§ Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary whether, according to the practice of the Irish Court of Chancery, a relator in a Chancery action is entitled to get the fiat of the Attorney-General without lodging any money as security for the defendant's costs; whether the present Master of the Rolls in Ireland has so held when 2164W a practising counsel; whether Lord Chief Justice Cherry, when Attorney-General for Ireland, gave his fiat to a labourer without requiring him to give any security for costs in the case of Attorney-General (Cahill) v. Allman and others; and if he will ascertain and state the grounds upon which Mr. Attorney-General Cherry required, as a condition of giving his fiat in the case of the Erasmus Smith Endowment, £400 to be lodged as security for the defendant's costs, thereby occasioning a further subsequent outlay of £21 to release that money?
§ Mr. BIRRELLThe Attorney-General tells me that if he has a doubt whether a relator in a Chancery action is competent to answer the costs of the action, the Attorney-General is entitled, before giving his fiat, to require that security should be given. I am not aware what were the views of the present Master of the Rolls when he was a practising counsel. The answer to the third part of the question is, I understand, in the affirmative, but in that case the Master of the Rolls ordered the relator to give security, and the order was upheld by the Court of Appeal. In the case of the Erasmus Smith Endowment it must be assumed that the Attorney-General, in the exercise of his discretion, thought that the relator should be called upon to give security for costs.