Sitting of 28 January 1897

STANDING ORDERS.
Ordered, that the Select Committee on Standing Orders do consist of thirteen Members:—Mr. Buchanan, Sir William Coddington, Mr. John Edward Ellis, Sir Thomas Esmonde, Sir Edward Gourley, Mr. Halsey, Mr. Humphreys-Owen, Mr. James Lowther, Sir John Lubbock, Sir John Mowbray, Mr. William Redmond, Sir Mark Stewart, and Mr. Whitmore were accordingly nominated Members of the Committee.—(Sir John Mowbray.)
SELECTION.
Ordered, that the Committee of Selection do consist of eleven Members:—Mr. Sydney Buxton, Sir John Dorington, Sir William Hart Dyke, Dr. Farquharson, Mr. Halsey, Mr. Justin McCarthy, Sir George Osborne Morgan, Mr. Philip Stanhope, Mr. Wharton, Mr. Wodehouse and the Chairman of the Select Committee on Standing Orders were accordingly nominated Members of the Committee.—(Sir John Mowbray.)
QUESTIONS.

  CANADA AND AUSTRALASIA (CABLE).
  SIR GEORGE BADEN-POWELL: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Conference on the telegraph cable to connect the Canadian Dominion with the Australasian Colonies has concluded its labours; and whether any approximate date can be given at which their Report can be presented to Parliament?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. J. CHAMBERLAIN,): The Committee has made its Report, but as that Report will be the subject of confidential discussions between her Majesty's Government and the representatives of the Colonial Governments, no date can at present be given for its presentation to Parliament.

  BIRTH CERTIFICATES.
  MR. E. BOULNOIS: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury why any person residing or having offices within the registration limits of the metropolis who may desire to procure a certificate of birth must suffer the inconvenience and loss of time of a personal application by himself or on his behalf while those who do not, live within that area can obtain one through the post; and whether the procedure can be altered so as to relieve dwellers in London from this disability?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,): I have communicated with the Registrar General, and he states that the Registration Acts make no provision for searching or obtaining Certificates at the General Register Office by means of correspondence. The imperfect information possessed by applicants renders such procedure often difficult and sometimes impossible. Nevertheless, as a matter of grace, the Registrar General assists the public on the point, as far as possible. When fairly clear information is given, he causes searches to be made and certificates furnished on application through the post from the provinces, but these
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  applications through the post add very much to the work of the office, which could not be carried on with the present staff if certificates were supplied generally through the post. The Registrar General finds it absolutely necessary, in order to prevent the obstruction of official business, that applicants within a reasonable distance of the General Register Office shall attend, or employ some one to attend personally, as contemplated in Section 37 of the 6 and 7 Will. IV., chap. 86.

  WOOL SORTING.
  SIR CHARLES DILKE: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether a Departmental Committee reported last year that wool sorting-should be scheduled as a dangerous trade: whether special rules have been framed for the trade; and whether any information upon the subject can be made public for consideration in the West Riding.
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY,): A recommendation that wool sorting should be certified as a dangerous trade was made last year by a Departmental Committee, and it was so certified accordingly. Special rules were at once prepared, but suggestions were made by the workmen at the eleventh hour requiring further investigations by the Committee which were only recently completed. The rules are now in the printer's hands, and will be ready for issue shortly; they will be served in the usual course upon the occupiers of works in which hair or wool (other than British wool) is sorted.

  HOUSEBREAKING (LIVERPOOL ASSIZES).
  MR. H. SETON-KARR: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) in view of the following facts, namely, that one Hugh Beattie was, on 17th November, 1896, convicted at Liverpool Assizes of breaking and entering a dwelling-house at Rainhill on 8th August, 1895, and sentenced to five years' penal servitude, and that one John Brady was previously

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  convicted and sentenced for the same offence, and that there are now two prisoners suffering punishment for the offence of which, on the evidence of the prosecution in Brady's case, only one can possibly be guilty, whether he proposes to take any, and what, steps in the matter; and (2) whether it is the fact that John Brady was convicted on the uncorroborated testimony of a single witness, and that Beattie, who subsequently pleaded guilty to the same offence, swore on his oath that Brady-was not concerned in the robbery, and that he, Beattie, committed it alone and and unassisted.
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: The statement of facts in the first paragraph of the Question is not quite complete. It should be added that Beattie pleaded guilty at the same time to six other indictments as well as the one referred to. As regards the second paragraph, it is not the fact that Brady was convicted on the uncorroborated testimony of one witness, other facts being proved at the trial which, in the opinion of the learned Judge, strongly confirmed the witness in question. After making most careful inquiries into the case, and consulting the Judge—who finds nothing in what has occurred subsequently to the trial to make him doubt that the prisoner Brady was properly convicted—I have come to the conclusion that there is no ground for any interference on my part.

  BOAT ACCIDENTS (ROYAL NAVY).
  MR. GIBSON BOWLES: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he can state how-many accidents to boats of Her Majesty's ships of war attended by loss of life took place during the year 1890, and how many lives were lost in all by these accidents; and whether he can also state if inquiry was held in each case to ascertain the cause of the accident, and can inform the House what the cause was in each case?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (Mr. G. J. GOSCHEN,): There were three accidents to boats of Her Majesty's ships attended with loss of life in 1896. An inquiry was held in each case. I cannot within the limits of an answer
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  across the floor of the House give the history of each case. Two were under oars and one under sail in a regatta. I would remind the hon. Member that there are 300 ships in commission, not to speak of those commissioned for the manœuvres, involving an enormous amount of boat work under all conditions of weather, and that the officers and men of the fleet cannot but resent the prominence given to these very rare accidents without any reference to the magnitude of the services safely performed.

  PARCELS POST (SWITZERLAND).
  COLONEL MILWARD (Warwick,: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether his attention has been directed to the clause in the new Agreement as to the Parcel Post between this country and Switzerland, by which it is declared that in fixing the rate of postage for parcels 2 francs 35 cents is to be considered the equivalent of 2s., and 2 francs 85 cents the equivalent of 2s. 5d., whereas, by the current rate of exchange, the sums should be 1s. 10½d. and 2s. 3d. respectively; and, will he explain what is the reason for this additional charge upon the British as compared with the Swiss public for precisely the same service?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. R. W. HANBURY,): Owing to the difference both in the currency and in the weights of this country and Switzerland, it is not practicable to fix precisely the same charge for the same service in both directions. For example, the postage of 2s. referred to by the hon. Member covers the conveyance to Switzerland of a parcel weighing 7 lb.; whereas the highest weight transmissible from Switzerland to this country for the corresponding sum of 2 francs 35 cents is 3 kilogrammes, or only 6 lb. 9 oz., and for a 7 lb. parcel 2 francs 85 cents would have to be paid. In the case of parcels sent at the lowest postage in the scale, the advantage to the English sender is considerable; for, the postage being practically identical in both countries, a weight of 13 oz. more can be sent for the same money from England to Switzer land than is transmissible in the opposite direction. The fact is that parcels of

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  under 7 lb. weight can be sent a little more cheaply from England to Switzerland than from Switzerland to England, while with parcels of over 7 lb. the opposite is true.

  ARMENIAN REFUGEE KILLED IN LONDON.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSON: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether an Armenian refugee has been kicked to death by a crowd in Bermondsey; and, whether any special precautions are considered necessary for the protection of these foreigners while in London?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: It is, unhappily, the case that an Armenian has died from an internal injury caused by a kick which he received in the streets. The facts appear to be these. He had gone out for a walk with another Armenian, and a number of lads, attracted by the oddness of their costume, set upon them in rough horseplay, eventually throwing the one down and, it is said, kicking him, while the other escaped. It appears that he then made his way back to the shelter where he was staying, and, complaining of internal pains—there were no external marks of violence visible—was taken to a hospital, where he was discovered, after his death, to have been suffering from a ruptured spleen. The police lost no time in taking action, and are doing their utmost to capture the principal offender. ["Hear, hear!"] There is no reason whatever to suppose that the fact of his being an Armenian had anything to do with the assault—[cheers]—and I do not think that any special protection is required for these foreigners. ["Hear, hear!"]
  MR. JAMES O'KELLY: Will any indemnity be paid?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: That is a question I am not prepared to answer at present.

  TREASON-FELONY PRISONER (DUFF.)
  MR. PATRICK OBRIEN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the present mental condition of the man Duff, one of the treason-felony prisoners
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  removed from Portland Prison to Broad-moor Criminal Lunatic Asylum, and whether there is any hope of his recovering his mind?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: The prisoner, John Duff, is still suffering from delusions, and his mental state shows no sign of improving. Except, however, on subjects connected with his delusions he converses rationally. I should add that Duff was convicted of manslaughter, and is not one of the treason-felony prisoners.

  LIGHT LOCOMOTIVES ACT. TRACTION ENGINES.
  MR. A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWEN: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board if he will explain why no decision has yet been arrived at on the application made by several makers of traction engines to the Board to have new patterns of wheels legalised under the Light Locomotives Act of last year; and whether, although a considerable time has elapsed since this application was made, and considering the damage alleged to be done, especially on pavements, by the only existing legal pattern, the Board will legalise some improved pattern or patterns as soon as possible?
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: The Local Government Board have as yet only received applications for approval of one particular pattern of wheel under the Light Locomotives Act of last Session. The Board were anticipating that they would receive several applications of this character, and proposed to defer their Inquiry in to the subject until the different applications could be considered together. If, however, within a short period no further applications are made to the Board, they will proceed to consider the question as regards the one application which they have before them.

  BOG SLIDE (KERRY).
  MR. JAMES ROCHE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether, having regard to the extensive destruction of property resulting from the recent bog slide in the county of Kerry, whereby numbers of people have been reduced to a condition of complete destitution,

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  he will direct, after due inquiry in to the state of the case, that funds be provided for their relief either by the Congested Districts Board or by the Government?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,): The Congested Districts Board took a very early opportunity of considering to what extent they could help in remedying the results of the disaster referred to in the question, and they have received special reports on the matter which were considered at a special meeting held on the 27th inst. One of the results of the bog slide is that a ford over which carts used to pass has been swept away and the bed of the river lowered at the place by from 3ft. to 4ft. The Board hope to erect a bridge to take the place of the ford and to repair the injury done to the road at each side of the ford. A limestone quarry, owned by the Earl of Kenmare, at which about twelve men have been usually employed, has been partially filled by the peat How. The Board would be prepared to contribute towards the cost of opening or reopening a quarry in the neighbourhood, provided that it can be shown that such an attempt can be brought to a successful issue, and that the farmers of the surrounding congested districts will be supplied with limestone on advantageous terms. As regards clearing the lands at present covered with peaty matter, the Board would, in the interests of agriculture, consider what support might be given by them towards carrying out any well-considered scheme that may be submitted to them.

  NEWRY BOARD OF GUARDIANS.
  MR. J. P. FARRELL: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether it has come to his knowledge that the Local Government Board for Ireland has issued a writ against four Members of the Newry Board of Guardians for £21 6s. paid by the guardians to Philip M'Govern, of Glan, county Cavan, for services rendered in treating four patients sent to him as an hydrophobia specialist by the Board; and whether it is according to law for the Board to endeavour to recover by judgment in the Superior Courts a sum which they were compelled
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  to pay by the judgment of the County Court?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The Local Government Board have issued a writ against the Newry Board of Guardians, specially naming four members, for the recovery of a sum of money paid by the Guardians to Philip M'Govern in direct contravention of the law. In October, 1895, the Guardians passed resolutions that three men, and any other persons bitten by a mad dog who might thereafter apply, were to be sent for treatment to M'Govern, who claims to be able to cure hydrophobia. The Board pointed out to the Guardians that, M'Govern's farmhouse not being a recognised hospital within the meaning of the 25 and 26 Vic. cap. 83, Section 7, the Guardians were acting ultra vires in sending patients to him for treatment. Upon the presentation of M 'Govern's hill the Guardians applied to the Board to sanction the expenditure, which the Board explained they had no power to do, and, as the account was not paid, M'Govern served the Guardians with a Civil Bill for the amount. The Guardians decided nut to defend the process, and judgment went against them accordingly by default. The Attorney General has granted his fiat for the proceedings which are now being taken in the Superior Court.

  PRISON VISITING COMMITTEES.
  MR. E. H. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will include in future reports of the Commissioners of Prisons and Directors of Convict Prisons a return of the number of meetings held and visits paid by the Visiting Committee of each prison (including convict prisons), in a form similar to that which has for many years been given in the reports of the General Prisons Board for Ireland as regards Irish prisons?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: There are of course no Visiting Committees at the convict prisons; but I see no objection to including in future' reports a return of the meetings and visits of the Visiting Committees of local prisons, and of the visitors of convict prisons, and have given directions accordingly.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: Thank you.

  PRISON OFFICERS' INSTRUCTION.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) whether the first training school for prison officers was started at Chelmsford on the 1st October, according to the intention announced in the last report of the Prison Commissioners; and (2) if so, what is the number of officers now going through a course of instruction?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEYsaid the answer to the first part of the question is—Yes; to the second—Sixteen.

  ROYAL IRISH CONSTABULARY.
  MR. JAMES DALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1) whether any large reduction in the Constabulary Force in Ireland is contemplated by the Government; and (2) whether he can state how many Divisional Commissioners or Resident Magistrates are to be disemployed, and to what extent the lower grades of the force are to be reduced?
  MR. RICHARD M. DANE: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can state the nature of the contemplated reduction in the strength of the Royal Irish Constabulary Force, and the anticipated saving in the annual expenditure thereby?
  Mr. GERALD BALFOUR: It is proposed to effect a considerable reduction in the strength of the Royal Irish Constabulary by allowing the force to waste down, through retirements and the stoppage of recruiting, by 605 men, after which the strength of the force will stand at 10,830. The gross reduction to be effected on the Constabulary Vote during the next financial year is estimated at £39,000. but against this there is an increase under the head of Pensions of £18,000. The ultimate saving arising out of the proposed reduction is estimated at £60,000 per annum. As regards the second paragraph of the question of the hon. Member for South Monaghan, there are no proposals at present under consideration for a diminution of the number of Divisional Commissioners or Resident Magistrates.
  MR. PATRICK M'HUGH: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary
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  to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1) whether the cost of the Royal Irish Constabulary has increased from 10¾d. per bead of the population in 1836 to 6s. 4d per head in 1895; (2) how many extra police are at present maintained at the Depot, Dublin, and what was the cost of same in the last financial year; and (3) will he, in view of the peaceful condition of Ireland, consider the advisability of reducing the strength of the Royal Irish Constabularly force, and applying the moneys which might be saved by the reduction to the material improvement of Ireland?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The figures quoted in the first paragraph of the Question are approximately correct. There are no extra police employed at the Depot. The force there consists of men of the reserve and of recruits in training for vacancies in the country, and these men, financially, form part of the Constabulary Force at large. The suggestion in the third paragraph forms part of a large question on which the hon. Member will hardly expect me to express an opinion at present.

  DAUNT'S ROCK LIGHTSHIP.
  MR. W. FIELD: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether, in view of the fact that four of the former crew of the Puffin are still alive, the master, lamplighter, and two men, they will be utilised as witnesses in the public inquiry as to the history and condition of the lightship, irrespective of her being raised or not?
  THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. C. T. RITCHIE,): When I answered the supplementary Question of the hon. Member for Cork City on Monday I was not aware of the facts referred to in the hon. Member's Question. Under those circumstances the Inquiry will proceed irrespective of the raising of the lightship.
  CAPTAIN DONELAN: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade if he is in a position to say what provision has been made for the relatives of the men lost by the foundering of the lightship Puffin?
  MR. RITCHIE: Yes, Sir. The list is too long to read, but I shall be happy to hand the hon. Member a copy.

  LAND C0MMISSION (COUNTY LEITRIM).
  MR. PATRICK M'HUGH: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that a sitting of the Land Commission had been fixed for the 4th December last at Manorhamilton, County Leitrim, but that on the 3rd December Mr. H. P. Ringwood wired from Morrison's Hotel, Dublin, to Michael M'Goldrick, of Ghurteen, Drumnacross, and six other farmers informing them that the sitting bad been indefinitely postponed; by whose authority was the sitting indefinitely postponed; will he see that those farmers who had arranged for the hearing of their cases on the day fixed will be compensated for the loss they have sustained by the postponement; and have the cases of Michael M'Goldrick and the others been heard yet; and, if not, when will they be heard?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The sitting referred to in the Question was arranged for the 4th ult. as stated. Instructions were issued by the Irish Land Commission to the Sub-Commissioners not to hear more cases than would occupy them and could be disposed of up to Christmas, as, owing to the appointment of a number of new Assistant Commissioners, the constitution, of the different Sub-Commissions to take up work after Christmas bad to be recast. In consequence of this direction Mr. Ringwood had to notify the postponement of the cases referred to. A necessary adjournment such as took place in this case does not appear to afford a reason for compensation. The cases have not yet been heard, but will be probably heard early in March.

  ERASMUS SMITH SCHOOLS.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been called to the fact that in the draft scheme for the educational endowments founded by Erasmus Smith, published 14th May 1893 (Seventh Schedule, page 38), the gross rental of the estates is given as £9,109 7s. 5d., and that the Governors invested in Government stock £14,679 2s. 2d.; allowing for interest on this investment, what has caused the differ-
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  ence of £1,931 between the gross income of 1891 and the alleged gross income of 1896; did the Vice. Chancellor (Report 1885–6, page 102) give the gross rental as £10,014 at a time when judicial rents had been fixed on most of the Erasmus Smith estates; and how, then, is the difference between the £10,014 gross rental in 1885 and £9,109 gross rental in 1891 explained?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: I have called for a report on this question, and hope to have it by Monday next.

  BRITISH SOUTH AFRICA COMPANY.
  MR. THOMAS BAYLEY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether Her Majesty's Government has approved the arrangement announced by Earl Grey in a report to the British South Africa Company, dated Kith October, for paying certain in dun as in Matabeleland a salary of £5 a month each in consideration of their assisting the Native Commissioners to maintain order in their several districts, and particularly to collect, but-tax and obtain labour for the mines; and whether, before the proposed new rules for the collection of but-tax are sanctioned, he will satisfy himself that they do not afford opportunities for extortion and a modified form of slavery?
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: The arrangement referred to has not yet been approved. Lord Grey has been informed that any settlement of a permanent character, including such arrangements, will have to be fully considered by Her Majesty's Government. I shall, of course, satisfy myself that the new policy does not lend itself to extortion or to a modified form of slavery. [Cheers.]

  STIPENDIARY MAGISTR ATES (IRELAND).
  MR. PATRICK M'HUGH: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he can state the number of stipendiary magistrates now employed in Ireland; what was the cost of the last financial year; and, are the appointments of those, magistrates permanent; and, if not, will he consider the advisability of abolishing the office of stipendiary magistrates in

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  Ireland, or, at least, of substantially reducing the expenditure on that class of public servants?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The number of resident magistrates now employed in Ireland is (59, and the total expenditure on this service in the financial year ended March 31, 1896, amounted to £47,466. This sum was inclusive of salaries, allowances, and travelling expenses. These magistrates are permanent Civil servants.

  TENANTS APPLICATION FOR REINSTATEMENT (COUNTY CARLOW).
  MR. JOHN HAMMOND: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether in the case of Michael Waters, tenant, I). Pack Beresford, landlord (No. 19, Carlow), in which an application for reinstatement was lodged by the evicted tenant with the Land Commission, any and what grounds were assigned by the landlord for withholding his consent to reinstatement?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The landlord in his objection did not state the grounds upon which he withheld his consent.

  ILLEGAL TRAWLING.
  MR. D. N. NICOL: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether the Secretary of State for Scotland has been able to make definite arrangements for the protection of line fishermen from the depredations of beam trawlers on the coast of Scotland?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. GRAHAM MURRAY,): I am now able to inform my hon. Friend that the matter has been under the consideration of the Government, and that it has been decided to make additional provision for this service.
  MR. J. G. WEIR: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate (1) whether the negotiations which have been in progress during the last few months between the Scottish Office and other Departments in regard to the question of a more effective sea police around the coast of Scotland are not sufficiently advanced to enable Her
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  Majesty's Government to announce the policy which it proposes to adopt in order to protect the interests of line fishermen against the depredations of trawlers: (2) whether, having regard to the fact that the Secretary for Scotland has recommended that line fishermen should assist the Government in bringing to justice persons engaged in illegal trawling, he is aware that a fine of 5s. was imposed on each of the crew of the steam trawler Amy Gertrude, of North Shields, for assault, and that when detected in illegal trawling in Lochbattle, Skye, on the 31st October last, by the fishing boat Janet, of Block ton, they assaulted the fishing boat's crew with stones and an iron bar, and attempted to run her down; and (3) whether he is aware that the trawler's number was concealed, and that this offence was not punished by the Court?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE: To the first part of the hon. Member's question I have already replied. As regards the second, a fine of 5s. for assault was imposed on each of the crew of the trawler referred to. On consideration of the precognitions, it appeared to the prosecutor that the evidence was insufficient to prove concealment of the number; and this charge accordingly was not made.
  MR. WEIR: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate whether, in view of the fact that Her Majesty's Government have requested the assistance of the line fishermen of Scotland to catch and identify persons engaged in illegal trawling, it is proposed to reward the master and crew of the fishing boat Janet, of Plockton, Ross-shire, who, at the imminent risk of their lives, were recently instrumental in obtaining a conviction against the master and crew of the steam trawler Amy Gertrude, of North Shields, for illegal trawling in Lochbattle, Skye, on the 31st October last?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE: As the hon. Member is aware it is not the practice to offer pecuniary rewards to such members of the public as assist to bring delinquents to justice, and there are no special reasons to make an exception in the present case.

  COLLISION AT SKA (H.M. GUNBOAT "LANDRAIL" AND S.S. "SIREN.")
  MR. J. GILHOOLY: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether the Government will compensate John Sullivan and the other members of the crew of the Siren for the loss of their property on the occasion of that ship being negligently run into and sunk by Her Majesty's gunboat Landrail last July when making for Portland Harbour?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY: The Admiralty are under no legal obligation to pay compensation for damage or loss occasioned by collision with H.M. ships, but as an act of grace, they have obtained the consent of the Treasury to compensate the officers and crew of the Siren in respect of the proved loss of their kits. The detailed claims rendered by them are now under consideration.

  MERCHANDISE MARKS ACT.
  SIR ALBERT ROLLIT: I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether he is prepared to move or support a proposal for a Select Committee to consider the operation and effects of the Merchandise Marks Acts?
  MR. RITCHIE: Yes, Sir; I am pre pared to assent to such a proposal if made by my hon. Friend?

  VACCINATION (ROYAL COMMISSION.)
  MR. J. W. LOGAN: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board if it is proposed to publish the evidence giver before the Royal Commission on Vaccination during the autumn of 189. and in 1892 and 1893, also the Report: of the Sub-Commissioners on smallpox epidemics since 1891; and, when it is probable such documents will reach the hands of Members?
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: I have mad. inquiry of the Royal Commission or Vaccination and have been informed that some of the Reports in question will be issued almost immediately and that all are in the hands of the printers.

  IRISH MILITIA.
  MR. F. A. O'KEEFFE: beg to ask the Under Secretary of Stat for War if, regarding the statement of the
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  War Authorities that it is their intention to send five regiments of Irish Militia to England this year for military training, he will consider the question as an equivalent of dispatching a similar number of English Militia regiments to Ireland for the same purpose?
  THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE WAR OFFICE (Mr. J. POWELL-WILLIAMS,): The only regiments of Irish militia brought to England for their training are artillery regiments, which are trained in the fortresses they would be required to garrison in case of war. There are no corresponding reasons for sending English militia to Ireland.

