wished to know if there was to be a clause in the bill for the benefit of those whose religious persuasions were different from the religion of the church of England; and to exempt them from the penalties they might otherwise incur?

said, it was intended that the bill should contain a clause to that effect; but it was to be confined solely to foreign corps.

said, that, even in the present stage of this proceeding, he could not help remarking that it was one of a very unconstitutional nature; that, according to our laws and constitution, no foreign troops could be allowed to come into this country, or within 6 miles of the coast.—Leave granted.

observed, that he had on a former day given notice of his intention to bring forward a regulation for the purpose of correcting many errors and abuses that prevailed in the revenue departments in Ireland; and the measure would be founded on a similar one, which was adopted some years ago in this country. His great object was, 1st, to have an accurate inquiry made into the state of those offices; and, when the result of the inquiry should be laid before the house, parliament would then be able to judge whether any and what steps were necessary to be taken. He then moved, "That leave be given to bring in a bill for appointing commissioners to inquire into the amount of the fees, salaries, emoluments, and other gratuities received by officers employed in Ireland, to examine into any abuses which may exist in the same; and to report to the house their observations, and suggest such means as may occur to them towards the better collection of the revenue in Ireland."

said, he felt himself impelled to rise and return his thanks to the rt. hon. gent. for bringing forward a measure of this importance, which would be of the most substantial benefit to Ireland; a benefit much greater than any that had ever been felt in this country; because the abuses were much greater in the one than the other. The rt. hon. gent. had on a former day drawn a melancholy picture of the finances and revenues of Ireland, and it was evident that that situation was occasioned, in a great measure, by the abuses which prevailed in the public boards in Ireland. The incidental expenses of these boards were enormous. In that of the post-office department, no less a sum than 5,000l. was allowed for losses sustained in one of the mail coaches. Their law expenses were equally enormous. The bill of costs for law expenses in the post office department, during the last year, amounted to no less than 5,800l. Those of the paving board were 2,000l. and similar expenses attended the board of commissioners for wide streets. The fees received by officers in all departments of the revenue, were also highly oppressive; those persons in subordinate situations were in the habit of exacting enormous and oppressive fees. These were abuses which called for an immediate investigation, and he was confident that such an investigation would be highly gratifying to the people of Ireland, who would cheerfully pay large taxes, as soon as they saw the acts for imposing them accompanied with a fair and accurate inquiry into all the abuses which prevented the due collection of the public revenue. The great balances that remained in the hands of the collectors, were another circumstance which made an inquiry still more necessary. These had considerably increased during the last year. It appeared large sums of the public money were now due, by some who had been promoted from subordinate to higher offices, and that deceased collectors, in whose hands balances had remained unpaid, left large estates behind them. The law expenses were not only enormous in every department of the revenue; but the sums in which offenders had been convicted were remitted, and the public was thus deprived of the benefit arising from them. These were great evils, which required a speedy investigation and cure.

said, he would not enter into any discussion on this subject until the bill passed through parliament, and the commissioners of inquiry should report their opinion to the house.

said, the hon. bart. had stated many facts in a way that required explanation from him, in order to do away the impression they otherwise must make upon the house. The incidents and law expenses in the post-office department had been occasioned chiefly by the many mail robberies which were committed. The commissioners of wide streets must necessarily have had numerous proceedings at law before they could carry into effect the business for which they had been instituted; and surely no one could say, that 2,000l. in one year was too great a sum, for the costs attending those proceedings; on the contrary, he considered it a very low sum. As to the commissioners of the revenue having remitted penalties, they had done no more than exercise the same powers which belonged to the commissioners in this country, who frequently used their discretion in extending indulgence to those who had been sufficiently punished already. He was sorry to hear the hon. bart. make the statements he did, which he must deprecate, because they were made at a time when they could not be answered.

said, the hon. bart. appeared to him to have done no more than make a plain statement of facts; and he now wished to know, whether it was intended that there should be any correction of the abuses prevailing in Ireland, before the commissioners under the intended bill should make their report?

said, he only meant that there should be no discussion, nor any regulation on the subject, until the commissioners should make their report. But, as to the immediate correction of abuses, all he could now say was, that he himself would answer for it, every exertion should be made, in the mean-time, to make the revenue officers in Ireland do their duty.

said, he thought it necessary to remove a very erroneous impression that seemed to dwell on the minds of gentlemen, with regard to the balances in the hands of collectors. Such balances had existed since the year 1725, and he himself never knew them less than 90,000l.

