, Miss Sterling was required again to go to prison for the 47 days still remaining of her sentence? And whether, considering the following sentence in the judgment of the Federal Court:
  "It goes without saying that the Federal tribunal, whose functions are not those of a Court of Appeal in penal affairs, has not to do
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  with the question of the application of the sentence pronounced, nor consequently to inquire whether, considering the circumstances of the case, the sentence passed on the applicant is not out of all proportion to the gravity of the facts brought to her charge,"
  he would make inquiries as to whether a sentence of such severity had ever been pronounced for a similar offence in the Canton of Vaud, with a view of obtaining, if possible, from the Cantonal authorities some mitigation of the sentence on Miss Sterling?
  *SIR JAMES FERGUSSON: Her Majesty's Government are well acquainted with the case of Miss Sterling, the general facts of which are as stated by the hon. Member. They were not able to interfere officially in it, while proceedings were pending in the Swiss Courts, but unofficial representations were made on her behalf, as her sentence was severe, and as she was said to be suffering in health from her imprisonment. Some years ago sentences passed upon Salvationists in Switzerland were carefully examined by Her Majesty's Government, and it was considered that we had no ground for interference, inasmuch as the law applied equally to natives and to foreigners.

  ZAMBESI.
  MR. BUCHANANasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether it was true that Mr. D. J. Rankin, a British subject, has discovered a good navigable channel, called the Chindé, in the delta of the Zambesi; whether the Portuguese were going to establish a custom house there; and, whether Her Majesty's Government would take immediate steps to insist on the opening of the navigation of that river to the flags of all nations by International agreement or otherwise?
  *SIR, J. FERGUSSON: Mr. Rankin has reported the existence of a good navigable channel through the Chindé mouth of the Zambesi river, and further inquiries are being made about it. Nothing is known as to the intentions of the Portuguese Government in regard to it. If the discovery should prove to be of real value, it will have an important bearing on the question of access to the upper waters and to the lakes. Her Majesty's Government adhere to their previous declarations of their claim of right to navigate the river.

  THE COLONIES AND THE SUGAR CONVENTION.
  SIR LYON PLAYFAIRasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the self-governing Colonies, especially Canada, Victoria, Natal, and the Cape, had given their opinion on the Sugar Convention; and, if so, would the Government communicate the correspondence to the House?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: As stated at the meeting of the Conference on April 5th of last year, all the Colonies had at that date accepted the Convention except Tasmania and New South Wales. Since then Tasmania has telegraphed acceptance, but no expression of opinion has been received from New South Wales. As, however, the Government of that colony has had the Convention before it for a long period it is understood that no objection is there raised. There is very little correspondence on the subject beyond that published in the Blue Book, and as it is incomplete and does not convey any expressions of opinion on the Convention there would be no advantage in presenting it to Parliament.

  THE SUGAR BOUNTIES BILL.
  SIR W. LAWSON: May I ask is there any truth in the statement that appears in a Conservative newspaper this morning that it is the intention of the Government to withdraw the Sugar Bounties Bill?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: The hon. Baronet often asks questions of that kind. He must be aware that newspapers live by paragraphs, and these paragraphs succeed in their object and are exceedingly interesting to credulous readers.

  THE WESTMINSTER ABBEY BILL.
  MR. FRANCIS POWELLasked the hon. Member for the Central Division Of Bradford whether he intended to proceed with the Westminster Abbey Bill to-morrow?
  MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I think it will be for the convenience of the House that I should state that there have been communications between the Government and the Dean of Westminster and myself with reference to the Westminster Abbey Bill and the overcrowded
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  state of Westminster Abbey, and that in all probability the Government will institute an independent inquiry into the subject. In these circumstances I shall not think it necessary to proceed with the Bill.

  THE ZULU TRIALS.
  MR. WALTER M'LARENasked the Under Secretary of state for the Colonies whether it was true, as reported in the Times, that the Special Court at Etshowe had adjourned sine die; and, if so, had Zibebu been tried for the murder of Umsutshwana, as promised by the Colonial Office; and, what had been the result of the trial?
  BARON H. DE WORMS: The Secretary of State has no official information as to the adjournment of the Court sine die. The Governor reports that the Commission has terminated. Preliminary magisterial proceedings against the persons charged with the murder of Umsutshwana were still in progress on the 28th ultimo, when Usibebu was still in custody. If the prisoners are committed for trial, they will, in due course, be brought before the proper tribunal.

  IRELAND—CONDUCT OF LIEUTENANT GEOHEGAN.
  MR. THEOBALDasked the Secretary of State for War if it was true that the appeal of Lieutenant Geoghegan against the sentence passed on him for brawling in a church had been heard, and that the sentence had been reserved by the Superior Court, which had thereby justified the action of the Lieutenant?
  *MR. E. STANHOPE: Yes, Sir. The Court of Quarter Sessions at Clonmel has unanimously reversed the sentence which had been passed on Lieutenant Geoghegan.

  CONTAGIOUS DISEASES (ANIMALS) ACTS.
  SIR E. BIRKBECKasked the First Lord of the Treasury whether the attention of Her Majesty's Government had been called to a resolution passed at the Council meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society on the 16th instant, and to the report unanimously adopted by the Central and Associated Chambers of Agriculture on the 30th instant, recommending that the

  989
  existing Acts with regard to the Contagious Diseases of Animals should be harmonized, strengthened, and consolidated; and, whether he would introduce a Bill at the earliest opportunity to give effect to such resolution?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: The Government have given their attention to the resolution to which my hon. Friend refers, and they fully admit the advantages which might be obtained by the consolidation of the existing Acts, but in the present state of public business they do not think it would be possible to pass such a measure in the present Session.

  THE ROYAL COMMISSION ON MINING ROYALTIES.
  MR. BRADLAUGH, on behalf of Mr. Burt (Morpeth), asked the First Lord of the Treasury if he could now state the terms of reference to the Royal Commission on Mining Royalties; and, whether he could give the names of the Commissioners?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: The reference to the Royal Commission will substantially be in the following terms, though I do not say that a word or two may not be altered. These terms will give the House the full meaning of the reference—
  "To inquire into the amounts paid as royalties, head rents, and way-leaves on coal, ironstone, iron ore, and other minerals worked in the United Kingdom, and the terms and conditions under which those payments are made, and into the economic operation thereof upon the mining industries of the country, and, further, to investigate the system of concessions prevailing in some foreign countries, and the conditions under which mining enterprise is conducted in the colonies."
  I am unable to give the names of the Royal Commissioners at present, but I hope to do so in a few days. I may mention, however, that Lord Northbrook has undertaken to preside over the Commission.
  MR. W. P. SINCLAIR: May I ask if the right hon. Gentlemen will consider whether the terms of reference to the Commission could be made to include inquiry into the royalties and rents that obtain in relation to taking clay for making bricks or other purposes?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: I must ask to have notice of this question. I was not aware that there was any desire that
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  the making of clay should be included in the inquiry.

  GENERAL PURPOSES GRAND COMMITTEE.
  SIR G. CAMPBELLasked the First Lord of the Treasury whether the Government would consent to a General Purposes Grand Committee, to which Bills not referable to the Law or Trade Committees may be referred if the House so pleases?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: The Government think that it is not desirable that such a Committee should be constituted. I am under the impression that the existing Standing Committees are capable of taking any Bills which the Government might think it desirable to refer to them. It would be undesirable also that such a Standing Committee should be constituted, thus withdrawing hon. Members from the House for that purpose, and adding to their duties.
  SIR G. CAMPBELL: I beg to give notice that I will take an early opportunity of calling the attention of the House to the extremely miserable result of the present system of Grand Committees, and the need for the further extension of the system.

  DISTRICT COUNCILS BILL.
  MR. T. ROBERTSONasked the First Lord of the Treasury if he could name a day for the introduction of the District Councils Bill.
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: Till the business of the House is further advanced I shall not be able to name a day for the District Councils Bill.

  BUILDING SOCIETIES AND INCOME TAX.
  MR. PICTONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention had been called to a memorial addressed by the Leicester Temperance and General Permanent Building Society in January last to the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, whether he was aware that while 95 per cent of the members of this society were in humble circumstances, and not liable to income tax, the Board of Inland Revenue insisted on either charging the tax, in order to return it, or on making the society collect the tax from the 5 per cent of members who were liable; whether he had considered the amount

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  of trouble and expense, and friction that must be caused in either case to a society promotive of thrift among the poor; and whether, in view of his statement in the analogous case of co-operative stores that "when the shareholders in any such stores are notoriously all, or almost all, persons of an income less than £150, it would not only not be a gain, but would be a positive loss to the revenue to levy a tax, nearly all of which has to be returned," he would cause the memorial of the Leicester Society to be reconsidered with a view to a more favourable answer than had yet been received.
  MR. GOSCHEN: My attention has been called to the memorial in question, and I accept the statement of the hon. Member that 95 per cent of the members of the Leicester Building Society to which he refers are not liable to income tax. It is just to meet cases of this kind, and to avoid the trouble, expense, and friction to which the hon. Member refers, that an arrangement has been proposed by the Inland Revenue to avoid the cumbrous process of collection and repayment of duties in such cases. This arrangement, which has been accepted by a number of building societies, has been declined by the one in question, but I cannot help hoping that its refusal may be reconsidered. The case of co-operative stores is not analogous, but in many respects different from that of building societies. But in either case it is the constant object of the Inland Revenue to avoid the necessity of collecting duties which have to be returned.
  MR. PICTON: May I hope that the answer I have referred to will be reconsidered, that there is a possibility of a more favourable answer being given to the memorial?
  MR. GOSCHEN: I do not know whether the hon. Member has seen the proposal of the Inland Revenue Department which has been accepted by other Building Societies, but I hope this particular Society will see its way to come to an arrangement with the Inland Revenue to avoid the friction which he and I deplore.

  THE PARIS EXHIBITION.
  MR. E. ROBERTSON: asked the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether his attention had been
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  called to a communication from the Vienna correspondent of the Standard stating that the absence of the British Ambassador from Paris was on all fours with the attitude of the Austrian Government, and that the French Government sought to distinguish between the commemoration of the Revolution of May 5th and the opening of the Exhibition on the 6th; whether any similar representation as to the distinction between the political and business ceremonial had been addressed to the Government; and whether the absence of the British Ambassador was the result of an understanding with the other Continental Powers.
  *SIR J. FERGUSSON: No, Sir; no such representation has been made to Her Majesty's Government. No invitation has been addressed to the British Ambassador, and there has been no concert between Her Majesty's Government and any other Government on the subject.

  ORDER OF BUSINESS.
  DR. CAMERON: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman if he can name a day when he will take the Scotch Local Government Bill?
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: I am not yet in a position to name a day. We shall not propose to take the Bill on Monday.
  SIR W. HARCOURT: Perhaps it might be convenient to state what business will probably be taken next week.
  *MR. W. H. SMITH: We propose to proceed with the Navy Bill on Monday and I hope to take the second reading of the Customs and Inland Revenue Bill on Thursday.

  MR. HARRISON AND MR. CONYBEARE.
  MR. ATHERLEY-JONES: May I be allowed to say that I had a desire to ask leave to move the adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing the arrest of Mr. Harrison and the prosecution of Mr. Conybeare, but in view of the fact that the matter is now under magisterial investigation, and in deference to the opinion expressed by you Mr. Speaker, I propose to defer the matter till after magisterial investigation is concluded.

  THE NEW MEMBER FOR BIRMINGHAM.
  *MR. SPEAKER: I have to intimate to the House that I have received the

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  Return of the Writ for the election of a Member for Central Birmingham, and therein I find that the gentleman returned is by a clerical error described as Albert John Bright, whereas I understand his name is John Albert Bright; I have to ask if any hon. Member can certify from his personal knowledge that this is so?
  VISCOUNT WOLMER (Hants,): I can certify from my personal knowledge that the name of the gentleman returned for Central Birmingham is John Albert Bright.
  *MR. R. SPEAKER: The Clerk of the Crown will make the necessary correction, and I will then ask the hon. Member to come to the Table.

  THE ROYAL COMMISSION ON THE VACCINATION LAWS.
  MR. PICTON: May I be allowed to ask the President of the Local Government Board a question in regard to the interpretation of the terms of reference to the Royal Commission on the Vaccination Laws. Paragraph 5 refers to inquiry into the working of the provisions of the Act in respect to repeated prosecutions for non-compliance with the requirements of the Vaccination Act. I have to ask, will not the insertion of the word "repeated" before "prosecutions" lead to the exclusion of what I understood was intended, inquiry into the principle of compulsory vaccination pure and simple?
  *MR. RITCHIE: I am glad the hon. Member has put the question, because the word "repeated" might undoubtedly be understood as the hon. Gentleman suggests. It is not intended so to narrow the reference. The word appeared in the original draft copy of the reference, but subsequently the word "repeated" was struck out with the view of showing there is no intention of limiting the inquiry in that sense.

  IRELAND—COASTGUARD STATION, BANNOW, COUNTY WEXFORD.
  MR.W. REDMONDasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether it was a fact that the owner of the houses occupied by the Coastguards as a Coastguard Station at Bannow, county Wexford, had received a three months' notice that the houses are to be vacated; that these houses were built
  994
  about fifty years ago by the grandfather of the present owner at the request of the Government of the day, and that of recent years they were enlarged and considerably improved; was it intended to abolish the Coastguard Station at Ban-now; and would any compensation be given to the owner of the houses?
  LORD G. HAMILTON: It is the case that the owner of the houses referred to has received notice that the houses will be vacated, the reason being that they are not kept in proper repair and they are in an insanitary condition. It is not known by whom the houses were originally built or when, but there is no reason to suppose they were built at the request of the Government or taken at other than a quarterly tenancy. The houses were improved by the landlord in 1866. It is not intended to abolish the Coastguard Station at Bannow. There is no ground for a claim for compensation by the owner.

  KING JA JA OF OPOBO.
  MR. W. REDMONDasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs when the promise given by him to allow King Ja Ja to return to his own country would be carried out; whether it was true that Ja Ja has been suffering much in health since he has been in St. Vincent; and whether there had been disturbances recently in Opobo in consequence of the discontent amongst the Natives there at their King's exile?
  *SIR J. FERGUSSON: The decision in the case of Ja Ja was that he should be deported for a term of not less than five years. Ja Ja has complained of ill-health, but his statement was not corroborated by the local authorities. The recent disturbances in the Opobo river were not owing to discontent in consequence of their late King's exile, but to a renewal of the interruption to trade in the river similar to those which Ja Ja formerly occasioned.
  MR. W. REDMOND: May I ask whether it is not a fact that the right hon. Gentleman himself stated in answer to a question I put to him in regard to this sentence, that, probably, the King would be allowed to return before the expiration of the term.
  *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I remember saying that when there were no evil consequences, no danger to be appre-

  995
  hended, there would he no objection to Ja Ja's return, but the circumstances referred to in the hon. Member's question show that that period has not arrived.
  MR. W. REDMOND: Will the right hon. Gentleman cause further inquiry to be made into the complaint that the climate of St. Vincent is injurious to the health of the King?
  *SIR J. FERGUSSON: The matter has been inquired into and, I believe, it has been proved that there is nothing in connection with Ja Ja's residence injurious to his health.

  DINIZULU.
  MR. W. REDMONDasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether it was true that Dinizulu had been sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment; and, if so, whether the Government, in consequence of Dinizulu having voluntarily surrendered himself, could see their way to mitigate this sentence; and whether all the papers in connection with the trial would be laid before Parliament.
  BARON H. DE WORMS: As I stated on the 30th of April, this sentence has been passed. When the Secretary of State reviews the case, as he will do when the record of evidence is complete, the circumstance referred to by the hon. Member in the first paragraph of his question, will be considered with all other material circumstances in the case. When all the papers have been received in full and reported upon there will probably be no objection to laying them before Parliament, but the Secretary of State would prefer not to give a decided answer until he has received them.

  NEW MEMBER.
  Made the affirmation required by law—John Albert Bright, esquire, for the City of Birmingham (Central Division).
  ORDERS OF THE DAY.

    WAYS AND MEANS.
    Considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee).

    ESTATE DUTY ON PERSONAL PROPERTY OF THE OF £10,000 AND UPWARDS, PASSING BY WILL OR ON INTESTACY.
    1. Resolved—That, towards raising the Supply granted to Her Majesty, there shall be
    996
    levied and paid to Her Majesty the following Duties (that is to say):
    Where, in the case of any Probate or Letters of Administration granted in England or Ireland on or after the first day of June one thousand eight hundred and eighty nine, or in the case of any Inventory exhibited and recorded in Scotland on or after that day, the estate and effects in respect whereof Duty is charged on the Affidavit or Inventory by section twenty-seven of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881," shall be above the value of £10,000
    Duty.—At the rate of One Pound for every full sum of £100, and for every fractional part of £100 over any multiple of £100;
    Where the Personal or Moveable Property included in an Account delivered according to section Thirty-eight of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881," on and after the first day of June one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine, shall be above the value of £10,000.
    Duty.—At the rate of One Pound for every full sum of £100, and for any fractional paat of £100 over any multiple of £100;
    The said Duties respectively are to be Stamp Duties in addition to the Stamp Duties charged on the Affidavit required from Persons applying for Probate or Letters of Administration in England or Ireland, and on the Inventory exhibited and recorded in Scotland, or in addition to the Stamp Duties charged on such Accounts of Personal and Moveable Property as are specified in the section thirty-eight of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881," but are not to be deemed "Probate Duties," within the meaning assigned to that expression by section twenty-one of "The Local Government Act, 1888."

    ESTATE DUTY ON SUCESSIONS OF THE VALUE OF £10,000 AND UPWARDS.
    Motion made and question proposed,
    2. "That, towards raising the the Supply granted to Her Majesty, there shall be levied and paid to Her Majesty in respect of the value of the entire personal property passing upon the death of any person dying on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine, as a Succession or Successions under "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," and in respect of the value of every Succession to real property under the said Act, upon the death of any person so dying, the following Duty (that is to say):—

    DUTY.
    Where such value is above £10,000.
    At the rate of One Pound for every full sum of £100, and for any fractional part of £100 over any multiple of £100.
    The said Duty is to be a Stamp Duty in addition to any Duties chargeable under "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," and Section twenty-one of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1888," provided that the said Duty shall not be payable upon the interest of a Successor in leaseholds passing to him by

    997
    will or devolution by law or on property included in an account delived according to section thirty-eight of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881."
    The value upon which the said Duty is to be charged and assessed shall be ascertained in accordance with "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," subject to the following provisions;—

    (a.) In the case of a Successor who is entitled to the real property comprised in his Succession for an estate in fee simple, or in fee according to the custom of any manor, or for lives renewable under any custom, or under any leases for lives, or for any estate in tail, or to possession of such real property under an entail, whether strict entail or otherwise or is entitled to any such property for life, and competent to dispose as he shall think fit of a continuing interest therein, the value shall be the principal value of such property after making such allowances (if any) as ought to be made under section thirty-four of the said Act:

    (b.) In the case of an increase of benefit accruing to a Successor, and chargeable to Succession Duty by reference to sections five, twenty, and twenty-five of "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," where the value of the Succession, apart from the increase of benefit, shall exceed ten thousand pounds, such increase of benefit shall be chargeable with Duty in conformity with this Resolution, whatever may be the value thereof; and where the value of the Succession, apart from the increase of benefit, shall not exceed ten thousand pounds, the value of such increase of benefit, as well as of every preceding increase of benefit, shall be added to the value of the Succession for the purpose of the said Duty.