  KING PREMPEH.
  MR. MICHAEL DAVITT: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether Prempeh, late King of Ashanti, has memorialised the Colonial Office, asking for the carrying out of promises made to him by British officers previous to the late expedition to Kumassi, to the effect that if no resistance was offered the matter would be settled amicably; whether Prempeh gave assurances that he would make full submission and accept the British terms, and pay the indemnity demanded of him in due course, if a reasonable time were allowed; whether any resistance whatever was offered to the advance of the British troops by Prempeh or his chiefs, who had made proclamation throughout the King's territory that all weapons should be removed to the interior, and that no opposition should be offered to the expedition; will he explain why, after these assurances, the King was deposed and made prisoner along with several of his chiefs, and the British soldiers who had been permitted to march without resistance to Kumassi afterwards looted the King's house and dug up the graves of dead chiefs in search of treasure; and, whether he will lay a copy of Prempeh's petition upon the Table of the House?
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: A petition signed by Prempeh has been received, but the statements contained in it materially misrepresent the facts. In December 1895 and January 1896, while the expedition was on its way to Kumassi, the Governor of the Gold

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  Coast sent messages requiring Prempeh to make full submission and to pay the cost of the expedition; no promise, however, was then made by Prempeh to pay this indemnity, and no reliance can be placed on the statement made in his petition that he would pay it if a reasonable time were allowed. No resistance was offered at Kumassi, but the Governor received no message reporting the removal of all weapons. Sir W. Maxwell reported, however, that in October 1895, messengers from Kumassi arrived in Samory's camp who invited him to help Prempeh "to recover all countries from the coast to Gaman which formerly belonged to Ashanti." I dare say the hon. Member knows that Samory is a powerful chief who has been slave-raiding in the Hinterland. On December 25th, the King of Bekwai informed us that although he had pressed Prempeh to comply with the demands of the British Government the latter had refused, and the reports from other chiefs proved the constant aim of Prempeh to have been the re-establishment of the old limits of Ashanti with its necessary consequences of slave-raiding and human sacrifices. The deportation of Prempeh was under the circumstances necessary, and without it the expedition could not have realised the objects for which it was intended. The articles found in the King's house were taken possession of by the officer commanding the expeditionary force, and have been fully described and accounted for. Further papers relating to the affairs of Ashanti will be laid before Parliament, and Prempeh's petition will be included.
  MR. DAVITT: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman has received newspapers from the Gold Coast written by Englishmen confirming all the statements made in the petition?
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir; but even if I had, I should not take ex parte and anonymous statements as being evidence against the statement of the Governor. [Cheers.]

  TRANSVAAL RAID.
  MR. H. O. ARNOLD-FOFSTER: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether copies of the Report of the Select Committee appointed
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  by the Cape Parliament to inquire into the Transvaal Raid can be obtained at the Vote Office; and, if not, whether he will make arrangements for the supply of copies to hon. Members on their application?
  MR. CHAMBERLAIN: Copies of the Report and of one of the appendices containing the principal telegrams can be supplied to the hon. Member from the Colonial Office, on his application, but the evidence has not been reprinted in this country. The Cape Parliamentary paper is, however, on sale by Simpkin, Marshall and Company, Limited. It is a volume of 760 pages.

  CRIMEAN VETERAN (JOHN BRENNAN).
  MR. JASPER TULLY: I beg to ask the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether his attention has been directed to the destitute condition of a Crimean veteran named John Brennan, of Boyle, formerly a private in the 41st Regiment, who was wounded in the attack on Sebastopol; and whether he would recommend that an additional grant be made to him from the fund for the relief of destitute war veterans?
  MR. POWELL-WILLIAMS: Yes, Sir. The hon. Member has himself directed my attention on two previous occasions to this man's case. I can only repeat that there is no record of his having been wounded while in the Army, and that his short service of only two and-a-half years does not qualify him for a special campaign pension.

  ARMY PENSION (JOHN KELLY).
  MR. TULLY: I beg to ask the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether the authorities have received a memorial signed by the local magistrates and clergymen praying that an increase of pension be granted to a wounded soldier named John Kelly, of Ballindoon, county Sligo, who when serving with the Connaught Rangers in the Kaffir War in 1875, had one of his legs shot away, and who is now unable to support himself, his wife, and eight children on the small pension which he was granted; and whether, under the circumstances, he will recommend an increase of pension to this man?
  MR. POWELL-WILLIAMS: John Kelly made an application to the Commissioners of Chelsea Hospital, and they have raised his pension from 1s. to 1s. 6d. a day in consequence of increased disability arising from the original cause of his discharge.
  MR. HUDSON KEARLEY: May I ask whether the hon. Gentleman is aware that the recent Committee which inquired into the affairs of the Patriotic Fund ascertained that there is a surplus available for such purposes as these, amounting to a quarter of a million of money.
  MR. SPEAKER: Order! That question does not arise out of the question on the paper.

  DISTRESS (WEST OF IRELAND).
  MR. D. CRILLY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he has yet to hand; the Report of the Local Government Board Inspector who has been inquiring into the extent of the distress at present existing in the West of Ireland; if he has so received the Report, can he state the conclusion arrived at as to the condition of the people living in the unions of Belmullet, Killala, and Ballina; and if he has not as yet received the Report in question, can he say when he expects to receive it?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The Report referred to is not a Report from the Poor Law Inspector in charge of these districts, but from one of the Commissioners of the Local Government Board who was directed to make a special inquiry. I expect to receive his Report in the course of a day or two.

  PUBLIC WORKS (IRELAND).
  DR. TANNER: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been directed to the net expenditure as shown in the Sixty-fourth annual Report of the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland, from which it appears that, while a decrease in expenditure in Class I, Public Works and Railways, to the amount of £52,390 is shown, an increase in Class II., Public Works Office, of £728 is likewise given
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  on comparing the expenditure in 1894–5 with 1895–6: and, whether it is a rule in the Irish Office of Works that officials should obtain more pay when there is shown to be a substantial falling off in moneys voted for Public Works services?
  MR. HANBURY: Owing to the gradual completion of railway schemes under the Act of 1889, there was a reduction of expenditure in 1895–96 of £52,390 as compared with 1894–95. Moneys are provided for public services from other sources in addition to Votes, and the total payments by the Board of Works for 1895–6, show an increase of £39,405 over 1894–5, and their receipts an increase of £7,142. On the 31st March 1896, there were nearly 3,000 more loan accounts open in the books of the Board than on the 31st March 1895. The increase in the Vote for the Board of Works for 1895–6 is partly due to automatic increments of salary, partly to increased provision for professional services, chiefly those of engineers and architects, and to increased travelling to expedite the inspection and reports on works and loans.

  KILCREA ABBEY (COUNTY CORK).
  DR. TANNER: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether any steps will be taken to carry out the work necessary for the preservation of Kilcrea Abbey, county Cork; and, why the Report on the state of this national and ancient monument is given under head 4 as being a ruin vested and repaired in Appendix H to the Sixty-fourth Report of the Commissioners of Public Works, Ireland, it being stated under sub-head 10 that further works must be held over for the present?
  MR. HANBURY: Periodical inspections are made of structures of this character which are vested in the Board of Works, and the last Report represents the ruins as being in a fair state of preservation. If, on the occasion of the next inspection, works of preservation are found necessary, they will be executed. The Report is given under head 4 (ruins vested and repaired) because subsequently to the date of vesting works were carried out at the structure.

  RAILWAYS (MID-CORK).
  DR. TANNER: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if any further developments have taken place in connection with the proposed extensions of either of the lines of railway in Mid Cork from Peak or Macroom to Ballyvourney; and, if so, what financial assistance will be given by Government, and under what terms?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The proposed lines have been considered by the Government, but I cannot hold out any hope that I shall be able to advise the Lord Lieutenant to certify either scheme under the first clause of the Act of last year.

  IRISH MAIL SERVICE.
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, if he will state in what respect the time table for the new Irish mail service as now fixed differs from that announced by the Postmaster General last year; and if he will give the hour of arrival and departure respectively from Kingstown instead of Dublin?
  MR. HANBURY: AS it would be very difficult in answering a question to state all the hours contained in the various time tables, I will lay on the Table a statement showing—(1) the present hours; (2) the hours proposed to be fixed last year; (3) the hours now decided on. The table shall show the hours at Kingstown as well as at Dublin.

  TRUNK TELEPHONE LINE (CORK AND DUBLIN).
  MR. MAURICE HEALY: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether the intention of the Post Office to construct a trunk telephone line between Cork and Dublin, announced last year, has been carried out; and if not, what the cause of the delay is?
  MR. HANBURY: The construction of the trunk telephone line from Dublin to Cork and Limerick is in progress, and the work will be pushed on with all reasonable speed. The Postmaster General is not aware that any delay has taken place.

  WEST INDIAN COLONIES (CABLE).
  SIR GEORGE BADEN-POWELL: I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether, in view of the benefits which such a connection would confer on the development of our West Indian Colonies, Her Majesty's Government have come to any conclusion with reference to the continuation to the British West Indian Colonies of the telegraphic cable communication from Halifax to Bermuda?
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: The matter is engaging the active attention of Her Majesty's Government.

  PARISH COUNCIL ELECTIONS.
  MR. H. C. F. LUTTRELL: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware that the effect of the new orders issued for the holding of parish council elections will be to render ineligible for election on 18th March all those who have entered into residence on 25th March 1896, 25th March being the day upon which most people in rural districts enter into residence; whether he will take steps to have this disqualification removed; and whether he will remove the new difficulty which the orders place in the way of electors who may desire a poll?
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: Having regard to the statutory provisions as to the first meeting of a parish council after their election and the notice required to be given of such meeting, the Local Government Board were obliged to fix a date earlier than 25th March for the meeting for the election of parish councillors, so as to admit of the requisite time being given for the different proceedings in the case of a poll being demanded. The difficulty to which the hon. Member alludes could only be removed by legislation. With respect to the question as to the demand of a poll, the position of the Board in this matter is that they have not themselves in their order made any provision on the subject, but have left the question to the operation of the statute itself.

  INJURIES TO WORKMEN (FOREIGN SHIPOWNERS).
  MR. FORTESCUE FLANNERY: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been drawn to recent judgments in the Port of Hamburg whereby Hamburg workmen, injured by the alleged negligence of a British shipowner, recovered damages with the alternative of the arrest of such British shipowner or his servants, and their punishment criminally; whether his attention has been drawn to the fact that, under the English Law as it at present stands, a British workman cannot recover compensation. from the owner resident abroad of a Foreign ship, although such workman may have been injured by the negligence of such owner or his servants, and although such Foreign ship may be arrested in respect of claims of a different character; and whether the Government will consider the advisability of introducing into the Bill to amend the Law of Employment increased protection to British workpeople from the consequences of negligence of Foreign shipowners or their officials?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: I have not seen the judgments to which the hon. Member refers, but I will communicate with the Board of Trade upon the question which he raises and which I believe is also being brought under the consideration of the House by a private Member's Bill.

  POOR RELIEF (IRELAND).
  MR. JOHN DILLON: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he intends to proceed this Session with the Bill on Poor Relief in Ireland which was read the First time last Session.
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: Yes, but the Bill is not quite ready, as I wish to introduce some changes from the draft of last Session.

  ALIEN PAUPER LUNATIC (SCOTLAND).
  SIR MARK STEWART: I beg to ask the Lord Advocate (1) if his attention has been called to the hardship imposed by law on a parish which has been compelled to afford relief to an alien pauper lunatic becoming
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  chargeable on the rates of such parish; and (2) if he can see his way to free the rates from such a burden by extending the costs of chargeability over a wider area than one parish by legislation or otherwise?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE: So long as the parish system is retained, cases of hardship of the kind mentioned by my hon. Friend must occasionally occur, but will tend to distribute themselves equally. I may point out, however, that so far as the obligation to relieve is concerned, there is no difference between an alien lunatic and a native lunatic without a known settlement. In reply to the second part of the Question, the occasional nature of the case complained of is a sufficient argument against making alterations in a system which works well.

  CAPE COLONY (SIR J. SIVEWRIGHT).
  SIR ELLIS ASHMEAD-BARTLETThad given notice of the following Question:—
  "To ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether his attention has been called to a speech made by Sir James Sivewright, a Cape Minister, at Worcester, in which Sir J. Sivewright stated that emissaries from the Transvaal had been deliberately stirring up disloyalty in Cape Colony; and whether Her Majesty's Government have any evidence in proof of this charge; and, if so, what action Her Majesty's Government propose to take? "
  The hon. Member said that since the Question was put on the paper he had seen a statement that Sir James Sivewright had given a different version of his speech from that given in the papers at first.
  MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN: I presume, therefore, that the hon. Member does not now put his Question. [Laughter.]
  MR. LEONARD COURTNEY: I should like to put the Question. ["Hear, hear!"] Is my right hon. Friend prepared to make any statement as to the accuracy or inaccuracy of the statement referred to?
  MR. J. CHAMBERLATN: The hon. Member has already said that Sir James Sivewright has himself apparently contradicted the accuracy of the statement imputed to him. Under these circumstances I cannot possibly give an opinion as to what might hypothetically have

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  been said by Sir James Sivewright, but what Sir James Sivewright himself said he did not say. [Laughter.]

  AGRICULTURAL LAND EATING BILL (IRELAND).
  MR. T. M. HEALY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland when the Irish Agricultural Hating Bill will be introduced?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: It is not proposed to introduce an Irish Agricultural Rating Bill.
  MR. VESEY KNOXasked to what purpose the money allocated to Ireland was to be applied, and whether it was not to be devoted to relieving the rates?
  Mr. GERALD BALFOURsaid the money would not be applied in that manner.
  MR. KNOXasked whether the right hon. Gentleman had endeavoured to ascertain the views of the Irish Members before giving a decision?
  [No answer was given.]

  AGRICULTURAL RATES ORDER.
  MR. PICKERSGILL: I beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether his attention has been drawn to the inconveniences which will result from compliance with Article XV. of the Agricultural Rates Order, 1896, and in particular whether the form of rate applicable to special sanitary rates might not with great advantage be adopted in lieu of the form given in Schedule Y of the Order; and, whether, in agricultural districts, where nearly every assessment contains agricultural land, the Local Government Board will object to complete valuation lists being-made out instead of supplementary lists?
  MR. T. W. RUSSELL: The Local Government Board have received representations with regard to the first and third points alluded to in the Question of the hon. Member for Bethnal Green. As regards the suggestion that the form of rate applicable to special sanitary rates might be adopted in lieu of the form given in Schedule Y of the Order, I may observe that no form of special sanitary rate is prescribed either by Statute or by the Orders of the Local Government Board. I infer, however, that what is
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  suggested is that instead of showing the amount of the rate payable at a reduced rate in the £ in the case of agricultural land, the course which the Public Health Act allows, as regards the sanitary rate, of showing in the rate the reduced rateable value should be adopted. It is not considered by the Board that the course referred to would be more convenient than that contemplated by Schedule Y; and further, the Agricultural Rates Act only authorises the reduction of the rate in the £ and not of the rate-able value.

  SHUTTLE GUARDS.
  MR. C. E. SCHWANN: I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, with reference to the case of David Pogson, of Marndon, who died from the effect of a blow from a flying shuttle in December last, as the loom was a fast Dobcross loom, known as a 70 to 80 pick per minute loom (as was shown at the Coroner's inquest), it was the duty of the District Inspector to have insisted on the looms in Messrs. James Crowther and Sons' mills, in which the accident happened, being fenced or protected, even prior to the late decision of the Recorder of Blackburn; and, can the Home Secretary, with the aid of experts, lay down or fix a limit of speed, taking into consideration the conditions of width of loom, etc., above which it shall be compulsory on all millowners in trades in which shuttles are used to have them efficiently protected by guards?
  SIR MATTHEW WHITE RIDLEY: I am satisfied that there has been no neglect of duty on the part of the Inspector. The use of shuttle guards has been gradually introduced and extended during the last few years, until the efforts of the Inspectors were suspended by the Blackburn decision, now reversed by the High Court. It is intended now to require the provision of these guards whenever serious danger, preventable by their use, is reasonably anticipated; but I have no power to lay down the limit of speed which shall be held to constitute danger, even if it were possible to make any rule.

  LICENSED PAWNBROKERS (IRELAND).
  MR. CRTLLY: I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he can supplement the return laid upon the Table of the House on Tuesday, on the authority of the City Marshal of Dublin, by giving the total number of licensed pawnbrokers in the cities and towns of Ireland named in that return; and if he will direct that in future returns the number of licensed pawnbrokers in these cities and towns will be given in addition to the number of pawn tickets issued and the total sum advanced to borrowers?
  MR. GERALD BALFOUR: The returns referred to were furnished by the City Marshal in pursuance of the Act 26 George III., cap. 43, Section 41, and Government cannot require him to include any information in these returns in addition to that prescribed by Statute. There would, however, be no objection to granting a separate return showing the number of licensed pawnbrokers in the cities and towns in Ireland if such a return be moved for by the hon. Member.

  MISSING STEAMER ("STATE OF GEORGIA").
  MR. J. BRYCE: I beg-to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty whether the Admiralty could despatch one of Her Majesty's ships to search for, or join in a search for, the British steamer State of Georgia, of Aberdeen, which is now about 20 days over due at Nova Scotia, to which she was bound, and which has, in the opinion of competent seafaring men, probably been caught in the ice fields in the western part of the North Atlantic Ocean, whence she might still be rescued were help promptly sent?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY: The whole of the squadron on the North American station is now-cruising in the West Indies, more than 2,000 miles distant from the supposed position of the State of Georgia. With the best possible disposition to render aid in such circumstances, it is clear that timely rescue by them would be impossible. Halifax, on the other hand, is only distant from 500 to 600 miles, and though it is not perhaps for me to make the suggestion, it would seem that the
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  readiest manner of ascertaining the facts as regards the unfortunate vessel, rendering help if not too late, is for a steamer to be chartered at Halifax to undertake the search.

  UNIVERSITY EDUCATION OF ROMAN CATHOLICS.
  MR. KNOX: I beg to ask the First-Lord of the Treasury, with reference to his speech on Friday last, whether he will direct Her Majesty's representatives in Austria, Belgium, and Germany to report on the provision made for the university education of Roman Catholics in those countries, with special reference to the constitution of the universities, the amount of their endowments, and the sources from which they have been derived, and the number of persons receiving university education in proportion to the Catholic population?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): I think the subject of the inquiry mentioned by the hon. Member is one of great interest, and I will ask the authorities at the Foreign Office how far Her Majesty's representatives abroad can assist in the matter.
  MR. LECKYasked whether the right hon. Gentleman would have any objection to extend the inquiries to other countries in Europe, America, and Australia in which there are large Roman Catholic populations!
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY: I cannot imagine that there would be any objection in principle to my hon. friend's proposal. Of course an inquiry in regard to the Colonies would not be conducted through the Foreign Office, but would be made through the Colonial Office.

  QUEEN'S REIGN (TREASON-FELONY PRISONERS).
  MR. MACNETLL: I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, having regard to the approaching celebration of the sixtieth anniversary of the accession of the Queen to the Throne, the Government will consider the question of recommending to Her Majesty to signalise that commemoration by the granting of an amnesty to political offenders

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  still undergoing terms of imprisonment under the Treason-felony or other Acts?
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY: As the hon. Member is aware, I have never admitted any distinction between persons convicted under the Treason-felony Act or the Explosives Act and other long-sentence prisoners. ["Hear."]

NEW MEMBER SWORN.
Augustus Henry Eden Allhusen, esquire, for the Borough of Salisbury.
ORDERS OF THE DAY.
  LORD PENRHYN'S QUARRIES.

    MOTION FOR ADJOURNMENT.
    MR. WILLIAM JONESrose to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance—namely—
    "the loss and privation arising from the dispute between employer and employed in the Penrhyn quarries, and the failure of the efforts under the Conciliation Act to terminate the dispute."
    MR. SPEAKERasked whether it was the pleasure of the House that leave should be given, and thereupon the whole of the Opposition and several Unionist Members rose in their places. The requisite assent to the Motion having thus been signified,
    MR. W. JONESsaid that for over 17 weeks the dispute at the Penrhyn quarries had been in progress and about 3,000 men had been thrown out of employment. The dispute had attracted considerable attention because it involved principles which, in their application, were not restricted to the local area of Bethesda, but were a matter of grave national concern. [Cheers.] It arose, in the first instance, from the dissatisfaction of the men employed with regard to some of the terms and conditions of their employment. Those terms had to do with the standard rate of wages, the system of large contracts and sub-letting,
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    and the conditions under which a class of unskilled workmen worked. The claim of the men with regard to these were a rise in the standard rate of wages, a minimum wage of 4s. 6d. a day; that large contracts should be abolished; that contracts should be confined to ordinary bargains, that they should be diminished in number and limited to monthly bargains. Their claims were formulated by a quarry committee, and this committee was a very important element indeed in the dispute. The committee consisted of delegates elected by the men working in the various galleries, and formed a sort of executive of the men. The important claim of the men was the recognition of this committee or any form of combination for protective purposes among the men whereby the negotiations could be carried on. This committee had never been recognised by Lord Penrhyn. [Some Ministerial cheers.] The question of wages, of contracts, and of sub-letting had become subsidiary ones to this—the right of combination among the quarry-men and the right to have access to their chosen spokesmen. This right had been persistently denied them. The men met at Bethesda and passed the following resolution:—
    "That we are of opinion that as workmen anxious to bring the present difference between us and our employer, if possible, to a peaceful settlement, it is our duty to call the attention of the Board of Trade to the matter, and to ask for their intervention under the provisions of the Conciliation Act of August, 1896."
    The workmen might be perfectly right, or they might be perfectly wrong—personally he believed they were in the right—but they were eager and willing to submit their whole case for inquiry to the Board of Trade. [Cheers.] On September 28, 71 men were suspended, in-eluding the whole of the members of the quarry committee, and 15 other men who had first opened up some of the grievances and enabled the committee to show that these grievances did exist. The same day the men met and resolved to support their committee, and to cease working until they were afforded an opportunity of explanation of this action on the part of the management. On the following day, in spite of the men's resolution and although the manager had actually received a copy of it, an effort was made to conclude bargains for