said, that as one of those employed in the superintendence of the revenue in Ireland, he thought it necessary to say a few words on the subject of the sums in the hands of collectors. There certainly was the sum of 600,000l. now outstanding; but the monies actually paid into the hands of collectors bore a very small proportion to that sum. The treasury of Ireland had used indefatigable exertions in endeavouring that no more money should be in the hands of collectors than was absolutely necessary. One cause of money remaining in their hands, was the difficulty of remitting it from distant parts of Ireland to the militia. But he could assure the house, that whenever the collectors appeared to have any disposition to keep money in their hands, the commissioners of the revenue took the most prompt and effectual means to get it from them.

begged leave to trouble the house with a few observations on this subject, in addition to what he had stated on a former day. So far from there being 600,000l. in the hands of collectors, the house would be surprised to hear what that sum actually was. There was now a return of 551,000l. outstanding revenue, charged to the collectors at this time; but this sum was not in their hands; they had not yet received it. The house would see what the cause of this was from the fact which he was about to state. It was the custom for the surveyors of excise in Ireland, to go once a month and visit all persons subject to the excise duty; for instance, distillers and matters. They received returns from the gougers or inferior excise officers, of the sums for which these were liable to pay, and they made a monthly return of them before they were paid; and the head collector made a return of them to the commissioners; and all these sums were charged to his account before ever they were collected in. The collector thus appears to have balances remaining in hand, when he has not received a shilling. The persons liable to the excise duty had generally a month's credit in paying the money. With matters and distillers this amounted to the sum of about 3 or 400,000l. The money, therefore, which was supposed, from the returns, to be in the collector's hands, was not paid. And he could assure the house, that of the 600,000l. said to be due to the Irish govt., not above 50,000l. was actually in the hands of collectors. He now spoke from the written documents which he examined; and from which it appeared, that this sum did, since Jan. last, fluctuate from 31,000l. to 49,000l. which sum it never exceeded; that was all the collectors now had in their hands; and why so much was remaining in their possession, he had already explained to the house. In order to satisfy the house on this subject, he now gave notice, that he would to-morrow move for certain returns, which would clearly show that his statement was correct, and would put an end to all mistaken views on the subject.

said, so far from having any objection to, he rather wished for, the production of the papers alluded to by the hon. gent. With respect to the balances remaining in hand, he would maintain, that the sum of 600,000l. was now due to govt.; that it ought to have been received by this time; and that govt. could have compelled the payment of it.

said, that what he had heard from the several gentlemen who spoke on this subject, was sufficient to prove to him, that it was of considerable importance. He was glad to find that the rt. hon. gent. (Mr. Corry) intended to move for certain papers; and, until these were produced, he should forbear to make any further observations on the business.

, in explanation, said, that the Irish treasury was controlled by the govt., with regard to the power it had of enforcing the collection of the revenue. And that 49,000l. was the highest sum in the hands of the collectors.—The motion was then put and carried.

said, that in duty to the nation at large, and his constituents in particular, he must oppose the present bill. He particularly objected to the manner in which the men were to be raised, and afterwards disposed of. He wished to know how they were to be disposed of in time of peace; how they were to be retained in time of peace? and how they were liable to be called upon to serve again, should it be necessary? The bill, he considered as nugatory in its immediate object; and in its permanent object unconstitutional.

said, he was not prepared to give a precise answer to the noble lord's questions. All he would now say was, that whenever peace arrived, it would be the object of parliament to consider what provisions should be necessary to keep up this force during the continuance of peace, and to fix the times for calling it out.

declared his feeling of this measure to be, that of his having double the objection to it which he would to the other bill relating to England. He would allude to one point in which England and Scotland differed materially, and that was with respect to the militia. He certainly thought the militia had been increased to too great an extent in England; and therefore the reduction of it was no evil; but that was not the case in Scotland, where the militia was in point of discipline nearly equal to a regular force. In that country, more than any other, the younger sons of gentlemen were in the habit of getting into the army, and of seeing actual service. Many of these persons went into the militia, and the consequence was, that the militia of Scotland was better officered than that of any other country. In the absence, therefore, of regular troops, Scotland safely relied on the militia for defence; and by the aid of the spirit and the exertions of the distinguished commander in chief in that country, they were rendered so perfect in discipline, as to be inferior to no troops whatever. From these considerations it must be very unwise to reduce any of the militia in Scotland. Between this bill and the other, there was another material difference, and that was the machinery possessed by England for raising men, which was not in Scotland. Here the poor laws would be the means of getting men in every parish. In Scotland there were no poor laws, and therefore the heritors of parishes had not the same machinery to work with. But as these heritors were in general country gentlemen, the mode they would adopt would be to meet and assess themselves to raise a certain sum of money, and that would be given to the crimps for raising the men. This, therefore, would be a tax on the proprietors of land, or, in other words, a land-tax; which was directly contrary to the articles of the Union with Scotland—a violation of a solemn engagement, which he called upon the Irish members to oppose, lest a similar violation of the union between their country and this might take place.