    *MR. CHILDERS: This Resolution is of course the Resolution which raises the whole question of the new duty. I do not, however, at the present moment rise to discuss the question, but for the purpose of obtaining information. When my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought in his Budget I listened with great attention to his speech, and I think I said it would be impossible to understand this new duty until we had the Resolution before us, and that probably it would be impossible to do so until we had the Bill itself before us. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will now be good enough to answer this question: Is it proposed that in the case of real estate which is the actual property of the person inheriting the duty of 1 per cent shall be paid upon the capital value of the estate, or according to the life-interest of the successor? Before going into a discussion, which must be
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    a very long one, it is desirable that this point should be made clear.
    *THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN,): I confess I thought this was clear. I will not put the matter in legal language or form, but I may say the intention of the Government is that where there is an absolute power of disposal it is not the life-interest but the capital value of the succession on which the duty will be taken.
    *MR. HALDANE: Is the Committee to understand that this duty is of a wholly different character from the Succession Duty, which varies according to consanguinity. Are we to understand that this is altogether a new duty analogous, if anything, to the Probate Duty levied in a lump sum in the case of personalty, and a duty which is to be levied in a lump sum in the case of realty?
    MR. SHAW-LEFEVRE: What is the meaning of "the principal value of such property" in the Resolution? Is the principal value of freehold ground rents to be estimated according to the real value, or, as is now the case under the existing Acts, without reference to the real value, which may be four or five times the amount of the nominal value?
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to be good enough to wait to see the Bill. I may say generally that the principal value would be ascertained in the manner in which it is now ascertained in taxing the property of Corporations. There are already provisions for taxing the capital value of real property, and these provisions will be applied to the present case. That is my general answer to the question. With respect to the question of the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Haldane), this is essentially a new duty, resembling the Succession Duty in some respects and the Probate Duty in others. The hon. and learned Gentleman is right in saying it is an additional tax which falls equally on any one who may obtain the succession, whatever his relationship to his predecessor, and so far it may be said to be like the Probate Duty. But I think to describe it simply as a sort of Probate Duty on Land would give a false impression. It is an increase of

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    scale of the Succession Duty by 1 per cent on all successions above £10,000.
    *MR. HALDANE: But it is not affected by the degree of consanguinity.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: No. Those who pay one and a-half per cent now will pay two and a-half; those who pay four and a-half now will pay five and a-half, and so on. It is irrespective of the relationship of the successor.
    MR. RATHBONE (Carnarvonshire,): Is the new duty of 1 per cent to be charged on the whole capital value of personal property, but only on the life interest of realty?
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I think I have made it plain that it is not so. Personalty and realty will be treated alike. As regards instalments, the payments in the case of realty will follow the Succession Duty, rather than the Probate Duty.
    *MR. H. H. FOWLER: Then for the purposes of this new duty is the scale of consanguinity abolished?
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I do not think that is the proper way of putting it. This duty is an increase of the scale of the duty paid before. It is an equal addition of 1 per cent all round, the addition being calculated on a somewhat new system.
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONE: The question is one of some perplexity. There is some difficulty in finding a proper appellation for the duty. It is hardly proper to call this a mere addition to the Succession Duty, because in certain essential particulars it departs from the principle of the Succession Duty. The principle of the Succession Duty as applied to land, is that it is taken upon the limited ownership, rather than upon the capital value. It is an entire change of the principle of the Succession Duty, when you impose the duty that is to be taken on the capital value without respect to the question whether the ownership is limited or absolute. So far, I think, we clearly understand the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and there can be no doubt about the matter whatever. In point of fact this additional charge in the case of the Succession Duty is to be levied as the property tax on the subject to which it applies. The Succession Duty, it will be remembered, affects
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    real property with two most important limitations, one being the distinction drawn between limited ownership and absolute ownership. That point has been completely cleared up. But the Succession Duty likewise affects, in a most important manner, the amount of the tax which is to be paid. As I understood the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the consanguinity scale will still remain in force with reference to this tax—the tax will be levied according to the degree of relationship. ["No."] I do not mean that the tax will be levied—it will be an absolute tax of 1 per cent, not upon the capital value simply without any deduction, but upon the capital value estimated according to the consanguinity scale. Is that so? If not, let us understand how it is.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I have been asked whether it is the abolition of the consanguinity scale, and I have said that I do not look upon it in that way. I look upon the consanguinity scale as not having absolutely anything to do with the new duty. The Estate Duty is levied equally upon the value of the succession, whatever the degree of consanguinity.
    MR. GLADSTONE: I am glad to hear that, but it is out of place to call it an Estate Duty.
    *MR. GOSCHEN; I call it an Estate Duty so as not to mix it up either with the Probate or the Succession Duty. This Estate Duty is a separate duty. It resembles the Probate Duty in some particulars, and it resembles the Succession Duty in others.
    MR. GLADSTONE: I perfectly understand it. It appears to me that those points in which the new duty resembles tho Succession Duty are of a peculiar character. But the two essential points which limit it as a tax are, first, whether the ownership is absolute or limited, and, secondly, whether it is limited under the consanguinity scale. I am not in the least blaming the Chancellor of the Exchequer; but I have observed that an idea has obtained considerable currency which is misleading as to the character of this new duty; and I gladly accept the appellation which has been given by the Government to this duty—that it is an Estate Duty. Although in its form it resembles the Succession Duty, especially in the most important matters of being levied

    1001
    on the entire value of the property and taking no cognizance of the consanguinity scale, yet its analogy really is to the Probate Duty, and not to the Succession Duty; but it is an Estate Duty quite distinct, as I understand, from both. It is to me very satisfactory on more grounds than one, inasmuch as it is founded on the principle of equal taxation as between personalty and realty. It is also of very great importance, because it now introduces for the first time into succession the principle of taxing capital value. I do not myself entertain any doubt as to the main principle of taxing capital value in contradistinction to other inferior interests, especially interests which might be earned out of the capital value; but, of course, the question will arise, if the principle of valuation of property is applicable on the occasion of death, may it not be made applicable on other occasions? This is a very large question indeed, and one of the utmost importance; but it is a question to which the present financial proposals of the Government obviously open the door. Although I intend to support the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I would remark that the limitation of it to estates above £10,000, is the introduction of a great novelty into our taxing system; and I should like to know whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer believes that the proposal he has made can possibly remain permanently limited within the bounds he has fixed. I can understand that there is no injustice in the principle of what is called graduated taxation. In itself it is not unjust that richer members of the community, who have a greater abundance of this world's comforts, should make a larger proportional contribution to the Exchequer than poorer members; but, on the other hand, there is this difficulty. I have never been able to observe any absolute rule by means of which that graduation is to be kept within bounds. It is quite clear that it is capable of being carried to a point at which graduation would become confiscation; and I should be glad if we could be told whether there is any fixed rule which, in the judgment of the Government, would apply to the custodians of property and to proprietary interests, for the purpose of distinguish-
    1002
    in g what is moderate and just from what is immoderate and unjust. I do not see how it is possible if it is held that estates of £10,000 ought to pay more than estates of £9,000 or £8,000, to say that estates of £10,000 ought to pay at the same rate as estates of £50,000, £100,000, £500,000, or £1,000,000. I am quite prepared to rest satisfied with what is now conceded; but I believe that no long period will elapse before others will improve upon the precedent now set, and will attempt to apply, within the bounds of moderation and justice, something like an ascending scale to the larger estates, now that the principle is, as I understand, unanimously endorsed by both parties, and is not objected to by the supporters of the present Government. Because we must observe that we have just passed unanimously the Resolution dealing with the limit of £10,000 to personal property. This unanimity is a fact of great importance, and it will probably be prolific of consequences in the future. It will rest with the judgment and discretion of the House to keep those consequences within safe bounds, and I have no doubt it can be done; and if it is done the Chancellor of the Exchequer will have been the prime cause of the achievement of a result which will be favourable on the whole to the interests of justice. I gladly accept, on the responsibility of the right hon. Gentleman, a proposal with regard to which it has always been felt that there is great difficulty in guaranteeing its limitation within due bounds. It is quite impossible for the Opposition, even if they were disposed to attack exemptions, to look with a jealous eye upon a proposal of this character, proceeding from such a source; and undoubtedly I shall record it on my financial memory as an important and material fact that the proposal embodied in the first Resolution should have received the unanimous, and even the silent acquiescence of the House.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I think the right hon. Gentleman has failed to remember the basis upon which, in my opening statement, I fixed the limit of £10,000. The right hon. Gentleman seems to think that this is the introduction of a new system of graduation; but in the Budget speech I stated that £10,000 was adopted as a limit which was analogous to the

    1003
    limits existing already in the case of the income tax. £10,000 may be held to represent an income of about £400 a-year, and that is the basis upon which, as the mouthpiece of the Government, I rest the proposal. Any step which goes beyond £10,000 in the direction of graduation would run as much counter to the proposals of the Government as would the graduation of the income tax on incomes above £400. I acknowledge there is always a danger in admitting these exemptions; but exemptions from income tax already exist, and it has not been argued that these exemptions are the beginning of graduated taxation. I must protest against its being suggested that because we have followed the analogy of the income tax therefore we are taking the first steps towards a system of graduation. I do not quite understand whether the right hon. Gentleman is or is not in favour of graduated death duties, for he spoke with some reserve; but for myself I do not wish to exercise a similar reserve; and I repeat that the Government have adopted this line of limit thinking it is analogous to income tax exemptions, and by no means as indicating any approval of a general scheme of graduated taxation. Then, as to the suggestion that the levying of taxes on capital value will not stop with the Estate Duty. That revives a point which arose in a controversy which I had with the right hon. Gentleman last year as regards the existing taxation of landed property. While land is less heavily taxed than personalty in respect of Death Duties, it is more heavily taxed in respect of income tax; and in my judgment it would be extremely unfair to rectify the disadvantage which personalty may be under as regards death duties without at the same time rectifying the disadvantage under which realty stands to so great an extent as regards income tax. The Government have maintained the status quo; they have not extended any advantage which realty enjoys as regards Succession Duty to the new tax; but they distinctly affirm that you cannot extend the principle of capital value to Succession Duty without at the same time recasting the income tax.
    MR. GLADSTONE: I cannot accept the statement that the limit of £10,000 s only equivalent to the exemptions
    1004
    from income tax which stop at £400, for in this commercial country a capital of £10,000 will yield more than £400—not if put into the New Consols, but if employed in business, as a vast amount of the wealth of this country is. But that is not the point. That is not the question. I think incomes of £400 a year are entitled to a deduction—I rather believe of £120. Therefore, the consequence is, that under £400 is taxable, and that the favour received is a very light one. But I should say that there is no analogy between this sum of £10,000 and the distinction of the limit of exemption under the income tax. But what I wish to point out to the House is the likelihood, nay, the moral certainty, that proposals of this character will produce in future times other proposals in the same direction, and going beyond the scope of the present proposal. As far as I am concerned, I have always taken a severe view of these matters. When I was Chancellor of the Exchequer I proposed that limit of exemption from the income tax, which Sir Robert Peel had put at £150, should be reduced to £100, and the House accepted that proposal. That was a rather stringent measure, perhaps, and that was the only Act I ever proposed touching this matter, as Chancellor of the Exchequer. But when Lord Iddesleigh proposed to raise the limit of exemption or partial exemption to £400, we pointed out to him that he must not suppose that the proposal would remain a dry and barren fact, but that other new proposals would be certain to be founded upon it. And so now the proposal of the Government has been founded upon the proposal of Lord Iddesleigh — beyond which it goes—and I confidently predict that before a very long time either the present or some other Government will submit proposals which will go beyond this proposal, and that a considerably larger application of the principle will be devised, proposed, and adopted. All I say is, Sir, that I trust that these applications will be kept within the bounds of reason and justice. And, in my opinion, there is no ground of reason or justice on which you can propose that estates of £10,000 shall be subject to a specially stated tax of 1 per cent—which is not to apply to estates of smaller value—and at the

    1005
    same time contend that it would be otherwise than just to apply a higher charge to estates of much greater value.
    *MR. HALDANE: I must say in the first place that so far as regards the analogy between the £10,000 value and the limit of exemption which exists in the case of the income tax, there is no analogy at all. The House observes that in the case of these estates of £0,000, you tax them by probate, succession and legacy duties, and in the case of the income tax, you except certain incomes from taxation altogether. Therefore, it is a case of graduated duty. You are imposing a new and additional duty on estates of the value of £10,000. We have reasons to congratulate ourselves on this side of the House, and also those opposite, in a somewhat wider sense than we usually do, because those of us who remember the controversies of 1885 between the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Goschen), and the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Chamberlain), have not forgotten that perhaps the bitterest of those controversies was waged about the subject of graduated taxation. It is perfectly true that this is only the first step, but it reminds me a little of Madame Recamiers' famous answer to the gentleman who said he had seen St. Denis walk first a mile and then at least one step with his head under his arm, that it was only the first that counted. This is the first step in graduated taxation, and you are committed to the principle. I am not at all opposed to graduated taxation within limits. It is a difficult subject, and requires careful consideration. I believe the majority of Members on this side of the House are practically prepared to consider it an open question, and to discuss it on that basis. But we should certainly like to approach it in a little more workable fashion than it seems to have been approached by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I do not know whether the House realises that the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes to add a fifth Death Duty. From the four already existing, complications arise, and I should rather have thought it desirable to consolidate these taxes than to propose a new duty. In the first place there is the Probate Duty, which has existed, I think, from the middle of
    1006
    the 17th century; then there is the Legacy Duty, which is levied exclusively upon successions, and which the landowners succeeded in confining to movable property. Then, in 1853, came the new and intricate Succession Duty, which I understood from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian was something in the nature of a compromise. The Government at that time took what they could get, and it was impossible for them to get any more, because their own supporters consisted of gentlemen connected with the landed interest, with which they were dealing for the first time. In 1881 a duty was imposed by which it was sought to attack voluntary gifts made by the people during lifetime for the sole purpose of evading the Death Duty. That duty I am glad to see is to be made more, binding and stringent by one of the resolutions. But surely, when you have four duties already, the time has come when you should try something in the way of simplification instead of imposing a new duty. The Lord Chancellor in the other House has a Bill affording facilities for the constitution of a real representative of the landed estates of deceased persons, and all you have to do is to allow that Probate Duty to attach to real as well as to personal estate. Instead of that you propose to create a duty which is a departure from the position which you took up last year. I find in Hansard that the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the conclusion of a long and powerful speech, said—"We have endeavoured to remedy certain inequalities so far as we think they ought to be remedied; but so far as the Government is concerned, we show our whole hand, and say that we have no further proposals to make."
    *MR. GOSCHEN: That had reference to the rectification of existing duties; it was not a general declaration that we would not deal with the Death Duties. We showed our whole hand, and the Government have made no further changes as between realty and personalty.
    *MR. HALDANE: Our point last year was that the whole system of the Death Duties should be put on a more even footing, but I accept the explanation which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has given, that the Government objected to take up the question of the Death

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    Duties unless in an entirely new and thorough-going fashion. We have got a new departure, but it is one which we on this side of the House have no reason to regret; on the contrary, we are entitled to congratulate ourselves, though, at the same time, we are entitled to complain that no attempt has been made to deal with the subject as a whole.
    *MR. CHAPLIN (Sleaford Division of Lincolnshire): I will not detain the Committee more than a few moments. But I think it necessary to say one word of protest, more especially after the closing observations of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian, and his adhesion to the proposal. The proposals of the Budget are before us, but I confess I am not very much enamoured of them. They were made just before the Easter Holidays, and for my own part I frankly own that I have been more pleasantly occupied than in a discussion of the Death Duties; and, without the figures and details I should not be in a position to enter upon any considerable discussion. When I first heard the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I listened to it with a good deal of suspicion, and that suspicion has certainly not been in the slightest degree allayed by the way in which the proposals have been received on the other side of the House. I remember that the hon. Member for Northampton patted the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the back and congratulated him on his proposals, observing that they were far more satisfactory than he could have anticipated. Then to-night the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian rightly and properly called attention to the future, and significantly remarked that although the House may be satisfied upon the present occasion, it must necessarily be the first step towards a much larger proposition in the future. Sir, I frankly confess that the more I consider the propositions of the right hon. Gentleman the less I am disposed to accept them. It seems to me that they open up questions of the largest character, which we on this side of the House would certainly do well to consider much more carefully than they have been considered up to the present time. There is no doubt about this. He is going to propose an additional burden, and a very serious burden, upon the
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    land, and that at a time when probably it is less able to bear it than ever it has been before. Under these circumstances, although I take no further part in the proceedings at this time, I rise to say that I reserve to myself the fullest right to take whatever course I please with regard to the question on a future occasion.
    MR. RICHARD CHAMBERLAIN: I wish to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer one question. On the Succession Duty, the time for payment is protracted, in order to enable the heir, without inconvenience, to find the money. The Chancellor of the Exchequer stated that with regard to the duty under discussion, equal time would be guaranteed for payment. One result of that would be that if the heir dies before full payment has been made, the country loses. I wish to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in providing for the extension of the time, he will enhance the amount of the duty by so much as will cover so much of the prospective loss, owing to the expectation of life in some cases being less than in others?
    MR. RATHBONE (Carnarvonshire,): I understand the Chancellor of the Exchequer to say that the charge will lie equally on personal and real estate, while the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian said it would be charged on the capital value of the succession. I think the Chancellor of the Exchequer is a great deal too modest. His proposal is n my opinion a very bold, but at the same time, a very just one; and if our Conservative friends will consider the matter they will, I think, agree that it is a very Conservative proposal. Now that the Democracy are in power, they ought to insist on this matter being put on a fair footing, either on the ability of a person to pay or on the benefits he receives from the Government. Probably on both those grounds it is right that those who leave large fortunes behind them should be liable to pay a larger proportion than they have done of the value of the estate.
    THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir R. WEBSTER,): I may perhaps be allowed to say a few words with the view of removing any doubt that may exist in the mind