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    the following month. The manager ignored the resolutions of the men, but none of the workmen took the bargains. [Cheers.] The same day a notice was posted in the quarry that the men who refused their bargains must remove their labour implements, and they were informed that the reasons for the suspension of the 71 men would be published in due course. When that document appeared it alleged against these 71 men insubordination, misrepresentation, and inciting the men to strike Since then the quarries had been laid idle. On September 30 an application was made, on behalf of the men, to the Board of Trade to take action, under Section 2 of the Conciliation Act, for the purpose of promoting a peaceful settlement of the dispute. Accordingly the Board of Trade communicated with Lord Penrhyn, and received an intimation that his lordship was prepared to have an interview with a deputation representing the men, of which none of the suspended quarrymen should be members. [Ironical cheers.] That proposal handicapped the men in this way, that they were to meet Lord Penrhyn without any of their trusted leaders or their chosen spokesmen. Under the strongest pressure from the Board of Trade the men yielded to this proposal. On December 5 the men met at Bethesda and resolved that three quarrymen should meet Lord Penrhyn;
    "that one or more representatives of the Board of Trade, should, if possible, be present at the first interview,"
    and also—
    "that the deputation should be accompanied by its own interpreter, and also by its own shorthand writer if any notes of the proceedings are to be taken."
    These seemed to be perfectly reasonable proposals. [Cheers.] Lord Penrhyn, writing to the Board of Trade on December 9, stated that he was prepared to receive the deputation—
    "upon receiving in writing a request from them to that effect, accompanied by their statement giving me an outline of the points which they propose to lay before me."
    The Board of Trade considered this to be the imposition of fresh conditions and
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    restrictions, and Sir Courtenay Boyle, in his letter to Lord Penrhyn, said:—
    "I am also to point out to you that the men only acceded to the suggestion that they should appoint a deputation not including any of the 71 suspended workmen who form their committee under the strongest pressure from the Board of Trade. Now that they have been induced with great difficulty to meet your wishes thus far, the Board of Trade would greatly regret if the opening of negotiations—always a difficult matter under such circumstances—should be rendered more difficult by the imposition of fresh conditions and restrictions."
    As to the proposal that there should be a representative of the Board of Trade present at the interview, Lord Penrhyn said he must
    "decline to comply with such a suggestion, as my acceptance of it would establish a precedent for outside interference with the management of my private affairs."
    He begged the House to listen to the striking reply of the Board of Trade—
    "I am to state that there is no desire to press the matter against your wishes, but I am to point out that in view of the provisions of the Conciliation Act, the Board cannot admit that the settlement of a prolonged dispute affecting some thousands of men and their families, can be rightly regarded as a matter of private interest only."
    [Cheers.]
    MR. W. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: Will the hon. Member read the reply of Lord Penrhyn to that?
    MR. W. JONESsaid he knew that in his letter Lord Penrhyn drew a distinction between the dispute and his private affairs, but he had given the House Lord Penrhyn's letter and the Board of Trade reply. ["Hear, hear!"] The next resolution ha I to do with the shorthand writer and interpreter—matters in the eyes of the Board of Trade, of detail not likely to cause serious difficulty. But how did Lord Penrhyn meet this trifling point?
    "I will, on this occasion, if pressed on the point, agree to it, provided that they are selected from amongst my late employés not included among the 71 who were suspended."
    Let the House consider for a moment, how could anybody reasonably expect an interpreter front among quarrymen? There were 3,000 men, and from these

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    their best and most trusted leaders were weeded out. A qualification for an interpreter was that he should think in two languages. How many men, with intellectual capacity, educational distinction, and a university training would be competent to think in two languages? How-could it be reasonably expected that among these quarrymen they could get an interpreter able to interpret between Lord Penrlryn—who knew no Welsh—and workmen on the other hand, who, although they had a smattering of English sufficient to read English newspapers, did not think English, and had not facility of expression to express their thoughts on technical points in English? ["Hear, hear!"] Lord Penrhyn declined to assent to the conditions, and the Board of Trade unfortunately felt that they could not usefully take any further steps to promote the desired conference. Subsequently the quarry was closed, and by December 31 there was not a single workman at work at Bethesda. During the interval some of the men found employment elsewhere; hundreds of them scattered over North Wales in quest of labour, and hundreds could not get it, and were forced to remain at home with their families, idle. What sort of men were these, and did they deserve better treatment? They were among the most intelligent workmen in the whole British Empire. [Cheers.] They had built and maintained three schools, well staffed and equipped, and efficient as any in North Wales. ["Hear!"] They had lately subscribed nearly £1,000 towards the building and maintenance of an intermediate school in the vicinity—[cheers]—with physical and chemical laboratories such as would do credit to any such establishment in the Kingdom. They had scholarships and exhibitions for their boys at the schools, and when the School Committee had overdrawn its banking account by about £1,000, in order to provide playing-grounds, the men promised, as soon as they could get remunerative labour, they would find that £1,000. ["Hear!"] They had built some 20 chapels, and paid off the chapel debts. In addition—and showing that they were alive to the advantages of higher education—they had collected a sum amounting to £1,500 towards the University College at Bangor, and when last Tuesday week the new building was
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    opened—though it was a time of strike and poverty—60 children appeared, 50 of whom were quarrymen's children, and two quarrymen and two ex-quarrymen were on the governing body. The Calendar showed this to be an almost crimeless district. Not long ago an inquiry was instituted as to the expediency of providing a new bench of magistrates for the district, but as the result of the inquiry, it was found that a bench of magistrates was absolutely and totally unnecessary, so few were the offences in the district. On the authority of the police, he could say that the offences were fewer now than they were before the strike. ["Hear, hear!"] Last Saturday week he passed through Bethesda, and saw hundreds of quarrymen congregated for a mass meeting to discuss proposals in notices set up by Lord Penrhyn's managers. There was perfect order, and no necessity to increase the staff of police. At the meeting the men applied remorseless logic to the notices of the quarry owner, but not a word of denunciation or disrespect was uttered against Lord Penrhyn himself. They discussed matters; they passed resolutions; they sang hymns. ["Hear, hear!" and laughter.] The resolutions went to show that they would sternly abide by the proposals of the Board of Trade, and would not renounce their right to combination. ["Hear, hear!"] Meanwhile there were between 600 and 800 families supported by the relief fund which had been started by tradesmen and others in the district, and contributed to by workmen in all parts of the country. Money from all parts was flowing fast into the funds, and, thanks to the generosity of the Press, all classes of the community—men of all creeds and all political parties—had helped to support these men in maintaining the prolonged struggle. Money could do much, but it could not heal troubled minds, it could not bring solace and content to scattered homes and families; money could not settle a grave labour dispute. ["Hear, hear!"] He thanked the House for the attention given to his endeavour to put forward a plain statements of facts, and he desired to thank, on behalf of his constituents, the President of the Board of Trade and his able staff for their capable efforts to promote a settlement of this dispute under one of the sections of the

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    Conciliation Act. It was only for him, as Member for the constituency, to present this case, and make an earnest appeal to the Government and the President of the Board of Trade to take any measures open to them under the Conciliation Act or others—which they on their responsibility and with the great influence they could command—to bring the two parties together, and so help to secure what was the real wish of every one of these three thousand quarrymen—a just, honourable and lasting settlement of the dispute. [Cheers.] He formally moved the adjournment of the House.
    MR. J. BRYN ROBERTSin seconding the Motion, associated himself with the opening remarks of his hon. Friend upon the right of combination. Had this been solely a question as to amount of wages, or time for holidays, or any matter relating to the working of the quarry he would have had a great, if not an insuperable, objection to intervene in any way. Bui the question here involved was whether Welsh quarrymen should have the rigid such as was exercised by workmen all over the Kingdom, and which had, in this case, been denied—the right of combining to secure their joint interests Lord Penrhyn seemed, to some extent to make the concession that it would be unreasonable and unjust to refuse such right, because he had said he did not object to combination, but he did object to the committee. But the noble Lord had omitted to state how the right of combination could be exercised without a committee. It was useless to say that three thousand could combine but must not appoint a lesser number to carry out the decisions of the majority, and to negotiate with the employer. To say that they might combine, but that every individual workman was to make his representation to Lord Penrhyn, was to trifle with language. Seventy-one men had been suspended, and most of these were on the committee. Lord Penrhyn had stated that he could not submit to the intervention of the committee in the work of the quarry. Now, if the committee had interfered with the working, saying, "You shall work here, but stop work there," "You shall enlarge this gallery, and shoot rubbish here," then everybody would admit such interference would be intolerable.
    698
    It was not interference of that description. The functions of the committee were the same as those which were carried out by agents of combinations of workmen all the world over. If a workman in the quarry felt that he had a grievance it was his duty to lay his complaint before the Committee, who inquired into it and ascertained whether there was any ground for bringing the matter to the attention of the managers. If the committee thought that the facts supplied by a workman disclosed a serious grievance, then it was their duty to consult and decide as to whether action, ought to be taken in regard to it. The contention that the committee had no right to consider such matters was unreasonable. It had been alleged that the committee had supported, if not incited, insubordination amongst Lord Penrhyn's quarrymen. What was the alleged insubordination? Two workmen declined to go down to the office when requested to do so. He did not intend to go into the original cause of the dispute between Lord Penrhyn and his workmen; but it was necessary for him to state certain facts to make the case clear. The workmen complained, amongst other things, that instead of the quarry being let as hitherto to small bodies of men, huge portions of it were sub-let to contractors, who sweated the workmen by again sub-letting. Two men were deputed to make certain measurements on behalf of the committee, and they did so during their own dinner hour. Immediately Lord Penrhyn heard of this the two men were requested to go to the office for the purpose of being subjected to a cross-examination. Lord Penrhyn stated that he required two of his quarrymen to go to the quarry office, and that the committee were instrumental in preventing them, and that a resolution was passed that no quarryman should go alone to the office in order to have an interview with respect to the matters that were in dispute between the quarry committee and Lord Penrhyn. The resolution the men passed was that with respect to the matters in dispute between Lord Penrhyn and the quarrymen as a body, Lord Penrhyn should not try to go behind the committee by going to the workmen one by one and endeavouring to frighten them into submission. There was good reason for

    699
    this resolution. Some of the men were sent for to the office and subjected to a cross-examination by Lord Penrhyn or his agent. The men were quite alone, and had none of their fellow-workmen to support them, and their knowledge of English was imperfect. It was a most unfair position to put the men in, a position unworthy of Lord Penrhyn. The majority of the men stood firm, but it was not a surprising thing that one or two of them did break down and back out. Then instant use was made of this circumstance to denounce the committee for having, as it was alleged, fabricated complaints and stimulated agitation, and all because those poor men had been frightened at this star chamber inquiry. The men who had been examined were suspended and afterwards dismissed, and the whole of the committee were also suspended. There was no suggestion that any one of those seventy-one men had been guilty of negligence in his work. The only reason assigned for this course was that they were on the committee, and gave certain advice. It was because the advice they gave to the men and the method they employed of conducting the controversy with him were not palatable to Lord Penrhyn that he took the action he did with regard to them. To say that men were liable to be dismissed because they were acting in the best interests of other workmen was to say that there was no right whatever of combination. He maintained that when men were appointed as a committee to act on behalf of their fellow-workmen, anything they did or said in such capacity ought to be entirely privileged. No employer should assume a right to visit with punishment anything done by those men in discharge of their duties as agents of the workmen. The position taken up by Lord Penrhyn on this part of the question was intolerable, and he hoped the House would show that it thought such an attitude on the part of an employer quite unreasonable. Lord Penrhyn spoke very strongly against outside interference, but it was not "outside interference" for the men to seek some assistance. The management of their labour was surely as much in their own hands and was as much an affair of the men as the management of the quarry was an affair of Lord Penrhyn's, and if Lord Penrhyn could
    700
    not carry on his quarry without the assistance of 3,000 men, then the conditions of labour in the quarry were no longer simply a question of his private affairs, as Lord Penrhyn seemed to think. As Lord Penrhyn was perfectly entitled to go where he liked to select his manager or agent, the men had an equal right to choose their own agents. If the quarry-men had shown any disposition to interfere with Lord Penrhyn's selection of his agents, then he for one would have been strongly opposed to such an interference; but he said that they had not done so, and that Lord Penrhyn had no right to dictate to the men as he had done. They had as much right in that matter as Lord Penrhyn had. Some 3,000 men had now been out for four months; their dwelling houses were situate in the middle of a highly preserved estate, and yet not a single charge of poaching could be brought against any one of them, and no riot or disturbance was traceable to the strike. Not only so, but they had treated their employer with the greatest respect, and they had, indeed, passed a resolution protesting against being held responsible for language which they considered bore with some degree of severity, if not violence, upon Lord Penrhyn, and dissociating themselves from it. The men desired to do everything they could to meet Lord Penrhyn except to abdicate the ordinary rights of free men. [Cheers.]
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANTfelt it his duty to take the very first opportunity of rising to reply to the observations which had been made against Lord Penrhyn and the management of the Penrhyn quarries, a, very considerable number of misstatements—["hear, hear!"]—having been made throughout the country in connection with this most unfortunate strike. There were two main points at issue before the House, namely, the question of Lord Penrhyn's attitude with regard to a Committee, and his attitude with regard to the intervention of the Board of Trade. [Cheers.] The dispute with reference to the first point dated back to 1885. At that time the late Lord Penrhyn was a very old man, and the quarries were in a state of financial difficulties—so serious, indeed, that in a short time they would have been closed. The late Lord Penrhyn gave the present owner of the

    701
    quarries full power to do what he could to put things on a better footing. There existed at that time in the quarry a Committee which was styled the Quarry Committee. It had been allowed to come into existence and had obtained recognition from the management. It was recognised as a Committee appointed by the workmen to receive complaints, to consider them, and to see whether they constituted a proper case to be placed before the supreme manager for his decision. There were many complaints about the action of this Committee; for example, that complaints which were made were not forwarded to the authorities, that there was no provision under it for the representation of the non-unionist workers, and that, as the late chief manager averred, it interfered in many ways with the working of the quarries. The present Lord Penrhyn determined to do away with the Committee. [Ironical cheers.] He said, as he had said again recently in the Press, that he could not allow any body of men to interfere between him and his workers. From the date when the quarry was put on a new footing down to the time of the, strike, things went on peacefully and smoothly, bringing increased prosperity to the quarries and district. Nothing more was wanted in proof of this than to point to the remarks of the hon. Member opposite, when he spoke of the manner in which the quarrymen had been able to found and endow various chapels and schools. In May of last year a number of the men wished to attend the May Day labour demonstration, and notice was given that the men should apply for leave in the ordinary manner. Some 300 men did apply; the remainder did not apply, but took leave. When they returned to work they were suspended for two days. [Ironical cheers.] Any employer of labour would understand that it was not unusual for such a. course to be adopted, and, at any rate, it was the rule of the quarry. After the two days' suspension they returned to work. Shortly before August seven of the employés forwarded to Mr. Young, the chief manager, a written statement and requisition dealing with the wages standard of different classes of workmen, one point being that there should be a minimum wage of 4s. 6d. a day. The result of a minimum, wage would simply be to put a premium
    702
    upon idleness. [Cheers.] He might point out that the wages of the quarry-men for the six months prior to the strike represented an average daily pay of 5s. 6d. On August 17 Lord Penrhyn received the deputation of the men with reference to various grievances, and at the interview he read out a. reply giving his reasons for not being able to grant their request. He also told them that if they had any desire to see him again they should write to Mr. Young, but down to the present time Lord Penrhyn had had no application from the workers. On August 20 the men formulated a detailed reply, going over the same ground. On September 25, after some weeks' further investigation, Lord Penrhyn forwarded a full rejoinder, and promised to put a stop to any abuses found to exist. On September 14 two workmen were summoned to the manager's office, but did not go, their explanation being that the Committee had told them not to. The men were suspended, and after an interval of 12 days, no further explanation having been made, they were discharged. The statement that they Were discharged next day was incorrect. On September 26 a resolution was passed at the meeting of the council of the North Wales Quarrymen's Union, stating:—
    "That we, as the committee of Lord Penrhyn's quarries, after serious consideration of our position, in the face of Lord Penrhyn's unfavourable reply to our request and complaints, are of opinion that no good can result from continuing the negotiations on the same lines as hitherto, and we regard it as our duty to make it plain that we shall strike in March next unless, in the meantime, we find that the main points of our grievances have been conceded."
    That meant that the men chose March next as the most convenient time for themselves, and therefore the most inconvenient time for the owners of the quarry, to announce a strike. This resolution was passed on September 26, and on September 28 notices were served on 31 men, comprising the committee and others, in the following words:—
    "I have to inform you that you are hereby suspended until further notice from the end of this quarry month.'"
    [Opposition cheers and laughter.] On September 28 a general strike was declared by the workmen, and on September 30 the Quarrymen's Union organiser

    703
    applied to the Board of Trade to intervene. With regard to Lord Penrhyn's action in declining the intervention of the Board of Trade, there were two or three points at issue in reference to this demand of the men. Lord Penrhyn stated on many occasions that he was always willing to receive any deputation from the men, but that he was not Milling to assent to the conditions which the Board of Trade proposed. Two of the stipulations were of minor importance. The men desired to have their own interpreter and shorthand writer. [Opposition cheers.] Lord Penrhyn assented to this on the understanding that these men were taken from the ranks of the quarrymen. [Opposition laughter and ironical cheers.] An efficient interpreter might easily have been found among the quarrymen. In the statement sent to Members of the House it was stated that when Lord Penrhyn received the deputation the working manager acted as interpreter. That was not so. The interpreter on that occasion was a man drawn from the ranks of the quarrymen, David Davies, and his services were available on any other occasion. As to the statement that all the men of light and leading in the quarry were on the committee, it was disproved by the fact that Mr. William H. Williams, who had been described in the Welsh papers as "the quarrymen's Gladstone "—[laughter]—was not a member of the committee, and a great number of other able men were not connected with it. As to the shorthand writer, he admitted that it might have been difficult to find one among the quarrymen—[Opposition cheers]—but there had been no suggestion on the part of either the men or the Board of Trade officials that any independent, impartial, and official shorthand writer should be asked to attend. Lord Penrhyn felt strongly that the suggestion involved an unjust slur upon the shorthand writer and interpreter who had attended previous meetings. In the letter which the Permanent Secretary of the Board of Trade wrote on September 24, he repudiated the suggestion that the proposal of the Board of Trade contained any imputation that the men had suffered any disadvantage from Lord Penrhyn's interpreter and shorthand
    704
    writer. But these difficulties were not too serious to have been overcome. [Opposition ironical cheers.] But Lord Penrhyn's main objection was extremely important. The men insisted that representatives of the Board of Trade should be present at the proposed conference, and the Board of Trade supported that view. [Opposition cheers.] The functions of these representatives and the authority they were to exercise had remained from the outset quite indefinite. The specific section of the Act to which the men referred contained no words for guidance in that matter. It made no reference to the presence of representatives of the Board of Trade at any conference between employers and employed. It simply authorised the appointment of a conciliator or board of conciliation.
    MR. BRYN ROBERTS: It provides for the appointment of a. Chairman.
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANTsaid that it had been asserted that Lord Penrhyn, in declining to avail himself of the Conciliation Act as interpreted by the Board of Trade, had flouted the Act and defied the Government. That accusation was unreasonable. The words of the Act must be taken to represent the opinions of the Government as to the limits to which it was expedient in practice or just in principle that the Board of Trade should interfere between employer and employed. Those words contained no shadow or suggestion of a compulsory principle—[cheers]—or that it was always the duty of either party to admit the application of the Act. Employers would always be apt to shrink from having recourse to this Act, because they were well aware that no arrangements which might be made between them and their workmen before a conciliation could be made binding on the men. [Cheers.] If the trade unions would consent, as recommended by the Labour Commission, to become legally liable for breach of contract, the matter might assume a. different complexion. [Cheers.] But trade unions were apparently resolute in their opposition to these recommendations. Lord Penrhyn also thought that the presence of the Board of Trade officials would weaken his authority and that of his officials in the quarry, and form a precedent for the men asking for similar intervention on other occasions. [Opposition cheers.] Finally, the fact

    705
    that in their letter of December 24 the Board intimated that Lord Penrhyn's letter had been forwarded to the organising secretary of the men, while the Board did not, until he had twice complained, forward to him the letters which had passed between the Department and the men—[Ministerial cheers]—did not encourage Lord Penrhyn to welcome the intervention of the Board of Trade.
    MR. HENRY BROADHURSTsaid that no statement made by the men could illustrate the grievances under which they laboured better than the defence of Lord Penrhyn offered by the hon. Gentleman. The hon. Gentleman had admitted the men's whole case. He had complained that the House did not adapt its legislation to the whims and fancies of Lord Penrhyn, and had stated that if that had been done Lord Penrhyn would probably have condescended to be advised by the legislation of Parliament and to be influenced by the Board of Trade. The House of Commons had not vet become the slave of Lord Penrhyn.
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANT: I beg to point out that I did not make any of those statements.
    MR. BROADHURSTsaid that the hon. Member had complained of the terms of the Act of last year, as not containing a binding clause on the workmen with respect to any contract entered into on their behalf. [Cries of "No!"] What did that amount to but a demand that the House of Commons should adapt itself to the peculiar prejudices of Lord Penrhyn—[cries of "No!"]—and not consider what would be equitable between employer and employed? The hon. Gentleman had admitted also that the committee's statement of complaint to Lord Penrhyn had been revised and altered to suit the fancies of the agent who conveyed it. The crux of the whole question was whether the men had a right to combine and to make their case heard through the mouths of their chosen leaders. That was the old position for which Trades Unionism had contended 40 years ago. The whole forces of Trades Unionism had long been used to demand on behalf of the workers the right to submit their grievances and their representations to the employers through their chosen leaders, as the employers could
    706
    communicate their wishes to the workmen through their managers and other paid agents. If that right was denied or objected to then the whole force of combination fell to the ground. Lord Penrhyn had been good enough to say that he did not object to combination, provided it took a form suitable to his own convenience and opinions. [Cries of "No!"] Yes, that was the fact. He wished hon. Gentlemen opposite would have a little patience. The leading-advocate of the other side had been given a most patient hearing. They had encouraged the hon. Gentleman by their cheers when they thought he was travelling in the right direction, but to their consternation he soon harked back to the old cry that a man had a right to do as he pleased with his own, and they then ceased to cheer him. [Laughter.] Lord Penrhyn did not object to combination so long as it did not interfere with his right to do what he liked with his workmen, or his right to conduct his own works without any consideration to the feelings of the people whom he employed. But he sincerely trusted that before the Debate closed some Member representing property and capital would stand up and put a different face on this unhappy dispute than had been put on it by the hon. Member who had just sat down. The hon. Member opposite had raised the old question of combination. It looked indeed as if they would have to fight for the old right of combination over again if the policy of Lord Penrhyn was to be the policy of the majority of the employers of this country. But happily Lord Penrhyn was in a minority of one. There were very large employers in this country who welcomed the advent of trades unionism, and who were anxious to settle disputes through the chosen delegates of their workpeople rather than by dealing individually with their workmen. He would also point out that slate quarrying was a business of great skill. The arrangement of contracts involved great technical knowledge and patience, and he did not know any other industry in which it was more necessary for men of highly skilled knowledge and training, and men thoroughly acquainted with the English and the Welsh languages to represent labour in negotiations of the kind which had led to this unhappy dispute. The

