said, that in rising, in pursuance of a notice given on Thursday night by a noble Friend near him, he deeply felt the responsibility which devolved on him, as the official representative in the House of Commons of that department of the Government with which the subject of the resolutions he should have the honour to propose was more immediately connected, in having to ask the House to adopt those resolutions which the Government felt it their duty to bring forward. He felt this responsibility deeply, not from any doubt as to the propriety, expediency, justice, or even humanity, of the course which the Government felt it their duty to adopt, or from any hesitation whatever as to the propriety of the course which it was his duty now to recommend to the House, but he felt it on account of the immense magnitude of the interests connected with the question—interests, as stated by the right hon. Baronet (Sir R. Peel) the other night, not of a pecuniary nature only, but affecting the present and future welfare of hundreds of thousands of our fellow-subjects—objects of the justice, the sympathies, and solicitude of that country and of Parliament, who, long subject to degradation and oppression, were now rapidly passing from that state to the possession and enjoyment of the privileges of British subjects and of freemen. He was sure that those interests would now, as they had heretofore, receive from that House a patient and considerate attention. He was assured, that in bringing the subject again before the House, as it never had so it never would—whatever might have taken place elsewhere—be discussed with any admixture of personal or party feeling. It had been discussed and considered by men of all parties, differing widely in political sentiments, with reference exclusively to those interests which it was their duty to consider, and which they would never sacrifice to external threats, or the injudicious zeal of honest advocates. He would not allude to the imputation of motives which had been cast upon the Government, and which they might well scorn; neither would he allude to the language that had been used elsewhere, for he well remembered the eloquent protest that had been uttered on the motion of the hon. Baronet, the Member for Yorkshire, against mixing this question up with political feeling, and making it subservient to party purposes; and he remembered, also, not many days since, and before a less favourable audience, the manly and gallant stand made by the hon. Member for Lincolnshire (Mr. Handley,) the long-tried and consistent advocate of immediate abolition had earnestly deprecated the impolicy, the injustice, and the discredit, that must arise in mixing up with the discussion of this question matters of a party and political nature. He would, therefore, pass over the subject, merely observing that he had seen in a newspaper of this day a letter from an hon. Friend near him (Mr. Adam Smith), who had also been a laborious and able advocate of negro rights, and of the abolition in the first instance of the slave-trade, and next of slavery—who boldly came forward and called upon the friends of the negro not to discredit the cause in which they were engaged by resorting to such modes of advocacy. He should now proceed to the subject which he was about to bring under the consideration of the House. It would be in the recollection of the House that after the subject had engaged much of the attention of the country, after public meetings had been held in the metropolis, and after a memorial had been presented to Government, which had been laid on the table of the House—after meetings had been held in different parts of the country for the purpose of influencing the decision of the House, a motion was brought forward on the 29th of March by his hon. Friend, the Member for Yorkshire. That motion led to a protracted discussion. The debate was prolonged to a late hour on the second night, when, after every argument had been exhausted, the House came to what he believed to be a deliberate decision upon the question submitted for its consideration. There were present on that occasion no less than 488 Members, of whom 271 voted for the amendment he had the honour to propose, while 217 voted for the motion of the hon. Member for Yorkshire, leaving a majority of fifty-four expressing the sense of the House against the motion, and in favour of the proposition of the Government which was embodied in a bill to which the House had also given its assent. The principle was then established, that to the extent to which the contract had been violated, the Parliament would give a remedy; but that to proceed to a greater extent, would be to commit an act of injustice. The bill founded upon that proposition embraced every remedy which had occurred to the Government, or which had been suggested in that House. Not a single division took place on the principle of the bill, the Legislature thus unanimously asserting, that it would be unjust, impolitic, and unwise, to interfere with a solemn decision of the Parliament upon so important a question. A division certainly did take place in the committee, but it was upon a clause proposed by the hon. Member for Honiton to terminate the apprenticeship in the island of Jamaica on the 1st of August, because, as his argument was, that the cases of cruelty had been fully made out with respect to that island. Upon that occasion the immediate abolitionists again mustered their strength, but were again defeated by a large majority. The Government, then, had a right to infer that, after two solemn expressions of the opinion of the House, the matter would not be seriously brought before the House again this Session. The bill having been passed, it was at once sent out to the West Indies, where, he had no doubt, it was now, in full and beneficial operation. The hon. Baronet opposite, however, gave notice that he would again submit the subject to Parliament on the 1st of May, but it was afterwards postponed to the 22nd, a period which rendered it utterly impossible to carry the intentions of the abolitionists into effect by the 1st of August. Under these circumstances there was an evident indifference on the part of the House to enter into a protracted debate upon a question which had been solemnly decided and twice within a few weeks, and a general impression that it would not he seriously imposed. The result was, that the resolution of the hon. Baronet was adopted, not in a House of 488 Members, but of 193, there being ninety-eight for, and ninety-five against it, leaving a bare majority of three in favour of the resolution. Had this been a question of merely domestic concern involving only some interests of the constituencies of hon. Members, he certainly should not have thought it necessary for the Government to invite the reconsideration of the question, with the view of clearing up any doubt which might attach to the real meaning and intentions of the House. Neither if the hon. Baronet had submitted to the House a practical measure founded on that resolution—which he presumed the hon. Baronet must have contemplated—should he have thought it worth while to take any immediate step, because the decision of the House could have been obtained on some of the stages of a bill for carrying the resolution into effect. It would not then have been necessary for Government to originate any measure to remove that uncertainty which might exist elsewhere as to its intentions, the consequences of which might be disastrous and ruinous. So, too, an explicit abandonment of all intention on the part of the hon. Baronet to propose a bill founded on that resolution would have been an express avowal of the circumstances under which the resolution was adopted, and an acknowledgment that the hon. Baronet had no confidence in the majority which fortuitous circumstances had thrown into his hand; and that conviction must have passed in his mind, or he would not have delayed the introduction of such a measure. But the course taken by the hon. Baronet was calculated to keep alive uncertainty where it was the greatest evil that could exist. That very uncertainty would keep up a misunderstanding among those to whom it would most likely produce evils which he was sure the hon. Baronet would be the last to create. Another not unimportant consideration, which ought, as it seemed to him, to induce the interference of Parliament was the delaration somewhat triumphantly and ostentatiously made at a late public meeting, that from this country to the West Indies, intelligence of the division on the 22nd instant, had been immediately communicated. He was glad to find, that all participation in this communication was disavowed by the hon. Baronet, but the fact was announced by the chairman of the public meeting as a matter of triumph, that the news had been transmitted to the West Indies; but he hoped, that in the colonies the parties who received such information would not be mistaken, and that they would not be deceived by supposing that Parliament had declared for the liberty of the slave, and had decreed the immediate emancipation of the apprentices. The result, however, of that very meeting would convince the West Indians of the error of such a supposition, for within one hour after its close, the hon. Baronet came down to that House and stated, that he was not prepared to introduce any measure founded upon that resolution—which was powerless and ineffectual without a change in the law made by the joint consent of both Houses of Parliament, and of the Crown. Any parties sending out any information of the intentions of Parliament in favour of immediate emancipation, would only be practising a delusion upon the people, which he (Sir George Grey) would not stop to describe. But if there was any chance that misapprehension should exist in the colonies from any quarter, or if that delusion should be studiously encouraged, it was the duty of that House, and a duty from which he trusted the House would not shrink, to clear up all uncertainty, and to declare under what state of the law the apprentices were to remain for a period yet unexpired, however short that period might be. He quarrelled not with those friends of emancipation who were the consistent, the warm, and the zealous friends of liberty, but he did quarrel with those who would induce the negro not to pay submission to the law whilst it remained unaltered. On the motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Yorkshire, the Secretary of the Wesleyan Mission, a society whose exertions were most praiseworthy, had addressed a circular letter to all the missionaries, stating that the opinion of the House of Commons had doubtless been come to after long consultation, and they therefore urged their friends in the colonies, whatever might be their opinion of the operation of the system or of the refusal of Parliament, to prove themselves the real friends of the negroes, and to urge them to refrain from all tumultuous or disorderly expressions of dissatisfaction and to urge on them a patient submission to the law so long as it remained unaltered. This was the opinion of the real friends of emancipation, and they had wisely urged every argument in their power to restrain disorder. He attached great weight to the growing intelligence of the people, and to the good effect of these remonstrances even under the influence of a system of apprenticeship, which had been unjustly characterised as worse and more degrading than slavery itself. He trusted to this intelligence, and to the exertions of those missionaries to facilitate correct information of the proceedings which took place in this country, and to remove all false impressions. But it was not to the Wesleyan missionaries alone that the country was thus indebted, but to other parties, who, holding the same sentiments as the hon. Baronet, were too honest, and who entertained too sincere a friendship for the negroes, to foster delusion or to lead them to receive any false impression of the resolutions to which the House had come. The mail which had arrived this morning had brought home the resolutions adopted at a meeting over which the rev. Walter Dendy was requested to preside, which took place in the parish of St. James, Jamaica, and which was attended by about 2,000 negroes. The meeting took place at Salter's Hill Chapel on the 13th of April, and the resolution which was unanimously adopted, was in these words:—

"Having heard a report has been circulated by some newspapers that James prædial apprentices in the parish of St. James will not work after the 1st of August next, we, the members and congregation at Salter's Hill, under the pastoral charge of the rev. Walter Dendy, Baptist missionary, resolve, that this report is a false and malicious libel upon us, as we never had such thoughts or intentions; but we are willing to work as usual for our masters so long as the present law continues in force, although we would rather be free; and that a copy of this resolution be forwarded to Sir Lionel Smith, Governor; Lord Glenelg, Colonial Secretary; and to the Rev. John Dyer, secretary of the Baptist Missionary Society. Signed, on the behalf of the meeting, Walter Dendy, Baptist missionary"

The newspapers which had been received by the same mail this morning contained also a report of the questions which had been put at this same meeting by Messrs. Walter Dendy and B. B. Dexter. One of the questions ran thus—

"If any one should be so wicked as to try to fill up your minds with the thought that you are all to be free in August next, will you take hint, whether he be white, brown, or black, to the special magistrate, that he may be punished."

