said, he wished to address a few words to the House on behalf of his noble and gallant Friend Lord Clyde. It will be in the recollection of the House, that in the course of the discussions respecting the amalgamation of the Indian forces, an hon. and gallant Member referred to certain supposed opinions of Lord Clyde, to the effect that in his (Lord Clyde's) opinion, none of the General Officers of Her Majesty's Indian forces were qualified to hold divisional command. He (Sir De Lacy Evans) stated at the time he was convinced that could not he an accurate representation of his noble Friend's opinions; and he was pleased now to find that his conjecture was perfectly correct. The shortest and most direct way to correct the mistake, would be to read two or three lines from a letter he had just received from Lord Clyde: "I never intended," said Lord Clyde, "to draw an invidious comparison between the officers of the Royal and Indian Services, or to desire to exclude from employment or divisional commands a fair proportion of the officers of the local army, so many of whom served with great distinction under my command." His noble Friend never wished to contend for more than a fair proportion of divisional commands being given to officers in the Royal service, on grounds that he laid down in much detail; but he was much hurt at finding that passages from some of his letters that were printed in the Parliamentary papers had had an interpretation put on them which they would not bear; and he therefore expressed an earnest wish that he (Sir De Lacy Evans) "would be good enough to state publicly to the House that the interpretation put on a passage in Lord Clyde's letter on the 8th of March, by Major-General Birch, was overstrained and inaccurate." This candid and honourable tribute to the services of the officers referred to by their illustrious Commander-in-Chief, together with his frank disclaimer of what he had been unfairly accused of, can but enhance the high public estimation my gallant Friend has so nobly won; while it will be a consolation to the distinguished officers, whose services are thus remembered and acknowledged, for the wholly unmerited depreciation their professional characters were lately so unhandsomely exposed to in this House. It was impossible to add anything to this statement, especially as the new order of things might be said to be consummated; but it was desirable that Parliament should know that no prejudice against those officers existed in the mind of their late Commander-in Chief.

said, he rose to ask the First Commissioner of Works, Whether the Government will grant a Committee next Session for the purpose of inquiring into the Westminster Improvement Commission? He wished, in the first place, to call attention to the condition of Victoria Street. Any Gentleman who would take the trouble to turn his Steps in that direction would witness a scene of ruin and desolation which could not he paralleled in any other capital in Europe: houses half built, and more than half in ruin; plots of ground, that if a title could be made to them would be worth their surface covered with gold, now the receptacle of all the filth in the neighbour- hood, and the resort of the vice and degradation of that dense population. Surely the House would not allow this state of things to continue. The Commission was constituted in 1849, on certain conditions. The first condition to which the Commissioners were bound by the Act was, to make a direct communication between Pimlico and Westminster Abbey, and also to complete a spacious and convenient approach from that part of the town to the Houses of Parliament. He regretted to say that they had been prevented from carrying out the first condition by the Dean and Chapter of Westminster. A corner of land had unfortunately been left in their hands, on which the Dean and Chapter had constructed a hideous building which looked like a nunnery outside, and was inside, he understood, a den of attorneys. Any one who looked down Victoria Street from Pimlico would scarcely believe but that a feeling of spite as much as cupidity had been the motive that induced the Dean and Chapter to shut up their noble cathedral and prevent it from being a grand and noble object in the future street. If the House did not consider the present disgraceful state of things a reason for interfering, surely the fact that £80,000 of the public money had been advanced would justify it in bringing a pressure to bear upon the First Commissioner of Works. The right hon. Gentleman might name a fresh Commission, or infuse some fresh blood into the present Commissioners, giving them the power of selling the land and half-finished houses and lodging the amount in the Court of Chancery, to be distributed as equity might direct. In any case, he trusted that this property would not be left in its present disgraceful state. If it were thought better to appoint a Select Committee, its inquiries should be carried further back than those of any former Select Committee, so that the gross dishonesty might be exposed which had occurred at the commencement of the Commission, and brought the undertaking to its present position. He wished to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman would consent to grant a Select Committee to inquire next Session into the proceedings of the Westminster Improvement Committee?

agreed with the hon. Baronet, that the present condition of Victoria Street was a most lamentable indication of the mismanagement of the building society known as the Westminster Improvement Commission. The Government had, however, no responsibility or control in the matter, nor had it taken any part in the affairs of the Commission. [Sir WILLIAM GALLWEY: They advanced £80,000.] He could not state what the Government would do next Session; all he could say was, that if the hon. Baronet made out a good case, and offered good grounds next Session for appointing a Select Committee, he for one would not offer any objection.