    707
    hon. Member opposite had admitted to the House that on last May Day the Penrhyn Quarry Management fined a number of their workmen two days' wages because they had the audacity to attend a labour demonstration. [Cries of "No!"]
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANT: I would like to point out to the hon. Gentleman that these men were suspended because they absented themselves without having first applied for leave.
    MR. BROADHURSTsaid that if the hon. Member had had patience and allowed him to finish his sentence he would have seen that that was precisely what he was going to wind up with. [Laughter.] The men were punished because they attended the May Day demonstration without the permission of the manager. What other employer was there in the kingdom that would look for a plea from his workpeople as to whether or not they should attend their annual function for trades union purposes? It was monstrous put on that ground. He had been present at that May Day demonstration, and he had attended many other labour demonstrations in North Wales, and there were thousands of quarrymen there whom he regarded as personal friends. He wished the whole House of Commons could have seen the proceedings on that remarkable day. It was a scene that would ever remain in his memory. [Laughter.] He begged hon. Members opposite, however frivolous they might be naturally, to give more serious thoughts to serious subjects. ["Hear, hear!"] He attended the conference in the morning, and he could say with truth that that conference had been conducted in a manner that would have done credit to the House of Commons, or to any other assembly in the world, and the religious tone and seriousness of the speeches, and the hymn-singing before and after the proceedings, made an impression on him which he would never forget. He took part in the procession in the afternoon, and later in the day he attended the public meeting, which again was opened and concluded by sacred songs of the most elevating and impressive character. He could not imagine why any man pretending to be included in the ranks of common Christianity should be excited to laughter when he heard that British workmen associated religious services
    708
    with a demonstration intended to improve their social condition and to increase their means of obtaining their daily bread. He hoped that some responsible Minister or some responsible ex-Minister would come to the front in the sacred right of labour, in the sacred right of workers to have a voice in the terms which decided their wages. They had heard the manner in which some of the scanty wages of these workmen were used for educational and religious purposes in the Principality. He counted it amongst the most pleasing experiences of his life what he had witnessed in various parts of Wales, showing the religious fervour and the educational enthusiasm of the working classes of that country. He trusted that the result of the Debate would be to induce this great owner of the means of production to listen to reason, and not to use his mighty wealth and his great strength to crush out by starvation and tyranny the spirit of independence of the workpeople. Men had the right to some extent to do what they liked with their own, but it should be remembered that municipal law limited that right whenever it interfered with our neighbours, or tended to the spread of disease from house to house, in almost every town and village of the kingdom; and, if that were so, how much more was it necessary that there should be a limitation to rights which were used in a cruel and vindictive manner against a large community, as they had been used, many of them thought, in the case of the Penrhyn quarries. He trusted that the result of the discussion would be to lead to reason, common sense and justice prevailing between the two parties in this dispute. They had heard from the spokesman of the men that they were still willing, as they had been willing at the commencement of the dispute, to go into arbitration and to abide by the decision, not of a politician of the Radical school, or of a politician of the. Conservative school, but to abide by the decision of a great permanent officer of the State who had no political purposes to serve, who was thoroughly unprejudiced and impartial, and who had already brought to a satisfactory conclusion many disputes during the last few years by the exercise of his influence, his good judgment, and his common sense. He might mention the

    709
    case of the shoe trade of the kingdom, which was within an ace of being almost ruined. He had that day a letter from the gentleman who was then President of the Employers' Association, who said that he believed no outside interference could do good, that they should be better without it, and that after listening to the reasons of the permanent official of the Board of Trade he saw how reasonable it was to follow the suggestions made from that quarter. He also said that he had never ceased to be glad that he did on that occasion accept the proposals made, which had had a happy effect upon the whole of the trade. He had no doubt the workmen's officers would in the main agree with the employers' official. If the Board of Trade could deal with the boot trade it was equally capable of dealing with the slate trade. He hoped that it was not too late even now for something to be done—for 3,000 men, with their families, on the brink of starvation, was no light matter. He prayed the House to contemplate this difficult subject with all the seriousness which it should show on a great occasion of this kind, and that passions would not be allowed to take the place of reason. Let them join as one man in holding out the olive leaf of peace to the two contending parties in this dispute. [Cheers.]
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPOKTthought it very desirable that they should confine themselves to the only matter of the Debate. There appeared to be two main allegations against Lord Penrhyn. The first was that he had dismissed or suspended a large number of his men because they were legitimately combining amongst themselves; and the second was that he had put himself in the wrong by declining to accept the intervention of the Board of Trade, and refused to avail himself of the Conciliation Act of last year. If it could be shown that Lord Penrhyn had dismised these men for no other reason except that they were engaged in a legitimate combination in their own interests, the House could take no effective action in the matter, because he apprehended that Lord Penrhyn's personal feelings would not be very materially affected. If there were a complete justification for the men, every hon. Member could have his own judgment
    710
    upon the matter. These men were dismissed for certain distinct and definite offences, the climax of which was that in December they threatened a strike, and he asked the House to say whether an employer was bound to keep in his employment men who had threatened to strike three or four mouths hence. It appeared, the hon. Member said, quoting from a statement circulated on behalf of Lord Penrhyn, that in August the men came with certain demands, which were refused. What those demands were was not very material, but they included a rise in wages to the extent of 37½ per cent., the present wage being 5s. 6d. a day, and included a demand for a minimum of 4s. 6d. a day. In refusing those demands Lord Penrhyn was only doing what other employers had done in similar cases. On December 26 the Committee of the men announced they would strike in March unless their demands were in the meantime granted, whereupon Lord Penrhyn suspended the Committee, and then a. general strike was declared. If Lord Penrhyn had no objection to combination, why, hon. Members might ask, did he refuse to recognise the Committee? The fact was that combination in that part of the world meant more than it meant to our ears. ["Oh!"] There was a Committee prior to 1885, which was not merely a Committee for the men, but a Committee which practically assumed the management of the quarry. [Ministerial cheers,] Their idea of management was to run up wages to such an extent that in 1885 the entire earnings were not sufficient to meet the wages bill. [Cheers.] Lord Penrhyn abolished the Committee, which had never since been recognised, and reduced wages to the maximum paid in any other quarry in the district. Now there was an attempt to restore the Committee to its old influence. The men passed a resolution that they should not be called individually to the office, but that negotiations should be carried on under the supervision of the General Committee—that was to say, that Lord Penrhyn was to be deprived of his right as an employer to send for any one of his employés. Could any employer possibly agree to that? [Ministerial cheers.] This Committee had been writing very able letters to the papers, one of which covered over two columns of The Times.

    711
    It was a beautifully expressed letter, in which it was said that the Committee were simply working men, who, as they were unable to express themselves in English, had to rely on a translator. [Laurghter.] He congratulated that translator on having done his work so admirably. The men complained that the quarry was not worked in the manner best calculated to benefit master or men. They meant to say that the management was bad, and would be a great deal better in their hands. ["No."] Mr. R. Davies, chairman of Committee, who went to Lord Penrhyn, made a speech in which he said his object was "to restore the King." It was obvious that the intention was to restore the Committee, not to represent the men in the interests of their labour, because a Committee in that sense had existed all these years. As representing the men Lord Penrhyn was ready to receive it now, but he would not recognise its authority to come between him and the management of his quarries. It was only natural Lord Penrhyn should take that course. He was upholding the right to manage his own property. He was entitled to do so in any case, but he was still further induced to do so by the almost fatal consequences which had ensued during that period when the management had passed into the hands of these men who were now seeking to resume it. He hoped the House would understand why Lord Penrhyn objected to the Committee, and that hon. Members would see that there could be no truth in the assertion that Lord Penrhyn dismissed these men for no other reason except that they were combining amongst themselves. As to the complaint regarding the shorthand writer, all Lord Penrhyn wanted was that any report which was sent out in connection with so delicate and difficult a matter as the preliminary negotiations with respect to conciliation, should be an accurate report. He naturally did not put much faith in that class of local journalists who for weeks and weeks past had been misrepresenting the facts of the dispute. If the men had suggested to Lord Penrhyn the name of an impartial reporter he would not have objected to his presence.
    AN HON. MEMBER: Why did he not suggest it?
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: The suggestion did not come from him, but from the men. What the men said was, "We want to bring our own reporter." He would now turn to another point. He had heard it stated that the sweating system largely prevailed in this quarry. A man sent up a long letter to the Board of Trade in support of this allegation. This individual stated that he was engaged casually, and for one day's job at road clearing at 4½d. per ton, under a contractor, not under Lord Penrhyn. He was able to clear five loads a day, which would be about 3s. 9d. That was not a very high wage, but at any rate it was not his own idea of sweating. The writer's description of sweating was this: "I succeeded in loading five loads a day and that by sweating extremely." [Loud laughter.]
    MR. J. W. LOGANasked, amidst interruption, whether the hon. Member was clear in his calculation.
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORTsaid a load was two tons. If the hon. Member would go into the matter he would find the statement was correct. It was not a high wage, 5s. 9d. a day, but it was a fair wage, and though the contractor might do well at those terms it seemed a bad bargain for Lord Penrhyn. He denied that Lord Penrhyn had declined to avail himself of the Conciliation Act. The Act provided that on the application of either party to a dispute the Board of Trade might, if satisfied on certain points, appoint a person or persons to act as a conciliator or as a board of conciliation. No such suggestion was made to Lord Penrhyn. The suggestion was that one or more representatives of the Board of Trade should be present at a proposed interview between himself and his employees. There was no provision in the Act for this. [Cheers.] Sir Courtenay Boyle in one of his letters presumed—the expression was not too strong—to say that that was the intention of the Act. It was, indeed, a new and dangerous doctrine that one of the administrative departments through one of its permanent officials should be allowed to do what even the Courts of Law could not do—read into an Act of Parliament words which were not there. [Cheers.] Lord Penrhyn declined to be bound by this assertion

    713
    of a Government official, and he believed the House would say he was right. So far as the Conciliation Act was concerned Lord Penrhyn was in the right and the Board of Trade was in the wrong. Some explanation on the point was due from the Board of Trade. [Cheers.] But Lord Penrhyn did not take his stand merely on the letter of the law. Even if the Board of Trade had confined itself within the limits of the Act, Lord Penrhyn would probably have declined to be bound by the decision of a tribunal which had apparently already made up its mind against him. ["Oh, oh!"] Two incidents would prove his case. There was a lot of correspondence between Lord Penrhyn and the men and the Board of Trade. The Board published the correspondence between Lord Penrhyn and themselves, but withheld the correspondence between the Board and the men. Lord Penrhyn asked for the correspondence, but Sir Courtenay Boyle wrote:—
    "I am not aware of any communication from the men the substance of which has not been known to your lordship, but if you desire to have the text of any letter and will specify which letter you have in your mind, I will cause a copy to be supplied to you at once."
    Was there ever anything so monstrously unfair? [Cheers.] Lord Penrhyn was asked to select from a bundle of correspondence he had never seen—[cheers and laughter]—a letter of the contents of which he was totally ignorant. Not being a conjuror or a thought-reader Lord Penrhyn declined to avail himself of the offer. The House would agree that the sources from which the Board of Trade derived information on which it might have to found its judgment, ought to be without taint or suspicion of prejudice or partiality. ["Hear, hear!"] The Board derived its information from officers called labour correspondents. The correspondent for the district of North Wales in which Lord Penrhyn's quarries were situated was Mr. George Rowley. Happily he was relieved from the necessity of giving the House his own views of Mr. Rowley's suitability for the office he held, and the impartiality with which he discharged his functions, because he had put on record his own views of his qualifications for the post.
    714
    Mr. Rowley was lately attacked in a local newspaper on the ground that he could not speak Welsh. This gentleman wrote to assert his qualifications for the post he held. He said:—
    "I received my appointment through the recommendation of several Welsh Members, well-known Radicals."
    [Loud cheers and laughter.] He further stated that he had been a trade unionist all his life to which, of course, there was no objection, and continued:—
    "I have taken a leading part for more than 20 years in, and have bad a large experience of, strikes of all kinds, and have on many occasions presided over meetings conducted wholly in Welsh. Only the other day I was chairman at a Welsh meeting at—"
    he declined to attempt to pronounce the name—
    "for the purpose of raising subscriptions on behalf of the Bethesda men."
    This was the man who was conveying the information to the Board of Trade—[cheers]—which was to enable them to hold the scales of justice evenly between the two parties to this dispute. Surely it was not Lord Penrhyn who owed an explanation to the House, but the Board of Trade. He frankly admitted that he bad been induced to take part in this Debate by considerations of a personal character. A life-long friendship which he had inherited had given him countless opportunities of learning the true character of the man who had been assailed with so much rancour. For weeks past Lord Penrhyn had been the subject of criticisms of a severe kind at the hands of those who could only have heard one side of the case. The Leader of the Opposition in the course of his speech on the Address expressed his deep regret and condemnation of the course Lord Penrhyn had taken in refusing to act under the provisions of the Conciliation Act. [Opposition cheers.] He had failed indeed, if he had not made it plain that Lord Penrhyn had never been invited to act under that Act—[cheers]—and he could not avoid, in the House of Commons, expressing his deep regret that the right hon. Gentleman was not more careful that a statement so calculated to prejudice public opinion before the facts were known, should at least be accurate,

    715
    however ill judged. [Cheers.] All over the country for weeks and weeks past there had been speeches, newspaper paragraphs, leading articles, and even sermons, denouncing Lord Penrhyn. Only last Sunday, he believed, the same hon. Members opposite were deriving fresh ideas and inspiration for their speeches from the eloquence of certain reverend gentlemen, one of whom, he understood, preached from the text, "And Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go." [Loud laughter.] The preacher forgot that the people in this case went of their own accord. [Laughter.] While the House would appreciate the humour of it, they would also appreciate its injustice. Lord Penrhyn was no hardhearted Pharaoh, but an upright, honourable, fair-minded English gentleman, and wholly incapable of any mean, paltry, or dishonourable action. [Cheers.] Suggestions had been made that he was a hard, ungenerous, and unjust employer; but the total refutation of that was to be obtained from the men themselves, who said they had had good wages and comfortable homes. They were undoubtedly a splendid body of men, but they earned splendid wages. [Some cries of "No."] That was proved by the fact that they were able to spend £1,000 in a cricket ground, to build 20 chapels, and to give £1,500 to the University of Bangor. It was very creditable to them to have done this, but they could not come to the House and complain of sweating wages. After this strike 400 men remained at work, and Lord Penrhyn kept them on for thirteen weeks, though nothing was coming out of the quarry, and when at last he had to dismiss them, he gave every one of them over the age of 65 a pension for life of £1 a month, and to everyone under that age£1 to assist him in obtaining work elsewhere. It was fair that the House should know these facts, If in the remarks he had made he had given offence to any section of the House, he apologised, but he made no apology for having resented, even with some warmth, an attack which he felt to be unjustifiable on an honourable and upright gentleman, and a personal friend.
    THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. C. T. RITCHIE,)said he associated himself with every
    716
    word his hon. Friend had said with regard to the personal character of Lord Penrhyn. He had not the honour of his personal acquaintance, but he had sufficient acquaintance with him to enable him to speak upon it. He knew from what he had heard from all quarters, and even from those who unfortunately were in opposition to him at the present moment, that the character of Lord Penrhyn was as had been described by his hon. Friend; and although he regretted the position he had taken up on this question, he hoped that no one word would fall from him that would give personal offence to him. The hon. Gentleman who made this Motion made it in a very clear and moderate speech—[Opposition cheers]—and he might also say the same for his hon. Friend the Member for South Northampton, who he thought performed a task of a difficult character in a way which won for him the admiration of all Members of the House. He wished that these examples of moderation had been followed by some of the subsequent speakers on both sides of the House—[cries of "Oh!" on the Ministerial side below the gangway]—because he was sure that what they all had at heart was to endeavour in some way or other to bring this unhappy dispute to an amicable arrangement; and it was not quite the right way of doing that to use very strong language on one side or the other. He wanted the House first of all to consider what was exactly the position of the Board of Trade with regard to questions of conciliation and the duties imposed on them by the Conciliation Act. The Board of Trade, as bad been already alluded to, had for many years past endeavoured to perform when requested the part of conciliator, and had done so with remarkable success in many difficult disputes, involving many intricate and difficult questions. But they did so without any statutory authority until the Act of last year was passed. That Act was passed because it was felt on all hands that the most unreasonable way of endeavouring to settle disputes was by trying to see which side could last out the longest. It was felt, and felt rightly, that disputes which involved the employment of a large number of people, which involved, it might be, the very existence of an industry, which

    717
    might be of great importance to the country, was not merely a private question—[cheers]—and that the utmost efforts possible should be made by the authority of an Act of Parliament to endeavour to do something which should bring these disputes to an end. Thus the House of Commons had recognised that this was a matter of great public concern, and they had accordingly placed upon the shoulders of the Board of Trade a large and heavy responsibility with regard to it. He was glad to think that since the passing of this Act many disputes—some of them of great importance—had been dealt with by the Board of Trade, an I happily settled. ["Hear, hear!"] He need scarcely allude to the well-known case of the London and North Western Railway Company, in which on the one side the directors and on the other side the men had shown the greatest willingness to listen to the representations made to them by himself, and in which ultimately a settlement was arrived at for which he had received the thanks of both parties. ["Hear, hear!"] It was also only the other day—indeed it was within the last week—that the Board of Trade had received an application from a large coal-mine owner at whoso mine, where 1,200 men were employed, a strike had occurred that the Department should put into action the stipulations and provisions of the Conciliation Act. The application, it should be observed, came not from the men who had struck, but from the owner who had been struck against. That was a proof that the Act was not regarded only by those who struck but was equally regarded by those who were struck against as being of value to them. ["Hear, hear!"] He might say that the utmost disposition had been shown by both parties to the dispute to take advantage of the provisions of the Act. ["Hear, hear!"] And how had these settlements been brought about? Not by the fussy or official interference of the Board of Trade, but by bringing the parties together. The principal object of the Board of Trade in all cases had always been not to put their statutory powers as conciliators into force, but to get those concerned to settle their disputes among themselves. ["Hear,
    718
    hear!"] They believed that if they could get the parties to a dispute round a table it would be found that there was really no very great difference between them, an I that the difficulties in the way of a settlement disappeared. The hon. Member for the Macclesfield Division of Cheshire had used some very strong language with regard to the action of the Board of Trade in connection with Lord Penrhyn and his employés; indeed he had actually implied a want of good faith on the part of the Department. [Cheers and counter-cheers.] The hon. Gentleman ha I referred to certain letters which had passed between the Department and Lord Penrhyn. He took upon himself the whole responsibility for the Board of Trade's share in that correspondence. [Cheers.] Every one of those letters was written under his own personal supervision, and he took upon himself the responsibility for every statement that was made in them. [Cheers.] The hon. Gentleman said that Sir Courtenay Boyle had been directed to read into the Act words which it did not contain. That was a view that he did not agree with. Sir Courtenay Boyle in his letter of December 24 said—
    "The remark in my previous letter with regard to another disadvantage under which the men would labour by having to come to you without any of their chosen leaders had reference to the condition you imposed that all the members of the committee originally chosen were to be excluded from selection by the men in appointing the deputation that was to wait upon you. To this condition, however disadvantageous as it undoubtedly was to the men, they very reluctantly consented, but they urged very strongly that a representative of the hoard of Trade should be present at the interview, believing that the adoption of this course would greatly facilitate the opening up of negotiations. In this view the Board of Trade concur, and they cannot but think that your categorical refusal to comply with this request was neither in harmony with the intention of the Conciliation Act nor promising for the success of the negotiations."
    He did not intend to trouble the House by reading Section 2 of the Conciliation Act. What was intended by that section any one could judge for himself; it was that the Board of Trade should endeavour to bring about settlement of disputes between employers and employed.
    SIR FRANCIS POWELL: Head the section.
    MR. RITCHIEsaid that the section was in these words—
    "Where a difference exists or is apprehended between an employer or any class of employers and workmen, or between different classes of workmen, the Board of Trade may, if they think fit, exercise all or any of the following powers, namely:—(a) Inquire into the causes and circumstances of the difference; (b) take such steps as to the Board may seem expedient for the purpose of enabling the parties to the difference to meet together by themselves or their representatives, under the presidency of a chairman mutually agreed upon or nominated by the Board of Trade or by some other person or body, with a view to the amicable settlement of the difference."
    ["Hear, hear!"] Did not that justify the view that Lord Penrhyn's refusal to allow the Board of Trade to take steps for the settlement of the dispute between him and his men was contrary to the intention of the Act? [Cheers.]
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORTsaid that he should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he contended that that section of the Act gave power to the Board of Trade to suggest that they should send their representative down to the scene of the dispute.
    MR. RITCHIEsaid that not only the phraseology of the section, but the whole intention of the Act was in that direction. ["Hear, hear!"] The intention of the section was that the Board of Trade might take such steps as they deemed necessary to bring about a settlement of the dispute between the parties—["bear, hear!"]—and if the Board of Trade thought that the only way to bring about a meeting between the parties was by their sending a representative, it was clearly their duty to do so. ["Hear, hear!"] The hon. Member further stated that it was quite evident from the course of the correspondence that the Board of Trade had made up their minds on the merits of the dispute. To that allegation he gave a most absolute and unqualified denial, and he might say that there was not a shade of foundation for it. [Cheers.] He and his advisers had been most careful not in any way to enter into the real merits of the dispute; with that he had always said he had nothing to do, and Lord Penrhyn knew that he had always
    720
    stated that in his correspondence with him. He was satisfied that Lord Penrhyn had never authorised the hon. Member to put forward any such contention. ["Hear, hear!"] The hon. Gentleman had spoken about some man, whose name he had never heard to his knowledge, as being a local labour correspondent of the Board of Trade, and from whom they had obtained their information in regard to this case. That certainly was not the ease. ["Hear, hear!"] So anxious had he been that the Department should receive the information necessary—not upon the merits of the case—that, in addition to the correspondence, he had asked his noble Friend Lord Dudley to go down and see Lord Penrhyn and endeavour, by his personal influence, to obtain that information, and he also sent down one of the most trusted officials of the Board of Trade to see the men with the view of persuading them to give up some of the points which they were insisting upon. Therefore the information received by the Board of Trade was not obtained in any shape from the person to whom the hon. Member referred. ["Hear, hear!"] The man might be a. labour correspondent of the Board of Trade for all he knew, and in that case doubtless it would have been his duty to furnish such information as he could. There was a large number of these local labour correspondents, and perhaps the man referred to might be one. [Ironical cheers.] Did hon. Members who objected to these local labour correspondents place any reliance on the Labour Department of the Board of Trade? Did they think it useful or useless? If they thought it useful they must have as their labour correspondents men who could advise them as regarded the circumstances of these cases. He did not know of the individual referred to, but he could say that his information in regard to this case was obtained from other sources. ["Hear, hear!"] The hon. Gentleman had also said that Lord Penrhyn had never been asked to consent to the appointment of a conciliator to act under the Conciliation Act. That was true, because he regarded the appointment of a conciliator as a more advanced step. Did he understand the hon. Gentleman to say that Lord Penrhyn would have