And the question was responded to by loud cries "Yes, sir, we will." Not only was the conduct of the missionaries above all praise, but so also was the conduct of the great body of the negroes. The evidence and the facts which he had on a former occasion stated, led him to retain the opinion that the negroes were fit for freedom but, as he had said before, he now repeated, that preparatory measures were necessary, and that practical men, even the Marquess of Sligo when in Jamaica, had doubted whether the apprentices would be benefited by immediate emancipation The apprentices had well conducted themselves; the sufferings which they had undergone increased their claims to praise, and he was sure that there was not a Member of that or the other House of Parliament who would refuse a tribute of approbation to them for their conduct, and who would not, instead of adding to delusion, endeavour to enlighten their minds—who would not try to secure to the negro the character which he had earned by his conduct during the first years of the apprenticeship, and to render him fit for the full enjoyment of unrestrained freedom? Now, in the came paper to which he had already referred, he found a report of the anniversary meeting of the Baptist chapel in Montego Bay, and a statement of the education in the schools connected with it. The meeting was held on Saturday, and on the following Sunday the rev. Mr. Burchell, before he began his discourse, alluded at some length to rumours that had gone abroad intended to disturb the peace and quietude of society, warned the negroes not to believe them, to take before the magistrates those who propagated them, and to wait patiently for the termination of their servitude. Such were the exertions which had been made by the Wesleyan missionaries and by the Baptist missionaries, and such had been the good conduct of the apprentices; and, therefore, he looked with less apprehension at the hasty and injurious, and, if he was to go to the length of the reports in the newspapers, he might say criminal and wicked attempts to impose upon the negroes by sending out information of their immediate freedom. Looking at the possible results, however, of the reception of such intelligence received before more authentic information could be conveyed, the Government had sent out a circular letter to the governors of the different West-India colonies, communicating to them the exact circumstances of the vote which had been taken. He now asked Parliament to interpose and to second the laudable efforts of those men on whom he relied, who thought with the hon. Baronet, that slavery ought not to exist, and yet who if they did think, that the law ought to be changed, thought also, that whilst it remained it ought to be upheld, and to relieve the Government from the possible necessity of resorting to coercion, to maintain it. He asked Parliament to do this, to interpose the weight of its authority, to put an end to all uncertainty, and to restrain all exasperation. He called upon the House to adhere to its first determination, unless it had since seen good and sufficient reason to annul it. He was not scared by the delusion, that by not altering the law they were perpetuating slavery. He had heard the eloquent speech of the hon. Member for Lincoln the other evening—a speech which might have been well made in 1833, before slavery was abolished; but in that year it was declared to be abolished from August 1, 1840, and was it worth while to keep alive excitement and to retard the improvement of the apprentice on the chance of introducing and carrying a bill the only benefit of which would be, that the apprenticeship system would be brought to a termination a few months earlier than as the law now stood? The question had not been put to the country in a fair way; it had been kept out of sight, that slavery was abolished; it had been stated as a question between amelioration and abolition, as if the apprenticeship system was a permanent substitute for slavery; but the truth was, it was a question of time, on which he called for the decision of the House. They had abolished slavery, and by the measure of the present session they had passed an act which would remedy all the practical evils of the existing system. In this he did not rely upon his own authority, but he added to his own the weight of the authority of the co-adjutor of Wilberforce, of one of the patriarchs of emancipation, of one of the most zealous and talented advocates of the rights of the negroes, the avowed organ he would not say of the party opposed to himself, but of the feeling of the consistent promoters of the welfare of the negroes. Mr. Buxton, since the motion of the hon. Baronet near him (Sir G. Strickland), had stated, that he had always opposed the apprenticeship system, and that he had never agreed in any part of it, except by compromise, in the report of the committee, and that he maintained his opinion, yet he saw no practical benefit which would result to the apprentices from now agitating the question. He hoped, that the opinion of this real and judicious friend to the negroes had found its way to the West Indies, as well as the communications of their professed and injudicious friends. "Continue and wait, working patiently," said Mr. Buxton, "and the time of emancipation is short and certain. So said he. The time was short and certain, and he hoped, that the negroes would wait and work patiently. He would not re-argue the question of contract; but the time being short and certain, he fully concurred with Mr. Buxton in thinking, that no ultimate benefit would be derived by an immediate change. What was the present position of the question? Parliament having decided two several times against forcing immediate emancipation, it was hoped, that voluntary manumission would go on to a great degree; and it was felt, that the interference of Parliament by direct legislation would expose them to the charge of breaking faith with the planters; for this reason the hon. Baronet the Member for Warwickshire did not bring forward any motion founded on his resolution; and all the information which he had since received strengthened his opinion, that if they carried a bill for immediate emancipation, it would put an end to slavery under unfavourable circumstances, while by allowing the term to expire it would end most auspiciously for all parties. The Virgin Islands and Nevis had already agreed to immediate emancipation; and in Barbadoes, although no act had been passed, yet it was so manifestly the opinion of both branches of the Legislature, that he believed, that an act would be passed giving unqualified freedom on the 1st of August, 1838. In Jamaica the events had not proceeded this far, and though the circumstances were different from some other colonies, yet an act had been received from the local Legislature carrying out to a great extent the provisions of the law which had recently passed the House. But he was told, that he was guilty of inconsistency in deprecating the interference of Parliament, and yet in recommending to the local legislatures measures upon this subject favouring immediate emancipation; but his object was to urge all improvements upon the colonial legislatures, that if they refused them they might be placed entirely in the wrong, and the Imperial Parliament not be charged with a breach of the national faith. By the second resolution which he had to propose, he intended to pledge the House to interfere in case the intention of the Abolition Act was not carried out. It was in these words:—

"That this House, at the same time, declares its opinion, that no means should be omitted which can tend to secure to the negro population of her Majesty's colonies the privileges to which they are entitled under the Act for the Abolition of Slavery, and under the Act for the Amendment of the Slavery Abolition Act; and further, that the anxious attention of this House will be directed to the state and condition of the negro population when the expiration of the term of apprenticeship shall have entitled them to the full enjoyment of entire freedom.

The expression of this determination he held to be of the greatest importance; it would be no unjust interference with any rights, and it was a power which the Parliament possessed, and which he hoped the House would exercise should it be required. To place the colonies in a fit situation for the enjoyment of unqualified freedom by all classes of her Majesty's subjects, there were many points on which the interference of the Parliament must be exerted, and it was only necessary for him to glance at a few of them. For education it was said that nothing had been done, but the foundation had been laid for an extensive system, and many n useful advances had been made, though much remained to be done. The reports of Mr. Latrobe, with respect to Jamaica, had been laid on the table of the House, and his extended inquiries to the Windward and Leeward Islands had been received, and when printed would show the progress which had been made. In addition there were improvements in prison discipline, a reform in the civil and criminal law, a more effective administration of justice. To all these the attention of the Government had been earnestly directed, and these exertions he should not fail to call upon Parliament to assist, if the interference of Parliament should be necessary to consolidate the great work of emancipation and liberty; and following out the sentiments of Lord Glenelg, as expressed by him in his circular to the governors of the West-India colonies, in November last:—

"The great cardinal principle of the law for the abolition of slavery is, that the apprenticeship of the emancipated slaves is to be immediately succeeded by personal freedom, in that full and unlimited sense of the term in which it is used in reference to the other subjects of the British Crown. This is the essence of the contract between Great Britain and the colonies. It is the basis of the enactments, whether parliamentary or colonial, on the subject. From this principle, I am persuaded that the colonial legislatures will not desire to depart. If such an attempt were possible, it would be met by the uncompromising resistance of the Government, the Parliament, and the people, of this country."

And he would not fail to ask Parliament to aid and strengthen the hand of the Government in perfecting freedom and in establishing the blessings of peace. There was one other consideration to which he wished to refer. It was an argument used by Mr. Thompson, the eloquent advocate of immediate emancipation, to whom, or to some other friend, he (Sir George Grey) was indebted for many reports of public meetings held upon this subject. It was well said—

"Has not our question an important bearing upon the great question of negro slavery in the United States and elsewhere, and might not our vacillation prove injurious to the vast interests with which our question stands connected?"