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    of my hon. Friend in regard to the wording of the resolution. The tax to be levied is, as I understand the matter, to be leviable on personalty and realty alike. If a man should succeed for life to £12,000 personalty, then the capital value of his life interest in that personalty is taken. If he succeeds for life to real property of the value of £12,000, the capital value of his life interest is to be taken. If his interest is absolute, then the case contemplated by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton would apply, and he would pay on that capital value. It makes no difference whether it is a succession to personalty or a succession to realty. With regard to the remarks of the hon. Member for Haddington (Mr. Haldane), I would point point out out that there are not four different kinds of duties, but practically only two, although they have different incidence.
    *SIR H. DAVEY: I am glad to understand that the fee-simple owner on succeeding will pay the duty on the fee simple value, and not merely on the life interest. Death Duties should be levied on the same principle as personalty and realty. It is a Succession Duty to all intents and purposes. If that be so, why should a difference be made in the mode in which this Succession Duty is to be levied and the way in which the Succession Duty is levied in the Act of 1853. A much more simple way would be to alter the Succession Duty Act of 1853, and make all Succession Duties under that Act liable on the fee-simple value of the property. With regard to the limit of £10,000, I think explanation given will hardly be satisfactory to hon. Gentlemen opposite. Let them take the case of a man who under one appointment succeeds to £4,000 personalty and £6,000 realty. Is it clear that he would pay on the whole value of the estate—viz., £10,000? Is the payment assessed on the total value of the Succession, whatever the quality of the property might be? In my opinion, the Estate Duty should be paid on the whole value of the estate, whatever may be its character. Is the payment assessed on the total value of the succession, whatever the quality of the property may be? Is it paid on the whole value, whether it is real or personal estate? Would a man who succeeded to £10,000 half in
    1010
    personalty and half in land pay the Estate Duty? In my opinion, the Estate Duty should be paid on the whole value of the estate, whatever may be its character.
    *SIR R. PAGET: I wish to take this opportunity of saying a few words on this important matter, and I agree very much with what fell from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Lincolnshire (Mr. Chaplin). I think it is our duty to examine carefully the propositions which have been put before us by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but having gone so far with the right hon. Gentleman, I am unable to go further with him. I confess that I do not share the fear with which he regards the proposals of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. On the contrary, it appears to me that in many respects they are worthy of support. I detect in them the principle of absolute equality of taxation in regard to personalty as well as realty, and in that principle I entirely concur. I go with the Chancellor of the Exchequer and say that it would not do alone to effect an equality in regard to Death Duties, but that that equality of taxation must be carried further. At present there are far more serious and heavy burdens imposed upon realty than upon personalty, and I should be glad, if possible, to remove every one of those inequalities and render the burden equal. That is the reply to the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, who with great emphasis asked, "Why introduce this new Estate Duty—why not get rid of the unjust action of the Act of 1853?" The answer is plain. You cannot get rid of that injustice unless you deal with the matter of taxation as a whole. If you can possibly do this, then I admit that the inequality must go. The matter has been one of great difficulty. Most of us dislike taxation in any shape, and special objection is taken to a new tax. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has displayed much ingenuity in designing new taxes which are to be borne by the community at large. New tax after new tax have been introduced with little or no irritation, and have been borne with equanimity. [Cries of "The Wheel Tax."] Yes; but that did not pass. I am only speaking of those which are the law of the laud, and I must congratulate the

    1011
    right hon. Gentleman on having introduced new taxes which have excited so little objection. If the elements of a graduated taxation are objectionable, we have had them on our Statute Book for years. From the moment the system of exemptions from income tax was introduced, there were, to a certain extent, instances of graduated taxation. As far as I can see, the present proposal is on all fours with the graduated taxation imposed in the income tax. It might possibly be made still further on all fours with it if the Chancellor of the Exchequer had followed with greater nicety the precedent of the income tax, and instead of fixing one point of £10,000 capital, below which the new Estate Duty should not apply, had introduced an automatic sliding scale, following the graduated exemptions now given to incomes below £400. There is no novelty in a system of graduated taxation to the extent I have mentioned; on the contrary, its application has already been recognized by Chancellors of the Exchequer on both sides of the House. This is only a re-application of the principle in dealing with the Succession Duty. I do not see any reason why we should fear that this is to form the groundwork of a new system of taxation, seeing that it has long since been enforced. I certainly approve heartily of a plan the leading features of which are identity and equality of taxation upon all property whatever.
    *MR. H. FOWLER: I am sorry that the Attorney General has left the House, because I wanted to call attention to one remark he has made; but perhaps the Chancellor of the Exchequer will be able to clear it up. The Attorney-General, speaking of this new tax—this estate duty, said that it was to be in every sense of the word levied on the value of the succession. That is not so. In Subsection A of the Resolution, in a certain description of property where the successor succeeds to an estate in fee simple, the duty is to be levied on the principal value of the property, and not on the value of the succession. Let me take the case of a man who dies possessed of a real estate of the value of £12,000, and leaves that estate to his son liable to the present Succession Duty. The income of the
    1012
    estate has to be ascertained, certain deductions have to be allowed, and the net value of the income has to be capitalized according to the scale of the Succession Duty Act. Possibly the son is of such an age that the value of the succession is £5,000. A Succession Duty of 1½ per cent is levied upon it, but if this Estate Duty is passed, that calculation will not be made in respect of it, but the authorities will ascertain what is the capital value of the whole property, and assuming that it is worth £12,000, the new Estate Duty would be 1 per cent upon £12,000, in addition to the duty upon the value of the succession as defined by the Succession Duty Act as the value of the son's life interest in the property. But although this proposal does introduce a most valuable alteration—one almost of priceless value—it is, nevertheless, limited to the case of absolute bequests. Where a father leaves an estate to a son for his life, and then to his grandchildren, the new duty will not he levied on the capital value of the property, but on the life interest of the son and on the ultimate interest of the grandchildren. Therefore, what we have is this—that where the succession is created by settlement or by will, as far as real property is concerned, this new duty will be levied on precisely the same principle as the old Succession Duty, but where real property passes absolutely, then the new duty is levied on the corpus on the same basis as it is levied on personal property.
    *SIR G. O. TREVELYAN: I hope I may be allowed to supplement by one word what my right hon. Friend has said. I do not think the House is quite aware what a serious proposition, from one point of view, has been laid before it. Take au estate of the value of £20,000. At the present moment a heir succeeding under the ordinary conditions would pay £135, taking the income at £600. Fifteen times 600 is 9,000, and 1½ per cent on £9,000 is £135. That is what the heir would pay at present. Under the Estate Duty, if the property if settled by will the heir will pay in addition £90. If on the other hand it is left absolutely he will pay £200. And so in the case of landed property, which is left absolutely, as in my opinion, all landed property ought to be left. The tax of the right hon. Gentleman opposite will

    1013
    increase the Death Duty paid by the heir from £135 to £335, an addition so enormous that I really doubt whether the right hon. Gentleman below the Gangway (Mr. Chaplin) during the agreeable Easter holidays he recently passed fully mastered it. It is the most serious proposal in regard to the taxation of a class which has ever been made, but it is an addition which I was delighted to hear proposed, and which I shall be delighted to see passed by Parliament. Under this new tax if the estate is left absolutely, the heir will have to pay £335, but if it is left through an entail he will only have to pay £225. Multiply that by ten, so that it may apply to the size of important estates in this country, and it will be seen that an entailed estate, every time it passes from one proprietor to another, will have an advantage as against an estate which passes absolutely of more than £1,000; and we know very well that the heirs of those entailed estates generally find themselves in a position, owing to the many family claims upon the estates, in which the additional £1,000 will be a serious burden indeed. And therefore I would ask the Committee to consider what an enormous premium the Chancellor of the Exchequer is putting on the deleterious practice of tying up land. There can be no doubt that an additional inducement will be offered by this proposal in favour of tying up land greater than has been given by any proposal which has been made for many years past. The advantage given to entailed property should as soon as possible be abolished, and therefore I trust that all of us will do our best to hasten the day when these duties will be placed upon a thoroughly comprehensive footing.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman who has just spoken is aware of the proposal which was made in 1885 by the right hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. Childers).
    *SIR G. TREVELYAN: Oh, yes.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: Then surely he ought to have raised the same objection to it which he has raised now. It was open to precisely the same objection as bat which he has taken to the present proposal. Under the proposal of the right hon. Member for Edinburgh there
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    would have been on property that was entailed only the charge for the life interest, whereas upon property that was not entailed there would have bnee a charge on the capital value. The late Government, in 1885, proposed, without any compensation such as is claimed by my hon. Friend behind (Sir R. Paget), to raise the Succession Duty to 3 per cent not on estates of £10,000 only, but on all successions. Right hon. Gentlemen opposite were going to put realty and personalty on the same footing as regards the death duties, but to leave realty under other burdens and disadvantages as compared with personalty. My belief is that when we remove some of the existing inequalities of these duties, but deal at the same time with the burdens which unjustly lay upon land, it will be found that the landed interest is in a more favourable, because more just, position than it is now. I have been asked several questions. The hon. and learned Member for Stockton (Sir H. Davey), after endorsing what I have done in charging the Estate Duty in certain cases upon capital value, asked why I did not apply this principle to the whole of the existing Succession Duties? My reply is that the Government would not consent to so apply it until at the same time they were able to relieve realty from the injustice to which it is subject in other respects. The hon. and learned Gentleman asks whether, if a man left £10,000, half in land and half in personalty, it would he liable to the Estate Duty. My reply is that that would not he. It would require further changes in the general administration of the Death Duties to be able to effect that object. I accept the statements of the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton as being a correct general description of my proposals. When my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General spoke of the value of the succession, I think he used these words not in any legal and technical sense, but he meant that the property is taxed at what it is worth to the successor. The right hon. Gentleman says he expects that in the Bill the whole method of valuation will be set forth. I cannot promise that. In the Succession Duty Act, there are Clauses which point out the mode of valuation; and it is by reference to them that I think the matter is dealt with by the present

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    Bill. The right hon. Member for Bridgton (Sir G. Trevelyan) has selected a case of 15 years. Of course, that is entirely an arbitrary selection.
    *SIR G. O. TREVELYAN: It is the average as given by the right hon. Gentleman himself.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: It may be perfectly true, as regards the new duty, that it does fall more heavily on the landed interest than the existing Succession Duty; but if we compare the position of land with that of personalty it will be seen that the increase on personalty is also severe. The right hon. Gentleman may try to alarm some of our friends as to the character of our proposals; but it rests with the Government to show, as we are able to do, that we have not forgotten the true interests of realty any more than we have neglected the true interests of personalty. We do not profess to favour either the one class of property or the other, but to observe a just measure between them when we are in the disagreeable position of having to impose any fresh taxation at all. One hon. Gentleman has said that we ought to have dealt with the Death Duties as a whole. For reasons which I have explained at considerable length it was impossible to do so in the present year.
    MR. SHAW LEFEVRE: I understand that the right hon. Gentleman has answered the important question put by the hon. and learned Member for Stockton in the negative. My hon. and learned Friend asked whether £10,000 left by a testator, evenly divided between realty and personalty, would pay duty under the present proposal, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer has answered that in the negative. That will lead to very extraordinary results. Supposing a testator leaves £20,000 evenly divided between realty and personalty, under -the present proposal that aggregate property would pay £200 to the Exchequer. But supposing the testator leaves £18,000 also evenly divided between realty and personalty, that would pay nothing. If, on the other hand, the aggregate property was £18,000, £10,000 in realty and £8,000 in personalty, the realty would pay £100, and the personalty would pay nothing. That seems to me to be a very strange state of things, and I cannot but think
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    that the Government would do well to reconsider their proposal with reference to the anomalies I have pointed out. The Chancellor of the Exchequer made a very effective tu quoque reply to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Bridgeton Division of Glasgow (Sir G. Trevelyan) but he did not touch the merits of the case. The point of my right hon. Friend's remarks was that under the proposal of the Government we add a fresh premium to entailed property inasmuch as entailed property will be less heavily burdened than property left absolutely to the heir. I have endeavoured to make a comparison as to what the results will be in the two cases—in the first place, of personal property of the value of £10,000, and in the other case of realty of the same value. I find that under the present law the personal property would pay £300 in the shape of Probate Duty, but in the case of real property, assuming the heir to be forty-five, payment would be made on a capitalized sum of £5,500–1½ per cent—namely, £82; and this would be reduced by the money being spread over eight instalments, on which discount would be allowed, to £75. Therefore, in one case there would be a payment of £300, and in the other a payment of only £75. Under the proposal of the Bill, £100 would be added to the amount payable in respect of the personalty, making £400. I assume that the property is left absolutely to the heir, and in the case of the realty £100 would be added, making, in that case, £175. That, also, is subject to discount. My right Friend was, therefore, quite correct when he said that the effect of the present proposal will be to increase the inducements to entail property. This, we feel, is a matter worthy of the serious consideration of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
    MAJOR RASCH: I desire to say a word on behalf of the small owners of land. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is, perhaps, unaware that in the Eastern Counties small owners of land are divisible into two categories—those who are ruined, and those who are going to be. This proposal will only precipitate the latter catastrophe. It does not effect the big men, the persons who own 200,000 acres, or the 800 persons who own 3,700 acres of land and upwards, but it

    1017
    comes down uncommonly heavily on the 180,000 people, who own 350 acres and a smaller quantity, and I do hope that, as the agricultural lamb has been sufficiently shorn already, the Chancellor of the Exchequer will temper the wind which blows from the Exchequer with reference to the small owners.
    *SIR J. SWINBURNE: I should like to know when the first instalment in the case of landed property will be due. An heir may succeed to an entailed estate, and yet have to wait eighteen months before receiving a farthing of rent, as on many estates the tenants hold their farms with "a running half-year's rent" allowed. Consequently, if the first instalment of the Death Duty is to be paid immediately, the heir may have to go to prison for non-payment of the Queen's Taxes, while he may not have received a shilling from the property he has inherited.
    SIR G. CAMPBELL: I always welcome any steps towards a graduated taxation of property, and with that view I very much welcome the proposal of Her Majesty's Government. I was also pleased to hear the observations of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian. It is perfectly clear, as the right hon. Gentleman so forcibly showed, that you cannot stop at £10,000. Something has been said about confiscation, but it seems to me there is a great distance between 1 per cent and confiscation of property. I think that if you put 1 per cent on the amount of £10,000, you might reasonably put 4, 5, 6, or even 10 per cent upon the property of the millionaires. I hope the same system of graduated taxation will be applied to the income tax. The only doubt I want to suggest with regard to the proposal of the Government is whether it is prudent to put the whole of the taxation on the Death Duties; whether it would not be better to revise the income tax. I fear that if you put it all on the Death Duties, the consequence will be that Members will be apt to spend their incomes.
    *SIR W. BARTTLELOT: I think we must all agree that a great deal of information has been afforded in the debate of to-day, and I hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will give us plenty of time to carefully
    1018
    consider the very serious proposals he has made. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian laid down, as he always does with regard to finance, the case as clearly as it could possibly be laid down. I wish to endorse one thing he said, and certainly adhered to, in the early part of his career as a financier, and that is that taxation should begin as low as it possibly can, and be kept upon a uniform scale, and that we should not have a graduation of taxation according to the property which a man may hold. But the right hon. Gentleman said a great deal to-day. The right hon. Gentleman has said that this tax might be converted into a tax upon estates totally irrespective of the Death Duties, and that the tax might be made use of for other purposes at another time. I gathered from the right hon. Gentleman's speech, not that he is anxious to see this done, but that these proposals will open a door to those who may wish to impose taxation upon property in a different way from that which has been adopted up to the present moment. This is a serious proposition, and I wish to call the special attention of my right hon. Friend to it. Such warnings of what may occur in the future deserve the serious consideration not only of the right hon. Gentleman, but of hon. Members who sit on the Ministerial side of the House. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian also warned us that an ascending scale may be made use of on large properties in regard to the income tax, the Death and Estate Duties, and that the consanguinity scale in the Death Duties might be abolished. That is another important point to be seriously noted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for though it is urged that the proposals are safeguarded, I would point out that the same argument was urged with respect to the Reform Bill of of 1867, but before the Bill left the House all the safeguards on which we on this side had depended were eliminated. May not the same fate overtake the proposals of my right hon. Friend? He proposes certain things which he thinks are safeguards, and I should like to know how the safeguards are to be maintained. As an illustration there is the case of two men who recently died, their property falling to their sons, neither of whom is going to reside

    1019
    (on account of their pecuniary inability to do so), on their properties, but both intend to sell them. It is difficult for hon. Members opposite to realize the position of men who inherit landed property, small or large, and who have not other means whereby to live. It becomes a severe hardship to such to be taxed more heavily than at present, especially when we consider the present condition of agriculture. Hon. Members opposite will give us credit for trying to deal leniently with our tenants and therefore we ought to receive consideration at the hands of the House.
    SIR W. HARCOURT: I am not very much surprised at the remarks of the hon. and gallant Gentleman. I think that what he has said is true, but it is the truth of what he says that commends these proposals to hon. Gentlemen who sit on this side of the House. It is a fact that nobody can deny that the proposals of the Budget open up in the future a great number of very important questions, such as graduated taxation, applicable equally to the income tax, and to the Succession and Probate and other Duties. The great question at the bottom of graduated taxation is, whether or not people with enormous means shall contribute in a greater ratio to the necessities of the State than people with humbler means. This was established to a certain extent some years ago in reference to the income tax; it was afterwards extended, and now it has been established in reference to the Death Duties by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is a characteristic of stones of this kind that when set rolling, they acquire the peculiar property of rolling faster and faster. These proposals also open up the question why property should only pay on the accident of death, and why it should not, as in other countries, contribute annually to the necessities of the State. It is quite true as the hon. and gallant Gentleman has said that all these questions are brought forward with great. weight and authority coming as they do from the Conservative Party in this country, and I hope they will receive increased force from the political situation. What I want now to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer is whether I fully understand the position of the right hon. Gentleman in dealing with the point raised by the right hon.
    1020
    Member for Mid Lothian. The right hon. Gentleman cannot mean that a property worth £18,000, equally divided between land and personalty, should pay nothing, because each of the properties would be £9,000, and therefore below the limit. He cannot possibly mean that when a man inherits £10,000 in realty, or £10,000 in personalty, he shall pay the tax, but not if he inherits less. The proposition is so absurd that the right hon. Gentleman cannot possibly mean it, and I hope he is prepared to tell us that the Bill will be amended in this respect. If the £18,000 is divided in this way, £10,000 in realty and £8,000 in personalty, is it to pay on realty and not on personalty? But surely the principle is that if a man inherits anything above £10,000 he should pay the Duty, without regard to the way in which the property is divided.
    MR. PICTON: I wish to put a simple question to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which I asked when the right hon. Gentleman made his Budget speech; he did not think it necessary to answer it then, but I hope he will not refuse to answer it now. The question is whether the 1 per cent extra is to be levied on the whole property, or is it to be levied on the portions which the successors may receive? I understand that an estate of £9,000, received by one child, would not pay the 1 per cent duty, but if a man leaves £12,000 to be divided among 12 children, then I understand on the other hand, that the extra 1 per cent is to be paid by each. ("No, no.") Well, there is evidently a difference of opinion on the subject, and I therefore hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will explain what is the real position of the matter. I do not pretend to be learned enough to understand the legal language of these resolutions. I am glad, however, to find I am not so simple but that there are others who agree with me. If the case is as I have put it there will undoubtedly be a considerable inequality, and an inequality by which some persons will be painfully affected. Where a large property, consisting mainly of personalty, is divided among a number of persons, those who happen to receive small sums from the estate and have to pay 1 per cent however small their portion may be will certainly have their feelings painfully