defended the bill, and observed, that so far from heritors subscribing money to employ crimps, he believed they would have influence enough among their tenants and neighbors to get the full complement of men required of the parishes. As to land-tax in Scotland, the same objection applied to the militia and army of reserve acts.

observed, that the hon. gent. who complained of a land-tax in Scotland had declared, last year, that it was a breach of the union with Scotland to lay a duty on malt there. But would the hon. gent. say, that a measure, which the exigency of the present moment rendered absolutely necessary, was now to be opposed, because it might contain something contrary to an act passed 100 years ago?—The report was then received, and the bill was ordered to be read a 3d time to-morrow.

opposed the principle of the bill. He began by taking notice of the several issues made by the bank, of dollars, and their refusal afterwards to take many of them back. He then observed, that, for the first time, parliament was called, upon to sanction a proceeding, which declared, that certain pieces of coin should not be counterfeited; and, he would ask, what security was there that these pieces of coin were not counterfeits? No coin should be suffered to circulate under the sanction of parliament, which did not come from the mint. This money was coined by an individual at Birmingham; who could tell to what an extent this money might not be coined there? or how many counterfeits might not be made? A coining machine was to be exported to Denmark; who could tell but in that country counterfeit money might not be coined and sent over here? He objected to those pieces, because they had the king's image on them; because they took away from his majesty's prerogative; and because there was no check as to the quantity which might be issued. He hoped that some regulation might be made to correct the silver specie of the country. The dollars were but a short time in circulation, when they were called in by the bank, and he was informed, that silver coin was now frequently brought here from France, and deposited in bags at the houses of different bankers, which might ultimately be detrimental to the public at large.

observed, that those medals, as the hon. gent. styled them, or coins, were issued not as from the royal mint, but upon the credit of the bank of England, as silver promissory notes. It was not compulsory on the public to accept them if they did not chuse, any more than to accept the paper notes of the bank; but as both were an accommodation to the public, and would be equally accepted as such, the question was, whether it would not be politic to guard the public against fraud by the forgery of the dollars as well as on that of bank notes,

declared, that as far as his conations led him to form any opinion on the subject, he had ever heard of any such circumstance as money being brought from France to this country and deposited in the hands of bankers. The bank directors were a body of men that merited the highest respect from every Englishman; they were men of the strictest integrity, and possessed of the highest sense of honour; their feeling towards the public at large was manifested in the support which they, at different times, gave to the credit and respectability of the nation, both in commercial and other transactions. They could not be fairly suspected of doing any thing which would be in the least detrimental to the interest of the public. As a banker, he must declare that he did not know of such a fact, nor did he suppose it probable that any banker was now purchasing dollars from the French.—The bill was then read a 2d time, and ordered to be referred to a committee to-morrow.

moved the order of the day, for the further consideration of the report of the slave trade abolition bill, and then moved that counsel be called in upon the same.

said, that since the union with Ireland, there were many members in that house who had never seen the evidence taken some years before at the bar of the house. This was a thing the members were entitled to, and therefore he wished the hon. member would put off the consideration of this business for a longer time.

shortly replied; after which the motion was agreed to, and counsel were called in. Mr. Pigot having been heard, Mr. Plomer was going to reply; when

rose, and proposed that the farther hearing of counsel should be postponed to afford the petitioners time to prepare.

objected, alleging that the case had beets fully argued, that the house was already in possession of sufficient information upon the subject, and that there was no reason to expect that the further argument of counsel would throw any new light upon it.—The question being put, that the bill be engrossed, a division took place, when there appeared—Ayes 52—noes 9.—The bill was then ordered to be read a 3d time on Wednesday.—Adjourned.