He must say, that he concurred with Mr. Thompson in thinking that the way in which our own experiment should be managed would have a most important bearing on the question of negro slavery in the United States and elsewhere. He believed the course adopted by other nations would depend materially, if not entirely, on the successful or unsuccessful result of the experiment which had been tried by England; and the advocates of the abolition of slavery would find, that the best line of conduct to be taken by this country would be to secure the transition of the negroes from their apprenticeship to absolute freedom in such a mode as that they might be well fitted to receive the blessing which was in store for them. If, on the contrary, they should persist in demanding the immediate and unqualified abolition of the present system, such consequences might ensue as would give their opponents the most powerful argument against the plan which they desired be adopted: therefore, he believed, that the welfare of the slaves would be best promoted by no step being taken affording an argument to the enemies of abolition, and which might show any vacillation on their part in not adhering to the compact of 1833. He called on the House, then, to interpose the weight of its authority to clear up the uncertainty, which, although it did not exist in the House, was prevalent elsewhere, as to the real opinion which was entertained by the majority of its Members, and to protect the negroes from the evil consequences which might be produced by the report which had gone forth to the colonies, and which was grounded on the resolution of the 22nd of May. There was no one in Parliament who did not know that there was no hope for the measure being passed this Session; and he called on the House, therefore, to pursue the course which he recommended, and to express by their votes the feelings which they entertained in favour of the negro race, and by that means to secure for them those rights to which they were entitled, and which would be best secured, he was convinced, by the adoption of these resolutions. He had the greatest confidence that this great object would be attained, and hon. Members would have the verdict of an approving conscience in their favour. They would secure the fruits of their exertions, not only by means of the legislative bodies of the West Indies, but in the co-operation of the proprietors and of the people of England. He could answer for the cordial disposition evinced by bodies of the most important and influential owners in Jamaica to carry into effect the sincere wishes of Parliament with regard to the future welfare of the negroes; and he sincerely hoped, that those measures which would hereafter be taken, would be such as to wipe off that blot from the pages of history which had so long existed as a disgrace to civilization. Having already so frequently trespassed on the House on the question at large, and having on former occasions fully stated his views upon the subject, he was unwilling to enter into it again; and he had, therefore, confined himself as much as possible to those resolutions which he had felt it to be his duty to propose, in order to relieve the House from the position in which it now stood. He asked the House, then, to adopt those resolutions under the most sincere conviction that that course would be most consistent with national justice and an adherence to national faith, as well as with the dictates of the enlightened policy of an intellectual Legislature. The hon. Baronet concluded by moving—"That in order to prevent the injurious consequences which may follow from the intentions of Parliament being left in doubt, and in order to maintain the peace and welfare of the colonies, it is necessary to declare, that, in the opinion of this House, it is not advisable to adopt any proceeding for the purpose of giving effect to the resolution of the 22nd of May."

cordially agreed with the hon. Gentleman in thinking that political feeling had nothing on earth to do with this question. He could most conscientiously and truly say, that political feeling did not operate with him. When he found, in 1833, that it was not the intention of the Government to place the negroes in the same position as the English labourer, he moved a reduction of the grant of 20,000,000l. to 15,000,000l., and he divided the House on the question. Having, in his own county, been the chairman of a great meeting in favour of immediate negro emancipation, and having also pre- sided at a meeting in Exeter-hall convened for the furtherance of the same object, and having declared, that he would make a motion for the immediate abolition of the system of apprenticeship, nothing but ill health had prevented him from bringing that motion forward. During his illness, the hon. Baronet, the Member for Yorkshire, brought under the consideration of the House a motion having for its object the emancipation of the negroes on the 1st of August next. When he recovered, he brought forward the motion of which he had given notice, and no man could say, that the Government had been taken by surprise. The noble Lord, the Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Gentleman the Member for Newark, and the hon. Member the Under-Secretary for the Colonies, were, he believed, in the House when the hon. Member for Lincoln concluded his eloquent speech, but no one rose to reply; mum was the order of the night; the noble Lord went out for a division, and the result of that division was defeat. Since that time, the struggle between the noble Lord and himself had been who should make the first move: it was his wish to force the Government to make a movement on the subject, and they had, in consequence, brought forward those resolutions. The effect of those resolutions, not in words, but in reality, would be to rescind and annul the resolution to which the House came on the 22nd of May, and the question really was, whether the House would stultify itself by rescinding a resolution on the 28th of May which it had agreed to on the 22nd, by what majority he cared not, but which had been agreed to after due deliberation. The noble Lord might, perhaps, say, that he did not seek to rescind this resolution. This was a matter comparatively indifferent to him; they might erase it from the Journals of the House, but they could not erase it from the hearts of the people, and if they attempted to do so they would inflict a wound which no Government on earth could heal. With regard to what the hon. Baronet had said respecting the connexion of this motion with the meeting of delegates, he could only say, that he had not attended any meeting of delegates at Exeter-hall, and he did not know what had passed at the meeting to which the hon. Baronet had alluded till somebody had told him there had been a flare-up between Mr. Handley and Lord Brougham. He had never said, that he had given up the idea of bringing in a bill during this Session of Parliament. He merely said, when the noble Lord asked him the other night what he intended to do, that he would not then introduce a bill, but that he would reserve to himself the full right to take any course which he might think most expedient. He was perfectly ready, if the amendment which he intended to propose were successful, to introduce a bill for the purpose of carrying out the resolution of the 22nd of May, which would include provisions to confer security upon the negro, and safety to the masters, and would place the negro exactly in the position of the free labourer in England. If, however, his amendment should be unfortunately lost, he would not say, what he should do, but he would take any and every constitutional course which was open to him for the purpose of effecting the resolution of the 22nd of May. He begged to move, by way of amendment, to leave out all the words in the original motion after the word "that," for the purpose of inserting words to this effect,—"that it is the opinion of this House, that the resolution passed on the 22nd of May should be carried into effect by means of a legislative enactment, due provision being made to secure the peace of the colonies, and to promote the welfare and good conduct of the negro population, on their attaining the full enjoyment of their entire freedom."

, in seconding the hon. Baronet's amendment, said, he felt, that to maintain silence upon this occasion would be to shrink from taking a part in carrying into effect that which he and others had recommended to the House, and which the House had adopted. To adopt any other course than that which was now proposed by the hon. Baronet would have the appearance of having recommended a resolution, the success of which they had not really desired, and also of not having duly considered all the consequences of having carried such a resolution. For his part, he could say most truly, that he never would have consented to support the resolution when the hon. Baronet moved it, if he had not felt confident of its justice, and had he not been prepared if the whole responsibility had devolved upon himself, to carry it into effect. He had duly considered the existing state of the law, as well as the consequences which were likely to ensue from the proposed measure; and having conscientiously supported the resolution, he conscientiously desired that it should not remain a dead letter. They had been taught by the experience of the last four or five years that all legislation for those colonies would be inoperative, unless it were carried into effect by the opinions and spirit of the persons possessed of property and authority in the colonies themselves. He (Mr. Villiers) was very much afraid, that if the same system should be practised for the next two years in those colonies—if the same provoking, the same wanton treatment of the labouring, population by their employers should be continued, the most alarming consequences might ensue. He had stated on a former occasion what he was now disposed to repeat—that he had no confidence in the securities which had been taken with a view to carry the law into effect. He could not, with any degree of confidence, expect that that law would be administered according to the intentions of the Legislature; since it was not denied, even by the special justices whom they had appointed, that if they had the will, they had not the power to give effect to those intentions. Even those who were disposed to befriend the slave asserted, that they declined to inflict punishment on the master out of mercy to the slave. Distributed, in short, as power was among these colonies, all their legislation must be fruitless unless they chose to abolish slavery at once and for ever. The advocates of immediate emancipation only proposed so far to alter the relations subsisting between the proprietors and the labourers as to create that mutual dependence which had been uniformly found in free communities to act so beneficially for both. He believed he might with truth assert, that of slave labour not more than two-thirds could be made available; and so convinced, in many in- stances, had the proprietors themselves become of the superiority of free labour in value, that several proprietors in Barbadoes, he was informed, had taken this subject seriously into consideration, and that not a month would elapse before the great change would be voluntarily effected by the planters themselves. Considering slavery to be odious in every form, and revolting to the best sympathies of our common nature, he gave his hearty sup- port to an amendment like the present, having for its object to bring it to an immediate termination.

would strenuously oppose the amendment. He considered that the House had entered into engagements of the most sacred and unequivocal nature from which they were in no position to recede. No contract more solemn had ever been formed by any legislature; and he felt it to be an urgent duty to enter his protest against the House entering again into the consideration of a question which was long since decided. He was a hater of slavery in the strongest sense of the word, but a lesser evil had been accepted for a greater, and by that arrangement the House was bound to abide. If in private life a man were to retreat from a contract of this sacred description, he would be considered a knave and something worses—a common robber. The opposition to the contract which had been entered into by the West-India planters was made still worse by its being carried on under the guise of religious feelings. He could not conceal the surprise with which he had read the statements which had been made upon this subject at various public meetings by a certain great individual, great it must be allowed from his talents and from the station which he held. It was with the utmost astonishment that he found that individual, unsatisfied by the opportunity which he enjoyed of delivering his sentiments in another House, endeavouring in addition to stir up the bad passions of the people of this country against his former friends with whom he was acting as a colleague at the period when the very measure was introduced and carried, against which he now inveighed so roundly and intemperately. When he perceived that learned individual thus occupied, he could not but regret to what bad uses his great talents were applied. "He, forsooth," (pursued the hon. Member), "to take it upon himself to become the preceptor of this House, and apply the rod to us for not following his bad example. He knows full well, however, or, if he do not know, he will speedily learn, that great as is his station, his advice will not be followed by any man in this country who values the possession of character. It is not conduct like his that should set itself up as a standard to regulate that of other men. What is it, Sir, that is habitually said of him in private as well as in public? Why, that his motives cannot be pure, when he thus veers about so rapidly from one extremity to the other? Sir, it is not to be endured that such a man should dictate to Members of this House, or threaten them with the displeasure of their constituents, to be stirred up by himself, for the conscientious discharge of their duties. We can well afford, however, to be taunted by one whose political consistency is such that he has already gone round every point of the compass. We can well afford to put up with the mass of absurdities to which he chooses to give utterance, in reference to our legislative duties, because we feel that they are but as the idle wind,' which is unheeded. His efforts may be increased tenfold, but they will meet with no response from the good sense of the country; and I tell him, from my place here, that I despise alike his taunts and his threats. He may dare to impute motives to us; but I plainly tell him I fear he is pursuing, for popular applause, a course which he cannot agree to in principle, if principle he has. The hon. Gentleman concluded by again calling on the House not to violate a solemn compact, and by declaring that he should vote in favour of the resolutions of the Under Secretary for the Colonies.