    721
    consented to the appointment of a conciliator if he had been asked to do so?
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORTsaid that under no circumstances would Lord Penrhyn have consented.
    MR. RITCHIEsaid that in that case he did not think that the hon. Member was entitled to find fault because the Board of Trade had not asked Lord Penrhyn to adopt a course to which he so strongly objected. ["Hear, hear!"] As he had already said, he regarded the appointment of a. conciliator as a more advanced step. He had always considered that the most friendly and best way of bringing about an agreement was to get the two parties to the dispute together, and the hon. Member must admit that he had endeavoured to bring the two parties together. The hon. Gentleman had laid great stress upon the fact that the whole of the correspondence was not sent to Lord Penrhyn, whilst it was sent to the men. But the men had to make up their minds whether or not they would accept Lord Penrhyn's proposals, and therefore it was necessary that the whole of the correspondence should be sent to them. That part of the correspondence which was not sent to Lord Penrhyn was of a purely formal character. Lord Penrhyn was acquainted with every material fact in this correspondence. He himself had sent to Lord Penrhyn the material letter in the correspondence. [Mr. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: What date?] He sent it to Lord Penrhyn on October 2. [Opposition cheers.]
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: This is not the correspondence referred to.
    MR. RITCHIE: I beg pardon, it is the correspondence. ["Hear, hear!"] He did not believe that Lord Penrhyn would for a moment contend that there was any portion of the letters of the least importance which was not forwarded to him. They had not concealed from him a single thing that he ought to have known: he was certain of that. ["Hear, hear!"] He could only say with regard to much of the discussion that had taken place that day that they had steadily avoided going into the merits of the case, and he did not now propose to go into them. ["Hear, hear!"] Their object was to attain peace. His hon. Friend said that there were three conditions laid down—two of them of minor
    722
    importance and one of them of considerable importance. The two of minor importance he had said might have been overcome, but not the important one. The two minor points were the shorthand writer and the interpreter, and the one of importance was the presence of a representative of the Board of Trade. It was curious that in letter No. 13 of the correspondence there were these words—that with regard to the presence of a Board of Trade representative, he stated, there was no desire to press the matter against Lord Penrhyn's wishes. So that this point was waived before the negotiations were brought to a conclusion.
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: It was revived.
    MR. RITCHIE: After the negotiations had practically terminated the suggestion was renewed; but prior to that Lord Penhryn was informed that the presence of a Board of Trade representative would not be pressed against his wishes. That was the one condition of importance, and it was withdrawn before the negotiations came to a close. ["Hear, hear!"] Then there remained the shorthand writer and the interpreter. He was told that it would have been impossible to have obtained in the quarry a man sufficiently acquainted with Welsh and English who would have made a good interpreter, and as to the shorthand writer my hon. Friend said that no suggestion came from the Board of Trade on the subject. On reference to No. 20 it would be found to this effect:—
    "I am directed to ask whether you still adhere to the objection to a representative of the Board of Trade attending at the first meeting, and whether you consent to the men bringing an interpreter and a shorthand writer whose names should he first submitted to you for your approval."
    [Opposition cheers.] He authorised that letter to be written without consultation with the men. [Mr. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: "Hear, hear!"] He did not quite understand that "hear, hear! "It was they who had reason to complain if he bad exceeded his powers in this respect. No notice was taken of that suggestion. As far as the Board of Trade was concerned there was no wish to press a shorthand writer not approved of by

    723
    Lord Penrhyn. He hoped that they would have no prolonged discussion on the subject. He most earnestly desired that the negotiations broken off might be resumed. They were willing to meet, as far as possible, every suggestion which Lord Penrhyn might make in order to get the parties together to discover reasons for ending the conflict. He hoped he had shown that that was the sole desire of the Board of Trade. [Cheers.]
    SIR WILLIAM HAUCOURT: We have witnessed this afternoon a remarkable and, I can only call it, a very painful scene. I have heard of Ministers being attacked, sometimes perhaps unjustly, by a violent Opposition, but a more vehement and, I think, a more unjust attack made on a responsible Minister of the Crown by one of his avowed supporters and cheered to the echo by hon. Gentlemen opposite I never heard of. [Laughter and Opposition cheers.] It seems to me the inveterate practice of this overwhelming majority is to occupy themselves night after night with attack after attack upon their chosen representatives. [Lauhter.] I must say the practice saves the minority the task of criticising the action of the Government; and I must add that if the hon. Member for Macclesfield desires to bring this quarrel to an end a more unsuccessful advocate I have never listened to; for, if this matter is to be approached in the spirit in which he has approached it, there will not and there cannot be peace in that district. [Cheers.] What is the language what we have heard from him in this matter? First of all it was a denunciation of the action of the Board of Trade in carrying out the Conciliation Act. There can be nothing more clear on the face of the Act than that the action of the Board of Trade in this matter was exactly the thing which the statute laid down. [Cheers.] Listen to what the Act says. It contemplates a difference between an employer and his workmen. In such case the Board of Trade may—

    (1.) "Inquire into the causes and circumstances of the difference.

    (2.) "Take such steps as to the Board may seem expedient for the purpose of enabling the parties to meet together of themselves or their representatives.

    (3.) "On the application of either party appoint a person to act as conciliator."

    724
    All this may be done on the application of one of the parties; it is only when it comes to a final arbitration that the consent of both sides is required. It is the duty of the Board of Trade to exercise the first three powers upon the application of either of the parties. Lord Penrhyn had undertaken to say that this is a private matter, in which the Board of Trade had no right to interfere and no light to inquire into the circumstances. The Board of Trade can take such steps as may seem expedient on the application of one of the parties for the purpose of enabling the parties to the difference to meet together. How are they to do that? The interference of the Board of Trade is resented by Lord Penrhyn. What was the Board of Trade to do except to apply to Lord Penrhyn and suggest to him how to carry the Act out? Thereupon Lord Penrhyn says: "This is a private affair; you have no business to interfere between me and my workmen." According to the Act the parties might meet under a chairman mutually agreed upon or nominated by the Board of Trade. It is clear, therefore, that the Board of Trade is entitled to nominate a chairman. It is entirely in accordance with the spirit of the Act as well as of the letter that the Board of Trade should send a representative. ["No!"] The words are perfectly clear. ["Hear, hear!"] Can anybody say that the course of the Board of Trade, in suggesting to Lord Penrhyn that a representative of the Board of Trade should be present in order to assist in settling the differences, did not come within the letter and spirit of that Act? I venture to say that the Board of Trade were justified in doing—and, indeed, were called upon to do—what they did. What the right hon. Gentleman has said is perfectly true. The Board of Trade might, if they had chosen to do so, on the application of the employers or workmen, and after taking into consideration the existence and adequacy of the means available for conciliation, have appointed a person or persons to act as a conciliator or as a board of conciliation. Now, what becomes of the hon. Member for Macclesfield's venomous attack upon Sir Courtenay Boyle for presuming to say on behalf of the Board of Trade what he did? It is a mean and unworthy course, and one

    725
    which is always condemned, and I hope always will he condemned in this House, to attack one of the permanent officials in a department of the Government for which there is a responsible Minister in this House. [Cheers.] No Minister who respects himself or respects the House of Commons will do otherwise than repudiate such unworthy attacks as those made by the hon. Member upon Sir Courtenay Boyle. ["Hear, hear!"] Sir Courtenay Boyle did in this matter what he ought to have done, and he did what his chief has taken—and very properly taken—the responsibility for. I deplore and condemn the conduct of Lord Penrhyn in refusing to accept the good offices of the Board of Trade under the Conciliation Act for the purpose of settling this unfortunate dispute. Hon. Gentlemen opposite are very pleased to go about the country boasting of the social legislation which they have passed. Here is a fine specimen of their social legislation! [Opposition cheers.] It has led to that sort of language which I can only call a declaration of warfare between employers and employed—["No, no"]—which has characterised the whole course of this dispute, and it is setting at naught your own Act of which you boast before the constituencies—an Act which I am bound to say has done great good in this country. ["Hear, hear!"] Yes; great good, because it had been fairly and honourably dealt with by employers of labour, Lord Penrhyn being, as far I know, the solo and unfortunate exception. Suppose, when one of the most disastrous strikes that could threaten the industry of this country was impending between the London and North-Western Railway Company, the company had chosen to hold the language of the old Duke of Newcastle before the Reform Bill—" Cannot I do what I like with my own? "That was the motto Lord Penrhyn has chosen to adopt. Suppose the London and North-Western Railway Company had chosen to say: "Oh, questions between us and our employés are private matters; what business has the Board of Trade to say a word in the matter? Why in the world are we not to do as we like with our own? On the contrary, they sought the good offices of the Board of Trade, and the matter was satisfactorily settled. Lord Penrhyn
    726
    would have nothing to do with the Board of Trade; he would have nobody but his own interpreter and his own shorthand writers, and he would take no step whatever that might put an end to the strife. There is another point, and in my opinion a more important and far more wide-reaching question, and that is the war Lord Penrhyn has declared against the principle of labour combination. Was there ever such an idle pretence as to say: "I am in favour of combination, but I will refuse to admit of any of the methods by which alone combination can be given effect to"? How can a combination of men be carried out except through a committee or a body corresponding to a committee? We have been told that these are the private rights of property of Lord Penrhyn. Yes, there are private rights of property; but these men have quite as great private rights as Lord Penrhyn. The men have private rights in their own labour, and when there is a. question of wages or contract they have just as much right to defend those private rights as Lord Penrhyn has to defend his. ["Hear, hear!"] How are they to defend their rights'.' Are they not to choose their own agents just as Lord Penrhyn chooses his? Lord Penrhyn has no right to question who shall be the agents of these men, any more than they have a right to challenge the agent Lord Penrhyn thinks fit to employ. If his example is followed by employers of labour you will have nothing but endless strikes, you will have no peace between capital and labour. [Cheers.] It is because employers of labour have for many a long year recognised that in these combinations, and in the agencies which these combinations employ, they have the best means of reconciling the interest of capital with that of labour, that they have always desired there should be representatives of these great bodies of workmen. Lord Penrhyn has endeavoured to deal individually with the men, and his men, I hope, never will allow themselves to be individually treated with. ["Hear, hear!"] Whatever his representatives may say, he has declared war upon the rights of combination. What business has he to attack the 71 men who were chosen by some thousands of these quarrymen?

    727
    An hon. Friend behind me gave a very good illustration—namely, that from the moment these men became the agents of the whole of the quarrymen they were invested, as it were, with a sort of right which belongs to an ambassador, and Lord Penrhyn had no right to attack the men and suspend them. I deeply regret that Lord Penrhyn, against whom personally I desire to say nothing—[a laugh]—I have said nothing against Lord Penrhyn personally. I have said he has totally misapprehended the intention and the character of the Conciliation Act, and, in my opinion, he has entirely misapprehended the whole character of these combinations of labour. ["Hear, hear!"] Now the question we have to discuss to-day is whether you desire, as Parliament appeared to desire last Session, that the Board of Trade should be a beneficent instrument in bringing these contests between capital and labour to end by offering its good offices in order to ascertain the rights of the matters and to remove the differences between the parties. You made an attempt. That attempt promised great success. Experience has shown that the intervention of the Board of Trade has been generally useful. I do not understand the denunciation of the labour correspondent. Everybody knows that the office of a labour correspondent is not at all to direct or to influence the policy of the Board of Trade. Labour correspondents simply send up particulars as to wages and employment, the number of unemployed, and so forth—mere statistical information—and therefore all the appeals to prejudice made by the hon. Member for Macclesfield only tend to embitter the controversy, which is bitter enough without them. You have in the Board of Trade a very useful instrument of conciliation. Are you going to destroy it by encouraging the line Lord Penrhyn has taken? If you are, then tear up your Conciliation Act—it is not worth the paper it is printed on—and admit your social reforms are worthless, as indeed they are if the conduct of Lord Penrhyn is to prevail. Let us come to a clear understanding on the subject of combination. Are you going to make war on the trade unions? If you take up the line that an employer of labour is entitled to say: "This is
    728
    my private affair, and you have no business in it, and I won't deal with any of my employés who go into combinations, and who choose their own representatives," we know exactly where we are. Shortly after I came into Parliament, as the hon. Member for Leicester knows very well, we fought out this battle in the seventies. We then passed these Acts, which gave recognition to the trade unions of the country, and are you prepared now to overthrow that legislation, and to support Lord Penrhyn in a view on the subject of combination which would defeat the whole principle of those Acts? I venture to say that this is a much larger question than that involved in the conduct of the Board of Trade. I hope, at all events, that in spite of the animated and vehement language of the hon. Member for Macclesfield, inspired, doubtless, by those sentiments of personal regard which everybody must respect, we have a higher duty than the consideration of the character of particular individuals or the sentiments of personal regard. ["Hear, hear!"] We have to deal with one of the gravest questions which affect the prosperity of this country. We know what injury has already been done by strikes to the trade of this country, and are you going to-night to encourage a course which must make strikes much more general and prolonged? Are you going to condemn the Board of Trade for interposing to prevent, if possible, the evils of strikes? [Cheers.] Are you going to declare principles making war upon that other method of conciliation by which it is competent for trade unions to appoint representative men to deal with their employers? If so, you are preparing for yourselves a very evil future—["Hear, hear!"]—if so, you will be laying the foundations of perpetual strife, which will undermine the prosperity and commerce of this country. Therefore, I hope that even at this moment wiser counsels may prevail, and that Lord Penrhyn will accede to the just and friendly interposition of the Board of Trade, and that he will deal in this matter with the men whom his employés regard as their representatives and friends. Except by so dealing with them I fear that it will be impossible that

    729
    Lord Penrhyn can ever come to a fair understanding with the men who served him before, and I have no doubt would serve him again. [Cheers.]
    THE FIRST LORD OF TUB TREASURY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR,): I cannot imagine to whom the solemn sermon contained in the closing sentences of the right hon. Gentleman's speech are really addressed. [Laughter.] Looking across the floor of the House the right hon. Gentleman said:—
    "Are you going to sanction this or that? Are you going to lay down that workmen are not to be permitted to combine? Are you going to support this or that new principle?"
    And turning to the Member for Leicester the right hon. Gentleman appealed to their common experience, observing,
    "Don't you remember the noble fight we fought 25 years ago for the purpose of enabling the British workmen to combine?"
    [Laughter.] So far as I can carry in my own mind the history of legislation on this subject, almost all the principal Acts giving liberty to workmen to combine were Tory Acts—[cheers]—and were part of that programme of social legislation against which the right hon. Gentleman sneers, but which I do not think he will find it very expedient to denounce on public platforms. [Cheers.] The right hon. Gentleman asks whether the Government are going to destroy their own Conciliation Act of last year—a most pertinent question, and one which I confess has been occurring to me more than once during the course of this Debate. It is principally, indeed solely, for the purpose of bogging the House not to destroy the Act by hasty and, if I may say so without offence, intemperate Debate that I have risen. [Cheers.] I make no complaint whatever against the fact that my right hon. Friend below the gangway and others have thought themselves bound to criticise the proceedings of the Board of Trade. ["Hear, hear!"] We ask for no immunity from criticism from either side of the House. ["Hear, hear!"] So long as criticism is directed to our administrative errors—if administrative errors they be—I should be the last person to complain of it. On this part of the Debate, however, I am bound to say that it seems to me that my right hon. Friend has ably and
    730
    successfully defended the action of his Department—[cheers]—and the action of his subordinates, and nothing further is required from his colleagues in defence cither of the head of the Department or of any members of it. ["Hear, hear!"] But there is a much larger question involved in this discussion, and I ask the House in all seriousness whether they think it possible that any Conciliation Act is going to work in this country if you take the matter out of the hands of the Department on the one side, and out of the hands of the workmen and employers on the other, and make it the subject of acrimonious controversy in the House of Commons. [Cheers.] The thing is absolutely impossible. This House has many great qualifications and many great gifts, but the qualification of being an impartial judge is one which it does not and never can possess, and it would be disastrous to the public interests if it should lay any claim to it. ["Hear, hear!"] I agree with the able speech of the opener of the Debate, a speech which was couched in very moderate language. I believe the hon. Member did his best not to embitter the dispute—["Hear, hear!"]—but his example has not, I think, been followed by every one who has spoken. In the nature of things it is impossible, perhaps, that the hon. Member's example should be followed by all. Once throw down on the floor of the House as a matter for discussion questions between representatives of different classes or sections in the House—questions in which personal discretion, conduct, and character were involved—and you will inevitably find that bitterness is imported, that accusations are made against people who cannot defend themselves which must rankle and leave behind them consequences very injurious to all the interests concerned, and which can be productive of nothing but evil to every person involved in the dispute. What would be thought if a similar course were taken when any body of gentlemen in this House thought not that the employer is in error, but that the trade union leaders involved in a dispute are in error owing to their action? Supposing the trade union leaders, by their faults, either of knowledge or of temper, involved a great industry in ruin and inflicted great injuries on a vast body of workmen, what

    731
    would be thought if their case was vehemently discussed on the floor of the House of Commons, and a strong personal attack made on their discretion? [Cheers.] I know what I should think in such circumstances. I should think it a most deplorable and unfortunate course. I should say that this was not the way to induce men to agree among themselves; and if that is not the way to act when we are dealing with the leaders of labour, so also it is not the way to act when we are dealing with those who are employers of labour. ["Hear, hear!"] We are all alike fallible, all alike liable to error, all alike may permit personal feeling to intervene between the dry light of discretion or reason, and these inevitable failings to which we are all liable are aggravated, not appeased, by such Debates as we have had to-night. ["Hear, hear!"] For my part I cannot help thinking that, if, whenever the Board of Trade happens to fail, either with the employer or a body of workmen, in carrying out the beneficent work which was initiated by Parliament last year, the merits of the question are to be discussed on the floor of the House of Commons, accompanied by the invective and bitterness which must attach to such questions, then social legislation, at which the right hon. Gentleman has sneered in so far as it is embodied in the Act of last year, is foredoomed to disastrous failure. ["Hear, hear!"] This much, I think, is generally acknowledged, that the body of workmen engaged in the quarries of Lord Penrhyn are most admirable specimens of the working men of this country—[cheers]—and, on the other hand, I think that it will be admitted that Lord Penrhyn, both as a man and as an employer, is honourable, and, indeed, not only honourable, but generous. ["Hear, hear!"] The part of my hon. Friend's speech in which he dealt with the motives which led him to bring the matter forward with so much ability—[cheers]—and the way in which he dealt with the character and conduct of a personal friend must have found an echo in the hearts of everyone who listened to him. ["Hear, hear!"] Whatever we may think of this dispute—and if I had an opinion I would not express it—["Hear, hear!"]—it is, at all events, abundantly clear that in Lord Penrhyn
    732
    we are dealing with one of those employers of labour who have shown themselves not merely honourable, but generous towards their workmen, and who have done very much for the great body of workmen, with whom, after all, their own interests are so intimately and closely associated. [Cheers.] Surely we ought to do something to earn the blessings that have been pronounced upon peacemakers. Some speeches, and notably that to which we have just listened, are not likely to earn us anything of that kind. [Laughter and cheers.] I hope, now that the Debate has gone on for upwards of three hours, it will be felt on all sides of the House that no further public advantage, that no further benefit to the men lately engaged in this great industry, that no further advantage either to capital or labour, can possibly accrue from prolonging a Debate which has gone on, in my judgment, too long already, and that we may hasten to bring this Debate to a conclusion and hesitate, and hesitate once again, before we think it necessary to bring into the arena of public Debates in the House of Commons matters with which the House of Commons is but little qualified to deal, and on which, if it does persist, as it has a right to persist, in dealing with, I am afraid it is likely to do more harm, in the long run, than good. My right hon. Friend has shown, both by his speech to-night and by his conduct, that his earnest desire and the object of the efforts of the Department over which he presides are directed towards healing those unhappy differences. [Cheers.] Let us not mar the good work in which he is engaged; let us wish him good speed in all his efforts, and let us not intervene in a manner, apparently in his support, but really in a way which must hamper all he is doing by attacks and criticisms upon persons who are not, and who cannot be, here to defend themselves, but with regard to whom passionate controversy had been aroused in the country which cannot but find a reflection in our Debates if we permit ourselves to debate them. I need say no more upon the substance of the Debate we have been engaged in. With regard to the technical point of view of the division, I hope we may be spared it. ["Hear, hear!"] It is evident that the division can only

    733
    be as to whether the House adjourns or does not adjourn, and whereas there are cases in which even that apparently unmeaning Motion may be interpreted into a verdict of the House on one side or the other of a question it cannot be so interpreted on the present occasion, because evidently all those who desire to support the Board of Trade, all those who desire to support Lord Penrhyn, all, whatever interest they may take in the controversy, are bound really to vote for the Government on this occasion. [Laughter.] Those who vote against the Government are condemning my right hon. Friend—[cries of "No!"]—and I understand that everybody, on all sides of the House, is agreed that my right hon. Friend has behaved admirably. [General cheers.] On the other hand, if there be any who concur with the criticisms hastily passed, if I may venture to say so, by my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield, they are equally bound to support the Government, because if they do not support the Government they are condemning Lord Penrhyn. [Laughter.] Under these circumstances I hope it will be generally thought that the Debate has gone far enough, and that we need not emphasise what has passed by going to the trouble of a division. [Cheers.]
    MR. JOHN BURNScharacterised the Debate as memorable in the industrial history of this country, and went so far as to say that the House of Commons would some day, perhaps, not regret that the Motion for Adjournment intervened between the South African Committee, which had for its object the correction of undisciplined wealth abroad, while this Motion sought to keep in check irresponsible capital at home. He regretted that the sympathetic speech of the First Lord of the Treasury offered no solution of the Penrhyn dispute. He could not follow the right hon. Gentleman that the House of Commons was out of place in discussing a momentous question like this. He would follow him, however, in not importing into his version, of the dispute any question as to Lord Penrhyn, whose heart he did not question, but whose head had sadly failed him, and in regard to whom the opinion of his own class was, that one Lord Penrhyn made an adjournment, 10 Lord Penrhyn's might make a riot, and 100 Lord Penrhyn's might make a revolu-
    734
    tion. He ventured to say that if they could hear the opinion of the whole Conservative Party of Lord Penrhyn's attitude it would be to advise him to take the first opportunity of climbing down from the position that he had made untenable by his intolerance. The First Lord of the Treasury took some credit to his Party for its connection with the passing of the laws that made for freedom of combination. Lord Cross's conduct towards that end deserved, and secured at the time, the approval of every labourer, irrespective of politics; but they complained—at least he did—that the old traditions of the Tory Party were being departed from in Lord Penrhyn's attitude. The First Lord of the Treasury bad no right to say that the House of Commons should not press this matter any further. The House of Commons he regarded as the highest tribunal in this country, and a Chamber in which the workmen, whether combined or not, had the utmost trust and confidence on the bedrock principles that affected their right to live and to combine. When the First Lord of the Treasury told them that they would do no good by discussing this question, he would say respectfully that his suggestion was simply sterile, because, beyond a few stilted commonplaces, there was no suggestion for any solution by means of which Lord Penrhyn would come to his senses and concede at once the elementary right of every Englishman to sell his labour under conditions that he himself might determine. The labour leaders and workmen involved in this dispute had been conciliatory almost to the point of subserviency. He did hope that before this Debate was over the Board of Trade would suggest some means by means of which the quarrymen would be able to follow their peaceful, constitutional demand for representation. If it was not conceded to them they would perhaps have to resort to means and methods that other workmen in other parts of the country had sometimes adopted, and not always with the preaching of sermons, the passing of resolutions in chapels, and the singing of hymns. However much they might regret it, they had got an industrial calamity in Bethesda. They had got there a social question that touched the very well-springs of representation in a free country, and unless

    735
    the First Lord of the Treasury could devise some means by which this wealthy mine and quarry owner could be brought to his own senses, then he admitted that Parliament was impotent and that the House of Commons was unable to keep in check what he believed might be construed by some men some day as an overt act on the part of a rich man using unfairly and unjustly and ungenerously his enormous power of wealth to drive men, through starvation, to do that which, he trusted, they might never have recourse to. The question in dispute was not how much per ton the quarrymen should ask Lord Penrhyn for their labour; not whether they should dictate to the manager or he should dictate to them, or whether their wages should be high or low. The question was, whether, in the year 1877, they would allow the power of the plutocrat to do what was unfortunately done in Germany and France, but which, if attempted in England, would be resisted and fought and overwhelmed, to the discomfiture of the Lord Penrhyn of the day and of the future. They had been told that Lord Penrhyn admitted the right of legitimate combination. In that he made a virtue of necessity, not daring to challenge the right. Lord Penrhyn, it was admitted, had taken the action for which he was being criticised because the men threatened to strike. Was he omnipotent in the kingdom of Wales, this lord who talked in so lofty a strain? In his opinion the fault of the Welsh quarry-men was that they had been so conciliatory and had not struck on the spur of the moment, when Lord Penrhyn was in a difficulty. The fairness of the quarrymen in giving six months' notice was conduct which a peer and aristocrat ought not to be so ungentlemanly as to overlook. The men were justified in asking for an increase of wages, having regard to the prices ruling in the market, and when they threatened to strike they only did the opposite of that which masters did when they gave notice of a reduction in a certain time, or in the alternative of a lock-out. If Lord Penrhyn's quarries had been in the Rhondda Valley and he had had to deal with the colliers there, it was possible that his castle might have been pulled down about his ears. [Cries of "Oh!"] Yes; it was because these men had been
    736
    too conciliatory and peaceable, and had been singing hymns instead of learning how to box that the aristocrat had dared to presume on their lack of obstinacy. The criticisms which had been passed upon the men's committee had been cheered in the House by the very same gentlemen who were enthusiastic a year ago when a committee of German Jews were concerned in the invasion of a friendly State. In their opinion a, Dr. Jameson, a Cecil Rhodes, or other filibusters could defy the law and deserved to be acclaimed as patriots; but if a few workmen without abusing their master approached him and submitted a peaceful resolution their action was described as tyranny which must be suppressed. The action of Sir Courtenay Boyle had been critised by hon. Members opposite, but the Government were responsible for the action of the Board of Trade, and if hon. Gentlemen opposite thought that the Government were unwise in striving to preserve order by preventing people, to whatever class they might belong, from making fools of themselves, they ought to bring forward a vote of want of confidence against their Ministers. A continental Socialist had said to him the other day:—
    "If there had been a dispute of this character upon the Continent, our governing classes would have made no inquiry, and would not have allowed the Minister at the Board of Trade to intervene. No Minister would have dared to write a letter like that which Sir Courtenay Boyle wrote to Lord Penrhyn. But the fact that such action is not possible on the Continent means that some day we shall have to solve our social and industrial problems all at once, perhaps with bloodshed and anarchy. Now I know how it is that you Englishmen are such practical people, and have conquered the world's markets. You keep off the possibility of revolution by insisting on reforms. When a Jameson rebels you imprison him; when a Lord Penrhyn does what he ought not to do you correct him, and when a labour leader exceeds his rights you punish him."
    For his part, if Lord Penrhyn were not checked he saw no reason why this dispute should not go on, why the men should not fight him and starve him, rich as he was, into submission. There was a limit even to his purse, and a picket might be established in the valley of Bethesda, strong enough to prevent any workmen from going to take employment. [Ministerial cries of "Violence!"]