    1021
    excited. Perhaps it is felt that those who are fortunate enough to receive any legacy at all would probably be in a generous humour, and would willingly pay anything that might be demanded from them. At the same time I think it is of importance that the matter should be clearly understood, or otherwise mistakes may be made.
    SIR R. FOWLER: There was a point put by the right hon. Member for Derby (Sir W. Harcourt), which I should like to see made clear. The right hon. Gentleman put the case of a testator leaving £18, 000—£9,000 in realty and £9,000 in personalty, and he asked whether in that case, so far as the duty is concerned, the estate is to escape scot free. But suppose a testator leaves £20,000 and it consists of £10,000 realty and £10,000 personalty, is the tax to be levied separately as between the one and the other?
    SIR W. LAWSON: I merely rise for the purpose of congratulating the Chancellor of the Exchequer upon the Budget. It is very not often that the right hon. Gentleman receives compliments from this side of the House, and I therefore think it is incumbent on me to say what I feel on this occasion. I consider that the right hon. Gentleman has had the honour of inaugurating in this country a fiscal revolution; and those who heard the speech of the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian will agree that I am not overstating the case. I look with the greatest pleasure on this scheme of graduated taxation, and I hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will carry it to a triumphant issue. It all illustrates the saying that "Everything comes to him who waits." We have not had long to wait in this matter, because the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian was defeated on this very question. The right hon. Gentleman wanted to increase the Death Duties, and the Beer Duties, placing an additional tax upon death and another upon beer which is the means of death. A great defeat of the Liberal Government occurred in consequence, and yet in less than four years, we are coming here to support a Tory Government in carrying out the very same proposition which turned out the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian. It is a very encouraging incident, and I feel
    1022
    sure that after this Budget we shall now go on increasing the taxation of that most mischievous creature, the rich man, and make him far more useful to the State than ever he has been before. I congratulate the Government heartily all the more that their own supporters appear to be a little lukewarm in regard to the present proposal.
    *SIR R. LETHBRIDGE: The difficulty stated by the right hon. Member for Bradford (Mr. Shaw Lefevre), and emphasized by the right hon. Member for Derby (Sir. W. Harcourt), might be very well met by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he were to reckon his limit of exemption from the new Estate Duty by reference to the amount of the income which passes rather than to the capitalised amount. I think a plan of that kind would do something to abate the apprehensions of those who fear that this new duty will press unfairly upon the landed proprietors. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian has endeavoured very skilfully to arouse the apprehensions of hon. Members on the Ministerial side by dwelling upon the fact that this is the thin end of the wedge for the introduction of a general system of graduated taxation. I must say that for my own part I regret very much that the right hon. Member for Sleaford (Mr. Chaplin) allowed himself to be drawn like a trout that rises to the fly skilfully thrown over his head. It is perfectly obvious to common sense that we have been accustomed in the exemption of the smaller incomes from income tax, to such an exemption as that which the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes, and it has never been dreamt of that the exemption of the smaller incomes really was to lead to anything like a graduated income tax. Therefore, I do not see why this proposal should be regarded as leading to graduated taxation of any kind, and I shall support the Chancellor of the Exchequer's proposals most unhesitatingly. I believe that he will be supported by the country at large, and that his proposals will have the approval not only of hon. Gentlemen opposite, but of the majority of Members on this side of the House.
    *SIR DAVEY: There is one point to which I think the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to

    1023
    be drawn. It is a somewhat technical point, but I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will follow me. Real estate only pays Succession Duty; it never pays Legacy Duty. The Succession Duty is paid on the real estate which is devised or passes by will, but where personalty is bequeathed by will it does not pay Succession Duty but Legacy Duty. As I read the resolution the new Estate Duty is only to be imposed on personal property passing by the death of any person dying on or after the 1st day of June, 1889, as a succession or successions under the Succession Duty Act 1853. What I wish to point out is that if £10,000 is bequeathed by a will to, say, a son, it would not be a succession under the Succession Duty Act 1853, but would be a legacy and liable to Legacy, not Succession, Duty, and therefore as I read the resolution as framed it would not he made to pay the new Estate Duty. I do not suggest to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that this is intended, but I think it is a matter worthy of his consideration in order to ascertain whether it is so or not. If the first resolution is intended to cover this case of course the question will not arise.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: It is intended to cover it.
    *SIR H. DAVEY: Then I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to meet the anomaly which my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby and I have pointed out, namely the case of a man who leaves an estate of £18,000 one half in realty and the other half in personalty. In that case Succession Duty will not be paid at all. That, I am afraid, is an anomaly which cannot be altered in his Bill, but must be altered in the resolution.
    *SIR R. WEBSTER: This point has not escaped our attention, but it is one of a practical nature. I quite agree that if the matter were reasoned out logically some scheme ought to be devised to meet a complex case of a man leaving £7,000 of personalty and £7,000 of realty, but we had to consider the matter from a practical point of view and we found that it would delay so extremely the collection of the Probate Duty that we were obliged to proceed tentatively, in order to see whether the plan is capable of further development. The point submitted by the hon. and
    1024
    learned Member has, however, not been lost sight of.
    SIR W. HARCOURT: I apprehend that it will be necessary to insert some provision in the Bill.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I am sorry to have to trouble the Committee so often. In the case put by the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Picton), I may state that the Estate Duty so far as personalty is concerned follows the Probate Duty, and would be paid out of the corpus of the estate before it came to a division. This being an extension of the Probate Duty, it would follow the lines of the Probate Duty. It may almost be said the Probate Duty is put at 4 instead of 3 per cent. My object as Chancellor of the Exchequer, has been not so much to reform the Death Duties as to get £800,000 into the Exchequer. The idea of the new duty is that it is to be an addition to the Probate Duty, and the Succession Duty. If it were to be made an increased Legacy Duty instead of an increased Probate Duty, I suppose not one-half of the duty would come into the Exchequer in the present year. With regard to complex estates, corn posed both of realty and personalty, I have urged upon the officers of the Inland Revenue to have a practical plan prepared which can he put before the Committee; but as hon. Members acquainted with legal affairs are aware, it takes a much longer time to ascertain the value of realty than of personalty, and the difficulties in the way of framing such a plan are very great, though not, I hope, insuperable. Our desire would be, if possible, to bring such estates under the tax, and I will express to the able officers of the department the view of the Committee that this ought to be done if the difficulties can be overcome. I endorse the remark that has been made by an hon. Member behind me that the criticisms of the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian and others are simply an attempt to frighten hon. Members on the Ministerial side, and to stir within them a spirit of disgust with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, on the ground that something like our present proposals has been a part of the Liberal programme for years past. In 1885 the Government of the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Mid Lothian, proposed an increase in the Succession Duty and the Beer Duty, and the main

    1025
    ground on which their scheme was resisted by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade, was that it would be unfair to increase the duty on land until relief was given to Local Taxation. But since then the present Government have surrendered considerable sums out of the Imperial Exchequer for local purposes. It was not contended in 1885 that there ought to be no approach to the equalization of the Death Duties, but only that such a step ought not to be taken until the House had redeemed the promise it has made to the ratepayers that some relief should be given to Local Taxation. This, however, has since been done, and the fact that it has been done makes all the difference between our position now and that of right hon. Gentlemen opposite in 1885.
    *MR. GEDGE: I desire to point out the inconvenience experienced by executors owing to their having to pay the Probate Duty before they can touch the property in respect of which it is due, and I wish to know whether this extra duty will be payable under similar conditions. When a man dies his executors are naturally anxious to prove his will as quickly as possible, and until 1881 they could do so, as they were allowed to estimate roughly the value of the estate for probate, and any mistake was rectified afterwards. But in that year the right hon. Member for Mid Lothian compelled them to make an account returning the estate with full particulars in the first instance, and this has greatly impeded them and delayed proving the will. If the proposals of the hon. Gentleman opposite be entertained and the value of the real property be added to that of the personalty for the calculation of the new Estate Duty, and if that is to be paid on proving the will, a delay of 8 or 9 months may take place before the value of the real property can be ascertained, and everybody concerned will be put to immense inconvenience.
    MR. DE LISLE: I wish to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has read the letter of Lord Addington which appeared in the Times a few days ago, suggesting the application of the consanguinity table to the payment of this tax, as in the majority of cases the persons coming under this tax would be widows and
    1026
    orphans, As the main object of the right hon. Gentleman is to find money for the Exchequer, I think he ought not to abandon the opportunity afforded him of raising a still larger sum by adopting the principle of the consanguinity table. I think it would be a mistake to throw away entirely this means of raising additional revenue.
    *SIR W. PLOWDEN: Before the Chancellor of the Exchequer rises to answer the questions which have been put to him, I wish to call his attention to the point which has been raised by the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Picton). It certainly seems to me that to tax an estate of £12,000 passing to 12 persons, each receiving only £1,000, and to allow an estate of £9,000 passing to a single individual to escape the duty altogether, is an anomaly. I do not think that so far the right hon. Gentleman has dealt with this matter. Is it the intention that the estate of £12,000 divided among a number of persons should pay the duty, while the estate of £9,000 should not pay it?
    *MR. PICTON: Will there be any difference made between the Succession Duty and the Probate Duty? I presume that in the case of real estate the Succession Duty is charged not on the corpus of the estate, but on individual successors. Therefore, if real estate of, say, £12,000, be divided among several successors, persons receiving less than £9,000 would not pay the 1 per cent extra, whereas an estate consisting of personalty descending to a number of persons would pay Probate Duty on the corpus of the estate, and would also pay the one per cent extra. That is, each of twelve children, among whom £12,000 of personalty is divided, would have to pay the extra one per cent from which realty in similar circumstances would be free.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: I fully realize the difficulty referred to by the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. Gedge), and all that is possible will be done to meet it. But the Bill proposes that this tax should be paid as a Stamp Duty simultaneously with Probate Duty. There can be no doubt that the Bill proposes an increase of the Probate Duty, as far as personalty is concerned, as distinguished from Legacy Duty. I have seen the letter of my noble Friend, Lord

    1027
    Addington, and I am surprised to find the suggestion as to the consanguinity table being applied to this tax. It would be quite inappropriate, having regard to the principle upon which Probate Duty is assessed. My noble Friend calls it a widow and orphan's tax, but he might as well call the Probate duty a widow and orphan's tax. The principle is to obtain the duty in proportion to the bulk of the property that passes, and it amounts to an addition to the present Probate Duty above a certain line. It will apply to the widows and orphans of very rich men who at present pay no Legacy Duty, as well as to those of persons who have a moderate, but not a small, fortune. I was surprised that a wise man like Lord Addington should try to create prejudice against the proposal by calling it a Widows' and Orphans' Tax; and I am afraid that it would only complicate the matter if the new Duty were to be varied according to the table of consanguinity. In regard to the point raised by the hon. Member for Leicester as to succession to personalty, there can be no doubt that the Estate Duty, so far as it applies to realty, will follow the principle of the Succession Duty. The Succession Duty is different from the Probate Duty in the fact that there is no corpus that is taxed, but that it is the individual interest of each successor which the tax takes. That difference will necessarily exist in the Bill as it is drawn.
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONE: The Chancellor of the Exchequer has entered rather into the question of machinery than the principle of the Bill—the different modes of dealing with personalty and realty respectively. The case which has been put by the hon. Member for Leicester certainly affords a striking instance of the different manner in which personalty and realty are treated. Under this proposal, if £12,000 personalty is left to be divided among 12 children, 1 per cent would have to be paid on each £1,000, the share of each child; whereas, in the case of succession to realty of the value of £12,000 divided among 12 children, no cognizance is taken of the gross amount. The £12,000 of realty would not pay, whereas the £12,000 of personalty would pay. That is a point which requires serious consideration. That
    1028
    exemption goes to the man whether he has children or not. We know nothing about children in the case of income tax; we say there is no analogy at all with the case of personal estate, where probate is taken up, between children, and each child suffers. There is no argument on the ground of analogy. I am afraid here is a new and rather striking inequality introduced in the modes of dealing with personalty and realty to this extent. Suppose an estate of £12,000 personalty goes in one portion, and suppose at the same time a succession value of £12,000 passes to a single individual in the nature of realty, these cases will receive identically the same treatment; they will also be dealt with in exactly the same manner when the sums in respect to which probate is taken out does not amount to £10,000, for then, whether they go to one or several individuals they pay nothing in respect to the new duty; but if £12,000 personalty is left to be divided among 12 children, 1 per cent will have to be paid on each £1,000, the share of each child. However, I do not wish to prolong the present discussion. When the matter comes before the House in the shape a Bill, we shall be able to form a more mature opinion upon it. The novelty of introducing, for the purpose of raising revenue, a permanent inequality in the treatment of personalty and realty appears to me to be a very serious matter.
    MR. ILLINGWORTH: Suppose the succession value of a real estate is say £27,000, and it is divided among three persons, the Chancellor of the Exchequer will lose all the benefit in each case, for each portion will be under £10,000, and so also of real estate of very large amounts if they are sufficiently sub-divided. I wonder the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when his friends made these complaints of new taxation, did not reply that the money is wanted for increased Army and Navy expenditure. The hon. Baronet the Member for Sussex (Sir W. Barttelot) is one of those who had not a word to say against this increase, and he has the satisfaction of knowing that it is for the defence of the country that the Chancellor of the Exchequer makes his demand. I think this discussion will be immensely valuable, for on this side of the House

    1029
    there appears to be almost unanimity in corroboration of the principle that graduated taxation is the system we must look forward to and develop in the future; and the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been successful in committing the Tory Party to approve of that principle. There are two other points on which I wish to say a word or two. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has maintained that tenderness of treatment towards entailed estates which from first to last I condemn. The system of entail is of no advantage to the country, and is a most pernicious practice. So far from the Committee being called upon to show special tenderness to estates thus treated, I think we should be doing the State a special service by putting a new and special burden upon estates so entailed. I am amazed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should lend himself to the maintenance of this system. Those who are owners of property, or claim to be the mouthpieces of that class, seem to imagine that their case during the last 12 or 15 years is one that deserves some special and exceptional treatment, but the only difference between these and those engaged in commerce and industry is that the latter have had the manliness to bear their losses and sufferings without coming continually before the House, and pleading in formâ pauperis, while it seems to be the vested right of those who own landed estates—and I know something of the one class as well as the other—to be always bringing to bear what influence they have on the Government in favour of exemption from this or that share of taxation. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has upheld the inequality and justified it on the ground that it would not do to proceed with the equalization of the Death Duties until the special charges on land referring specially to the income tax had been readjusted. As time goes on, nothing will become more manifest to the House and to the country than that the income realized from land ought to bear a higher rate of Income Tax than income derived from precarious sources, such as professions, trades, and industries. Hon. Gentlemen must bear in mind that land is a luxury—not so much as it used to be I grant, but still it is a luxury—and those who own it have privileges connected
    1030
    with the ownership that should bear proportionate burdens. I am glad of the progress we have made to-night towards a policy of a more just and equal taxation, but I doubt if it will take the form that hon. Gentlemen opposite desire.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: With reference to the concluding remarks of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) I think he and the Committee will see that anomalies must arise near the line of limitation, wherever we may draw it. Hon. Members have been pressing these anomalies that only our from the attempt to draw a line that will save smaller estates, anomalies that will arise only in exceptional cases. Nobody knows better than the right hon. Gentleman that wherever you draw a line giving exceptions, anomalies will only occur close to that line. I will consider with my colleagues all that has been urged as to these exceptions, but whatever conclusion we may come to it is certain that the anomalies cannot all be removed.
    MR. GLADSTONE: If I may presume to say so, my right hon. Friend entirely mistakes the question. These anomalies which my right hon. Friend admits do not in the slightest degree arise from the drawing of the line. That has no connection with the case. You may draw a line and avoid these anomalies, and the way to avoid these is to deal with realty and personally on the same principle—the amount of the value passing to the individual—instead of adopting two different principles for realty and personalty. Where it is realty you look to the value of the interest passing to each successor; but where it is personalty you look to the gross value. This is the source of the whole anomaly. I hope some of us on this side of the House may be able to draw some Amendment giving effect to our views and bringing them out distinctly.
    *MR. H. H. FOWLER: I may point out to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the form of the resolution deals with successions to property in two different ways, as thus: There shall be levied and paid to Her Majesty in respect of the value of the entire personal property passing upon the death of any person dying on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred

    1031
    and eighty nine, as a succession or Successions under "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," and in respect of the value of every Succession to real property under the said Act, upon the death of any person so dying, the following duty, that is to say:—and so on, placing 1 per cent or values above £10,000. Now if £10,000 in consols is settled on marriage, and devisable among children, as in the case put by the hon. Member for Leicester, then the additional 1 per cent duty on Succession would be imposed; but if a man leaves the property among his children, then no additional duty is imposed. When we come to the sub-section A, the duty is levied upon the corpus of the personalty of a man dying worth £10,000; but if a man, having four or five farms, valued at £8,000 to £9,000 each, left a farm to each of his children, no duty would be payable.
    Resolution agreed to.

    AMENDMENTS OF THE LAW AS TO SUCCESSION DUTY.
    3. Resolved, that the allowance under section thirty eight of "The Succession duty Act, 1853," to a successor upon taking a succession upon the death of any person dying on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine, shall only be made in respect of the value of property which the successor may have acquired by any title not conferring a succession on him, and which passes from the successor to some other person.
    That the duties charged under "The Succession Duty Act, 1853," and section twenty-one of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1888," shall be payable upon a succession upon the death of any person dying on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine, although the value thereof shall be less than twenty pounds.

    AMENDMENT OF SECTION 38 OF "THE CUSTOMS AND INLAND REVENUE ACT, 1881."
    4. Resolved, That it is expedient, with the view of explaining and extending the charge of Stamp Duties on accounts of personal or moveable property under section 38 of "The Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881," to amend the section as follows;—
    The description of property marked (a) in sub-section two of the section shall be read as if the word "twelve" were substituted for the word "three" therein;
    The said description of property shall include property taken under any gift, whenever made, of which bona fide possession and enjoyment shall not have been assumed by the donee immediately upon the gift and thenceforward retained to the entire exclusion of the donor, or of any benefit to him by contract or otherwise;
    1032
    The description of property marked (b) in the said sub-section two shall be construed as if the expression "to be transferred to or vested in himself and any other person" included also any purchase or investment effected by the person who was absolutely entitled to the property either by himself alone, or in concert, or by arrangement with any other person;
    The description of property marked (c) shall be construed as if the expression "voluntary settlement" included any trust, whether expressed in writing or otherwise, in favour of a volunteer, and, if contained in a deed or other instrument effecting the settlement, whether such deed or other instrument was made for valuable consideration or not as between the settlor or any other person, and as if the expression "such property," where-ever the same occurs, included the proceeds of sale thereof;
    And that the said charge shall extend to money received under a policy of assurance effected by any person dying on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine, on his life, where the policy is wholly kept up by him for the benefit of a donee, whether nominee or assignee, or a part of such money in proportion to the premiums paid by him, where the policy is partially kept up by him for such benefit;
    And that no return of Stamp Duty shall be made under sub-section three of the section by reason of, or in relation to, any Account charged under that section and delivered on or after the first day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine.

    DUTY ON CAPITAL OF COMPANIES WITH LIMITED LIABILITY UNDER LETTERS PATENT OR SPECIAL ACTS OF PARLIAMENT.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That the same Duty as is imposed by Section 11 of the 'Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1888,' shall be charged and paid upon a Statement of the Amount of Nominal Share Capital of any Corporation or Company where the Liability of the Holders of Shares in the Capital of such Corporation or Company is Limited by Letters Patent, to be hereafter granted by Her Majesty, Her Heirs or Successors, or any Act of Parliament to be hereafter passed."
    *MR. HALDANE: May I ask for some explanation of this Resolution? Does it mean that the duty is only imposed where the liability is limited, or is it intended to impose the duty in all cases where the company is incorporated otherwise than under the Act of 1862?
    *MR. GOSCHEN: It is rather a technical point, but the intention is to reach certain companies which now escape because they get their limited liability from letters patent or from

    1033
    special Acts. It is intended to put these on the same footing as those under the general law of limited liability.
    Question proposed, "That these Resolutions be reported to the House."
    *MR. CHILDERS: We have had a most interesting discussion upon the second Resolution. I presume the Bill must be grounded on the Report of the Resolutions, and I presume it would not be possible to alter materially the clauses of the Bill in Committee, unless alteration is made in the Report of the Resolutions. Under these circumstances it becomes extremely important that the Report should be fully considered. It is not a Party question in any degree, and in order that we may have time to consider very carefully the very important points which have been raised this evening, I would ask that the Report stage should not be taken, say, before Tuesday next.
    *MR. GOSCHEN: Certainly, I should not propose to take the Report before Monday, but I will consult with my right hon. Friend the First Lord on the matter.
    Resolutions to be reported on Monday next; Committee to sit again to-morrow.