, having voted for the resolution of the hon. Baronet near him the other night, he felt bound to oppose the resolutions of the Under Secretary for the Colonies. The hon. Member who spoke last had admitted, that the conduct of the masters was a violation of the principle of the compact; then, if they had not fulfilled their stipulations, what right had they to call on the other side to fulfil theirs? The apprentices were no parties to the contract; they could not be the property of their masters; if they were, let us rather make them compensation than continue the compact.

said, it was not on the ground of any contract that he had come to the conclusion to vote in support of the resolutions before the House, which he did with regret, as it was in opposition to most of those he represented. His conclusion was founded on the conviction that it was more for the interest of the parties to allow the term to expire without interruption, than in the existing state of things, to abridge the term, and leave the apprentices exposed to the direct hostility of those who were to be their future employers. He thought, that better provision might have been made for the treatment of the apprentices; he would not have paid the money till the conditions had been fulfilled. That was now too late, and the question was whether, an arrangement having been made, the country was prepared to run the risk of its immediate and premature termination, or to endeavour to introduce gradual ameliorations, and to let the term expire. He had read the statements which had been made on this subject, and he hoped, though he did not deny their truth, that they were not average statements. If cases of cruelty under the apprentice system had been advertised for in the manufacturing districts in this country, it would not be difficult to get up statements which would rouse the feelings of the country, and the Table of the House might be loaded with petitions for cutting short the term of apprenticeship there.

said, in support of the compact, that, for more than a century, bargains for slaves had been recognised by the laws of England over and over again—that they formed a large part of the statutes of the realm, and, therefore, could be made the subject of a compact. Had not a property in slaves been recognised over and over again in the statutes? He had not come down to the House prepared to cite authorities, but he would refer to a statute in the 5th of George 2nd, or about that date, which, in distinct terms, recognised slaves as property, and as transferable and inheritable as real property in the West Indies by the heir, and were not considered as assets. He should like to ask the hon. Member for Bandon, why a negro who had been born a slave, might not be as well fitted to become the subject of a contract as any person under the age of twenty-one years was considered to be in this country? since the system of apprenticeship had worked well here, it was absurd for it to be gravely asserted, that it would not apply equally well to the negroes in the colonies. He thought, that it was for the benefit of the negroes that they should be under the restraint of such a system. The law of 1833 was ordained by the Legislature to be valid without any indentures, but it consisted of several contracts; and if this were admitted, he put it to the House whether) in justice, such contracts, which had in many cases become the basis of marriage settlements, and of various other arrangements, ought to be broken by any new legislative measure. He, indeed, doubted whether the labour of a negro would be as valuable if he were free as in his present condition of a slave. He was not so extravagant as to suppose that the condition of the negroes in the twenty colonies had been free from complaint; but let it be as bad as it might, the proprietors who were resident out of the country, ought not to lose, on such an account, the benefit to which they were entitled by the contract. The House had a character to maintain with foreign powers, with the colonies, and with the United Kingdom; and, to support it, it was impossible for a majority of that House not to reject the resolution of the hon. Baronet. After a clause had been introduced into the measure of 1833, to the effect that no compensation money should be paid until the colonies had done all in their power to carry it into full execution—after motions had been brought forward on this subject, both in that House and the other House of Parliament, and rejected by large majorities, he thought it was too much for them to be asked to pursue any course inconsistent with their former proceedings, and in contradiction to their former decisions. He deplored the step which had been taken by the hon. Baronet, for the apprenticeship system would save the negroes from dangers which he was loth to contemplate. Let the House remember the insurrection at St. Domingo, and when they recollected that the number of apprentices was seven times that of the slaves who were to be made free in August, and foresaw the possibility of a recurrence of such dangers as he had alluded to, he was sure they would agree with him, that it was better for the present system to be carried out, than for an alteration to be made which should liberate the negroes at an earlier period than the time agreed on in the measure of 1833.

concurred, in thinking that the less the House proceeded by way of resolution the better, because, as the House was aware, the principles which were thought to belong to resolutions were sometimes departed from. Whatever moral force a resolution of that House might have, it did not possess the force of law; but from the moment when the House of Commons, whether by surprise or not, had sanctioned that resolution, which it was now sought to rescind, and which it had excited so large an amount of public sympathy, he, for one, felt himself bound to work it out by some legislative enactment. No one, he believed, would vote for immediate emancipation in the strict sense of the word; and in voting for the abolition of negro emancipation, he contemplated the time necessary for preliminary legislation. It had been argued, that it would be unjust to terminate the period of apprenticeship, but the House must be aware, that apprentice indentures were not unfrequently cancelled in this country, whenever misconduct on the part of the master was established; he maintained that the contract had been violated by the West-India planters. It might be true, that the compensation-money was not paid until certificates were given that the Colonial Legislatures had done all that was required of them by the Abolition Act of 1833; but the cause of complaint was, that they since had passed enactments which defeated the object which the Imperial Parliament desired to attain. He was of opinion, that the House should persist in maintaining the resolution of the other night, and by thus taking advantage of that measure of justice and humanity they would place the question on the safest and surest grounds.

had been pressed very much to vote in favour of the resolution of the hon. Baronet (Sir E. Wilmot), and against the resolutions proposed by his hon. Friend to-night, and he wished shortly to state the reasons why, while participating entirely in the sympathy felt by his constituents for the still unfortunate condition of the negro apprentices of the West Indies; he, nevertheless, found it impossible, consistently with what he considered to be due to the interest of those apprentices, to oppose the original motion before the House. The hon. Member (Mr. Ward) had stated, that all the difficulty of the question would be got over, if, by previous enactments, the great change which must ultimately take place in the condition of the negro could be safely provided for. If this could be done, it might be done consistently with good faith, for, as respected the interest of the planter, there would arise only a question of compensation, which he would not allow to interfere with his disposition to do justice to the slave; but he confessed, that he did not think any measure affecting the provisions of the Act of 1833 would be productive of benefit to any party concerned. A great deal had been said of the difficulty of dealing with such a question as the present by way of resolution. Why, then, had not the hon. Baronet at once introduced his bill, which was to operate with such facility a change in the condition of the negro population, securing, at one and the same time, the liberty of the slave, and the security of the West Indies? He had looked upon the question as one of difficulty long before the present cry had been raised on the subject; he would not call it clamour, for be sympathised with the people out of doors, and entirely concurred with them in thinking that the Legislature was bound, in obedience to the feeling of the country, to take such measures as might safely accomplish the end in view,—namely, the entire extinction of the last traces of this abominable system of slavery. Long before the excitement at present existing with respect to the question he had looked forward to the attainment of that object with hope, but not without alarm, and a deep sense of the responsibility of those who had to prepare and mature the measures necessary to bring to a successful accomplishment that which had been decreed by this great nation. He had considered the state of the social relations in the West Indies, and he found, that a great number of the evils which the people of other countries suffered from, was there provided for by the system of slavery. Of course, that did not constitute any argument for the maintenance of the system; but it established the necessity of enacting matured legislative provisions before a final change was attempted. Under the system of slavery, the planter was compelled by law to maintain the impotent, aged, and infirm negroes. Under these circumstances, and considering that in our colonies different habits and customs prevailed, some being Dutch, some Spanish, some French, as well as English, did the hon. Member (Mr. Ward) think that a change could be easily provided for? Had the hon. Member considered the question of poor-laws as applicable to the West Indies? The state of the finances and of the institutions of the colonies, too, must not be lost sight of. Jamaica, he believed, was in a state bordering upon bankruptcy, Did the hon. Member think that the two years which were to elapse before the termination of the apprenticeship system were more than sufficient to prepare measures to meet the circumstances of the colonies when the great change took place? There was another most important difficulty to be considered. In some of the colonies they had representative institutions, and in others there were no such institutions. In Jamaica they had a local Legislature, which had opposed itself to the Government, and which had acted contrary to the feelings of the country, and in contempt of the Government and the Imperial Legislature. But that assembly still existed, and a local Legislature was undoubtedly necessary. They could not ask Parliament to pass local Acts, because it was impossible that Parliament could understand the local circumstances of the colonies. They must, therefore, take means to legislate for local circumstances out of that House; and the question was, were those means to be found in the colonies? If the slaves were to be made free, they could not deny them a participation in the privileges of freemen, and as a large majority of the population of the West-Indies were negroes, it became important to ask whether they were capable of taking a part in legislation. Were the negroes, without instruction and unacquainted with business, capable, not of governing and of legislating for themselves only, but of legislating also for those who had hitherto been their masters? That was a most important question, which the House ought fully to consider, and to examine whether the unexpired term of apprenticeship was not necessary for fitting the negroes for exercising the privileges of freemen. Then, again, new machinery was required, adapted to the new state of things which would arise in 1840, and time was required for constructing and maturing that machinery. If, too, they gave new institutions to Jamaica, they would require also to give similar institutions to Guiana; for the same sort of Government ought, in his opinion, to be established in all the colonies. What that Government should be he would not have the boldness to pronounce; but, at all events, it was obviously necessary that time should be allowed for mature consideration in regard to the Government best adapted to the peculiar circumstances of the colonies. If they laid their heads together, he thought it possible, before the two years of appren- ticeship yet to run were expired, to devise measures calculated to effect the great object which all had in view; but, unless they did so, he confessed he had little hope of the attainment of their object, or of the establishment of institutions in the colonies calculated to promote the welfare and happiness of all parties. The House had a right to expect that one good should result from the frequent discussion of this question, and that was, that the masters must, from those discussions, become sensible that, that House and the country had a watchful eye over their proceedings, and that the Imperial Parliament was determined not to allow a single vestige of slavery to exist after the year 1840. He thought it, therefore, better to allow both parties to arrive at that period in a state of good feeling with respect to each other, and not take any steps calculated to disturb the harmony which existed. He had heard of many persons who were disposed to meet the wishes of the people of this country, and to emancipate the slaves immediately, in order to conciliate them, and to secure a feeling in their favour, when the year 1840 should have arrived. A great many of the West-India proprietors knew, that after 1840 they would be dependent for the cultivation of their estates on voluntary labour, and, therefore, it was impossible not to suppose, that in order to secure the good will of the negro population they would, for the sake of their own interests, treat them with kindness and consideration. In several of the islands emancipation had been granted, and it was but reasonable to expect that other colonies would follow the example. Undoubtedly the greatest difficulties were in the case of Jamaica and the colonies on the coast of Guiana. These colonies were great in point of extent and requiring a great number of persons for their cultivation, and their peculiar circumstances required, that the greatest precautions should be taken in any measures relating to the negro population. He thought, therefore, that they ought not to deal with measures relating to those colonies with precipitation. If any excitement should take place in Jamaica, and if there should be a rebellion in several parishes of that island, it was impossible to say, that they might not be called upon to take some measures calculated to defeat the object which all had in view. Under all the circumstances, and looking at the good effects likely to result from the expressions contained the resolutions of the Government, he trusted the House would not refuse to agree to those resolutions. There was one most powerful reason recommending such a course. This country wished for the total extinction of slavery, and had-set an example to the world of humanity and of consideration for their fellow-creatures. Let them, then, not take any steps calculated to defeat their object, but let them adopt such a course as would enable them to show to other nations, that by safe and judicious steps they had tried a great experiment, and had brought that experiment to a satisfactory conclusion. If they so acted, their example would be followed by other nations, and a final termination would speedily be put to slavery in every part of the world.