    737
    No; he left violence to hon. Members opposite, and was content to rely upon persuasive argument. The hon. Member for Macclesfield had said that one of the demands of the men was the establishment of a minimum wage. Well, had not the principle of the minimum wage been accepted by the hon. Member's own Government? The 4s. 6d. a day asked for was only the average pay when the men were at work. It was contended that Lord Penrhyn was justified, and within his right, in suspending his men. Shylock was also within his right when he demanded his pound of flesh, and they all knew Shylock's punishment, and perhaps Lord Penrhyn's punishment might come sooner than he expected. The tone of Lord Penrhyn, of his letter, and of his representative, and his attitude of lordly indifference were not in keeping with modern requirements. He did not object so much to the nasty thing Lord Penrhyn had done as to the nasty way in which he had done it. He ought to have shown better manners in his negotiations with his men, and ought not to have flouted a Government Department as this lordly legislator had thought fit to do. He resented and repudiated the insinuation that there had been intimidation of non-union men by unionists. It had been hinted that the action resolved upon by the men had not been approved by all of them. It was, however, impossible to get over the fact that all the men who had gone out, non-unionists as well as unionists, had stuck together up to the present, and would continue to do so. Another point had to be dealt with. Seventy-one men had been dismissed. ["No, no!"] Suspended or dismissed. Why not say deprived of employment? Why call things by false names? If these seventy-one men were to present themselves at the works to-morrow, or three months hence, for employment, as he hoped they would not, and the other men were starved back into submission, as he trusted they would not be, then would not the suspension of these seventy-one men be interpreted as dismissal? Was not this suspension a premonitory symptom of dismissal? For combination these men had been suspended, and this suspension might be interpreted as dismissal. The Board of Trade were invoked to settle this dispute in a simple
    738
    way, and there were Members who said the Board had acted unjustly. They did not say that two years ago, when men like himself, who did not hesitate to grasp the nettle, said conciliation was needed. The Bill was asked for and assented to, it passed unanimously through the House, and not even the hon. Member for Macclesfield or the son of Lord Penrhyn objected; but now, because the interposition of the Board was in favour of the men, the Act was repudiated. This quibble about deputation and committee was not fair to the House of Commons. Lord Penrhyn allowed a deputation on August 17. What was the difference between a deputation of the men and a committee of the men? An electoral college of 5G decides there shall be an Executive Committee of 11, who in turn appoint a deputation of 7 workmen. If Lord Penrhyn condescended to see a deputation on August 17, 1896, then he ought equally to have seen a smaller, businesslike, technical committee five months later. It was well known that Messrs. Harland and Wolff, Sir William Houldsworth, William Allan, Mr. Whiteley, or Mr. Kenyon would in the case of any dispute arising with their workpeople, send for and consult with the Executive Committee of the District Association. What these men could do with safety, profit, and satisfaction, Lord Penrhyn, by compulsion and pressure from the House, or the force of public opinion, should be forced to submit to. There was at stake not the question of a strike or the question of the intervention of the Board of Trade; the question to decide was, should the workmen have the right to sell their labour through their own agencies and by their own selection? Lord Penrhyn contravened that doctrine, and on him rested the responsibility for what had taken place. It had been said the prolongation of the Debate would do harm. Would Lord Penrhyn, if the Debate stopped, reconsider his attitude? Would the men be allowed to resume work to-morrow? If he would not or could not do that, then the House of Commons would have to consider whether there should not be applied to the brutal, intolerant employer that treatment which years ago the House applied to labouring men in labour disputes. In the streets of London a cabman had only to whistle

    739
    the "Dead March" in Saul to another cabman with whom he disagreed, and he was liable to be hauled before a magistrate and get a month. To call a man a "blackleg" might mean three months for intimidation. Three men waiting outside a factory and seen by a policeman might come within the clutches of the law, and 500 men peaceably assembled were liable to be convicted.
    MR. SPEAKERcalled the hon. Member to order; his remarks were travelling outside the matter before the House.
    MR. BURNSconcluded by remarking that what was sauce for the labouring goose should be sauce for the lordly gander. He admitted that it was very difficult for the House of Commons to intervene in labour disputes of this character. He admitted that if it did interfere it would be found possibly that the same power asked for against the master would be used against the workmen, but fortunately that alternative was never likely to occur, because the Conciliation Act provided a middle course by which the matters in dispute could be made the subject of public arbitration, which could be voluntarily adopted. If either side objected, then the mighty force of public opinion, stronger than troops or police, and in some cases than Acts of Parliament, would act against those who dared push aside the Conciliation Act and ignore those fundamental relations between master and men Englishmen have observed in the past, and which had prevented many disputes assuming that serious character they had in America. He appealed to Lord Penrhyn not to force this quarrel further; not to drive away from their native place the men who had earned his wealth, and had rendered it possible for him to assume the power and means of insulting them in their native land, where they had worked in removing a mountain around which they had played as children. They had known only this employment, which had been carried on under peaceful conditions but a single irresponsible individual could arouse passions that the Conciliation Act could control, and the House of Commons should not permit any man, though a Peer, to use his monopoly, stand above law, and bring poverty, misery, and despair into this Welsh valley. He appealed to Lord Penrhyn to leave his
    740
    hard-hearted policy, to put aside the greed of the new millionaire and monopolist, and not ruin and insult the men whose labour gave him his wealth and position. If he would not respond to that appeal, then Englishmen would treat him as he deserved. Children would mock him, women would spurn him, and the Welsh quarrymen would take to combination as they never had before. They would organise as the Northumberland miners had organised, and he was ready to help them. It would then be impossible for any man to flout public opinion and legislation in the scandalous way Lord Penrhyn had.
    On the return of MR. SPEAKER after the usual interval,
    MR. LLOYD GEORGEsaid he represented a constituency whose whole interests were in a speedy determination of the strike, and therefore he should be exceedingly unwilling to do anything to prolong the dispute unless he were convinced that in so doing there was a question of justice and right involved for a number of meritorious workmen in another constituency. He was exceedingly sorry that some passionate words had been used in defence of Lord Penrhyn, which would have the unhappy effect of prolonging a disastrous struggle. He quite agreed that it was not for the House of Commons to enter into the original dispute between the workmen and their employers, but there was one point which the House of Commons could settle, and it was a very simple one. The hon. Member for Macclesfield had said that these men were paid on the average 5s. 6d. a day, but every man who knew anything about slate quarries knew that there were days when the men. could not be employed at all, and Lord Penrhyn in his computation of averages took no account of the weeks and months when the quarries were stopped owing to weather and other reasons. Times of sickness, too, had' to be deducted, and accidents. It was perfectly true there might be men earning their £15 a month, but cases were submitted to Lord Penrhyn where men were not earning £1 a week. What the men asked was that as long as they worked hard and skilfully, and did their work honestly,

    741
    they should be paid, not exactly equally, but in proportion to their skill and industry without regard to considerations of luck. At the beginning of the month one face of rock was given to one set of men and another face to another set, and the result was that a certain set of men who got favourable terms from the management made probably very high wages especially the contractors, but the bulk of them, taking the average, earned very low wages indeed. The men asked that this should be equalised; that there should be no favouritism. Did the hon. Member know how long it took to master this trade—one of the most highly-skilled in the United Kingdom? No man could master this trade without an apprenticeship of fully seven years at least. And it was a trade carried on at the risk of their lives. Most of those men in the course of their employment met with serious accidents, and in the course of a year live or seven men got killed. Yet, in face of all that, the hon. Member for Macclesfield sneered at a minimum wage of 4s. 6d. per day! The hon. Member distinctly challenged the right of any to say that Lord Penrhyn had been put in the wrong by refusing the interference of the Board of Trade in connection with the Conciliation Bill. Now that was a fair issue, not merely for this House, but for the public. ["Hear, hear!"] They would know in future that they were lighting at any rate for the principle of conciliation in labour disputes. They had that not merely on the assertion of the Opposition side of the House, but by the admission of the friends of Lord Penrhyn himself. The first point of the hon. Gentleman was that Lord Penrhyn had not refused the right of legitimate combination to the men. But Lord Penrhyn had refused to recognise the right of the committee to speak on behalf of the men, though the committee was elected openly and fairly by the men. How could 3,000 men, except through a. committee, make known their grievances? Lord Penrhyn's idea of combination was this. They might meet and pass resolutions, and register themselves as the members of a trade union; but directly they began to put the union into active operation he refused to recognise the representatives. It was a perfect farce, and a dishonest contention
    742
    to say that Lord Penrhyn recognised the right of the men to combine. What precipitated the strike was the suspension of the 58 members of the committee, together with 13 others. The hon. Member had said that that, was done because the committee had passed a. resolution announcing a strike in March. But the House had not been told that something like 80 per cent. of the men had previously passed a resolution calling for an immediate strike. The whole action of the committee was directed to restraining the men from striking on the spot. There was another point which the hon. Gentleman had not explained, and which had been overlooked by the agent of the quarry in the statement circulated to hon. Members. Why were the 13 men suspended who were not members of the committee? Simply because they had dared to give evidence to the committee in support of the statements of grievances to Lord Penrhyn. No reason at all had been assigned for the dismissal of these men.
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: Misrepresentation.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid that Lord Penrhyn called the giving of evidence with regard to grievances "misrepresentation." But these 13 men were not the only men who had made complaints. The whole 3,000 workmen had made complaints on different points; but Lord Penrhyn did not dismiss them all. He wished to strike at the leaders, and so intimidate all the men into submission. How hollow, then, was this profession of Lord Penrhyn's that he did not refuse the right of the men to combine, when, directly they did combine, he threatened to suspend and discharge the first men who offered to give effect to the combination. As to another point of the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire, there was a quarry committee prior to 1885. When the late Lord Penrhyn had the quarry, there was a quarry committee, and all the points that were raised now. What the men asked for was simply a restoration of the old rule in the quarry. The hon. Member for South Northamptonshire, who had a personal interest in the quarry, said that the old committee were dismissed because there were complaints against it—that some of the grievances of the men were withheld from the management. Of

    743
    course the committee, which presented the grievances, reviewed them first, and withheld those which they did not think substantial. And yet that was made the cause of complaint. Then, as to Lord Penrhyn's reasons for refusing the interference of the Board of Trade. They were very curious. That placed in the forefront by the hon. Member for South Northants was that Lord Penrhyn was not supplied with the whole of the correspondence between the men and the Board of Trade. That point had been disposed of by the President of the Board of Trade. Lord Penrhyn was supplied with it as soon as he applied for it. [Mr. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: "Not for three weeks."] At any rate, Lord Penrhyn had refused to submit the dispute to the arbitration of the Board of Trade before he knew of the existence of that correspondence. Therefore the reason given was hollow and insincere. Then Lord Penrhyn said that he objected to outside interference with the management of his private affairs. But his action throughout this controversy was inconsistent with that statement. Lord Penrhyn invited the men to present their grievances to him at his Bangor office; and before the men appeared, he prepared a written reply to the deputation and sent it to the Press. [Mr. BROMLEY-DAVENPORT: "No."] If the hon. Member had mastered his brief he would not have contradicted him on that point. In the course of an interview Lord Penrhyn said that the reply had been sent to the Press beforehand, in order that the men might be able to read it the next day. This was the man who objected to outside interference. Then Lord Penrhyn went up to London to interview the Board of Trade, and entered into a correspondence with them. Why did he not refuse interference from the first? Up to the point when he thought that the Board of Trade and the public might be persuaded to go against the men, Lord Penrhyn was perfectly willing to allow the interference. The hon. Member for South Northants said that Lord Penrhyn was not going to submit the matter to the Board of Trade, since the Board seemed to have taken sides against him. Yes, it was only when he saw that the Board of Trade would not play his game, that he refused the interference. What then became of Lord Penrhyn's
    744
    high principle of objecting to people interfering in his private affairs? Lord Penrhyn sent his reply to the men to the Press and took the public into his confidence! Why did he do so? Because he thought he could divert public sympathy from the men. When it was a question of starving the men into submission, Lord Penrhyn was willing to take the Board of Trade, the public, everybody in fact, into his confidence; but when it was a question of the Board of Trade and the public assisting the men to arrive at a just and equitable settlement of the dispute, he discovered that there was a high principle involved, and that he could not allow any interference by anybody in the management of his private affairs. Lord Penrhyn had also by means of the circular he had sent to every Member of the House taken the House into his confidence as to the manner in which he managed his quarries; so that from first to last his action was absolutely inconsistent with the principle he had himself laid down. Again, Lord Penrhyn's offer to allow a shorthand writer and an interpreter to be present at the interview between him and the men, provided they could be found in the ranks of the quarrymen themselves, was cruel and insulting. How many men employed either in a colliery or a quarry could write shorthand? The thing was absurd. Then, again, Lord Penrhyn was palpably insincere. Knowing, as he did, that there was no shorthand writer among the men, he made a proposal that was perfectly futile and nugatory. Lord Penrhyn also said that no one had challenged the accuracy of the report of the interview between him and his men which he had made public. Why, he had himself actually challenged the accuracy of the transcript of the shorthand notes of the interview which he himself made public. Lord Penrhyn first supplied a copy of the transcript to the Press. This gentleman who objects to any public interference in his private affairs took the public into his confidence before he held any communication on the subject of the interview with the men. A few days after the report of the interview was published in the Press he wrote to the men saying that the first transcript was not correct, and forwarding a corrected copy. The transcript sent to the men was in fact "doctored."

    745
    Everyone who knew the personal relations between the Special Correspondent of The Times and Lord Penrhyn knew that The Times correspondent was not likely to be prejudiced in favour of the men, and that he had at his disposal all the information in the possession of Lord Penrhyn. What, then, did The Times Correspondent in regard to this dispute between the men and Lord Penrhyn say as to the two conflicting versions of the interview? He promised in his leters to The Times on January 6 that it would be his object to procure the two versions and compare them. The Times Correspondent had never fulfilled that promise. Not a line had since appeared in The Times on that particular part of the dispute. What was the inference to be drawn from that circumstance? Why, that if the difference between the two versions was unsubstantial, The Times Correspondent—who was Lord Penrhyn's counsel and a brother of Lord Penrhyn's solicitor—would be certain to point out the fact in The Times. Who, then, could say that the notes of the interview were reliable? He did not blame the shorthand writer who took down the notes of the conversation between Lord Penrhyn and the men. It was difficult even for a trained reporter to take down a conversation, and the gentleman who reported the interview was not a reporter, but a clerk employed in taking notes of letters dictated to him. Then came the question of the interpreter who was present at the interview. It had been stated that he was drawn from the ranks of the men. That was not strictly accurate. The man had been a quarry-man at one period of his career, but he was now engaged in Lord Penrhyn's office. That would give the House an indication of the sort of half truths which Lord Penrhyn had conveyed to the public.
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANT: The man is employed at the port.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: That is exactly my point. He is one of the officials down at the port of Bangor, and yet we had him described as a quarry-man by the hon. Member for Macclesfield.
    MR. BROMLEY DAVENPORT: I meant to say that he had been one of the men.
    MR. DOUGLAS-PENNANT: This man had been a quarryman, but is now employed on the quay.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: That is what I said.
    MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! I hope the hon. Gentleman will be able to conclude his speech without so many colloquies across the floor of the House.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGE: I did not invite those interruptions by which hon. Members opposite have confirmed my point.
    MR. SPEAKER: I did not mean that the hon. Member had invited the interruptions.
    MR. LLOYD-GEORGEsaid he did not wish to suggest anything against the interpreter. All he wished to imply was that whilst the man could interpret into English what the men said in Welsh, he could not interpret into Welsh what Lord Penrhyn said in English. Lord Penrhyn also objected to the presence on the deputation of Mr. W. II. Williams, the one leader of the men which the men desired to have with, them. That meant that Lord Penrhyn wanted to exclude every one of the leaders of the men from the interviews in order that he might browbeat the men in his usual style. What did the Correspondent of The Times say? He said the men had been before Lord Penrhyn for four hours and that most of the time had been taken up with the cross-examination of the men by Lord Penhryn. Lord Penrhyn bullied these men, he said, "How dare you? Why should you say this? What ground have you got for that? "Lord Penrhyn shouted at these monoglot Welshmen—[cries of "Oh!"]—that was the fact, and that was one of the reasons why the men insisted on there being an outsider at the conference, and why Lord Penrhyn objected to it. He proceeded on the assumption that these men were a pack of liars, who misrepresented the facts. That was not the way to receive a deputation, and the men were perfectly right to demand that there should be an outsider present. It was significant that during the whole of the recess there was not a single speech delivered on Tory platforms in which the Conciliation Bill was not lauded as a sample of Tory legislation, and yet at the first attempt that was made to put it into operation it was denounced by a

    747
    Tory Member amid the cheers of the whole of his colleagues. ["Hear, hear!"] That was a fair sample of the sincerity of hon. Members in this matter. These men were not the men to make wild and unreasonable demands. After four months' struggle they were perfectly peaceable. The quarry agents, whom probably the men blamed more than they blamed Lord Penrhyn, lived amongst them, and yet he had never heard of a single quarryman who had been turned adrift by the action of the agent who had ever raised his finger or hurled a menace or insult at one of these agents. These men were perfectly right in asking that the influence of the House of Commons should be brought to bear on the Board of Trade, with a view of promoting fair conciliation.
    COLONEL BLUNDELLsaid he entirely agreed as to the efficacy of the Conciliation Act, but there had been a want of tact by the Board of Trade in this case. With regard to Lord Penrhyn's objection to the reporter proposed, it was natural that everyone should want a reporter to report technical questions correctly, and if proper advice had been brought to bear he thought that Lord Penrhyn would undoubtedly have accepted that. He thought the men had the right to choose their own representatives just as in a law case a man had the right to choose his own counsel. That was what ought to have been pressed upon Lord Penrhyn, but it must be recollected that 30 years ago most employers objected to any agent representing the men they employed in a dispute. He must say that he did not believe that conciliation could be carried out by an ukase from Whitehall Gardens, and he ventured to think the Board of Trade had been much too previous in this case. He thought that a "deputation" was the correct word to use, and that that represented a real conference between the employer and his men. They should try and get these men to work in the quarries again, because, they might depend upon it, mistakes had been made all round.
    MR. JOHN WILSONsaid there seemed to be a misapprehension as to what the terms a "committee" and a "deputation" really meant. He
    748
    had no doubt that, as it had been on many occasions, it was a deputation, and in all well managed trades unions the committee selected from the body of the workmen were invariably sent as the deputation to negotiate the matter in dispute with their employers. He found that the workmen passed a resolution in which they asked that a representative of the Board of Trade should, if possible, be present at the first interview. He could fully understand that, for in previous labour disputes they had realised positions where it would have been in the interests of a peaceful solution if a disinterested person had taken part in the negotiations as an intermediary. If the hon. Member for Carnarvon was correct in his description of the way in which Lord Penrhyn treated these men he could fully understand that they required some disinterested outsider to be present. As to the possibilities of one of the workmen in the quarry being asked to act as interpreter or shorthand writer, he would ask hon. Members to realise the position of such a man who knew that his bread depended on his demeanour before his employer. It was surely a wise demand on the part of the workmen that an interpreter and shorthand writer should be chosen who was in dependant of the action of their employer, in addition to which Lord Penrhyn could have had his own interpreter present to watch on behalf of his interests. He commented on what had been said by two hon. Members opposite with regard to the men having been accustomed to send a collective note to the employer that they would be absent on a certain day. For years that had been accepted, and no demur had been raised, but on the present occasion the men were told that they must make individual application. There was another thing in the circular which had not been mentioned—that not only did Lord Penrhyn refuse to accept the mediation of the Board of Trade, but he refused previously to accept arbitration. At the interview of 17th August,
    "Lord Penrhyn informed the deputation that they would be held personally responsible, that he would recognise no committee; he charged the deputation with misrepresentation but the specific instances he then gave of alleged misrepresentation were within a week fully proved to be groundless."