  SUPPLY.
  Considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)

  CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES.

    CLASS II.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a sum, not exceeding £60,366, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1890, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of Her Majesty's Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs."
    DR. CAMERON: On a point of Order I now ask whether the Motion of which I have given notice should have precedence of that of the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. Jennings). My Motion refers to the first item—the salary of the Chief Secretary of State, but the Motion of the hon. Member has, I think, reference to the Vote generally.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I understand the hon. Member for Stockport wishes to raise the question of the propriety of certain items in the Vote. His notice
    1034
    was given long before that of the hon. Member for Glasgow, but if he chooses to waive his right, the hon. Member for Glasgow can proceed.
    *MR. JENNINGS: My Motion refers to items under sub-head A, but I intend to discuss various salaries. I do not know whether I should he in order.
    THE CHAIRMAN: There is no precedence in the details of an item.
    *MR. JENNINGS: This Vote shows a general tendency in the direction of a rise in the scale of salaries. The total sum now asked for is £70,366. In the first year of Lord Beaconsfield's administration, 1874–5, it was £61,713, so that there is an increase of £8,600 in the intervening period, and this large increase is one of the grounds on which I ask the Committee to reduce the Vote. There has been a general rise in the scale of almost all the salaries, and a totally new post worth £1,500 a-year has been created for an Under Secretary. The Committee will observe that the sum mentioned in the Vote does not by any means include the total expenditure of the Foreign Office. To arrive at that we must add £15,580 for stationery and printing.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is not now entering into Item A. He must now confine himself to that item.
    *MR. JENNINGS: I shall keep to the sub-head with great accuracy and strictness. It will be observed that out of £48,211 paid for salaries no less than £42,649 goes to 78 persons. I think a glance at the figures will satisfy the Committee that nearly all these receive extravagant sums. The Secretary of State with his £5,000 a-year cannot be said to be overpaid, considering the great responsibility and the heavy work which attach to his office. Then I come to an Under Secretary with £2,000 a-year. That is probably the permanent Under Secretary, though it is not so stated in the Vote. After that there is entered another Under Secretary with a salary of £1,500 a-year. This is an inadequate sum for the ingenuity shown by the hon. Baronet (Sir James Fergusson) in answering questions on Foreign Affairs without imparting the slightest scrap of useful information. Then there are two Assistant Under Secretaries with £1,500 a-year each. So that there are four

    1035
    Under Secretaries costing £6,500 a-year. We have always understood that the most industrious Foreign Minister this country ever had was Lord Palmerston, and he contrived to do with only one Under Secretary. In the first year of Lord Beaconsfield's administration there was one Under Secretary less than there is now. In point of fact, the work which is now divided amongst four persons used to be done by three. But these Under Secretaries all have assistants, no doubt on the principle referred to in Swift's lines about the big fleas which have little fleas to bite them. So far as we can discover, the work of the Foreign Office is shifted from one pair of shoulders to another until it is really difficult to ascertain who does it, and still more difficult to ascertain what use it is when it is done. Very few of the assistant Under Secretaries are paid less than from £400 to £700 a-year as their regular salaries, yet if they are asked to write out the answers of the oracle transmitted to this House through the Under Secretary, they actually receive additional remuneration, so that they have the great advantage of being paid twice over for their time and trouble. This is the peculiarity of the office. First a clerk is paid a considerable sum for giving his whole time to the State, he is then taken aside to do something else, and he forthwith receives an additional salary for that. No doubt the answer will be the country is rich and can afford it. We are often told that people prefer to have a lavish expenditure of money in the public departments. Well, if that be so, they ought to be satisfied with the constitution of this office. It will also be observed that the persons in the office are accumulating very heavy pensions. There have been cases where clerks of from 30 to 35 years old have received pensions of from £200 to £300 a-year, and where persons after 10 or 12 years' service have gone off with still more substantial pensions. It may be said that this is deferred pay, but the salaries are so large as to leave no room for this, and, in fact, nothing is deferred except sometimes the work. The chief clerk gets a salary of £1,250 a-year, and also a compensation allowance of £794 a-year. This gentleman has never been anything but a clerk in the Foreign Office so far as I can find out, and
    1036
    why he should have this compensation allowance we can only darkly conjecture. He probably has come to the conclusion that as times go this is not a bad country to live in. Then we have five senior clerks receiving £1,000 a-year each, and seven assistant clerks receiving £800 a-year each, and this in an office where the work is mostly put out. The most substantial commercial house would not dream of paying such salaries. Immense time, of course, is spent in dealing with correspondence which is of no earthly significance to any human being. The work could be done equally efficiently by clerks at £150 or £200 a-year, and would be so done in an ordinary commercial office. I maintain that the apparatus worked by these expensive clerks is of no benefit to the nation; it has seldom done any good, and it h s often done irreparable harm. We should have had fewer wars and difficulties with Foreign Powers if half the system had been swept away long ago. There are 20 junior clerks with £200 a-year to start with. In April 1879 there were only 10. These junior clerks are now getting £i00 a-year each. I affirm that there is no commercial house in the whole of the kingdom who would pay clerks of the description, required to attend only from 11 to 5, and whose duties are of the lightest description, more than from £100 to £200 a-year. Their work is light; as soon as the streets of London begin to feel a little warm they have a month or six weeks' holiday, they are accumulating large pensions, and their duties are arranged chiefly by themselves. Then there is the Librarian and keeper of the papers at £1,000, besides another of the mysterious compensation allowances of £389 a-year. The librarian of the British Museum only receives £1,200 a-year, and I think it highly probable that he has more important papers and books to take care of than the librarian of the Foreign Office. No doubt there are treaties to look after, but their importance is a matter open to very considerable question. There is, however, a special major-domo to look after these treaties, and he is down on this lucky list for £898 a-year. He has an assistant with a salary of £559, while the other librarian has an assistant at £575, two first class clerks receiving £950, four

    1037
    second class clerks with £1,439, four third class clerks with £762, and ten temporary clerks with £1,000. I say that such a librarian's department has never been heard of before outside Bedlam. The superintendent of Treaties, most of which are so stone-dead that they require no superintendence of any kind, gets £900 a-year. The keeper of the MSS. at the British Museum only gets £750 a-year, and the keeper of printed books the same amount. What are the duties of this gentleman at the Foreign Office? Part of his duty is to attend to British and Foreign Orders, medals, honorary rewards, questions of ceremony and precedence, and other mouldy trappings of the great sham which the Foreign Office represents. If the whole litter were taken outside this House, and thrown into the river, the country would be all the better off. As no one has the slightest interest in looking after the public money in this Department, it contrives to muddle away over £15,000 a-year in stationery and printing. You might paper the Foreign Office an inch thick with the stationery that is wasted there every year. It spends £8,500 in telegrams, although diplomatic telegrams are specially charged for under another heading. We ought to apologize for mentioning in such company the persons of low birth stationed at the Foreign Office, but unfortunately such persons there must be. I hope the Committee will notice with respectful admiration that the office keeper has £250 a-year and quarters rent free, and, therefore, he is far better off than many clergymen and barristers. I hope there are not many barristers and country parsons who would presume to put themselves on a level with the office keeper at the Foreign Office. He has of course plenty of assistants, in accordance with the sound principle of the office, that no man should do anything if he can get somebody else to do it for him. Accordingly we find him surrounded with seven other office keepers, and three doorkeepers, mostly receiving from £100 to £150 a-year each. People talk about bringing up their sons to the professions, but it would be much better to bring them up as office keepers under Government. They would then be certain of receiving a very good salary, quarters rent free, and a good pension.
    1038
    No one can entertain a reasonable doubt that if this office fell into the hands of a person who managed it on strictly business principles, there would be a large decrease of cost with no sacrifice of efficiency. We shall be told, I have no doubt, that it is absolutely indispensable to pay good salaries, because persons of a superior class must be employed. I do not see the necessity for it. All the country needs is to have efficient clerks who will do their duty. From what I have observed, the heads of most Departments are underpaid and overworked, but otherwise the scale of salaries is absurdly out of proportion to the work done. I daresay it will be intimated by the Under Secretary, that if this Amendment be adopted, the British Empire will be placed in a position of considerable jeopardy. One peculiarity of the British Empire is that it seems to be always in a position of jeopardy, and, if we cut down the bloated salaries of the Foreign Office, it will be no worse off than it is already. Another objection to these criticisms was put to me the other day in something like this form "If we get rid of all these snug berths under Government, what are we to do with our younger sons?" That is a problem which we shall have to face before very long, but England has been making provision for younger sons for a very long time, and there are many signs that the people are getting weary of doing so, and intend in the future to exact honest service for the salaries paid. It will probably be said that the office generally is in a state of automatic increase. Automatic is a very delightful word to the official ear, but it will not satisfy, I hope, the feeling of the country, which demands a thorough reform of these Departments. I would earnestly express a hope that the Committee will not be deterred from adopting the Amendment I propose to move, by the suggestion that no good will come of it. I maintain that very considerable good has come from these discussions in Supply. Only last year a reduction of a Vote was moved and not accepted at the time, but a much greater reduction has been carried out this year. My proposal may not be accepted to-night, but if the general rule is followed, the effect will be shown in succeeding years. I beg to move the reduction of the Vote by £1,000.

    1039
    Motion made and Question proposed, "That item A, of £48,211, for salaries, be reduced by £1,000."—(Mr. Jennings.)
    *THE UNDER SECRETARY FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir J. FERGUSSON,): I venture to think there has seldom been an attack made on a Department, and a reduction moved in the Estimates 'on weaker grounds. The hon. Member might have been expected to adduce something to support his sweeping assertions that the office was overmanned with men who were overpaid, and that no work was done, but the unfounded assertion appears to be evolved out of his own imagination. He has given no proof of it, and I can tell him that it is as unfounded as it is absurd. The hon. Member has not had the courtesy or consideration, which I have experienced from Members sitting in all parts of the House, who having regard to the many affairs for which I have to answer, have given some notice of the subjects to which they propose to draw attention. I have received several letters from hon. Members, mentioning points to which they desire to call attention; the hon. Member, however, has not been so courteous or considerate; but that is his way. It is the course he chose to adopt, and the tone that ran through his speech was consistent with it. There has been no addition made to our establishment that has not been asked for, and the reasons for which have not been required by the Treasurer with great particularity; and Committees have been appointed to inquire into the strength of establishments and the reasons for every appointment. No addition has been made to this office for which there has not been absolute necessity in the opinion of responsible Members of successive Administrations. He has referred particularly to the addition of an Assistant Under Secretary. Well, Sir, that addition was made 15 years ago in order to afford assistance to the growing amount of legal business brought before the Foreign Office. The amount of ordinary work in the office has more than doubled during the last 30 years. An actual saving was effected on the appointment of a legal assistant, because the salary is only half of what it was necessary to pay previously to a
    1040
    member of the Bar. The work of the office is necessarily distributed among Departments with a responsible head for each, and without such responsibility and division the office would be inefficient and ill-arranged. We have relations and correspondence with many countries, and our business with these countries, singly or in groups, must be divided among the responsible chiefs of divisions. There is, for instance, an American, an Eastern, a Western, an African, and a Consular Department, each embracing a great variety of interests and a large amount of responsible business. The Under Secretaries divide between them the Superintendence of the Departments. Our constantly increasing commercial relations also entail a large amount of labour on those employed in the Foreign Office, and I do not think that office is overmanned, the fact being that the gentleman engaged there never spare themselves and never think of limiting their duties to the statutory number of hours. If you were to go to the Foreign Office at seven or eight o'clock at night you would find many gentlemen engaged there in the transaction of important business.
    MR. MOLLOY: For which they receive extra pay.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: They do not, indeed. Nor is the work shifted about from one person to another, as each person has his own work and must manage to do it. With respect to Private Secretaryships, the Foreign Office is not peculiar, and the Under Secretaries would find it impossible without such help to get through the work of the Department. Reference has been made to the Chief Clerk and to the Librarian, and I may say that the Chief Clerk is a most responsible officer and a valuable public servant. He has worked his way in the service and performs important duties. As to the Librarian, complaint has been made of his having a salary of £1,000 a year. In answer to that I would point out that his duties are of the most important character; and hon. Members will probably be able to appreciate how necessary it is to the Secretary of State and other Members of the Government to be able to have at their immediate command precise information with I regard to previous transactions relating

    1041
    to every country in the world, and that all papers in connection with commercial treaties and historical matters of the highest importance shall be thoroughly accessible. It is therefore very desirable that we should have all our records in the most perfect order, so that there should be no mistake in regard to any of them. In my opinion there is no salary better earned than that of the Librarian, Sir Edward Hertslet, who enjoys a world-wide reputation. In regard to the matter of stationery, I may say that I am unaware of any waste going on in the Department. There is necessarily a large amount of stationery used, but I believe that, generally speaking, there has been a steady and continuous effort to promote economy. In regard to the item of telegrams, the estimate has this year been reduced by the sum of £1,500. No doubt the salaries of the office keepers are high, but it is worth while to pay well not only where we get good work done, but when we must rely with absolute confidence on those whom we employ. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Jennings) thinks we might have as good clerks as we require for £350 a year; and there I join issue with him. The competition for appointments in the Foreign Office, it is true, is limited, and it is necessary in such a service not only to have efficiency, but to have men whom we can implicitly trust. Since I have been at the Foreign Office the gentlemen who have been admitted to that service have all been men whose abilities would have done credit to any employment. There are necessarily secrets in the department for the divulgence of which large sums would gladly be paid — of which there cannot be a doubt. Just imagine for a moment what some of the secrets of the Foreign Office would be worth for Stock Exchange purposes; and yet there is the most absolute confidence in all the officials there employed, and no gentleman in that office can be charged with breach of confidence, or even with indiscretion. These are reasons why we should pay good salaries, and at the same time I may state that we have no idle men. I think it will require something more than the general allegations of the hon. Member opposite to deprive those gentlemen of the confidence of the country, or to establish a charge of
    1042
    extravagance against the office which I have the honour to represent.
    MR. BRADLAUGH: I do not think the right hon. Baronet has shown his usual kindliness or fairness in the reply he has just given to the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. Jennings), to whom I think the right hon. Gentleman might have given credit for aiding in the economies of which he has spoken. I do not intend to follow the right hon. Gentleman in the general remarks he has addressed to the Committee, but I will call attention to the fact that it is admitted that the expense of the Foreign Office is very high. I think that when we have obtained from the Under Secretary for the Foreign Office the admission that the cost of that Department is very high, hon. Members 'who are not connected with that office may agree that it is too high. I will only add that if the hon. Gentleman the Member for Stockport goes to a division, I shall vote with him so as to record my protest against the manner in which that service is conducted.
    MR. E. ROBERTSON: Sir, we on this side of the House think the hon. Member for Stockport has thrown a great deal of light on this subject. For myself, I have some reluctance in attacking these salaries without the necessary information. I do not know whether this particular office is now under the consideration of the Royal Commission, which, I believe, is concerning itself with the civil establishments as a whole, but there are some things on the surface of the Vote to which I would like to call the attention of the Committee. An immense deal of this work must be merely clerical. It is all very well to tell us that there are most distinguished men in the Department, and I am quite willing to believe that these people work very hard; but there is an immense number of people employed in merely clerical work. I think the right hon. Baronet has not attempted to answer the hon. Member for Stockport. He has limited his answer entirely to superior persons, and he has told us how able and distinguished they are. And in one portion of his answer it came out that the Foreign Office does not limit itself to materially benefiting those distinguished servants, but that they receive titular dignities,

    1043
    in addition to their salaries. As to the Librarian's Department, I think we see the full force of everything said by the hon. Member for Stockport. It is undoubtedly true that the Foreign Minister should have an ample library relating to foreign places and treaties, but you have, I suppose, the Treaty Department which supplies the information wanted as to treaty relations. There is something radically wrong in this Librarian's Department. I see there are 12 permanent officials engaged in the library, and 10 temporary clerks. That appears to be an enormous staff, even to do the most important work of the character described by the right hon. Gentleman. Again, their salaries amount to about £6,175. I am not sure whether I have made the calculation correctly, but it is above £6,000, which is an enormous expenditure. Instead of receiving with indignation, as I am afraid he did, the speech of the hon. Member for Stockport, the right hon. Baronet ought in the interests of economy to have welcomed the criticism. For my own part, the only objection I have to the excellent and enlightening speech of the hon. Member for Stockport, is that he did not move a larger reduction than that which he proposed.
    MR. HANBURY: I do not wish to say anything about the Foreign Office, which will come before the Royal Commission on Civil Establishments, but I would like to say, from the experience of that Commission, that unless the Foreign Office is a great deal different from the other Civil Service Establishments it will require a good deal of altering. I certainly do not think the right hon. Baronet Las answered any portion of the speech of the hon. Member for Stockport. We who are interested in the discussion of the Civil Service Estimates and in bringing about economy do lay great stress on the manner in which the right hon. Baronet has answered my hon. Friend. He must not suppose that hurling charges of discourtesy against hon. Members will in any way answer his purpose. As far as I am concerned, I am not going to be deterred by answers of that kind, and I am quite sure that, now these discussions are originated from both sides of the House, we will expect a little fuller and
    1044
    more courteous answers when we bring forward Motions of this kind.
    MR. MUNRO FERGUSON: The hon. Gentleman the Member for Stockport has spoken of the character of the work at the Foreign Office, and I think there can be no doubt that while some money might be saved, and the hours in some cases made longer, yet so far as the duties are concerned, there is no public office where the work is better done than in the Foreign Office. Comparison has been made between the salaries in commercial houses and the Foreign Office; but I am perfectly certain there are no clerks in commercial houses who are entrusted with secrets of the importance which must come under the notice of clerks in the Foreign Office. I believe that if the clerks in the Foreign Office served for honours and without salary, they would not betray their trust; still I think on the ground of expedience, it is well to remove all cause of temptation, and on that ground there is some recompense for paying a higher rate of salary. I do not in the least mean to say that the Foreign Office may not be capable of reform, but certainly from my short experience of it I am clearly of opinion that the character of the work done deserves praise.
    MR. MOLLOY: My hon. Friend would appear to have very little experience indeed, especially judging from his last observations, in which he compared commercial establishments with the Foreign Office, and remarked that they were not subject to the same conditions as those which obtain at the Foreign Office. His support of the Foreign Office amounted to this—that there you have such important work that you must have men upon whom you can depend; that is to imply, that if you employed clerks at a lower salary you would have men upon whom you could not depend. My hon. Friend, in his anxiety to support this Vote, has really done much more harm than good. Now, I wish to draw attention to this fact, that upon every occasion of a debate about any public department, we are given the stereotyped answer which we have received to night. The Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs commenced by saying he had never heard of an attack made upon weaker grounds; he had never heard such sweeping as-