rose to take his share of the responsibility of a measure which he was well aware was not popular out of doors. He was sorry he could not give his support to the amendment which had been moved by the hon. Baronet. It had been argued, that a contract had been entered into in 1833 by the Imperial Parliament with the colonies, but he contended no contract had been entered into with any one in reference to this question. In that year the Imperial Parliament took upon itself the settlement of the slave question, and he believed, that no Government but that of Earl Grey could have carried such a measure as then passed the Legislature in reference to slavery. But no contract was then entered into, and they only conceded to the slave-owners a sum of money and a right to the labour of the negro population for a limited period, in order to compensate them for the absolute property in the slave population which they had previously claimed. Such were the circumstances of the case; and it could not be disputed that the slave-owners had as good a right to the labour of the negroes for the time stipulated, as they had to the 20,000,000l. which had been also granted them; and it was not sufficient to say, that certain persons had acted contrary to the intentions of the Government to deprive them of any portion of what the Legislature had conceded. He looked on the Act of 1833 only as a declaration on the part of the Imperial Parliament that the slaves should have their freedom in 1840; but there was no contract entered into with any one. With respect to the resolutions before the House, he thought the Government would have acted better if they had moved to rescind the resolution which had been carried by the hon. Baronet near him, and did not think they had fairly met the difficulties of the case by the resolutions which had been proposed. That they meant that resolution to be inoperative was obvious; but if it were to be inoperative, why should it be allowed to remain on the journals of the House? He believed it impossible to emancipate the slaves immediately without injury 'to themselves, yet to allow the resolution to remain on the journals could only tend to create irritating feelings betwixt the masters and the apprentices. Under all the circumstances, feeling that he could not support the amendment of the hon. Baronet near him, and although he could have wished that the Government should have proposed to rescind the resolution for the immediate termination of the apprenticeship system, yet, believing that the resolutions of the Government would be attended with beneficial results, he should give his support to the motion of the hon. Baronet, the Member for Devonport.

Sir, I certainly rise with some reluctance to reply to the observations of my right hon. Friend, the Member for Coventry. The hon. Gentleman has asked the hon. Baronet who proposed this amendment, why he did not introduce a bill founded on the resolution which passed the House the other night? The answer is, that if he were to introduce a bill, that bill would inevitably, by the opposition of her Majesty's Government, be defeated; and, therefore, the only chance that he has of success is to obtain from Parliament a recognition of the principle avowed by the House on the 22d instant. Therefore I think the answer that must be given by the hon. Baronet is very clear, and that is, that the hon. Baronet does not introduce a bill because such a bill introduced by him would be a total failure, whilst, if it were introduced by her Majesty's Government, it would be carried into effect. But, then, the right hon. Gentleman has said, that there would be great danger in any measure by which emancipation should be given to the negro, and by which there should be that change in society in the West Indies which is contemplated by this amendment. I am old enough to remember having heard this argument used against the abolition of the slave trade; and I apprehend, that whoever has read that able and convincing publication issued by the Marquess of Sligo on the Apprenticeship System, will remember how much his Lordship ridicules that argument. Lord Sligo, who, perhaps, is better acquainted with colonial society than almost any man in this House, says we were first told, that the negroes would all rise on the day on which they were liberated in August, 1834; but did they rise in rebellion? No—they rose only to worship their God—they went to their temples, and they offered praise to that Benefactor who had given them this great good. Then it was said, they deferred their rising till Christmas—at the Christmas holidays most assuredly they would rise and cut the throats of the white inhabitants. He asks, did they rise at Christmas? and replies, No; they enjoyed their festival with great innocence, with great hilarity, and as freemen ought to enjoy it. This apprehension of danger is, I will not say, a bugbear—but it is a chimerical apprehension. I don't believe the least danger would arise from your giving liberty to the slaves, and why do I say so? I say it on the test of experience, because wherever you have made a concession to them, it has at all times been received with gratitude, and disappointed the apprehension of the timid: and therefore, I think, I am justified in saying that the fears expressed by my right hon. Friend, and some other Members of the House, are wholly without foundation. The hon. Member for Sheffield has very justly observed, that co-ordinately with this resolution for the extinction of slavery, you are to take measures to secure the peace and tranquillity of the colonies; and therefore if you pass the amendment of the hon. Baronet (Sir E. Wilmot), you come to the determination to do away with the danger needlessly apprehended. In a certain degree he has put to the test the sincerity of these apprehensions by calling upon you to do an act of national justice. But then, says my right hon. Friend, there is another circumstance against which you ought to be on your guard. He says (and I am surprised to hear a commercial man make the observation) the people of Jamaica are almost all in a state of bankruptcy and insolvency. "No."] Well, then the finances of Jamaica. I suppose the finances of Jamaica must depend very much on the state of the funds of those who supply those finances, and if they are in that depressed state, it will only be necessary to call for those supplies which are to retrieve them. But it is hot our fault if they are in that situation. We have paid their share of the twenty millions of money, and their public or private finances ought not to be in the situation that my right hon. Friend has described. But them, he says, they will want poor-laws if they have liberty. Why, the people of Ireland want poor-laws, and yet they have liberty. And, he says, they also want vagrant laws. Cannot vagrant laws be supplied at the time of granting emancipation, if Government are disposed to take the measure up in good earnest? But it is said, that during the present session you have not time to legislate upon so intricate a subject. I am told, that during the time that remains of this Session, there is an intention to settle two questions that have been very much agitated—the Irish Church and Irish Corporations questions; and if we can have these two difficult questions settled, I do not know why we should apprehend that there is not sufficient time to settle the question that relates to giving Emancipation to the apprenticed negro. I should really conceive there is time enough to accomplish this object, and I do not know why Government should not address themselves to that subject. My right hon. Friend says, that two years are insufficient to provide those laws that are necessary when the state of society is changed. I wish to ask her Majesty's Government what has been done during the four years which have already passed? What has been done since the year 1833? Why have not these measures been proceeding? We knew that this time was to come. It is a reproach on the Government to say there has not been sufficient time to make these preparations. If the preparations are not now complete, there ought to have been some advances made towards them in the four years that have past. My right hon. Friend says, what did you recommend to be done in the report of the committee for inquiry into the working of the apprenticeship system, of which you were a member? I will not shrink from giving an answer to that question? ["Cheers."] I see the hon. Member for Newark is cheering that avowal. He stated, on a former occasion, what the committee did, but only partially. I will state to the House what they did more fully, and more candidly and explicitly. I was one of those who agreed to the report of the se- lect committee of 1836, and in that report it was stated distinctly, that it was inexpedient to disturb the arrangements that had been made with respect to the West-India planters, as to the apprenticeship system; and it was also stated, that it was desirable to postpone legislation. Bat then there is a matter connected with that subject that ought to be brought under the consideration of the House, and it is this—that the committee gave seven recommendations to the colonial legislatures for the regulation of the colonies, and not one of those recommendations has been attended to. The first was, that there should be more reciprocity with respect to the penalties. Now, I beg to know, whether that reciprocity has been established? As far as I know, it was only embodied in Lord Glenelg's Bill, which was brought forward two years after our report was agreed to. Is that a bonâ fide reciprocity? Would not, in the mean time, difficulties arise? Has it not been owing to this neglect that this agitation has arisen? What is the next complaint? That there was a want of fairly-constituted tribunals, in order to affix the value of the negroes who wished to purchase their freedom. Have these tribunals been established? or, if they have, are they not of very recent date? It was next said, that protection ought to be given to the special magistrates. Now, whoever is aware of the situation in which the special magistrates are placed, knows they have not had the protection they ought to have enjoyed—that it has been insufficient—that they have been placed in situations continually where impartiality was impossible, and that they frequently went from the table of the planter to the judicial bench, to decide questions pending between the planter and the slave. Next, it was said, that there was a want of proper attention to the provision grounds of the negro. That is a complaint that has remained to the present day. They have been put upon a system by which, as the negroes say, they have been defrauded of almost the only day in the week in which they ought to have the opportunity of cultivating those provision grounds, and the consequence is, that the provision grounds have gone into great dilapidation, and are quite insufficient for the production of what is necessary for their support. The fifth of these recommendations, complained of a want of protection against the flogging of females. Now I am bound to say, that the flogging of females (one of the greatest abuses complained of) has been continued up to the present day. Shall it be said, that after the committee has given these cogent recommendations to Parliament, which have wholly been neglected, they are called upon to adhere to the principle upon which this report was founded—or shall it be now said, that the apprenticeship system was not to be disturbed after all the recommendations on which its stability was made to depend have been disregarded? The sixth subject of recommendation related to the want of a well-defined marriage-law for the negroes. Now, Sir, I would ask my right hon. Friend, the Under Secretary for the Colonies, whether the subject has not been pressed upon the attention of the Government for the last two years—and whether a promise was not given that attention would be paid to it—and whether, up to the present hour, the negroes are not in such a situation that half the marriages are so solemnised that the parties do not know whether they are legal or not, and that many of the children are, consequently, in a dubious state of legitimacy? Sir, I say, that this is not a state in which these persons ought to be placed. Very far from it. The last of the recommendations of the committee referred to a want of protection to children under six years of age at the time the Slave Abolition law was passed. I believe that protection has never been extended to these children in a fair or satisfactory manner; and if such has not been the case. I maintain that I have established the proposition I set out with, namely, that not one of the seven recommendations of the committee has been complied with, and all the dissatisfaction and discontent that have arisen throughout this country, both in and out of the House, has been owing to this circumstance. But, Sir, I am inclined to press the matter somewhat further—I say, that the noble Lord, the Member for North Lancashire, has been in some degree to blame—and here let me observe, that I by no means wish to undervalue his services—I fully appreciate those services in providing for the ultimate manumission of these unhappy men, and no language can express how much the friends of humanity owe him, and the Government with which he was connected, on that account. I think, however, that after the passing of the Act, there was a want of attention to the interests of the negroes, when he suffered the compensation money to slip through his hands, and go into the pockets of the planters, before he had made arrangements or guaranteeing the fulfilment of the conditions for which that compensation was paid. He was bound by the Act of Parliament to obtain from them a sufficient guarantee that the conditions of the compact should be strictly complied with. In reality, some of those conditions have not been complied with up to the present hour; and if the noble Lord, instead of having been carried away by the excess of his liberality, and his confiding spirit, had kept back the 20,000,000l., and had only paid it when the planters were fairly entitled to it, the question we are now discussing would, in all probability, never have arisen. Now I would beg to ask the noble Lord (and he will have an opportunity of giving me a reply in the course of the evening), whether that adequate and sufficient guarantee was given, on the part of the planters, that the Imperial Act required? From the best attention I have been able to give to the subject, I have been led to conclude that such has not been the case. Sir, I wish now to refer to the provisions of the Act itself for the Abolition of Slavery, and I shall trouble the House with one of its provisions. [The hon. Member here referred to the Act, but finding some difficulty in making out the clause to which he wished to direct attention, Lord Stanley crossed from the opposite side of the House and handed him a copy of the statute.] Mr. Baines then proceeded to read the clause as follows:—