    749
    Last year, when the Conciliation, in Trades Disputes Bill was before the House, there was a great fear that the workmen would not accept it. He was glad the first objection to accept it had come from a largo employer of labour and had proved to the country that the workmen were ready at all times to avail themselves of and to carry out any Act which the House might pass. The men desired to avail themselves of the Act passed last year to settle these disputes They tried to put the machinery of the Act in operation; the employer refused arbitration, and said he would not allow the Board of Trade to interfere because the matter in dispute was his "private affair!" To call the stopping of work of a whole industrial community, an attempt to depopulate a whole district his "private affair" was preposterous. The country as a whole, and not only North Wales, had a vested interest in this dispute. Some in the House disputed the right of any man to put his hand on any hill or valley, field or plain and say it was his own. If the law gave him sanction the welfare of a portion of its people was too valuable to be treated as a private commodity, and he hoped the Board of Trade in their transactions between employers and employed in the future would carry out the same idea The First Lord of the Treasury said "This matter is bigger than the Board of Trade in its results." This was true For many years there had not been a dispute which had attracted to it so much attention, and which had evoked so much sympathy as this. Let Lord Penrhyn learn the lesson that a wise man should learn that public opinion was against him. It had been said that no law could touch him. No man was honest who was made so by Act of Parliament. There was a law which was above that House and outside, and he did not envy the state of mind of any man who was not susceptible to the law of public opinion. Everywhere throughout the country, in the Press, and on the platform, and in the minds and hearts of men everywhere there was nothing but denunciation of Lord Penrhyn's action. The result was a widening of the chasm between employer and employed in this country. [Ministerial cries of "No!"] Every man who had the industrial prosperity of his coun-
    750
    try at heart should seek to narrow and not widen that chasm—["hear, hear!"]—to soothe and conciliate and not to embitter and irritate their relations. The industrial prosperity of this country could not live by conflict. ["Hear, hear!"] This conduct of Lord Penrhyn's would largely depreciate the character of the whole employing class in this country. [Ministerial laughter and cries of "No"] It would have an effect outside North Wales to a, greater extent than Gentlemen opposite imagined. He had been amongst the quarrymen of North Wales. He knew them to be honest, respectable men, and the working men of the North of England were connected with them by ties of labour and toil. The First Lord of the Treasury asked how it would be if workmen and workmen's leaders had made against them charges similar to those against Lord Penrhyn? If the workmen had acted in the same arbitrary fashion and said they would strike unless Lord Penrhyn discharged Mr. Young and chose a fresh manager, because they would not meet him, he would have as soundly condemned them, as he condemned Lord Penrhyn now. He hoped Lord Penrhyn's heart would soften, and if the law could not touch him he hoped he would accept the mediation of the Board of Trade, and whether in the presence of its representatives or not, would try by the help of the men to bring this matter to a peaceful solution. ["Hear, hear!"]
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERpointed out while the Leader of the Opposition deprecated the use of any language which would embitter this controversy he himself on the first night of the Session referred to it in terms by no means judicial or savouring of an impartial mind which were entirely uncalled for and in a manner almost disorderly, and before any evidence had been read or the House had ordered any correspondence to be laid on the Table.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: The correspondence was published before the commencement of the Session.
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERsaid that it had been published only in a fragmentary manner, and had not set out the cases of the respective parties in a complete form. At any rate, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Monmouthshire had taken the earliest

    751
    opportunity to prejudge the case to the utmost of his power, and to condemn the course which had been taken by one party to the dispute. He had no doubt that the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade had hoped that by the course he had taken he would have been able to settle the dispute between the parties, but he thought that the House would be of opinion that that course was most ill-calculated to effect that object. The Board of Trade appeared not to have endeavoured to ascertain, in the first place, whether both parties would be ready to accept their decision with regard to the matters in dispute. He should have thought that a very slight experience in connection with these matters would have convinced the right hon. Gentleman that his suggestion was not likely to bring about an amicable settlement of the questions raised between the parties. It was clear that Parliament had never intended that a public department should attempt to settle such questions by intervention rather than by conciliation. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade must have been thinking of the action of another President—the President of the United States—in connection with the questions raised between this country and Venezuela, who had thought to settle those questions by intervention. The right hon. Gentleman appeared to have forgotten that when Parliament passed the Conciliation Act they had refused to introduce the compulsory element into it, and had placed the whole matter upon a voluntary basis." The right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Monmouthshire had talked about power having been given to the Board of Trade to do this, that, or the other. But it was clear that Parliament, in passing the Act in question, had intended that if the intervention of the Board of Trade was not acceptable to both parties they were to retire in favour of some more acceptable arbitrator. There was nothing in the Act which compelled either party to submit to the intervention of the Board of Trade against his will. The charge he had to bring against the Board of Trade, not against Sir Courtenay Boyle the able permanent Secretary of the Department, who he knew was always anxious to carry out the instructions of
    752
    his Chief, was that their letters were not calculated to bring about an amicable settlement of this dispute. The tone adopted by the Department in those letters was of a most irritating character and was ill-calculated to bring about a settlement, while it was one that no employer of labour who respected himself could be expected to submit to. He begged to say that he approached this subject having no authority on the part of Lord Penrhyn to speak on his behalf. He had had a large experience on this subject because he had had the management for many years of a large coal mine, in which some 2,000 men were employed, a large number of whom, and their fathers and grandfathers had passed their lives in that employment. Those men had little or no connection with any local union or trade combination. It had been stated, and the statement had not been contradicted, that every man employed by Lord Penrhyn was at liberty to join a trade union if he desired to do so. It was, however, charged against Lord Penrhyn that he had taken a course that was hostile to the liberty of combination. That assertion was absolutely untrue. The House would realise that there was not only such a thing as the right to combine, but there was also such a thing as the right not to combine, and it was the latter right that Lord Penrhyn desired to maintain. Some hon. Members had spoken of this committee as if it were freely elected and a thoroughly representative body—as if it were the exponent of the majority and the minority of those employed in the quarry. The correspondence showed that the Committee represented the dominant majority, who ignored the rights of the minority. ["No, no!"] Their resolutions clearly showed this. Complaints were made that the majority frequently endeavoured to interfere with matters affecting wages and the power of earning—that these must be entirely controlled by these trade union delegates. Perhaps it would be said that it was a libel to say that any pressure was ever at any time used to force men into the unions. He well recollected what took place in Lord Londonderry's collieries. A strike occurred on the ground that the trade unionists insisted that the overmen should join the union or be dismissed.
    MR. JOHN WILSON: That is not correct. The overmen were not asked to join the union. [Opposition cheers.]
    MR. JAMES LOWTHER: I apologise—it was the deputies. I had not the name on my tongue—[cheers]—but the deputies for my purpose are the same thing. ["Hear, hear!"] The trade union insisted that the deputies should join the union or be dismissed.
    MR. JOHN WILSON: That was done because Lord Londonderry offered to give the deputies so much more if they would leave the union. ["Oh!" and Opposition laughter.]
    MR. JAMES LOWTHER: I believe the statement of the hon. Member to be entirely inaccurate. What I believe happened was this—that when these deputies were threatened by the union if they did not join the union Lord Londonderry said he should stand by them. [Cheers.] He told them he would see that they were not injured and that their wages should be increased.
    MR. JOHN WILSON: That is not the case. What he gave was money to leave the union. [Cries of "No, no!"]
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERbelieved he had stated the fact, for Lord London-deny made every one in his employ free to be a member of the union or not. That he had authority to say. Lord Londonderry in this particular case said, "I shall not desert the men who refuse to submit to this insolent dictation." That showed the spirit in which these trade union leaders approached the liberty of workmen, either combined or not combined. Could it be wondered at that Lord Penrhyn should resist oppression of this kind? Lord Penrhyn was entitled—and he was bound as a man of honour—to stand by his workmen who declined to join any trades union. He was entitled to say that he should not hand over the management of his concerns to a body dominated by such a spirit of trade union combination as was shown in this matter. He was going to dwell for a moment on one point, which was, that the publication by the Board of Trade of this correspondence was, in his judgment, a most unfortunate act. ["Hear, hear!"] They did not themselves, he believed, apprehend this. The
    754
    Board of Trade sent a portion of the correspondence to the representatives of the men. What object could be served by that? The President of the Board of Trade said he did not send the correspondence until he had arrived at the conclusion that the attempts at a settlement had failed. Then why did he send it? He did not think that the publication of this correspondence could serve any good purpose. His right hon. Friend had published the correspondence on one side, while the correspondence on the other side could not be obtained. He could not understand what good object was to be served.
    MR. RITCHIE: The Board of Trade did not publish any correspondence. They were invited to do so, and I strongly objected. The correspondence was sent so that they might exercise their judgment on the terms of Lord Penrhyn.
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERcontended that was the same thing. His right hon. Friend thought it right that the men should be acquainted with. Lord Penrhyn's proposals. Surely there might have been other means of enabling the men to become acquainted with those proposals. He presumed Lord Penrhyn could have communicated his views to his men without the assistance of the Board of Trade. He did not hesitate to say that the premature publication of a portion of the correspondence had very largely embittered the controversy, and that the intervention of the Board of Trade had so far resulted in his hon. Friend being "slated." [Laughter and cries of "Oh, oh!"] Reference had been made to the labour correspondents. He had never believed in the system of labour correspondents, and in the last Parliament he called attention to several highly improper appointments, improper owing to their political, partisan character. [Cheers.] One of those appointments was that of Mr. Rowley, who happened to be labour correspondent for the district in which the Penrhyn quarries were. It was upon the information of that gentleman that in this matter the Board of Trade was set in motion.
    MR. RITCHIE: I must absolutely contradict that statement. There was no communication whatever between that correspondent and the Board of Trade, myself, or anyone connected with the

    755
    Board of Trade, in connection with this dispute during any time of the negotiations. [Cheers.]
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERwas glad they were to understand that the Board of Trade took no earthly notice of their labour correspondent.
    MR. RITCHIE: None whatever. [A laugh.] Labour correspondents are not appointed to give the Board of Trade information with regard to disputes and strikes. They are appointed to give the Board information with regard to trade unions and employment. I know nothing of the gentleman. But we received no communication; we invited no communication, from this gentleman with regard to the dispute in the Penrhyn quarries. We heard nothing from him, and we made no inquiries.
    MR. JAMES LOWTHERwas bound to say the statement of the right hon. Gentleman was eminently satisfactory. [Laughter.] Now that he understood his right hon. Friend took no notice of this gentleman's statements, he thought his right hon. Friend's official career would be less mischievous than he had feared it would be. [Laughter and cheers.] In conclusion, he hoped that what had taken place to-night would be an object lesson to those who desired to move a public department in the direction of interfering in labour disputes upon the request of either party concerned, for so far such interference had been dangerous and mischievous.
    MR. A. J. MUNDELLAmaintained that in its working the Conciliation Act, though it was only passed last August, had already proved most beneficent. The operation of the Act had proved a blessing to thousands and tens of thousands of people. The right hon. Gentleman's intervention had not only resulted in the putting an end to railway disputes, but in the settlement of troubles between capital and labour in other instances. It was an evil omen when an Act like the Conciliation Act had been passed
    756
    that a peer of the realm should be the first to refuse to pay any attention to it. He should be sorry to say anything which would tend to exasperate feelings on either side, and he hoped that one of the results of the Debate would be that Lord Penrhyn would take good counsel and put an end to the conflict as soon as possible. He might point out that the President of the Board of Trade had not exhausted the powers of the Conciliation Act in the matter. He might take a further step. [Cries of "What stop?"]. The right hon. Gentleman, consulting the Act, said the President of the Board of Trade, on the application of an employer or a body of workmen, could appoint a conciliator—["Oh, oh" and laughter]—who would make inquiries into the causes of the dispute and report to the Board of Trade. That report could be called for in the House, and in that way public attention could be brought to bear on the facts. [Ministerial cries of "Oh!"] And there was a yet further step the President of the Board of Trade could take. On the application of both parties—[Ministerial cheers]—he could appoint an arbitrator. [Laughter and "Hear, hear!"] A question of more serious importance had not been brought before the House for years, and he warned hon. Gentlemen opposite—[Cries of "Oh, oh" and laughter]—that the dispute had been discussed in every workshop in the kingdom. [Laughter.] They must be aware also, if they read their newspapers—["Oh, oh" and laughter]—that resolutions had been passed by every trade council in the kingdom in reference to the dispute, and there could be no doubt that a very strong feeling had been created in the country about it. Moreover, the circumstances of the dispute were of a serious character from a public point of view. The noble Lord by the course he had taken had made himself a very dangerous advocate of the scheme of Mr. Henry George. [Loud Ministerial laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen opposite

    757
    seemed to treat the matter with levity, but he repeated that other matters than the actual dispute were involved. One of the results of it would be to give a great impetus to the demand for the nationalisation of mines and of land. [Ministerial laughter and cries of "Question?"] Hon. Members opposite could not possibly be aware of the immense benefit the Conciliation Act had already been to the trade of the country, or they would not be advocates of that dangerous form of feudalism which Lord Penrhyn had put in practice. [Laughter.] There was not a word in the correspondence to justify the statement that Lord Penrhyn had been championing the cause of the nonunion men. There had been no conflict between the union and non-union men in the matter, for both classes of men were unanimous, as one man, in asking for a propel' settlement of the dispute. What, he would ask, would be the effect on small employers of labour in the country when a large employer of labour like Lord Penrhyn set such an example as he had done? [Cheers.] They would be able to point to the action of his lordship as a justification for resisting the Conciliation Act if it were to their interests to do so. Hon. Gentlemen opposite had complained that the President, of the Board of Trade had intervened, as they termed it, in this dispute. Why, when the last Liberal Government was in power constant questions were addressed to Ministers by those very same Gentlemen to know what action the Government could take with a view to bring the then existing trade disputes to an end. During that time there was a great trade dispute in Scotland, and constant pressure was exercised on the then President of the Board of Trade, by the hon. Gentlemen opposite, to take some action which would be likely to bring about a settlement. Yet they were now to be told that the President of the Board, although certain powers had been placed in his
    758
    hands by Act of Parliament to be exercised in such cases, was not to exercise those powers. He trusted the President of the Board of Trade would do in the future what he had done in this case. He was bound to say that, so far from having erred on the side of too great promptitude and too great severity, the action of the right hon. Gentleman had been marked by great moderation, by great patience and forbearance, and, what was more, he had put great pressure on the workmen to forego many of their just claims. That being so, it was a monstrous thing that there should be found in that House a man defending the action which had been taken by Lord Penrhyn—action which he believed was fraught with great mischief to the future of this country.
    MR. G. W. WOLFFsaid that, as a large employer of labour, he had felt a very great interest in the Debate that had taken place. The dispute, into the details of which he would not cuter, had a very considerable bearing on employers of labour beyond its immediate consequences or its immediate local importance. This particular dispute, it seems, was a matter of urgent public importance to the House. Well, there had been a great many strikes in this country—he had himself been engaged in dozens of them—and he had asked himself over and over again in what way this dispute differed from the ordinary disputes which had taken place from time to time, and if this dispute was a matter of urgent public importance, why should not every dispute that took place in the United Kingdom be the same? The only point in which he could see that this dispute differed from all the others was the fact that the men had appealed to the Board of Trade to act under the Conciliation Act and to settle the dispute, and that this arbitration had been refused by Lord Penrhyn. So far as he understood, the Conciliation Act was an Absolutely voluntary Act. If the workmen liked to act under it they could

    759
    appeal to the Board of Trade to set it in motion; if the employer liked to act under it he could make the same appeal; but there was no compulsion on either one or the other to accept the arbitration. That being so, he could not understand why so much blame should be attached to Lord Penrhyn for declining to take the decision of the Board of Trade on the matter. A great deal had been said about the liberty of the men to combine for their own protection. He thought any employer who in this year, 1897, disputed the right of workmen to combine for their own protection or for any object they liked could be little less than a fool. He was quite willing that they should combine for their own protection or to improve their condition, but he equally maintained that an employer had an equal right to decline to receive any deputation the workmen might choose to appoint. The matter on both sides was entirely one of expediency. He could not help thinking that the House, he would not like to say was going beyond its rights or its functions, but was going far in heaping such an amount of blame on an employer because he did not like to receive a particular committee to settle matters as to the way in which the work should be carried on in his quarry or workshop, He thought that it was a dangerous doctrine that, because a man did not choose to accept the arbitration of the Board of Trade—and he could not be compelled to accept it by law—he should be held up, as it were, in that House to the execration of every honest and respect-able citizen. This would be making this Act, which was intended to be voluntary, in reality a compulsory Act. He never thought much of that Act, but still nobody had ever ventured to promulgate an Act which would compel arbitration in trade disputes. He thought it was perhaps going a little too far to wish for such an Act, but at the same time he did not think they would ever settle such disputes unless they did
    760
    make the Act compulsory. While he wished to give the men every facility for combining, and while he admitted they had a perfect right to do whatever they liked in this way, he did hope that House would not set itself up as a sort of Court of Justice to try employers who refused the offices of the Board of Trade, and that they would recognise that he had a perfect right to refuse it, however ill-advised he might be in taking that course.
    MR. ELLIS GRIFFITHsaid they had to thank the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken for the valuable admission that an employer who disputed the right of men to legitimate combination was not less than a fool. They not only accepted that dictum in theory, but would also adopt it in practice. What was the right these men said they had? The right they said they had was to combine for matters that concerned them as workmen. They did not wish, they had never claimed, to interfere in any way with the management of this quarry. They had never said a word against Mr. Young or against the subordinates upon the management. All that the men claimed was that when their wages were in dispute, and the question of their livelihood was involved, they had a right to combine to promote their own interests. Not a single instance of wrongdoing could be proved against the committee that had been dismissed by Lord Penrhyn. That committee represented the 300 non-Union men as well as the Unionists, and the former were as keen and active in this dispute as the latter. The right hon. Member for the Thanet Division had said that the object of the Act was conciliation, and not intervention. But how could anyone conciliate without intervening? The Act had two objects—the one being conciliation and the other arbitration. Unless both sides to a dispute agreed to ask for the services of the Board of Trade, arbitration could not be resorted to under the Statute. It therefore could

    761
    not be resorted to in the case under consideration, because Lord Penrhyn declared that he did not want the provisions respecting arbitration to be brought into operation. There remained the expedient of conciliation, and he held that, according to the meaning and spirit of the Act, the Board of Trade was fully entitled to intervene with conciliatory purpose upon the application of one of the parties. That was what it had attempted to do. It had been said that the Department had forced its services upon Lord Penrhyn, but that was not correct, as was shown by the correspondence. In one of Sir Courtenay Boyle's letters that gentleman said:—
    "I am directed to inform you that, in accordance with the virtual understanding arrived at between Mr. Ritchie and Mr. Young, the quarrymen have been communicated with, with a view to the appointment of a deputation to wait upon you."
    if that letter meant anything it must mean that Mr. Young, Lord Penrhyn's representative, and the President of the Board of Trade, had had an informal meeting, when arrangements were made as to what should be done? He agreed with the last speaker that it was ridiculous to suppose that people could be compelled as the law stood to abide by the award either of a conciliation or arbitration board. Put there could be a compulsory Inquiry. [Cries of "No "and "Yes."] The cries of hon. Members below the Gangway opposite showed that they had not studied this Act; the President of the Board of Trade, upon the application of either party, might appoint someone to hold an Inquiry, and he hoped that that power would be exercised, for an Inquiry would be of great use. It was public opinion that determined the results of these controversies, and in the long run public opinion was found to be on the right side, and that side won, whether it was the side of the masters or of the men. The chief value of the Act was that it supplied an easy means of concentrating
    762
    and focussing public opinion on the points in dispute. Why did Lord Penrhyn refuse conciliation? Was it, as they had heard, his haughty and feudal pride that stood in the way? No; it was because he knew that he was in the wrong. The last speaker had said that this was not a matter of urgent public importance. He differed from the Hon. Member, being unable to believe that the enforced idleness of 3,000 men was an unimportant matter. If these 3,000 men had been denied employment anywhere else than in the Principality of Wales more would, he thought, have been heard about the importance of this enforced idleness. He trusted that that Debate and the position taken up by the President of the Board of Trade would encourage the men to keep in the path of law-abiding straightforwardness, and would strengthen their conviction that in the end they must triumph over Lord Penrhyn.
    Question, "That this House do now adjourn," put, and negatived.

BRITISH SOUTH AFRICA COMMITTEE.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. J. CHAMBERLAIN,)moved:—
"That a Select Committee he appointed to inquire into the origin and circumstances of the incursion into the South African Republic by an armed force, and into the administration of the British South Africa Company, and to report thereon, and further to report what alterations are desirable in the government of the territories under the control of the Company; that the Committee have leave to hear counsel to such extent as they shall see tit, and have power to send for persons, papers, and records."
MR. J. M. MACLEANrose to move the following Amendment:—
"That, in view of the peaceful settlement of affairs in the Chartered Company's territories, the punishment of all persons connected with the raid into the Transvaal, and the inexpediency

763
in the interest of all South Africa, of reopening questions which have now been disposed of, this House thinks it unnecessary to re-appoint the Select Committee of 1896."
In moving the Amendment, notice of which he had placed on the Paper, he thought it hardly necessary to offer an apology to the House for having, on the first day of the Session, prevented this Motion from being passed sub silentio. The extraordinary public interest which had been excited on the matter was the best justification he could possibly offer for what he did in that connection. He had had many conversations with Members of the House on the subject, and he had had very numerous communications from outside, and he thought all Members must be aware that a very strong public opinion had been excited in favour of dropping this Select Committee on the South African question. ["Hear, hear" and "No, no!"] So far as he could judge, it was the almost universal feeling in the House that it was grievous to the State to keep open an Inquiry which might prolong indefinitely a state of unrest in South Africa. ["Oh, oh!"] He was sure that this feeling had been expressed to him by a majority of the Members of the House—["No, no!"]—and if the Government were to relax for the occasion the ties of Party fidelity and discipline, and would intimate to their followers that they were free to vote according to their own judgment in the matter, he knew very well what the result would be. ["Hear, hear!"] The Government, so far as he could judge, did not affirm that they themselves were very keenly in favour of the reappointment of this Committee; therefore he was not open to the objection which had been alleged against him, curiously enough by many of the Radical newspapers, that in bringing forward this Amendment he was guilty of an act of disloyalty to the Government now in power, and he was not open to the charge, upon which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mon-
764
mouth (Sir W. Harcourt) had made such pleasant reflections, to the effect that he and his friends had been obliged to come to the rescue of the Government frequently against their own rebellious followers. No doubt occasions of this kind had arisen, and it was sometimes embarrassing and bewildering to loyal supporters of the Government to find that when questions of great public interest arose, and discussions took place upon them in the House, the loudest cheers and strongest support given to the Government came from the opposite side of the House. [Laughter.] He had himself been so much taken aback by these manifestations that when a division was called he had sometimes been tempted to address his right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Treasury in the words of the bold Sir Bedivere:—
"Oh, my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go?"
[Laughter.] But this was not what happened on the present occasion; it was a perfectly loyal Amendment brought forward by a Member who supposed he was really doing a, service to the Government by helping them to get rid of this Committee. He had been told that a compact had been made by the Government with somebody or other that this Committee should be reappointed, but he did not see how any Government could pledge the House to renew a Committee in a new Session. Surely the House was the best judge of its own dignity and honour, and if circumstances had arisen which rendered it indispensable that the Committee should be reappointed, the House could absolve itself from any breach of faith in the matter. Had any circumstances arisen since the Committee was appointed last year that rendered it inexpedient that the Committee should be reappointed? It was easy to point out that such circumstances had arisen. In the first place, with regard to the Inquiry into the existence of the Chartered Company and the desirability of continuing it in