    1045
    sertions; and he complained that the hon. Member who moved the reduction knew perfectly well that the whole of the accusations were unfounded. Unfounded! I thought the hon. Member went through every one of these details. He pointed out the large salary of the Librarian. Was that unfounded? He pointed out the details with regard to these Under Secretaries. Was that unfounded? In Lord Palmerston's time, when there was more to do at the Foreign Office than now, there were not so many Under Secretaries. Within the last 15 years we have added another Under Secretary at a salary of £1,500 a year, and we have largely increased the staff. When the Under Secretary said that these accusations were unfounded, I certainly thought he was going to give us some explanation. What explanation did he give us? He said that no increase was made without the consent of the Treasury. Those of us who have examined for some years past into these matters know exactly what that means. It is not of the slightest importance, and is no check upon extravagances. On the first day of this Session, when we had the Estimates before us, I made an attack on the Department on the ground of extravagance and the large number of clerks employed. Identically the same answer was given on that occasion as has been given on this. But the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs on that occasion did condescend to something like details. He said the Head Clerk had also to do legal work.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: The hon. Member must be under a mistake. I did not say that.
    MR. MOLLOY: The whole excuse amounts to this. The Assistant Under Secretary must have some legal knowledge. I am not saying he has not such knowledge, or that he is not a good man. Then the right hon. Gentleman pleaded another excuse, and that was that each of these gentlemen had his own department and his own share of the work to look after. One man attended to the correspondence with Consuls. Of course he does. Nobody supposed you would give a man £1,500 a year for doing nothing. Then he said that another man attended to commercial matters. Of course he does. And so he went on, from one class to another, and pleaded this excuse as a justifi-
    1046
    cation for the large salaries which are being paid. But I ask the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, is such an excuse any explanation of the accusation that extravagance prevails in this office? Next, dealing with the necessity for having reliable men in the Foreign Office, the right hon. Gentleman suggested that there were very valuable secrets, and that unless the officials were highly paid they would accept the bribes which were offered to them to disclose these secrets. I ventured to dissent from that view, and the right hon. Gentleman at once said, "Oh, yes; look at the Stock Exchange, and what they would pay for those secrets." I hope he did not mean to make any accusation against the Stock Exchange, and I trust he will take this opportunity of saying he did not, for his remarks will be reported in the papers, and if he does not take this opportunity they will have a very ugly bearing. I hope he will say that he did mean to cast any imputation upon the gentlemen of the Stock Exchange, or to suggest that they would bribe anyone in order to get hold of the secrets of the Foreign Office. If it is necessary to have reliable officers in this department, is it not equally necessary to have them in other departments? You can, for £150 a year, get men of position and education and family as it is called, for employment as clerks, and if you can do that in other departments, why cannot you do it in the Foreign Office? The whole history of the Foreign Office is this. It has been used in times past to provide positions for the younger sons of certain families. Men of position who have desired to find appointments for their sons have pestered Ministers, and I can quite understand the vast amount of pestering which Ministers have undergone. In times not long ago these positions were made and these large salaries were given in order to satisfy the demands of political friends, who asked for provision for the younger members of their families. Of course you cannot blame the present Government for that, but you can ask them to examine into this matter and see whether the salaries cannot be reduced and the work done with fewer people. The taxation arising from these public offices is enormous, and I am glad to find that it is not only on one

    1047
    side of the House that a desire is growing up to reduce these heavy burdens. I am glad to know that there is a growing determination to have no more queen bees in the public service, and to employ no man unless he does honest work for honest wages.
    *SIR JAMES FERGUSSON: I am most anxious to give all the information in my power when proper questions are asked. The hon. Member for Dundee has asked, for instance, why it is necessary there should have been additional clerks employed in the library. I will give him an answer. The amount of correspondence has so enormously increased that, whereas four years ago under twenty-four thousand papers had to be registered and indexed every year, now the number is eighty thousand, and the consequence has been that for some time the staff has not been sufficiently strong to cope with this work. Hence there has been an accumulation of papers, amounting to nearly a million, and in order to work off these arrears ten temporary clerks have been engaged, and it is calculated that they will complete their task in five years; while, by a permanent addition of four lower division clerks, it is hoped that the work of registration and indexing will not again fall into arrear. I exceedingly regret that hon. Members do not think I have replied adequately to the remarks of the hon. Member for Stockport. I think he rather spoilt the justice of his case by assuming that these posts were light and genteel, and enormously overpaid, and that the salaries were bloated. In my early days in this House. it was not thought that public servants who were doing their duty were proper objects for ridicule and comment of this sort. Let me remind the Committee that the Royal Commission on Public Offices has not yet dealt with the Foreign Office. It will shortly do so, and hon. Members may feel assured that the office will receive a searching examination, and if the care which, I believe, has been given by Ministers and by the Treasury, as guardians of the public purse, is found not to have effected such economies as are necessary—if it is found that the office is overmanned and under- worked, it will all come out; you may depend upon that. The hon. Member for King's County declares that the office was as much em-
    1048
    ployed in Lord Palmerston's time as it is now. I can assure him that there is no comparison whatever between the two periods in respect of the necessary correspondence entailed by inquiries of all kinds which have been conducted.
    MR. MOLLOY: I referred to foreign complications.
    *SIR JAMES FERGUSSON: Well, Sir, if there were more foreign complications then than now I think the country is doing very well by paying a little more money in order to keep out of these complications. Probably the best of the Foreign Office work is never heard of, and that work is the avoidance of these complications. In conclusion, I venture to submit to the Committee that no case has been made out for the reduction of any part of this Vole.
    *MR. JENNINGS: It appears to me that the case I presented to the House remains entirely untouched. I followed the Estimates closely, and if my statements with regard to them are unfounded, it is because the Estimates themselves are erroneous. As to the curious charge that I gave no notice of my intention to take this course, let me remind the hon. Baronet that notice of my intention to reduce the Vote has been on the paper nearly two months, and surely it is not expected that in addition to giving that notice I am to supply further details. I presumed it would be taken for granted that any Member moving to reduce a Vote would necessarily refer to the Estimates. However, the next time I give notice of such an Amendment, I will send in a copy of the Estimates. One is always very glad to take a lesson in courtesy from the hon. Baronet. I am sure we could not go to a better person for it, but I never knew before that a Minister expected to be supplied with a full précis of a Member's criticism beforehand. Let me now point out that he has left every fact which I brought forward unchallenged. I am glad to have this opportunity of ascertaining how many Conservatives there are on these Benches who are ready to fulfil the pledges which I constantly hear them make to their constituents that they will endeavour to secure economy, retrenchment and reform. They have now an opportunity of acting on their pledges, and I therefore ask the Committee to take a division on this Vote.

    1049
    Question put.
    The House divided:—Ayes, 63; Noes, 84.—(Div. List No. 91.)
    Original Question again proposed.
    *SIR G. CAMPBELL: I desire, Sir, to move the reduction of the salary of the Secretary for Foreign Affairs (the Marquess of Salisbury) by the small sum of £100. I do so not by way of finding fault with the individual policy of the Secretary of State, but rather because it seems to me that he does not sufficiently adhere to that policy and I hope to elicit some declaration respecting it, and that the Committee may strengthen his hands. For my own part, I believe that, comparatively speaking, the foreign affairs of this country have been better managed than they usually are, and, individually, I am inclined very much to adhere to the views of the present Foreign Secretary as enunciated by himself. What I complain of is that he does not seem sufficiently to adhere to those views, and I think he is apt to be driven out of them by company mongers, adventurers, and soon. I wish especially to call attention to the present scramble for the great Continent of Africa, and to obtain some indications of the policy of the Government on the subject. It is a matter of continual regret to me that that dreadful Irish Question, like Aaron's Rod, so much swallows up other questions. So much attention is devoted to Irish subjects, from the clothes of one hon. Member to the incarceration of another, that foreign affairs are not now discussed by the body of Radical Members who used to pay so much attention to them. I was reading the other day an article written a few years ago by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. Gladstone) in which he alluded to the risk that we might be carried on from the Nile right through the interior of Africa to our colonial possessions in South Africa. Though I am not in favour of annexation or the subjugation of native races, I am free to confess that the circumstances of Africa are such, the anarchy prevailing there is such, the system of slavery is such, that I believe it would be a benefit that much of the Continent should be dominated and taken charge of by
    1050
    European Powers. The question is, what part are we to take in the scramble which is going on? I am very much against trying to turn out the civilized Mahommedan Powers, who exercise great civilizing influence over a large part of Africa. I would suggest to the Government that we ought to have a decided policy. We ought not to drift or to have our policy decided by the aims and ambitions of company-mongers and adventurers. I believe that if the Foreign Secretary would let us know what his policy is in this matter the House of Commons would probably support him, and he would be much stronger and more able to withstand the pressure to which I have alluded. The present policy of the Foreign Office so far as it regards the generous and handsome manner in which they meet Germany and other powers in these matters is a good policy. It is not right that we should seek to monopolize the whole world; we ought to share it with other Powers, and therefore in that respect I have no fault to find with the foreign policy of the Government. I do, however, somewhat regret the Zanzibar country, full as it has been for many years of British Indian subjects and of enterprising traders, that it should be handed over to German dominion; but still, what is done is done, and it is of no use now complaining. I fear, however generous and reasonable may be the spirit evinced by the Government, there is great danger likely to arise in the scramble now going on in the great Continent of Africa, and therefore it behoves the Government to be wary, and to ensure that they have the support of the House of Commons at their back in order that they may be able to maintain their own nights in the interests of this country. When I look around Africa it seems to me that although the principles enunciated by the Government are good, they have no fixed practice. Let me say a few words on the Soudan question. Looking at the last Blue Book published respecting affairs in the Soudan and at Suakin, I become more and more puzzled as to what is the real policy of the Government in regard to this country. I have already congratulated them on the successful way in which the expedition to Suakin was carried out, and its operations limited under the

    1051
    pressure of Radical Members, but what I wish to point out is that since our expedition has returned the Egyptian troops have again become the aggressors, have advanced miles into the interior of the Soudan and have plundered peaceful traders. This is very much to be regretted. Now I have not been able to find out what is the policy of the Government in regard to this matter, and I must say that the last Blue Book published has a most extraordinary termination. In the month of January last Sir E. Baring sent a long dispatch in which he gives the views of different people in connection with this matter, and he asks the Government what course is to he followed. I find that the new Governor General at Suakin is under the direction of the General commanding at Cairo, who in turn is controlled by Reaz Pasha, the Egyptian Prime Minister. In his dispatch Sir E. Baring encloses a paper showing that the Egyptian Prime Minister's policy has not changed in the least degree, and that he still desires the re-occupation of portions of the Soudan. Now these views having been communicated to Her Majesty's Government, I naturally looked to the end of the despatch to see what the views of Her Majesty's Government are. And here is the only result:—
    "Foreign Office, February 12, 1889.
    "I have received and laid before the Queen and the Cabinet your despatch and enclosures relative to the policy to be pursued in the Suakim, and the situation at Suakin. I have read with great interest the papers furnished by Sir Francis Grenfell, Col. Kitchener, and your own observations upon it, and I have to offer you my best thanks for the lucid exposition which you have offered on the past and present condition of the question."
    That is all we have of the views of the Foreign Secretary, and of the Government. Now Sir, this is an important question. The Egyptian Prime Minister is practically pledged to try to re-occupy the Soudan, and I think we have a right to ask the Government to give us some indication of their view, in regard to the occupation of the Soudan, and they ought to let us know whether they are now as firm as they were two or three months ago in their intention to abandon it, or whether they intend to allow Reaz Pasha, General Grenfell, and Colonel Kitchener to carry on a little aggressive war on their own account. Do the Government still adhere to the views
    1052
    which they held two or three months ago? If so they must prohibit these aggressive proceedings. But after this question of the Soudan comes that of the Equatorial provinces, which are held by that gallant man Emin Pasha. There has been great anxiety in many quarters to go to Emin's relief, but probaby there is behind this an anxiety to relieve him of the provinces of which he is possessed, and to hand them over to one or other of the nations interested. The Imperial East African Company is one of the organizations which, while professing great and lofty ambitions, are apparently aiming at the Equatorial Provinces and that not, by a system of concilliation alone, but by the help of rougher methods, and I fear that in pursuing their object they will bring us into antagonism with the Germans. I know that this African Company claims to be very virtuous, and is inclined to cry out "Thank God we are not as these Germans," but from a letter from the manager of the Company which I have seen I am inclined to think that their method is not altogether that of conciliation. I want to know, do the Government intend to encourage this company and other British subjects, in their attempt to acquire a large share of Central Africa. And now I come to the Nyassa Region, where there is apparently a war being carried on by subscription. Again I want to know what is the attitude of the Government in this matter. To all appearance a private company is carrying on war in the region of Lake Nyassa, and we use diplomatic influence to get arms passed to them through Portuguese territory, while an officer on the active list of Her Majesty's Army, is in command of the aggressive forces. It is said to be a war directed against slave-trading Arabs; to be a war of Christianity against slave dealers; but I believe there is another view to be taken of this matter. The other day I went to Exeter Hall—A place I do not very often go to. There there were Archbishops and Bishops, and even these are sometimes reasonable men. I heard a great deal of declamation about putting down slavery and promoting Christianity, and after that we had on the platform another gentleman, a converted captain. I naturally ex-

    1053
    pected to hear something still more fiery, but to my astonishment he turned out to be an extraordinarily fair, reasonable, moderate man. He told us that the Arabs are not so bad as they are painted, and the responsibility for the fighting does not altogether rest upon them. A confirmation of this news is given in a letter which has been published in Scotland from a responsible resident in Zanzibar, who states that the Sultan sent au agent to negotiate terms, that this agent requested that operations might be suspended for a certain time, but that the company refused to wait more than ten days, and on the eleventh day proceeded to extremities. In the first day's fighting, however, the agent of the company was wounded. If the advice which was offered had been followed, a settlement would have been more easily obtained. The situation illustrates the extreme inconvenience of the Government allowing a private war to be carried on by those over whom they have no control. I hope we shall now have some explanation of the policy of the Government. It ought to be stated whether the Government will now take the responsibility of controlling this aggressive trading company or whether the Government will announce that they will absolutely withdraw from all responsibility in the matter. And now I come to the question of South Africa—a matter which I believe rather belongs to the Colonial Office. Still, after what we heard the other day from the Prime Minister, I think we ought to have a clear and distinct statement of the policy of the Government. In regard to Bechuanaland—
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order.
    *SIR GEO. CAMPBELL: I only intend to refer to it in general terms, but it must be remembered that the late speech of Sir Hercules Robinson was to the effect that the Imperial Government had no longer any place in South Africa. I will not argue the policy.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order.
    *SIR GEO. CAMPBELL: I only wish to impress upon the Government that they should declare in general terms what their policy is. I can only say in conclusion that we had better concentrate our energies in South Africa
    1054
    and leave the rest of the Continent to other European Powers.
    DR. CAMERON: The Amendment which I have placed on the Paper refers to some of the subjects which have already been discussed, and I desire to call especial attention to the attitude of the Government in connection with the Nyassa war, but before doing so I wish to say a word or two about Samoa. Some time ago I asked a question about a British subject at Samoa being taken prisoner by a German man-of-war, and released only after strong remonstrance from the commander of a British man-of-war, and in the answer given papers were promised; but, although papers have been produced, they do not contain anything about the case. Papers of a later date than those produced in this country have been issued by the Governments of Germany and the United States. I know that the Samoan business is to be dealt with by a Congress; but still, an outrage has been committed upon a British subject, and the House and the country ought to be made aware of the precise circumstances, not for the sake of censuring Germany for a wrong which has been disowned, but in order that pressure may be brought to bear for the individual who has been wronged. With regard to the events in the Nyassa region, the attitude of the Government is one involving very great danger; at the best it is a bad precedent, and it is altogether unfair to individuals. The district has been opened up by British exploration, which has been followed by missionary settlements and the advent of a trading company, with the protection and almost with the patronage of Her Majesty's Government. When hostilities broke out there were two of our Consuls on the spot, and one of them, I believe, beat up auxiliaries for the company among the friendly tribes. The company offered, if it received a charter, to maintain a gunboat on the lake and to preserve peace and order. But the Government would not consent to operations involving the landing of troops, as a march into the interior was impracticable. It is said that the Government has intervened to get munitions of war passed through the Portuguese Customs, and yet Lord Salisbury told a deputation

    1055
    that persons out there, missionaries and traders, must rely upon themselves, and must arm for their own protection. I venture to say that this trading company has been encouraged to carry on warlike operations in Africa by the Government, and that they have consequently embarked on this filibustering warfare on their own account. Is it not a fact that the Prime Minister himself told the deputation that waited on him that the persons out there, these traders and missionaries must rely upon themselves and protect themselves by force of arms? As I look upon the matter, in the light of the law laid down in a case brought before the House by Sir Charles Dilke, any British subject who commits in any country not under a recognized Government any act of war, who shoots or kills, or does anything of that sort, is liable according to our law to the same penalty as if he committed the act on British territory. Now, I hold that the reply of the Prime Minister to the deputation was an incitement to break the law quite as much as incitements we have heard so much of in this House. Munitions of war have been sent out to carry on war, and I believe that small cannons were sent and passed through the Portuguese Customs by the intervention of our Government. But the most humiliating feature of the case, if it is true, is this. Some war rockets were required, and I believe application was made to the Foreign Office for a permit from the Portuguese Government, but the applicants were told that the Portuguese Government made so much fuss about other munitions of war sent out that they had better be sent out on the quiet. They were so sent, and they were detected by the Portuguese authorities, and the British Consul at Quilimané has absolutely been put in prison for assisting in the attempt to smuggle these rockets into the country without declaring them to the Portuguese Government. Is it true that the British Consul was imprisoned for assisting in this attempt, and that at the instance of the Home Government? If so, it is a most disgraceful thing, especially after the answer we have heard to-day that the Government have not abandoned and will not abandon their contention that the Zambesi is a navigable river. Why, if that be so, we have a right to
    1056
    send these war rockets into the interior, and we should at once have called upon the Portuguese Government to release our Consul. In any case, to allow a British Consul to go to prison for complicity in smuggling, acting as he believed according to the desire of his own Foreign Office, is a state of humiliation and degradation that I did not think the present Administration would sink to. But recently the Portuguese have gone further. They have marched into the interior and hoisted their flag in the Nyassa district, and practically have annexed it. That statement appeared in the press the other day, and I asked a question upon it, and certainly it was not denied. Now I believe there is some dispute as to the true boundary of the Portuguese sphere of influence in Central Africa, but there is no contention, I believe, that they have any right to extend their sphere of influence so high as our settlements in the Nyassa district. If there is any place in Central Africa where we have interests to guard, and where it is desirable our influence should be exercised, it is the district to which what I am saying relates. If the Portuguese had been there in sufficient force to compel the observance of law and order, to put down disturbances and outrages that have taken place there, well and good. I will not say who is to blame. I do not agree with my hon. Friends that the missionaries and trading companies are to blame; but if any civilized Government had sufficient force there to put down this irregular filibustering warfare I should welcome the annexation with pleasure. But the Portuguese annexation is purely nominal. Some years ago they took Quilimané, and they were only able to hold it against the natves by the assistance of these very trading companies whom they are now attempting to kill by closing the Zambesi river. If the Zambesi is according to International Law a navigable river it is not liable to be closed at all by any Government. Why not enforce the right of navigation? There was a hint of a gunboat being sent for. Why was it not sent for when our Consul was put in prison? I have been always a consistent advocate of a peaceful policy, but while I advocate a peaceful policy I also advocate the protection of British