"And be it further enacted, that, subject to the obligations imposed by this Act, or to be imposed by any such Act or General Assembly, or Ordinance, or Order in Council, as hereinafter mentioned, upon such apprenticed labourers as aforesaid, all and every the persons who on the said 1st day of August, 1834, shall be holden in slavery within any such British colony as aforesaid, shall upon and from and after the said 1st day of August, 1834, become and be to all intents and purposes free, and discharged of and from all manner of slavery, and shall be absolutely and for ever manumitted; and that the children thereafter to be born to any such persons, and the offspring of such children, shall in like manner be free from their birth; and that from and after the said 1st day of August, 1834, slavery shall be and is hereby utterly and for ever abolished, and declared unlawful throughout the British colonies, plantations, and possessions abroad."

Sir, having stated to the House what are the provisions of the Act, I shall now refer to the commentary made by the noble Lord upon that Act. The noble Lord explicitly stated (thinking that the provisions might not be sufficiently clear) what was meant to be enacted. Before the Act had passed into law, and after the bill had been introduced to the House, the noble Lord said:—

"I propose, then, that every slave on the passing of this Act, shall forthwith have the power of claiming to be put in a situation in which he shall enjoy all the privileges of a free man—in which he shall feel no taint of his servile condition—in which he shall be freed from the atrocious system of irresponsible corporeal punishment—in which he shall have the full enjoyment of his domestic ties—in which he shall not be compelled to see those who are nearest and dearest to him insulted by punishment, or liable to degradation—in which he shall enjoy every right and every privilege of a free man, subject to this restriction, and this restriction only—that he shall for a certain time remain under contract to labour industriously in the service of his present owner, but his then employer."

Sir, I will now ask the noble Lord and the House, whether the negro does enjoy "all the privileges of a free man?"—I will ask the House whether he has not been subjected to imprisonment at the pleasure of the planter?—whether he has not been subjected to punishment at the will of the overseer, without having had that trial to which he was justly and legally entitled? Either such has been the case, or all the statements which have been put forth on the subject are grossly erroneous. But I wish to ask the House further, has the negro felt "no taint of his servile condition?"—has he not every hour of his labour, and even when at rest, been subject to that cruelty and oppression which has very properly been termed "servile," because it was not such as a free labourer would have submitted to? Do we not find by the returns sent home to this country by the special magistrates, that millions of stripes have been inflicted upon these unhappy men; and has not the infamous system of flogging females been proved upon the most complete and irrefragable evidence? and has it not been admitted, that the Act has been violated in the most shameful manner? Then it was said that the negro would be no longer subjected to see his nearest and dearest relations placed in degraded or dishonourable situations; but I would ask if females are not, even to this very day, according to the testimony of Lord Sligo, for the most trifling offences, yoked to carts in the streets, chained to persons of the most degraded and abandoned habits, and placed in situations the most vile and revolting to which a female could be subjected? and whether the morals and characters of the young females are not frequently contaminated, and the manners of the mothers endangered by this most improper and unfeeling conduct? Sir, I appeal to the House, and I would ask, is this enjoying the rights of a free man? Is this enjoying the liberty of a free man? Is this seeing his relations no longer exposed to degradation and insult? I put these questions fairly to the House, and I repeat that in all these cases there has been a gross violation of the contract. It has been asserted that we are the advocates for a violation of the contract, but I tell you that those who have committed a violation of the contract are the parties who, after having given these solemn pledges—after having received the twenty millions of compensation—now subject the apprentices to this degradation and these unwarrantable punishments, which have excited the indignation of every honourable and humane man in the empire. There have been unbounded proofs of the docility and of the kind disposition of the negroes; and yet these oppressed people are to be treated in the manner I have described, and you marvel because they complain. Is it not very natural that they should complain, and that their friends should complain for them? I hear it said that those who create this excitation are labouring under a delusion of mind, and that they display too warm and ardent feelings. I don't wonder at it, but how is it that these feelings are excited? It is because the negroes have not been properly treated—it is because they have been treated unkindly and ungenerously; and is there any thing in which a matt can be more unkindly treated than in the article of food? Now I come to the case of British Guiana—and I beg to ask the hon. Member for Newark (Mr. Gladstone) if it is not within his knowledge, that there was an Order in Council, issued when Sir George Murray was in the Colonial Office, after a strict investigation had been made into the wants of the negroes, and after he had ascertained what was the reasonable food that ought to be awarded to them, by which it was ordered that the negro should have twenty-one pints of farinaceous food per week? [Mr. Gladstone here expressed dissent.] Does the hon. Gentleman say no? Why, I don't happen to have the Order in Council with me, but I believe he will find there is not the least doubt of the accuracy of the statement I have made. I will put another question—Has not the negro, who was allowed twenty-one pints of flour before the abolition of Slavery, been restricted to ten pints since? Does he believe that? I shall be in a situation to prove, most incontestibly, that since the passing of the Act for the Abolition of Slavery (whatever might have been the quantity before) he has only received ten pints weekly. According to the Order in Council, issued in 1831, while Sir George Murray was in the Colonial Office, negroes were to be allowed twenty-one pints of meal a week, and seven herrings in addition to this; and since the year 1831, their allowance has only been ten pints of flour, three pounds of salt cod fish, and half a pint of salt; making a difference of one half of the whole quantity. Was it not natural that the negro should complain of this, that when he was in a state of what is called liberty, he should only have one-half the quantity of food he had when in slavery! That is the complaint that has been continually made, and it is made up to the present hour. Within the last month there has been an Order in Council issued, by which it is declared that the negro shall have either seventy pounds weight of plantains, or that he shall have what is equal to it—twenty-one pints of flour. I beg to ask my right hon. Friend, the Under Secretary for the Colonies, whether that is not the case? [A laugh.] This is not a laughing or light matter—it is very light food, but not a very light subject. It is either true or not, that there has been such an Order in Council. If it is true, what is the inference? Not that the negroes are over-fed now, but that they were under-fed before. [Cries of "Question, question," from the Opposition.] I hope I shall not be thought very obtrusive, when it is considered I have presented to the House not fewer than 100 petitions, perhaps signed by 100,000 individuals, and that I have not opened my mouth either in or out of the House on this matter, during all the time the discussions on this subject have been going on. ["Hear, hear."] I think it cannot be said I have obtruded myself very unfairly, or at undue length, on the attention of the House. I hope I have only done what it is competent for me as a Member of Parliament to do, and I hope I have not done it offensively. I believe the persons who are concerned in what may be called the present agitation, are themselves actuated by the best and purest motives. There have been presented to the House upwards of three thousand petitions on this subject. Those petitions are signed by upwards of a million of people; and shall we have petitions to that amount laid on the table (and from individuals, too, who don't lightly take up a subject) only to be disregarded by the House? There cannot be two opinions in this House, that for the most part the persons who sign those petitions are under the influence of the best principles. Those who know them best esteem them most. After having such an array of petitions, and such statements as I have brought before the House, I think hon. Members will not be of opinion that the measure has been taken up lightly, or in the spirit of party. My hon. Friend opposite (Sir E. Wilmot) has not taken up this subject in a party spirit. I shall vote for his resolution under the perfect confidence that if the House of Commons have the firmness to enact those laws that are necessary for the preservation and tranquillity of the Colonies, it is quite competent to them to do so, without endangering the peace of the Colonies. With respect to any injustice to the planters, I will only say that if you were to terminate the apprenticeship system to-morrow, I do not believe you would do them any injustice. Why do I say so? You ought to give the apprentices compensation for the wrongs they have suffered under the apprenticeship system. They don't ask you for money—they ask you for that which is better than money—liberty. The years of apprenticeship yet to come will be nothing more or less than slavery. With respect to the complaints in Jamaica, it is said; those complaints are not universal. I am of opinion the House is not sufficiently acquainted with the extent of those complaints. When I am supported by such authority as the Marquess of Sligo, fortified by the authority of the magistrates,—and by the authority of official documents—all of which support the case I have laboured so feebly to advocate—after there have been exhibited before the House those statements, I think the House may very safely come to the conclusion that the amendment moved by the hon. Baronet opposite ought to be adopted, and that the Government should be instructed to carry it into law.