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the employment of its present powers, it was well known that since the House last met this Chartered Company had prosecuted a successful war, and had restored peace within its territory, had done that at its own expense, and had been trusted by the Government of the country to do it. It would be a very inexpedient thing indeed, now that the Company had restored order in that vast region of South. Africa, to go on to question its title to the territory secured. ["Hear, hear!"] The Chartered Company had a long history, but down to the Jameson raid its title was unquestioned by hon. Members on both sides of the House, and since the raid there had been absolute proof that the Government itself had ample power within the limits of the present charter to clip the wings of the Chartered Company and to prevent it from taking the aggressive against any other State in South Africa or from doing anything beyond administering its own affairs. The House knew that the Government took away from the Chartered Company the military and police powers which it had exercised in Rhodesia, and the Secretary of State for the Colonies had been placed in the position of the Board of Control of the old East India Company. The Chartered Company had not ventured to perform any administrative act whatever which was contrary to the wishes of the Secretary of State. There was no advantage, therefore, to be gained by going into the history of what had been done by the Chartered Company a year ago. He did not suppose any one imagined that the Chartered Company could be proved to have any connection whatever with the Jameson raid. ["Oh, oh!" and cheers.] Was it desirable to inquire into a matter of that kind now. ["Yes."] Had the House not had enough of the Jameson raid and all the circumstances connected with it? By no possibility could the inquiry into the Chartered Company's acts of last year lead to any interference with that Company beyond
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the power which the Colonial Secretary possessed at the present time and which was allowed by the charter. Did hon. Members propose that the property of the Company should be taken away from them after being allowed and encouraged by the Colonial Secretary to wage war to maintain that property? There was a multitude of small shareholders in the Chartered Company throughout the country besides the aristocratic capitalists, about whom the hon. Member for Northampton seemed to know more than he did. These men and women had invested a small amount of money in the Company individually, on the principle, no doubt, of backing the British hon. and was it possible that any Committee could think of taking away that property and abolishing all the rights which the Chartered Company possessed? So far, therefore, as the Chartered Company was concerned, any further inquiry by a Committee of the House could lead to no useful result whatever. Then as to the question whether the Committee could deal with Mr. Rhodes, who was looked upon by many persons as the chief offender against the peace of South Africa. Could this Committee hope to deal with Mr. Rhodes. What had been the history of Mr. Rhodes during the interval between last year and this? The House knew that he had been busily engaged in the territory which bore his name: they knew of the good work he had done there; and if they wanted to find out what the Government thought of the work of Mr. Rhodes in South Africa they had only to refer to the Queen's Speech. One passage in the Queen's Speech dealt with the rebellion in Matabeleland and Mashonaland, and it said that this rebellion had been repressed by the steadfastness and courage of the settlers, reinforced by our troops and the aid of the English and Dutch. Who had been the inspiring genius to the settlers in Rhodesia except Mr. Rhodes himself? And yet this was the man whom they were going to accuse

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of sowing dissension between the English and Dutch races in South Africa. [Cheers.] Mr. Rhodes had been the most active man in our colonies there to induce the English and Dutch races to work together. Mr. Rhodes had completely rehabilitated himself in the public opinion of this country by the work he had done since Parliament rose last year. ["No, no!" and cheers.] The enthusiastic receptions given to him by his countrymen in Cape Colony proved that they regarded him as the living impersonation of that spirit of private enterprise which had transformed this island kingdom into a world-wide Empire. [Cheers.] What was it proposed that this Committee could do to Mr. Rhodes? Suppose it came to the same conclusion as that which was arrived at after full and thorough inquiry by the Cape Parliament—that Mr. Rhodes had nothing to do with the actual raid itself, that he only made preparations and acted as Lord Loch had previously done, and that Lord Loch's conduct had never been repudiated either by Lord Ripon or by his successor, the present Colonial Secretary? That was the state of things they had to deal with, and they knew that a Committee of the House of Commons could not go well beyond the inquiry which was made at the Cape. That inquiry was most searching and thorough. He did not know if hon. Members had seen the Blue-book published by the Cape Assembly, which contained a large mass of evidence, and he said that a Committee of the House of Commons would not be able to obtain any further evidence than was submitted to a Committee of the Cape Assembly. He knew there were some people repeating current gossip, who said there ought to be wonderful revelations made, some of them affecting the Colonial Secretary and others affecting Mr. Rhodes, but he treated these reports as of no value whatever. ["Hear, hear!"] He had criticised very freely the public policy of the Colonial Secretary, but no one would dream of saying
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that the right hon. Gentleman personally had any complicity in the raid which took place in South Africa. To accuse him of dishonour of that kind would be idle and ridiculous. ["Hear, hear."] And in the same way he did not think they could expect to obtain any revelations as to some extraordinary conduct of Mr. Rhodes in relation to this raid beyond what they knew already. That was the position in which they would find themselves. What was to be done, supposing they came to a resolution that Mr. Rhodes was simply a man who determined to assist British subjects in the Transvaal if they rose against an oppressive Government? Supposing they were to come to that decision; would that satisfy the people who insisted that Mr. Rhodes should be their personal enemy, and who demanded that he should be banished from South Africa? They would at once say that a Committee of that House were simply accomplices with Mr. Rhodes in hushing up the whole affair. On the other hand, did they think a Committee of the House of Commons could punish Mr. Rhodes, could banish him from South Africa and exile him from public life? That House dare not lay its little finger on Mr. Rhodes. If it were to do anything of the kind it would set the whole of South Africa in a blaze. ["Hear, hear!"] That was one of the principal reasons why he had interfered in the matter. He had been anxious to prevent the House from making the mistake which it had made several times before with great loss of dignity and authority—the mistake of coming into collision with the public opinion of a powerful colony. ["Hear, hear!"] South Africa must be maintained for the British Empire by the good will and public opinion of the settlers out there, and if the House of Commons were to take upon itself to proscribe the most powerful man who had risen in late years in South Africa, the man who was beloved by the great mass of English settlers out there, he did

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nut think it could avoid placing itself in a position from which it would with difficulty emerge without loss of authority and prestige. ["Hear, hear!"] So much for the position of that House. With regards to Mr. Rhodes, he did not know what crime he was to be accused of committing during the last year. He seemed to him to have devoted all his labour's to the service of his country, just as he did at the time when he saved the whole of the territory from the frontier of Cape Colony up to the Zambesi from falling into the hands of a foreign Power, and prevented the Boers of the Transvaal from joining hands with the Germans in South-West Africa, which would for ever have prevented the predominance of the British race in that part of the world. ["Hear, hear!"] He had seen a great many articles in the newspapers lately speaking in terms of grave rebuke of the indiscretions of speech committed by Mr. Rhodes. Was he to be summoned before a Committee of the House of Commons to answer for those indiscretions of speech, to tell them what he meant by the reference to people who grew orchids or the exact meaning of that stinging phrase, "unctuous rectitude," which he used with regard to some people in this country? A man who saved or made an empire could not pick and choose his language as they did in that House—[laughter]—or as an editor of a newspaper sitting in his comfortable armchair could afford to do. He did not think they should punish Mr. Rhodes for committing a few crimes of that kind. So much for the position of Mr. Rhodes with regard to the Inquiry. He might say that, personally, he had no knowledge whatever of Mr. Rhodes; he never had any communication with him of any kind, and he had simply taken up this question because he believed his experience had given him a great know ledge of the sentiments entertained with regard to Imperial questions by their fellow countrymen living in distant
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parts of the Empire. ["Hear hear!"] He asked himself with whom was this compact made which the Government spoke of? Was it made with the Transvaal Government? Now he did not think that idea could be maintained for a moment. If any compact of that kind had been made with the Transvaal Government he thought it had been cancelled by the conduct of President Kruger during the last twelve months, but the Blue-book showed that no such compact was ever entered into by the English Government. He ventured to recall what many Members, perhaps, had forgotten, the exact position taken up by our Government here in January, 1896. After Jameson's raid Mr. Hofmeyr telegraphed to the Secretary of State for the Colonies asking for an assurance that justice would be done upon all the parties who had joined in the raid, and the Secretary of State for the Colonies, on January 7, replied:—
"There shall be full inquiry into the circum-stances of the late raid upon Transvaal territory, and stops will be taken to make it impossible for such attempts to be planned or executed in future."
That seemed to him to have been the only pledge given to people in South Africa by the Colonial Secretary. Now, what was the statement made by the right hon. Gentleman a few days after that, on January 13? He said:—
"Now that Her Majesty's Government have fulfilled their obligations with the South African Republic, and have engaged to bring the leaders in the recent invasion to trial "—
not before a Select Committee—
"Her Majesty's Government are anxious that the negotiations which have been conducted by you should result in a permanent settlement, by which the possibility of further internal troubles will be prevented."
So that any compact that was made with the Government at Pretoria must have been purely conditional—conditional on the carrying out of certain concessions by the Government of Mr. Kruger. The Colonial Secretary made

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that quite plain in the second part of his Dispatch, when he said:—
"It is my sincere hope that President Kruger, who has hitherto shown so much wisdom in dealing with the situation, will now take the opportunity afforded to him of making of his own free will such reasonable concessions to the Uitlanders as will remove the last excuse of disloyalty and will establish the free institutions of the Republic on a firm and lasting basis."
There they had the policy of the Colonial Secretary before he allowed his better instincts to be overborne by the timid counsels of Sir H. Robinson. ["Hear, hear!"] Only one more passage would he refer to as confirming that view of the policy of the right hon. Gentleman. On January 15th he telegraphed again to Sir H. Robinson, and he said:—
"There can be no settlement until the questions raised by these telegrams are disposed of. The people of Johannesburg laid down their arms in the belief that reasonable concessions would be arranged by your intervention—[cheers]—and until these are granted and are definitely promised you by the President the root-cause of the recent troubles will remain."
Now, in those words the right hon. Gentleman distinctly declared that the root cause of the trouble which culminated in the Jameson raid was the attempt on the part of the Transvaal Government to deprive the Uitlanders of their just civil rights. He thought the language the right hon. Gentleman there used might be said to afford a reasonable justification for the rising of the Uitlanders and their insurrection against such a tyrannical Government as that of the Transvaal. He said the President had again and again promised reform, and added that grave dissatisfaction would be caused if he (Sir H. Robinson) left Pretoria without a clear understanding on those points. Sir H. Robinson left Pretoria without a clear understanding on any point whatever. [A cheer.] No concession whatever was made by President Kruger in return for what we did for him. He did not blame President Kruger for that. The President was a sagacious and far-sighted man, engaged in building up an indepen-
772
dent nation, and, speaking from an impartial point of view, he could admire the wisdom and determination with which he prosecuted his design. [Cheers.] He did not wonder that Mr. Kruger proved himself superior to the finished diplomatists of more civilised nations [laughter and cheers], because he was free from the necessity of attending to employers' liability and old age pensions [cheers and laughter], and strikes and trade unions, and the thousand different channels in which the energies of statesmen in a civilised country were frittered away. Mr. Kruger had only one end to accomplish. He wished to make his people free and strong, and he went direct to the accomplishment of that end. He admired Mr. Kruger for it; but he could not absolve our own Government for having neglected to obtain from him those concessions for which alone the people of Johannesburg were; induced to lay down their arms, and Jameson and his men were brought to trial and punishment. No concessions of any kind had been made. On the contrary, all to whom the reputation of the Colonial Secretary was dear [cheers and laughter] must resent the cavalier treatment to which the right hon. Gentleman had been exposed at the hands of President Kruger. He had often heard Mr. Kruger spoken of as like one of the heroes in Plutarch; and he was reminded of the way in which Plutarch told of Sylla's treatment of the Greek orators, when they came out from Athens and wished to read to him long harangues. Sylla said to them:—
"My good friends, pack up your speeches and be gone. I have not come here to take lessons, but to subdue rebels to obedience."
The Colonial Secretary had tried to practise on Mr. Kruger all that dialectical skill with which he so often charmed the House of Commons into obedience to his wishes. But Mr. Kruger's only reply was, "My good friend, take up your dispatches and be gone." [Laughter and

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cheers.] "I have not come here to listen to lectures, but to subdue a rebellious city." [Laughter.] Not only had no concessions been made, but Mr. Kruger had advanced his pretensions still further. The English settlers in the Transvaal were further than ever from getting the elementary rights of citizens; and we were confronted with the fact that the Boers intended to create a state of society in the Transvaal in which British subjects should be an inferior caste to the Dutchmen, who were the ruling power in the State. The immigration returns of the Cape would show a large increase in the immigration of foreigners as compared with British subjects. Many of those foreigners went straight to the Transvaal, where the Boers were building up a strong military State, centrally situated on the long line of communications between Cape Colony and Rhodesia and a great menace to the security of our possessions. Alarm was often expressed lest Mr. Kruger should some day throw off our suzerainty. Why should he? What had become of that suzerainty? As it now existed it could only be compared to Milton's description of death—" What seemed his head, the likeness of a kingly crown had on." [Cheers.] That suzerainty would never be a reality till we asserted our power and preponderance in South Africa. If we had no compact with anybody outside the House was there a compact with anyone within the House? Those who pressed for the appointment of this Committee were not men on the Ministerial side of the House, or Members of the Government, who might be influenced by a fancied point of honour. The men who desired the Committee were the right hon. Member for West Monmouth and the hon. Member for Northampton. If anybody's, the Committee was that of the hon. Member for Northampton. [Cheers.] Those who were familiar with the story of the impeachment of Warren Hastings would remember that there was one vindictive personal assailant of the great Proconsul
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—Sir Philip Francis—who was at the bottom of the mischief. He brought Pitt and Pox together and got the impeachment arranged. We had a Sir Philip Francis in our own day, who had brought together our modern Pitt and Fox to arrange this Inquiry, though he did not attribute to the hon. Member for Northampton the personal motives which animated Sir Philip Francis. He admired the courage and independence of the hon. Member's character, and he had always thought the hon. Member to be the only consistent man in attacking Mr. Rhodes and the Chartered Company. The hon. Member at least would not bow down to Mr. Rhodes, even when English society threw itself at his feet and the Government of Lord Rosebery heaped honours upon him and made him a Privy Councillor. Therefore he found no fault with the hon. Member for the action he had taken in the matter. But, while he was willing to do a great deal to oblige the hon. Member, when it came to making a choice between him and doing something towards maintaining the dignity of the British Empire, the hon. Member must pardon him for not giving him his support. He could not find any substance in any of the considerations that suggested themselves to his mind as possibly affording a justification for the action of the Government. On the other hand, he knew from what he had read and heard that the people of this country had grown heartily sick and weary of the irritating and humiliating references to the Jameson raid, which were now apparently to be prolonged for a year or two at the pleasure of a Committee of the House. ["Hear, hear!"] The public felt that they had sat long enough in sackcloth and ashes lamenting their sins and praising the magnanimity of President Kruger. [Cheers.] Let the dead past bury its dead. Let them be up and doing again. He felt sure that if they would but adopt a firm policy they would do more to

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bring the Dutch and English in South Africa together than by following a pusillanimous policy. [Cheers.] It was because an unsettled and wavering policy had been hitherto followed in regard to South Africa that many Afrikanders were inclined to gravitate towards the Dutch Republics. A favourable opportunity was now at hand for the adoption of a firm policy. Lord Rosmead was coming home. Let there, then, be an end of the policy associated with Lord Rosmead's name. He hoped the Government would select for Lord Rosmead's place someone who would lift up the standard of England and assert our power and permanent authority in South Africa. [Cheers.] He felt sure that if we spoke on that boldly and firmly, and above all took care to make clear that we would maintain what we said with our Imperial forces, we should command respect, and everybody would quietly assent to what we asked them to do. [Cheers.] The time had come for telling the Transvaal Government what we meant to have done, and to insist upon that Government carrying it out. [Cheers.] Much had been said against English civilisation, but at least it gave equal right to every man. [Nationalist cries of "No."] He did not know what hon. Gentleman opposite had to complain of, except it was that the Irish got more than their fair share of rights. [Laughter and cheers.] We ought certainly to insist that the Transvaal Government should give the same privileges to English settlers that Dutchmen received in our Commonwealth; and when all men were equal in South Africa we might hope to see restored order, peace and prosperity to that country. [Cheers.]
SIR JOHN LUBBOCKsaid he seconded the Motion of his hon. Friend. He did so with a deep sense of the gravity of the issue before the House as regards the South African portion of the British Empire. Things were now beginning to settle
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down in South Africa, and this Inquiry would, he feared, tend once more to revive bitter memories and angry feelings between the different races and interests in that country. At the same time he did not for a moment complain of her Majesty's Government for the course they had taken. They were no doubt, honourably bound by their understanding with the Leader of the Opposition. It was said that the right hon. Gentleman claimed the fulfilment of their promise, and that they feel themselves committed to him. But much had happened since then, and he should have hoped that the Government might have left the decision to the judgment of the House. It was a difficult question of political ethics, and he appreciated the chivalrous spirit which made the Government feel bound to press the Motion. But the House of Commons had a duty to the country and the Empire. They had to consider whether this Committee would do good or harm, and to vote according to their consciences. They had some years ago a somewhat similar case. In 1884, Mr. Gladstone had promised a discussion on Egyptian affairs. On June 30, the right hon. Gentleman proposed to redeem his pledge, but he was opposed by Mr. Forster and the present First Lord of the Admiralty on the ground that circumstances had changed, and that a discussion had become undesirable. The present First Lord of the Admiralty said:—
"I freely admit that the Government were bound to give a day for discussion when they were challenged by the Opposition. … but I claim this, that the House of Commons at large is entitled to disregard these considerations, and that we have simply to look at what is most for the interests of the country."
As to any imputations on the Government, the Colonial Office, or his right hon. Friend the Secretary for the Colonies, they could afford to treat them with scorn. [Cheers.] There had, of course, been nothing but dark innuendoes and vague suggestions, and these would in any case continue to be made. As to foreign opinion, those whose confidence

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was worth having, those who looked fairly at the circumstances, knew quite well that in difficult circumstances Her Majesty's Government had acted loyally and in good faith towards the Transvaal. There were, unfortunately, some foreign papers, even in Germany, allied to us as she was in blood and in her real interests, justly called the Reptile Press, which lost no opportunity of traducing and misrepresenting this country. They would probably continue to do so whatever we might do. As regarded the Chartered Company, he had no interest in the Company and was not connected with it, but he believed that no evidence would be forthcoming which would in any way implicate them. At the same time he confessed he regretted that at a crisis of great difficulty, when their full attention was required to deal with the grave situation arising from the rinderpest and the native rebellions, they should be distracted, and some of their ablest administrators should be dragged from their natural places at the post of danger to resist an attack from the rear, and to take part in a mischievous, though academic, Inquiry. They were invited to inquire into the origin and circumstances of the raid. But in that case they must investigate the refusal of political rights, the system of taxation, the system of monopolies, the impediments of commerce, from which the Uitlanders alleged that they so grievously suffered, and which, in their opinion, were so unfair and oppressive as to have driven them to rebellion. What good could possibly come now from this Inquiry? Were we to consider the complaints of the Boers and take no account of the grievances of the Uitlanders? The possible harm was clear enough; it stared us in the face; it might stir up hatred between the different races in South Africa; it might endanger our relations with foreign Powers; it might paralyse, and would certainly injure, the trade and industries of South Africa—and for what? No one
778
had yet pointed out any good that could possibly result. ["Hear, hear"!] Those responsible for the raid had been punished. The Cape Parliament had made an Inquiry and published a report. They had not thought it necessary to do more; why should we? ["Hear, hear!"] Our policy should be to let bygones be bygones—[cheers]—to endeavour to promote peace and goodwill between the different races in South Africa. This Inquiry would, he feared, relight the slumbering embers of race jealousies and personal animosities. To press for it just now, when angry feelings were beginning to subside, but when difficulties with the native races were acute and threatening, seemed, he did not say unpatriotic, for that would imply a sinister intention, which he was sure did not exist, but most unwise. If the Inquiry led to new troubles and complications, they would at least feel that they did their duty in endeavouring to prevent it, and they must throw the onus of the responsibility on the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition and his colleagues. [Cheers.]
The right hon. Baronet was speaking at Twelve o'clock, when the Debate stood adjourned.
Debate to be resumed To-morrow.

SUPPLY.
Committee deferred till To-morrow.
PUBLIC HEALTH (SCOTLAND) BILL.
Second Beading deferred till Tomorrow.
LAW OF EVIDENCE (CRIMINAL CASES).
Adjourned Debate on Motion for leave to bring in a Bill [21st January] further adjourned till To-morrow.
MILITARY WORKS [MONEY].
Committee thereupon deferred till To-morrow.
VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS [AID GRANT, ETC.].
Committee thereupon deferred till Monday.
RIVERS POLLUTION PREVENTION BILL.
Second Reading deferred till Wednesday, 17th February.
EDUCATIONAL ENDOWMENTS (IRELAND) ACT (1885) AMENDMENT BILL.
Second Heading deferred till Tomorrow.
UNLAWFUL POSSESSION BILL.
Adjourned Debate on Second Reading [2Gth January] further adjourned till To-morrow.
SHOPS (EARLY CLOSING) BILL.
Second Reading deferred till Tomorrow.
MERCHANDISE MARKS.
Ordered, that a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the effects and operation of the Merchandise Marks Act 1887, and into the subject of Merchandise Marks generally.—(Sir Albert Rollit.)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS.
Bill to amend the Law as to qualifications for elections to Parish Councils and as to the annual assembly of the
780
parish meeting, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Luttrell and Sir John Dorington; presented accordingly, and Read the First time; to be Read a Second Time upon Monday next, and to be printed.—[No. 100.]

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
On the Motion for the Adjournment of the House,
SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTasked the Leader of the House what steps he proposed to take with reference to the Debate on the British South Africa Committee, and also what would be done with regard to the Motion that originally stood first relating to Committee of Supply?
THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY: Of course our original plan was to pass the Resolution in regard to Supply and that relating to the South Africa Committee to-night, and there would have been ample time for both these discussions and other business, too, had it not been for the Debate on the Adjournment of the House. That Debate has occupied practically the whole evening, and under these circumstances the Government feel themselves obliged to ask for to-morrow for the continuation of the discussion of both Resolutions. If that is done without objection we shall be able to proceed on Monday with the Education Resolution.
SIR WILFRID LAWSON: Which shall we take first?
THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY: We shall proceed first with the Debate on the South Africa Committee.
DR. TANNER: Will the right hon. Gentleman go on with Supply to-morrow?
THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY: There will be some Supplementary Estimates, if we reach them.
Adjourned at five minutes after Twelve o'Clock.

ADDRESS.
The Queen's Answer to the Address of Tuesday the 19th instant reported: and Address and Answer to be printed and published.
EARL OF LIMERICK.
Petition of William Henry Edmond de Vere Sheaffe Earl of Limerick, claiming a right to vote at the elections of Representative Peers for Ireland; read, and referred to the Lord Chancellor to consider and report thereupon to the House.
STATUTE LAW REVISION BILLS AND CONSOLIDATION BILLS.
Moved to resolve, That it is desirable that all Statute Law Revision Pills and Consolidation Bills of the present Session be referred to a Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament (The Lord Chancellor), agreed to: Ordered that a Message be sent to the Commons to communicate this resolution, and to desire their concurrence.
INCREASE IN THE ARMY.
VISCOUNT DE VESCIgave notice that on Monday he would ask the Secretary of State for War whether it was the intention of her Majesty's Government to lay before Parliament proposals for an increase in the strength of the Army, and, if so, in what arms? By what number of battalions it was proposed to increase the strength of the infantry; whether it was proposed to add to the Brigade of Guards and in what manner; whether, if the strength of the Brigade of Guards was increased, it was proposed to place the Brigade on the roster for foreign service in time of peace, and under what conditions?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE PRIME MINISTER (The MARQUESS OF SALISBURY): I do not know whether it is agreeable to my noble Friend to adjourn until Monday? I believe that Lord Lansdowne has a matter of some importance to bring forward on that day, but I have heard of nothing for to-morrow.
THE EARL OF KLMBERLEYformally signified assent.
House adjourned at Twenty-five minutes before Five o'clock, to Monday next, a Quarter past Four o'clock.