    1057
    subjects abroad. The Portuguese Government cannot require much pressure. At all events my complaint is that the Government do not pursue one policy or the other. I should not object if they said to these missionaries and traders "You have no right to be there; you must clear out; you can only be allowed to defend your lives by force of arms, but you must not go beyond that, and we will not allow our Consuls and officers to take part in these warlike operations." That is an intelligent policy that might be defended. On the other hand, the Government might say we have interests to defend, and then intimate to Portugal that we must have access for means of defence to this district of Nyassa. They might insist on acting on the contention that the Zambesi is a navigable river which it is not lawful for any single nation to close against the commerce of the world. But the Government have done neither; they have refused to take any responsibility for the state of matters in the Nyassa district, and, on the other hand, they have sent their Consul and military officers there to mix themselves up in warlike operations; they have interceded with the Portuguese Government to allow offensive weapons of war to be carried inland to carry on an aggressive war—I do not mean an aggressive war for purposes of annexation, but an aggressive war carried on for strategic reasons. They have done this; they have encouraged a breach of British law and given encouragement to filibustering, and with what result? The British subjects who, with the sanction and approval of the British Government and at the incitement of the Prime Minister, are conducting these filibustering expeditions, are, in the eyes of international law, nothing but filibusters and pirates, and any civilized country exercising influence over the district would be justified in treating them as such and hanging them, and we should have no right to interfere. This is the position in which the Government have put themselves by their vacillation, by their neglect to declare the rights and wrongs of the matter by international law. Men are taking part in these filibustering expeditions without the slightest idea that they are offending
    1058
    against International Law; for when they find their actions sanctioned, as they suppose, by the Government and encouraged by the words of the Prime Minister, they naturally consider they are in the right, though from the point of view of International Law their action is wholly unjustifiable. Another course quite in accord with International Law was open to the Government. They might have given the charter asked for by the Trading Company, following the precedent set with the Niger Company, the North Borneo Company, and other companies. If they had done that we should then at least have had a recognized company recognizing their responsibility, and the Government conducting their warlike operations. But the Government refused to adopt either of these plans and their conduct has been fraught with the most serious danger. They have set a dangerous precedent, giving Government sanction to what is nothing more nor less than filibustering that may lead us into very great trouble indeed. The missions there are Presbyterian, and the people of Scotland are watching what takes place with the greatest interest. They cannot understand that there is anything wrong in conduct sanctioned by the Government, or why the Government are not taking steps to open up that navigable river so that supplies may be obtained. If anything happens to those men the Government will be held responsible. The Government have set a precedent which may land us in trouble in any part of the globe. We may be brought into conflict with interests vastly more formidable than those of Portugal. The extension of German interests has been referred to; if we get into a mess like this where German interests are concerned we shall have to eat as much humble pie as Prince Bismarck has had to at Samoa. On account of the dangerous, imbecile, almost criminal course the Foreign Office has pursued in this Lake Nyassa business, I move the reduction of £100 under the sub-head in regard to the salary of the Secretary of State.
    Motion made, and Question put, "That Item A, of £48,211 for Salaries, be reduced by £100, part of the Salary of the Secretary of State." — (Dr, Cameron.)
    *MR. BUCHANAN: This is a subject upon which my constituents take considerable interest. First I may say as regards the more general question this much. The Prime Minister in conducting affairs in Africa has not so much looked at British and Imperial interests in Africa as he has looked at what he considers will be the effect of a certain policy in Africa on our relations to certain Powers in Europe, particularly Germany. We can show this without much difficulty by a reference to the events that have taken place at Zanzibar, or the Zambesi and at Lake Nyassa. The value of discussions such as this is that they inform the Government of the opinions held in the country on this and similar subjects and it strengthens the hands of the Government in their negotiations with Foreign Powers. It is matter of regret that during the Session we have not had the opportunity of a direct and specific debate on the events that have been proceeding on the south-east coast of Africa, and are forced to take such opportunities as this to elicit such information as we can as to the present condition of affairs and the precise policy of the Government in that part of the world. The last opportunity we had was in the Debate on the Address, and then we were promised papers that should give us full information, but up to this time we are not in possession of the promised information, though much valuable information has been published by the Governments of Germany and the United States. Undoubtedly events have occurred upon which we should very much like to have information. From Zanzibar Colonel Euan Smith has been summoned home, and Mr. Portal has been sent to take his place. Colonel Euan Smith's return was ostensibly to consult with the Foreign Office as to the condition of affairs of Zanzibar and the line to be taken by the British Government there. Colonel Euan Smith, of course, has not been long back, but still we have absolutely no information as to whether there
    1060
    is necessity in the view of the Government for altering our policy at Zanzibar Further, we desire to have some information as to the course the Government intend to pursue in regard to the interests of British Indian subjects, who have settled on the South East Coast of Africa, and who suffered severely, firstly from the Portuguese at the attack on Tungi, and subsequently from the bombardment with which the German squadron visited several settlements there. I believe they claimed redress, but obtained none. It is no matter of surprise that the British Indian merchants presented a memorial to Colonel Euan Smith, which was published more than six months ago, expressing deep regret and surprise that the interests of Indian subjects who had hitherto been encouraged to settle on the coast and sink their capital in mercantile adventures there, were so little regarded at Zanzibar. We should like to hear that some steps are being taken to urge consideration of these claims. Then I should like to have some information as to the blockade of the coast which, so far as I can gather from the newspapers, seems to be almost at an end, nor should I regret if that should be the case. It has had little effect upon the Slave Trade, and it has always exposed us to the risk of serious misunderstanding with other Powers. The question of the Zambesi and Nyassa land has come more into prominence since last we discussed it. First of all there is the Portugese expedition which has been alluded to under under Lieutenant Carodoso, who has marched into the interior from Mozambique nominally on an exploring expedition, though in Lisbon and elsewhere it was quite understood it was really a filibustering and annexing expedition. We have heard, and it has not been authoritatively denied, that Lieutenant Carodoso has hoisted the Portuguese flag in the territory at the southern end of Lake Nyassa. This territory, which Lieutenant Carodoso pretends to have annexed to Portugal, is close to the access by river to the Nyassa settlements, and I would strongly urge on Her Majesty's Government to maintain the principle and the line of action enunciated by Lord Salisbury as to the

    1061
    freedom of the Zambesi. We cannot deny the Sovereignty of Portugal over the south east coast and the littoral at the mouth of the Zambesi, but it has always been matter of dispute as to how far inland the rights of Sovereignty on the part of Portugal extend. I have always understood, however, that we would never recognize any Portuguese or other Sovereignty over the important access to Nyassa district afforded by the Zambesi further inland than the Ruo River. Lord Salisbury took up this attitude six months ago, and I would most strongly urge upon Her Majesty's Government not to depart from that position. The navigation of the Zambesi is now the more important in that there has just come to hand the information that Mr. Rankin has discovered an excellent navigable channel in the Chindé which will give direct access, with much greater depth, to communicate not only with Nyassa but the North-West territories. More and more does it become incumbent on Her Majesty's Government to maintain the Zambesi and its tributaries as a free and open means of access into the interior of Africa for the flags of all nations. It is of unspeakable importance for the development of civilization and commerce. Portugal has the power of imposing certain duties on the Zambesi which I will not now argue, but the power should be strictly defined and limited and the Zambesi should be under some kind of international control such as is exercised on the Danube and elsewhere. I would urge these points on Her Majesty's Government—to keep open the Zambesi as access to the interior of Africa and to let the Portuguese know that we recognize no Sovereignty of theirs further inland than the Ruo River. In this way we shall go far to encourage, and to protect in a practical way, the British settlements in that part of the world.
    MR. MUNRO FERGUSON: On a previous occasion I pointed out that, unless some more definite policy be adopted by Her Majesty's Government in South-East Africa, there is little use in our maintaining consular relations with that part of the world.
    1062
    The question has been raised very clearly by the two speeches to which we have listened, and in fact it is a question that carries with it intense interest in Scotland. I stated on a previous occasion that the recent visit of Count Herbert Bismarck to this country, together with the circumstance of Colonel Euan Smith's recall, pointed to the fact that the position on that part of the African coast has become well nigh intolerable. As to the Anglo-German blockade, there has been an entire absence of information of late. We wish to know what has been done; how long the blockade is likely to continue; and what measure of success has up the present attended it. We are absolutely without official information on the point, and the ordinary news that comes to us does not point to any satisfactory state of matters. The action of the Germans has certainly not led to our position being any more comfortable in that part of the world. We also desire to know what is to be done when the blackade is raised—whether any useful result will come from it, and especially whether slavery will be abolished. As to the interior, some assurance is necessary that the extravagant pretensions of the Portuguese will receive at least some supervision on the part of Her Majesty's Government. Whatever civilization has penetrated into the interior of Nyassaland is due to the Scotch and English missionary societies and trading operations, and I do not recognize that the Portuguese have any claims whatever. It will require much stronger arguments than any that have yet been used to shake the faith of the people of Scotland in the fact that British interests in this quarter of the world predominate over those of any other country. The subject of the communications with South-East Africa also deserves attention, the German and French lines of steamers having been subsidized in a way which may damage our trade. What we ask for now is information, and I trust we shall have some from Her Majesty's

    1063
    Government before the discussion concludes.
    *SIR J. SWINBURNE: I should like to ask the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs what steps are being taken to open up the Zambesi to British trade and commerce. The Portuguese, who have occupied territories on the Zambesi for the last 250 years, have never developed the country but have introduced every kind of vice and disease amongst the natives under their influence in the neighbourhood. I should like to know what steps are being taken for the purpose of making the Zambesi a useful thoroughfare for our commerce.
    *MR. W. LAWRENCE: I desire to ask whether any communication has been received from the German Government with regard to the German Expedition to East Africa under Dr. Peters. It seems to me that we have already suffered not a little from the Germans on this coast, and that our interests are likely to suffer more if this expedition gets behind our settlements. Is there any arrangement between the Germans and ourselves as to this Expedition?
    COMMANDER BETHELL: I am not surprised at the interest which is taken in this matter, and I would join my voice in the appeal to the Government that they would assist the Scottish Association to which is due almost all the good which has been done in the region of Lake Nyassa. With regard to the waterway of the Zambesi, so far as I know the statement of Lord Salisbury has not been shaken in any way. I believe the waterway is to be maintained as a common waterway, and that under no circumstances will this country permit Portugal or any other country to place its hand upon the Zambesi. I apprehend that the same argument applies to the country north of the Zambesi, for it is absolutely essential to our interests
    1064
    that that part of the country should be placed either under our power or under some mutual arrangement by which we at any rate cannot be shut out from all those parts of Africa in which our interest is daily increasing. I think we have ground for complaint, too, as to the action of Her Majesty's Government in regard to the Indian traders on the coast. I have never been a strong advocate of the blockade of the coast, which I think has done no good either in respect of the slave trade or of those other matters which have been its more ostensible object. I profoundly regret that the Government has thought proper to permit the bombardment of places on the coast which has necessarily done much injury to our subjects, and for which I understand no reparation is to be made.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I have to reply to a range of observations somewhat wide. At the very commencement, I have to deal with a survey by the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy, extending if not from China to Peru, at least from the Suez Canal right round the Continent of Africa. The hon. Gentleman the member for Kirkcaldy, has taken a deep and intelligent interest in affairs connected with the Continent, and yet, although we have not for the first time to-night entered into the discussion of the subject, I am afraid that he and I are no nearer agreement. The hon. Member does not approve of the action of Her Majesty's Government, and the policy which they have pursued in relation to the affairs of the Continent of Africa, but I am able to disabuse his mind of some suspicion with regard to our policy in the Soudan. I can assure him that the declarations which Her Majesty's Government have many times made with regard to the Soudan are unchanged, and that there was no intention of encouraging, nor, so far as our influence goes, of permitting, any alteration in the policy we have supported of standing on the defensive and patiently developing the resources of Egypt. That policy has been abundantly suc-

    1065
    cessful. This country, which three years ago gave anxiety to the world because it could not fail to excite international jealousy, is now out of danger, and its financial condition, as well as that of the people, has been immensely improved. This has been the result of a policy of defence as distinguished from a policy of aggression. We have defended the frontier from attack successfully, and each time we have done so the longer interval has there been between the attacks. It is not intended on the part of Egypt to extend, or on the part of England to encourage the extention of Egyptian influence in the Soudan. The hon. Member has referred again to the policy of Her Majesty's Government in encouraging trading companies. It appears that the operations of these companies are not without success, and they seem to be the best means of spreading civilization inwards from the coast and combating and undermining the devastating effects of the slave trade. I think the policy of the Government in this matter will meet with the approval of the House, but it is only by slow and tentative measures that this influence can be extended. But when the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy speaks slightingly of the East African Company and refers to its members as Pharisees I think he does injustice to a body of men well organized and presided over by those who in other spheres of life have risen to the rank of statesmen. They have inaugurated their proceedings most prudently, and they have signalized themselves by acts of the greatest liberality. I doubt whether in the history of the world there have been acts more judicious and liberal than those the East African company have recently performed, especially that of the liberation of slaves. Reference has been made to the warlike operations at Lake Nyassa, and the hon. Member says he wonders why the policy of the Government can be to tolerate the carrying on of the operations without the sanction of the Government. Undoubtedly the state of affairs in the region of Lake Nyassa presents unprecedented difficulties, and British subjects, either influenced by enterprize in commerce or devotion to Christian missions, have penetrated into the interior if the Continent and have been carrying
    1066
    on peaceful relations of trade with the natives and exercising a civilizing influence. These men went there without the sanction or any promise on the part of the Government. Their proceedings though they began in a small way, now have become considerable, and British interests have assumed an importance which we cannot disregard and to which we are by no means insensible. The hon. Member opposite was mistaken in saying that the establishment of these interests have been due solely to Scotch-men. He has forgotten the English Universities Mission which has penetrated to the eastern shore of Lake Nyassa. When questions have been asked with regard to the position of these commercial and missionary undertakings, and what Her Majesty's Government propose to do in view of the dangers to which these English subjects are exposed from the slave trading Arabs on the one hand and the Portuguese on the other, I have been obliged to point out that Her Majesty's Government are unable to accept what are commonly called military responsibilities in respect of a position from which they would not communicate from any settled base. Again, it was pointed out that we had sent an English Consul to represent English law and to act as a Magistrate at the Lakes, and that we should at least furnish him with an armed steam launch, I was compelled to say that even the smallest amount the British Force once placed in any district would involve great difficulty, because wherever the British flag flies it cannot be allowed to suffer defeat. It is a serious thing to undertake responsibilities which may involve an expedition of great magnitude, and perhaps the loss of more lives than were originally threatened. If we have learnt one lesson from past events in Abyssinia and the Soudan, it is that we should not undertake any responsibility without being prepared to follow it up to the fullest extent to which events may lead us, and above all to look at the possible results before we undertake anything. It is in that view that I, whilst feeling the deepest interest in this question as a Scotchman and from other points of view, am obliged to declare that Her Majesty's Government cannot assume responsibility for any

    1067
    military operations. It has been said that the Prime Minister encouraged a deputation which waited on him to undertake unauthorized warlike operations, but I am sure the Prime Minister did no such thing. He pointed out that these people must defend themselves, and that they must all have read with pride how a handful of English, supported by some natives, have held their own in the midst of warlike Arabs. The Prime Minister did not tell them to turn tail and abandon all they had undertaken, and I do not think those who waited on the noble Lord would have expected him to give any such advice.
    DR. CAMERON: What I have advanced is that if you give them a Royal charter they will undertake to do the whole thing.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: It would be a serious thing to give a Royal charter—to give the sanction of the British flag to this undertaking. In those places in Africa where a charter has been given the country is accessible to the sea where Her Majesty's cruizers are seen and whence support, if necessary, can be given to Her Majesty's subjects; but to give a charter to what has been called a filibustering expedition into the heart of Africa would be a rash and hazardous undertaking which could hardly be defended in this House. As to the Portuguese who have marched to Lake Nyassa, we have said to them, "We cannot view with indifference any act which would endanger our settlements in the interior," and we have denied to them shadowy rights in a territory in which they have previously exercised no authority. We have said that we cannot view with indifference injury to the prosperity of our people in regions where the Portuguese have not exercised sovereignty, do not possess a protectorate and do not now undertake it. But I do not take it that any hon. Member objects to the Portuguese going into the interior of Africa so far as they can legitimately extend their colonization. Several hon. Members have referred to the Zambesi, as a
    1068
    navigable river over which we have the right of transit. That declaration has been made over and over again. I am glad to know that the existence of a navigable mouth of the Zambesi has been affirmed, as it will considerably alter our position in regard to that river by largely extending our facilities for utilizing it. Reference has been made to the difficulty which has hitherto been experienced in ascending the Zambesi, and to the unreasonable obstacles created by the Portuguese. Up to the present time sea-borne cargoes could not be carried up that river in the vessels arriving there; there has always been a land portage over a considerable number of miles in the Portuguese territory. If, therefore, a navigable mouth of the river has been discovered, that circumstance will prove to be of the utmost importance, because, having asserted for ourselves the right to navigate that river—
    DR CLARK: Free from tax?
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: That is a question which I cannot answer off-hand. Merchants have made no complaint of the transit duty of 3 per cent, and reasonable Customs duties may be necessary. The hon. Member for the College Division of Glasgow has made some reference to circumstance with which I am not acquainted, with respect to smuggling by the African Lake Company.
    DR. CAMERON: I must correct the right hon. Baronet. The African Lake Company sent a deputation to the Foreign Office to ask them to obtain permission from the Portuguese Government to send war rockets to our countrymen up the country; but the Foreign Office said they had had trouble with that Government, and recommended that the rockets should be smuggled in.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I am sure the Foreign Office never recommended smuggling.
    DR. CAMERON: I will ask a question on the subject.
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: And I shall be very glad to answer it; but I deny that the Government have been a party