would leave it to others who had more practical knowledge and local information than he had, to enter into the more minute details into which the hon. Gentlemen who had preceded him had gone; his main object was rather to state those leading considerations which had brought his mind to the conclusion, the force of which he most strongly felt, that it was fit the House should not proceed to carry into execution the resolution which, by a majority of three, the House of Commons had affirmed on a preceding evening. He had no difficulty whatever in taking a course either for rescinding that resolution in direct terms, or a course which he considered to be exactly tantamount, namely, the passing of a resolution that the House of Commons was not prepared to carry the resolution of the previous evening into effect. He would not enter into the discussion of the mere terms of the resolution, for the rescinding the resolution of the hon. Baronet, the Member for Warwickshire, would imply, that the apprenticeship system was to continue until the year 1840; and the affirmation of the resolutions moved by the hon. Baronet, the Under Secretary for the Colonies, would imply exactly the same thing,—would be so considered in the colonies, and he apprehended would be as effectual for the purpose of removing delusions and misunderstandings, as if the resolution of the former night was rescinded. He had no difficulty in rescinding that resolution first, because he thought the course of proceeding adopted by the hon. Baronet, the Member for Warwickshire, the proceeding by resolution in a grave matter of this kind, was most objectionable. Here was an Act of Parliament which had been adopted by both branches of the Legislature, involving, in his opinion, a solemn engagement which it was attempted to repeal, not by an Act of Parliament to be submitted to both those branches of the Legislature, but by a single resolution carried after a short debate, precluding that which was most necessary, namely, the consideration of the details, by which alone the principle of such a measure could be judged of. To do this, and thus to evade a compact into which the Legislature had entered, and to evade it without inviting the House of Lords to be a party, was a course which might be taken at any time when the public feeling could be easily excited, and Jay which the House of Commons might escape all the difficulty of executing its own principle, though from the execution of that principle it was impossible to recede. If the hon. Baronet, the Member for Warwickshire, had asked for leave to bring in a bill, that measure would have passed through the several stages which had been wisely provided in order to guard against precipitate decisions. But the hon. Baronet had not taken that course; he had sought to involve the House, by the decision of one night, in difficulties for which he himself had no solution. He had carried his resolution, and, having done so, now said he left the difficulties arising from it to be dealt with by others. Now, he must say, that nothing could be more unfair in a matter of the gravest importance, and in a question upon which the public feeling was so easily excited. If the hon. Gentleman was confident of the justice of the principle of his resolution, and the feasibility of its execution, he, the author of the resolution, ought to have been prepared with a remedy for the difficulties into which he brought the House; and it was not enough to say that, by a slight majority, he would not only contravene the decision of the other House of Parliament, pronounced some time since, but also the decisions of that House, pronounced not two months since, and then shrink from the execution of his plan, and ask others to frame its details. Therefore, for the purpose of guarding against and discouraging a practice of this nature —a practice, as he conceived, calculated to fetter the deliberate judgment of Parliament,—he had no hesitation in taking a course which would annul the hon. Baronet's resolution; he had no hesitation in taking a course which would amount to this—that the resolution ought to have no effect. He should now state, without exaggeration, and without any attempt at declamation, the train of consecutive reasoning by which he had come to the conclusion, that it would be neither wise nor just suddenly to terminate the period of apprenticeship in the colonies. He apprehended, that that period had been fixed and enacted in the measure of 1833 for a double purpose; first he considered it had been expressly enacted to provide in part the compensation to the proprietors of slaves, and next he considered it had been enacted for the purpose of instituting a preparatory state, which the negroes should pass through previous to the complete termination of slavery. Could there be a doubt, that a contract had been entered into? Why it appeared to him, that if ever there was an engagement entered into by Parliament, it was the engagement, that in compensation for the loss of the labour of the slaves, there should be first a pecuniary grant made to the masters, and secondly, that a proprietorship in their labour as apprentices for a given period should be awarded as part of the compensation. With respect to this point, what had been the language of those by whom the act of 1833 had been passed? What had been said by his noble Friend the author of the measure? His noble Friend on July 24,1833, stated in this House, "When I introduced this bill, I distinctly stated, (and I do not shrink from avowing it now) that I consider the period of apprenticeship to be part of the compensation to be paid to the proprietors". Could anything he more express than this declaration of the author of the measure? And what said the then Chancellor of the Exchequer the same evening? Lord Althorp said "All I would observe is, that the period of apprenticeship is an essential principle of the bill, and if the period of apprenticeship was reduced to two years it would be equivalent to no apprenticeship at all, and this amendment, if carried, will be totally destructive of one of the main principles on which the bill is founded". But what were the enactments in the act itself? Those enactments gave a right of property in the labour of the negroes during the period of apprenticeship; they enabled parties to dispose, for pecuniary compensation, of the right to labour during the period of apprenticeship. Could, then, any thing be more clear than that Parliament considered that the right to labour was compensation, when it permitted that labour to be disposed of. He would ask what regulations the hon. Baronet proposed with respect to the sales which had actually taken place under the bill? What regulations did he propose with respect to those parties who, relying not only on the implied faith but the positive enactments of Parliament, had disposed of the right they had to the labours of their slaves? Was the party who had paid his money for that labour, to lose it without chance of compensation of any kind whatever? If that was said, then such an act of injustice never was committed. But to remove all doubt that this was the compact, he would quote from the report of a committee to which the hon. Baronet (Sir E. Wilmot) was himself a party in 1836, in which they spoke in these terms of that arrangement by which the labour of slaves, as apprentices for seven years, was made part of the compensation granted to the planters. That committee said:—

"Under these circumstances, they must express a conviction that nothing could be more unfortunate than any occurrence that had a tendency to unsettle the minds of any class with regard to the fixed determination of Parliament to preserve inviolate both parts of the solemn engagement by which the services of the negroes were secured for a definite period, and under specified restrictions."