    1069
    to any filibustering expedition. The Government have always strongly discouraged any aggressive warfare; but in 1887, when honest Englishmen, with their wives and families, were doing nothing but good, were attacked and in danger of massacre, no one could say that our Consul, Mr. O'Neill, did any more than his duty in giving them all the help he could. What would any man have said of him if he bad not done so? It was a position of great difficulty for which, perhaps, there is no precedent, but there was no other course which, in the circumstances, he could have pursued. While we warned these people that we could not give them material assistance, we did not deny them the means of defending themselves. As for their making attacks, it should be borne in mind that sometimes the best defence was for people to attack their enemies before they were themselves beleagured. These men have done nothing unworthy of British subjects. On the contrary, they have displayed great heroism, and Her Majesty's Government would have been insensible to their duty if they had not assisted them as far as they legitimately could. With regard to the operations on the East Coast of Africa, the Member for West Edinburgh declared that the Government had neglected the interests of British subjects on that coast. That is far from being the case. Undoubtedly it is a matter of the deepest regret that there should have been any disturbances and collisions on that coast to endanger the peaceful operations of commerce. It is, unhappily, true that great numbers of British subjects who were carrying on a prosperous trade have been seriously injured or even ruined by the disturbances. For those disturbances Her Majesty's Government are in no way responsible. We did all we could by warning them of the intended danger, and by removing them in order to prevent their suffering more loss. The Member for West Edinburgh has asked what the results of the blockade are, and what there is to show for all this expenditure and suffering. The blockade was undertaken on the invitation of the German Government, and I ask now, as I have asked before, "How
    1070
    could we decline to take part in a blockade which was intended to further objects in which we have long been interested?" The joint action of the two Governments has put down the seaboard slave trade to a much greater extent than hitherto. Had we abstained from joining the Germans, I do not think it would have been better for the people of that coast, while undoubtedly there would have been a want of that harmony of action which is more than ever desirable. It is most desirable that this semi-warlike state of things should cease. It is most desirable that we should have a police on the coast, whereby the sources of the trade may be dried up, and that we may no longer have to apply the poor remedy of catching a few stray traders on the sea, and so that we may no longer see these poor people dragged from their homes and sold into slavery. What I desire to say to the House, without going through all the speculations, is that it must not be supposed that such operations, conducted by two such powers as the Empires of Germany and England, can cease without some permanent measures being taken of a stronger character, both to check this trade and to put us in a better position to prevent it in future. It is manifest that it would have been futile to have kept so many ships of war occupying this part of the coast, catching a few slave-traders, if we were to abandon the blockade without having taken some permanent measures to render much more unlikely the recurrence both of slave trading and the barbarous circumstances attending it. We have to act not alone, but in harmony with our allies, and I can only ask the Committee to extend to us the same confidence which has hitherto been enjoyed by the Government of all hands, knowing that there must be occasion to exercise the patience, indulgence, and sympathies of the country.
    MR. BUCHANAN: I wish to call the attention of the right hon. Baronet to the papers that were promised.
    *SIR LEWIS PELLY: I was not in the House when the hon. Member opposite characterized the British East African Company as Pharisees.
    SIR G. CAMPBELL: No, I did not.
    *SIR L. PELLY: I understood the Under Secretary for Foretgn Affairs to say so. Well, Sir, I think the nature of the enterprize itself, and the names of the gentlemen engaged in that enterprize, are sufficient answer. I pass by the imputation in silence. I desire to endorse every word that has fallen from the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in respect of the East African Company, and I am glad to say that, owing to the tact and ability of Her Majesty's Consul General (Colonel Euan Smith), and the great administrative ability shown by Mr. Geo. Mackenzie, matters on the coast have gone on far better than we could have expected. No doubt we may possibly have a difficulty or two, for even under the best Governments difficulties must arise. But as matters are we are content, and we have to thank Her Majesty's Government and to acknowledge that they have given us all impartial support, having regard to the claims and international duties which devolve upon them. If I might add one word at this late hour, I would say that the company would very urgently ask the attention of Her Majesty's Government to the necessity of keeping up a good steam communication between the East Coast and England. We believe such communication to be most essential in the interests of the trade and of the general political condition along that coast.
    DR. CLARK: I regretted very much to hear the speech of the right hon. Baronet the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs. I thought that the Government were really prepared to do something to solve this Nyassa-Zambesi problem. But we have a policy of blowing hot and cold, and the great policy of drift and do nothing, which has done very much harm, and, possibly, when blood has been shed, the Government will move. On the South-East African problem a great deal depends. I am now speaking of that lake which was discovered by a Scotchman, and was opened up and settled by Scotchmen, who formed a Scotch Trading Company. These men went there doing good on every hand and no
    1072
    harm to anyone. They have been developing trade and widening the civilization of the native African tribes. But certain of the tribes come from the East, and they take the natives from under the care of the missionaries; they burn down villages, and they take away men and women and carry them down to the coast. The missionaries and the Company defend the people round about them, and there is an unauthorized war going on between British subjects, who may be captured when they come south by the Portuguese. Because it is simply piracy, this work that is being carried on. This Company have their trade upon the Shury river and the Zambesi river, and the Portuguese Government have prevented them carrying on their trade on these two rivers. Now, what the Company has done has been to open up a new way into the interior of Africa. They have opened up the Stevenson route by Lake Nyassa to Tanganyika; and the Government may give them protection, not by landing an army, but by having a gunboat on the lake. That is all that is required. If you want to stop the Slave trade, if you have steamers on the coast and on the Red Sea, well then you ought to have a gunboat on Lake Nyassa, because that would stop the traffic across the lake, and more slaves pass that way than over the Red Sea or any other route. You can legalize the position of the Company by giving them a Charter. You are giving Charters to some other companies who are doing nothing at all. Here is a company developing the resources of the country, and who want a legalized position, and you refuse them a Charter. If they are doing good on every hand, and no harm to anyone, give them a Charter, and then they will not run the risk of being hanged when they come to Portuguese territory. But you are not prepared to take any one of these courses. You are simply letting things drift. As regards the free navigation of the Zambesi, I suppose it is now a British river, and you ought to open up the country. The Zambesi ought not to be Portuguese. I think the Government should do something in this matter and should adopt some definite policy. They might either protect this Scottish Association,

    1073
    by having a gunboat on Lake Nyassa, or they might compel them to retire, or they might legalize their position by granting them a Charter.
    DR. CAMERON: My complaint against the Government is that they have allowed this unauthorized warfare by private subscription to be carried on and to drag its weary length along without any prospect of bringing it to a termination. I do not complain that they have adopted this or that policy, but I do complain that they have encouraged a breach of British law and that they have allowed to go on an irregular warfare, and I want to know what steps they now intend to take in regard to it. There are three courses which may be taken in regard to the Zambesi operations. Either the Government should order British subjects to confine themselves to defensive operations, or warn them that if they do not do so they must expect no support from the British Government, or they should give the company the Charter which they have applied for and in reference to the grant of which they said they would be willing in the event of obtaining it to maintain a gunboat on Lake Nyassa, and would thus be able to restore law and order and put down the slave trade in the district. I do not find fault with the conduct of the missionaries and traders, for I contend that they have acted with the encouragement of the Prime Minister, on whom the responsibility will rest.
    MR. MUNRO FERGUSON: I want to have a clear understanding on the question of the navigation of the Zambesi. Are we to understand that the Portuguese Government will be allowed to fix what transit rates they please on this river?
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I have referred to the position of trade up the Zambesi river when it has to be carried by land, and I have stated that when it has to pass through Portuguese territory there will be no ground of complaint if the Portuguese Government confine their customs dues to moderate Transit Duties. If the Zambesi is found to be navigable from the sea up to the rapids
    1074
    and shallows, that will be a novel state of things which will have to be governed by circumstances. I may say that Her Majesty's Government have claimed the right to free navigation of the Zambesi by vessels flying their national flag. I therefore hope that that is a sufficient answer to the question. With regard to Dr. Peters's Expedition, it is not recognized by the Government of Germany, and the East African Company has declined to allow it to pass through its territory. The Expedition seems to have been a rather ill-considered project; and certainly it is undesirable that Expeditions which are not duly authorized, and which have an undetermined object, should pass through their territory. The desire of the Government is, as far as they can consistently with the rights of other nations, to defend and protect the rights of this country.
    *SIR J. SWINBURNE: I wish to ask what steps are to be taken to open the Zambesi to British trade and commerce?
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: Inquiries are being made with regard to the discovery of a navigable mouth. If a practicable mouth is found, a vessel will be sent up the river, and will, I hope, be the precursor of many others.
    *SIR J. SWINBURNE: I should also like to ask whether, if only a small mouth is discovered, the Government will undertake to open the river to British commerce?
    *SIR J. FERGUSSON: I can make no such promise if only a small mouth is found. If, on the contrary, a navigable mouth exists, the Government will certainly claim that the river shall be open to British commerce.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 84; Noes 198.—(Div. List, No. 92.)
    Original Question put, and agreed to.
    Resolution to he reported to-morrow, at Two of the clock; Committee to sit again to-morrow at Two of the clock.

  OFFICIAL SECRETS BILL (No. 97.)
  Order read for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [16th April], "That the Bill be now read the third time."?
  Question again proposed.
  Debate resumed.
  DR. CAMERON: I rise to move the re-committal of the Bill. I wish to point out that the Bill is drawn in such a way as to catch in the net of criminal legislation a great number of persons whom it is not intended should be included. The Bill provides that if any man in a Government office disclose an official secret contrary to the rules of the office—which by the way may be modified and altered at any time without the cognizance of the House—he shall be liable to certain penalties. But if any official should give information on certain subjects to Members of this House he would bring himself under the Act, because the very giving of the information would be against the rules of the office. I understand the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite is willing to modify the Bill in that respect. But there is another part of the Bill which is equally objectionable. The hon. Member for Crewe has pointed out how inventions may be pirated, and in fact we know how in the Post Office certain telegraphic inventions are pirated.
  *THE SPEAKER: Order, order!
  It being midnight, the debate stood adjourned. Dabate to be resumed upon Monday next.

  PUBLIC LIBRARIES ACT (1855) AMENDMENT BILL. (No. 82.)

    THIRD READING.
    MR. MACINNES: I understand that my hon. Friend in charge of the Bill has no objection to the Amendment that stands on the Paper in my name if the Government do not object to it.
    Amendment proposed,
    Clause 1, page 1, line 21, after "nursery grounds," insert "or the occupier of any land covered with water or used only as a canal or towing-path for the same, or as a railway constructed under the powers of any Act of Parliament for public conveyance."—(Mr. Mac Lines.)
    *MR. RITCHIE: No, Sir; it is quite impossible for the Government to accept this Amendment, because it would alter the existing state of the law, which renders property now exempt liable for these particular rates. No doubt there is considerable difference as to the way in which property of this kind is assessed
    1076
    for various purposes, and it may very possibly be that there is some ground for reviewing the whole circumstances of the case. But this is not a Bill for that purpose, and the Government could not consent to any alterations of the general law in reference to the question of rating in this Bill.
    MR. MAC INNES: I beg to withdraw the Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    MR. H. GARDNER: I wish to move, as an Amendment, in line 7 to omit the words from "and" to "parishes."
    Amendment proposed, line 7, to omit the words from "and" to "parishes."
    Amendment put, and agreed to.
    MR. H. GARDNER: I beg to move that the Bill be read a third time.
    Motion made, "That the Bill be now read a third time."—(Mr. H. Gardner).
    MR. BRUNNER: I am glad to hear from the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Ritchie) that he is aware that the law with regard to public libraries still requires amendment, in spite of the efforts of my hon. Friend. The question of rating deserves his attention. The rating of agricultural land is in a very anomalous condition under the Public Libraries Act. In some cases it is rated to the full value, in some to a third of the value, and in others to a fourth. The fear of preventing the passage of the Bill has prevented me moving an Amendment in that direction, but I trust the matter will receive the right hon. Gentleman's attention.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Bill read third time, and passed.

    SMALL HOLDINGS COMMITTEE.
    Ordered, That Mr. Cobb be discharged from the Select Committee on Small Holdings.
    Ordered, That Mr. Seale-Hayne be added to the Committee.—(Mr. Arnold Morley.)
    House adjourned at ten minutes after Twelve o'clock.

Preamble
The Earl of Lucan—took the Oath.
LEE-ON-THE·SOLENT (LIGHT) RAILWAY BILL.
Order of the Day for Second Reading read, and discharged. The Chairman of Committees informed the House that the promoters do not intend to proceed further with the Bill. Ordered that the Bill be not further proceeded with.
LEE-ON-THE·SOLENT (LIGHT) RAILWAY BILL.
  SALE OF GOODS BILL [No. 49].
  A Bill for codifying the law relating to the sale of goods—Was presented by The Lord Herschell; read 1a; and to be printed.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS BILL.
Read 2a (according to order), and committed to a Committee of the whole House on Monday next.
ELEMENTARY EDUCATION PROVISIONAL ORDER CONFIRMATION (ACTON, &c) BILL [No. 19].
House in Committee (according to Order); Bill reported without Amendment; and to be read 3a to-morrow.
HORSEFLESH (SALE FOR FOOD) BILL [No. 41].

  SECOND READING.
  *EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, I have to ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading to this Bill, which has come up from the other House. The title is not a very ornamental one, but the subject is one which seriously
  962
  affects a large number of people. The object of the Bill is to provide that no person shall buy horseflesh under any misconception as to the nature of what he is purchasing. It is drawn on the lines of the Act which passed your Lordship's House some years ago and became law—the Act known as the Margarine Act. So far as it is possible to legislate upon matters so dissimilar as horseflesh and margarine, the Bill follows on the lines of the Margarine Act. Another portion of this Bill is taken from the unsound meat clauses of the Public Health Act, which have been found a great protection to the purchaser, and have been a very useful means of preserving the health of the community. I believe it is now rather more than forty years ago since the question was first mooted of the consumption of horseflesh as an article of human food. In 1847 the first steps were taken in Berlin to bring horseflesh as an article of food for the community. I am told that horseflesh is by no means unpalatable, and that it possesses certain qualities which are agreeable to the taste of many persons. Whether that is so or not, I think your Lordships will agree that those who intend to buy what is ordinarily known as butcher's meat, ought not to have palmed off upon them, at the price of butcher's meat, meat which is really horseflesh. I need not go into the chemical question as to the component parts of horseflesh; but I may simply say this, that whatever the peculiarities of taste may be which makes horseflesh differ from ordinary butcher's meat, a very simple test will show whether it is horseflesh or not, for the specific gravity of the chemical constituents of the fat of horseflesh is

  963
  such that it is very easy indeed to place beyond all doubt whether the meat in question is horseflesh or not. I am told that in certain cases the vendors of horseflesh remove the fat from horseflesh, and substitute the fat of beef or mutton for the fat that properly belongs to horseflesh. We know that various trades have their various tricks, and we need not go into that closely. But what I want to point out to your Lordships is that it is a very serious grievance that one class of meat should be foisted upon the unsuspecting purchaser for another. The feeling on this subject is very great in those places where the attention of the public has been called to it. In Lancashire, in Manchester and in Salford, I am told, there is a great consumption of horseflesh. A few years ago, the price paid by the Manchester Zoological Gardens for the carcase of a horse was only 25s. I am told now that from some mysterious cause or another the price of horseflesh has risen, and the directors of the Manchester Zoological Gardens, instead of buying their carcases for 25s., have to pay no less a sum than £3. I think that shows a considerable alteration of the conditions under which horseflesh is sold. No one can wish that this traffic should be carried on surreptitiously, and that innocent purchasers should be induced to purchase horseflesh thinking it good, sound. wholesome beef. The Bill will not in any way interfere with proper traffic. There is no desire whatever to interfere with the sale of horseflesh. All the desire is, that horseflesh when sold shall be sold as horseflesh, and not sold as anything else. Power is, therefore, given to the medical officer to apply to the Justices of the Peace for a search warrant where he has reason to believe horseflesh is being sold as beef. I understand that it was stated at a banquet held in London in 1868, that there were 75,000 horses which were annually wasted through not being consumed as human food. I think it is quite possible that under proper restrictions the sale of horseflesh may be developed, and it may become a proper article of consumption for the public; but it must be done in a manner open and without fraud, and not so as to delude the innocent purchaser into the belief that he is buying that
  964
  which he is not supplied with. Moreover, I have been looking up to this time to the question merely from the consumer's point of view, but I think something should be said from the tradesman's point of view. It is very hard that an honest butcher who is selling butcher's meat should be undersold by those who sell horseflesh, who are able, of course, to undersell him, and interfere very seriously with his sale of beef. It is desirable to put the trade under such proper restrictions as, without interfering with the convenience of the public, will secure the genuineness of the article sold, and also take care that the honest trader is not placed at a disadvantage. I am informed that in a very few days a petition has been got up, not to your Lordships, but to the other House of Parliament, signed by 23,000 people, who are aggrieved at the conditions under which the trade is carried on. I need not mention the localities, but I understand that in a very few days this petition, signed by 23,000 people, was got up and presented to the House of Commons in support of this Bill. The restrictions contained in this Bill are, as I have said, copied from the Margarine Act so far as they are capable of application. The first clause provides that no one is to sell or to offer for sale any horseflesh except in a place which is to be registered for that purpose, and he shall have in a conspicuous position over his shop or stall words indicating that horseflesh is sold there. The second clause, borrowed in the main from the Margarine Act, provides that any purchaser purchasing horseflesh unless he asks for horseflesh shall be supplied with a label of a certain size and so forth, so that he may know exactly what he has bought. Clause 3 provides that the Medical Officer or Inspector of Nuisances, or any other officer of the Local Authority acting under proper instructions, may at all reasonable times examine any meat that he has reason to believe is horseflesh. That is taken from the Unsound Meat Clauses of the Public Health Act which have worked exceedingly well. Then follows Clause 4, which enables Justices of the Peace to grant a warrant on the application of the Medical Officer of Health. Clause 5 provides for the disposal of the horseflesh which has been seized under the

  965
  foregoing clauses, and the remaining clauses are really unimportant. My Lords, I think I have shown that legislation is required for the protection not merely of the consumer, but also of the honest tradesman; and I also think I have shown that the Clauses are copied from similar Clauses, which have been found by experience reasonable and suitable, and therefore I hope your Lordships will now give a Second Reading to this Bill.
  LORD LAMINGTON: My Lords, I do not rise for the purpose of making any objection to the second reading of this Bill, which is practically similar to one which I introduced last year called the Foreign Meat Bill. That Bill, consisting of one clause only, insisted upon any butcher who sold foreign or colonial meat putting distinctly on a board that the meat sold was foreign. I withdrew that Bill last year because the noble Lord at the head of the Government promised that a similar Bill should be introduced this Session by the Government. [The Marquess of SALISBURY expressed dissent.] I certainly understood that such a promise was made, and I am sorry to hear that I am mistaken and that no Bill of the kind will be introduced by the Government. However, the principle of this Bill (and it was also the principle of the Margarine Act) is that people ought not to be deluded into purchasing something other than that which they think they are purchasing.
  *VISCOUNT TORRINGTON: On behalf of Her Majesty's Government it is not my intention to oppose the second reading of this Bill. As I understand its principle, it is, shortly, that a purchaser who buys meat as butcher's meat should be protected against having horseflesh palmed off upon him.
  LORD HERSCHELL: I do not intend to vote against the second reading, but I would like to point out to your Lordships that in some respects the Bill will need revision. For instance, by Clause 6 it is provided that—
  "In any proceedings against any person for offending against the provisions of this Act, it shall not be necessary to prove that any horseflesh which may have been sold, offered, exposed, or kept for sale, was intended for human food; but the onus of proving that any such horseflesh was not intended for human food shall rest with such person."
  Now, if I rightly understand that Sec-
  966
  tion, a cats'-meat man who sells horseflesh would be bound to prove that he sells it not for human consumption.
  LORD THRING: I think that in some clauses the measure is too stringent. For instance, one of the provisions is that anyone selling horseflesh for human food must supply the purchaser with a label on which shall be printed in legible letters, not less than an inch in length, "horseflesh;" and by Clause 6 a trader who does not comply with that provision is liable to a penalty "not exceeding £20." The Bill will require examination on this and other points in Committee.
  Bill read 2a according to order.
  *EARL BEAUCHAMP: I beg to move that the Bill be committed to a Committee of the whole House.
  THE PRIME MINISTER AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (the Marquess of SALISBURY): After what has been said upon the Second Reading, it seems to me that this is a Bill which should go to one of the Standing Committees. Perhaps the noble Earl will agree to its going to the Standing Committee for General Bills.
  *EARL BEAUCHAMP: The only reason for my wishing to refer it to a Committee of the whole House is that we have no knowledge whatever when the Standing Committees are going to meet. The question is a pressing one, and, unless it is clear that the Bill would be considered by a Standing Committee within a reasonable time, I would prefer that your Lordships should bring your collective wisdom to bear upon it in Committee of the whole House, so that the Bill may become law before Whitsuntide.
  THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I understand that the Chairmen of the Standing Committees will meet shortly to make provision for the despatch of the business before them. There is no such hurry as the noble Earl seems to suppose for passing the Bill, because, judging from the state of affairs in the House of Commons, they are not likely to be waiting for the noble Earl to send them business.
  THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY: I really think that, although it is very undesirable that horseflesh should be sold fraudulently as butcher's meat, and although it may be very wise to

  967
  legislate upon the subject, there cannot be any extraordinary urgency about the matter; and I therefore beg to move that the Bill be referred to the Standing Committee for General Bills.
  *EARL BEAUCHAMP: I will not trouble your Lordships to divide.
  Bill committed to the Standing Committee for General Bills.

TRUST COMPANIES BILL. (No. 10.)
Committed to the Standing Committee for Bills relating to Law, &c
House adjourned at a quarter before Five o'clock, till To-morrow, a quarter past Ten o'clock.