Here, then, again was a recognition of that arrangement, as a solemn engagement by the committee which sat to consider the state of the law, and the practice under the law in the colonies, and that committee was composed of men not prejudiced in favour of the proprietors, but who were disposed to execute their duty faithfully and impartially, and they recognised the position for which he contended, that there had been a compact between Parliament and the planters. But it had been said, there was no written engagement. Perhaps not; but there were unwritten engagements which ought to be as binding on Parliament as a contract formally executed; and if the faith of Parliament was pledged to this—if it was understood in the West Indies, in this country, and throughout the world, that this had been an arrangement made for the purpose of depriving the proprietors of any claim or dominion over their slaves, whether that engagement was written or unwritten, he contended, the faith of Parliament ought to be held as solemn an engagement as if the parties had sealed the compact. The question then still remained, had there been any violation of the contract? He took it that the apprenticeship formed a part of the compensation quite as much as the 20,000,000l. of money which had been paid, and then he bud to inquire, had there been such a violation by the planters generally as would entitle the House to visit them generally with punishment. Of course, he had also to consider whe- ther or not the penalty the hon. Baronet proposed, was a just penalty. Was it to be confined to the guilty, did it exclude the innocent parties from suffering it. If not, he could not consider it a just punishment. Parliament had a just right to interpose to secure to the negro every right and privilege which he was entitled to expect from the Abolition Act, and that would be a just punishment on the planter for a breach of contract; but still it was necessary to ascertain whether or not there had been such an universal, or, at least, such a general neglect, of the compact by the planters as to entitle the Legislature here to fix any penalty, and if so, whether that proposed was a fitting penalty, and consistent with good policy and the permanent interests of the slaves themselves; for care ought to be taken, lest in attempting to punish the planters, the negro population also might suffer. Now he had attempted to read the evidence, and he felt convinced that no satisfaction could arise from referring to individual extracts, because any man, on either side of the question, might make out an excellent case both ways. It was impossible to judge the matter but from general results, because in many colonies the state of things was different. In Antigua, for instance, the legislature had declared for immediate abolition; in Barbadoes, they were maturely considering with good will the possibility of giving effect to the acts of the Imperial Parliament, and that being so, it surely would not he right for the Legislature to interpose, and to rob the Assembly of Barbadoes of the grace of their measures. If so, how could this country expect to govern that colony? Was it to draw a line of demarcation between the white and the black population—to determine the hands in which the power should be vested, and conduct the executive government of the colony in all its branches? If not, surely it was to the interest of the slaves for this country to conciliate the white population. With respect to Barbadoes, would any man, looking at the permanent relations between the whites and the blacks, advise Parliament to take a step by which the white population should learn that the House of Commons had stepped in, and suddenly deprived them of the act of grace and favour which they themselves had contemplated. Nothing could be more unfair and unjust. Look, again, at Jamaica, and there the report before the House led to the same conclusion. Let it not be understood, however, that he was the advocate of the course pursued by the Assembly in Jamaica, for he could not consider it any thing short of infatuation. Seeing how inevitable was the arrival of the period when the slave would be entirely free—when no colonial power could defeat the intention of Parliament—knowing there were two short years only to elapse before the slave would be entitled to every privilege—looking at these things, how any men possessed of legislative functions could not discover it was their own true interest and policy to apply themselves with fidelity and good will to the fulfilment of the wishes and intentions of the Imperial Parliament, and to provide every wise measure for that period, the approach of which was inevitable, he could not understand. But, had there been on the part of the whole West-Indian body such a violation of their duty as would justify the interference now proposed? He did not think there had; and in proof of this position he would take the Report of the Committee of the House of Commons in 1836. It was there stated, that the mutual irritation which had prevailed among the black and white population was decreasing, and that on the part of the negro population industrious habits seemed to be gaining ground. The hon. Gentleman opposite asked why there should be an interval of two years for the purpose of framing paratory measures, and he said, "What have you done during the last four years?" Why, this delay was recommended by that very committee of 1836, which contained some of the best friends of the negroes, and they declared that it would be most prudent to defer all preparatory enactments till the period immediately preceding the period of emancipation. The House then, was fully justified in not having passed any preparatory measures, because those who were among the warmest friends of the negroes had advised their postponement. With respect to Jamaica, hon. Members opposite had themselves admitted, after a full examination that there was no doubt of a successful result to the experiment in that colony. Antigua had anticipated the period fixed for emancipation, and Barbadoes was preparing to follow her example. Now, what was the case with respect to Guiana? The governor of that colony appeared to have conciliated the good will of the slaves to a degree which rendered his authority on these points most valuable. Any conclusion might be supported from the voluminous extracts laid on the table, but he confessed, that he placed much reliance on the opinion of a man like Sir James Carmichael Smyth. If evidence could be trusted at all, Sir J. C. Smyth seemed to have completely succeeded in conciliating the good will of the negro population. He began by a bold and impartial execution of his duty, and, disregarding alike intrigues and menaces in the discharge of it, he fully succeeded in gaining the affections of the negro population. And what was the opinion of Sir James Carmichael Smyth, with reference to the slave emancipation act in Guiana? He stated, that when he compared the condition of the apprenticed labourers with what he had been as a slave, he felt no small degree of satisfaction in reflecting upon the share which he had taken in carrying this measure into effect. The hon. Gentleman opposite said, that millions of stripes had been inflicted on the apprenticed negro. Now, he thought that it was best to deal with this question without exaggeration. What was the opinion expressed by Sir James Carmichael Smyth with reference to the amount of punishment inflicted in Guiana? Why, that he could lay his head on his pillow with the reflection that throughout the whole colony not one single lash was given which ought to be withheld, and he also said, that looking at what had then been already effected, he could look forward to the greater alterations which must be made in August, 1890, with something like confidence. He said, also, and it should be recollected that this came from one of the greatest friends of the negroes, that the period of apprenticeship ought not to be shortened. Surely it was better to rely on the testimony of a man with the experience of Sir James Carmichael Smyth than on unauthenticated statements, coming from persons whose names were often not mentioned. Looking, then, at the state of Antigua, Barbadoes, and Guiana, he could not come to the conclusion that there had been that general infidelity to their engagements on the part of the West-Indian proprietors which would sanction a departure on the part of the House from the compact which was entered into in 1833. Then arose the question whether the considerations urged by prudence and sound policy would suggest, that with a view of punishing the planter the period of apprenticeship should at once expire. He thought that such a course would be most unjust as far as the planters were concerned, and most unwise with reference to the interests of the colonies. The proposal made by hon. Gentlemen was, to put an abrupt and immediate termination to the state of apprenticeship without any preparatory measures. There might be a difference of opinion upon the question whether apprenticeship ought ever to have been introduced, though he thought, that his noble Friend had done right in substituting that system for a state of slavery, without incurring the fearful risk of an immediate emancipation; but many of those who differed from him on that question, concurred with him in deprecating an abrupt and immediate termination to the existing system. Were hon. Members quite sure that the real comforts of the negro were not more in the power of the whites than they at first imagined, and were they quite certain, that if the negro were suddenly placed in the state of a British freeman he would enjoy all his material comforts? The House should remember that our colonies were not under a despotic Government like that of Spain, which could by a royal ordinance secure to the newly-emancipated apprentices all the practical rights of freemen. Only two years remained for the consideration of measures to be found for the regulation of a new state of society, and he trusted, that the House of Commons would not, by sanctioning a breach of engagement, at the same time be guilty of such precipitation and folly as never could be expected from the Legislature of Great Britain, or indeed from any other legislature in the world. They might depend upon it, when the year 1840 should come, the condition of the master and the apprentice would demand the careful and impartial attention of Parliament. They would have many evils and difficulties to contend with, and unless they showed by their votes to the white proprietor that they acted with deliberate judgment, and held the scales of justice with a steady hand, they would impair and weaken the power which they would then be called upon to exercise. If they in their hearts believed, that the immediate abolition of the system of appren- ticeship was just and necessary, let them pass the required enactments; but if once they showed, by yielding to extrinsic impressions, that Parliament was prepared to abdicate its function and to suffer them to devolve on Exeter-hall, he not only thought that they would strike a great blow at the legislative authority of Parliament, but he did not hesitate to say, that they would deprive themselves of that influence which they ought to exercise hereafter in moderating the violent passions which must be excited in our West-Indian colonies. He also felt the full force of the argument which had been urged during this debate, that the conduct of the British Parliament in regard to this question would not only have an important influence upon the condition of the negroes in our own colonies, but also upon the condition of the millions of slaves in other countries. If we told the planters in other countries that this experiment had failed, we might depend upon it that the difficulties in the way of an amicable adjustment of slavery in those countries would be formidably increased. His belief was, that no power on the face of the globe could effect the permanent continuance of slavery. He believed, that the wisest course both for France and America to adopt, would be, immediately to take into their consideration measures for the ultimate termination of slavery. It was impossible to witness the spectacle of 800,000 negroes emancipated by England, without feeling assured that their condition must materially influence that of 5,000,000 of slaves; but, in the name of humanity, let us set others an example of the peaceful and amicable adjustment of this question. Let us beware how by any such act, we put in hazard the realization of this prospect. Were we to tell foreign countries that they had no right to come to any compromise on this subject, and that there was no medium between slavery and immediate emancipation? 11 we held that language we should be throwing fresh obstructions in the way of a peaceful settlement. He believed, that the great triumph of the experiment would be an amicable; but if liberty was to be wrested with violence from the master by the slave, he could see nothing in the distance but a long course of violence, anarchy, and bloodshed. If, however, the House of Commons showed that they could raise themselves above the appeals that were made to their passions, and permitted this experiment to be fairly and successfully worked out, they might look forward to a time, perhaps they might even live to see it, when in every other country of the world the very name of slave would be forgotten. But it was possible that by misleading the slave, and by inciting persons to tell him that by a vote of the House of Commons he was actually free, he might be led to acts of violence in endeavouring to assert his liberty which must be repressed by force, and which would not only prevent our own apprenticed negroes from following a course of peaceful industry, but would, at the same time, afford to the slave proprietor of other countries an excuse for doggedly refusing his assent to an amicable adjustment. Upon these grounds he should feel it his duty to give his cordial support to the resolutions proposed by the hon. Baronet the Member for Devonport.

said, that the right hon. Baronet who had just sat down had objected to the form in which the hon. Baronet, the Member for Warwickshire, had brought forward his motion this evening. Now he (Mr. O'Connell) thought that, that form, the form of a resolution, was the most convenient, because it placed the principle at issue before the House, and did not enter into details. The right hon. Baronet had exhibited rather a chivalrous spirit in his allusion to the Exeter-hall meetings. He was unwilling, it seemed, that the entire weight of censure should fall on the Government, but was ready to take his own share of it. The right hon. Baronet's allusion to Guiana had been met by anticipation, and answered by incontrovertible facts, The hon. Gentleman, the Member for Oxford, had stated, upon the authority of the Chief Justice of England and of all the colleges at Oxford, that there was no contract between the Legislature and the planters,—that the 20,000,000l. was given in the shape of a donation—he repeated, that it was given in the shape of a donation; and that what the Legislature gave, it had a right also to take away. Such was the argument of the hon. Member, and he was only sorry that he had not spoken consistently throughout. What occasioned him (Mr. O'Connell) most regret was, an observation of the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Coventry (Mr. Ellice). He knew the impression which that right hon. Gentleman's sentiments were in the habit of making on the House, and it was therefore with the greatest regret that he had heard that right hon. Gentleman speak of the numerous delays which must take place before the negroes could be finally emancipated. The right hon. Gentleman seemed to calculate this period at four years. What! were they to have four years more of slavery? According to him, the preparation for freedom would occupy that interval of time. Why, they had had four years of preparation already. The money had been paid, but nothing else had been done. Some hon. Members talked of the danger of a too speedy emancipation; but was there no danger in improper delay. According to the 12th section of the Slavery Abolition Act," from the 1st of August, 1840, slavery was to be utterly and for ever abolished," subject to the qualifications and restrictions in the act theretofore mentioned; and yet the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Coventry, spoke of a further interval from the present time of four years. What effect, he would ask, would naturally be produced among the negroes by this vacillation in their enactments—by this irresolution in their decisions, which contradicted in one week the proceedings of the other? If the Government persevered in their present course, it was dubious whether the negroes would not speedily emerge from their present tranquil position. Never had so much of moral agitation been exhibited in this country upon any question as had been displayed upon the present occasion. It was neither idle, nor dissipated, nor profligate, but considerate, legal, and determined agitation. Its promoters had determined to move society to its very centre, because they felt convinced, that the English people had been swindled out of their money, and that the planters had pocketed 20,000,000l., when they should not have touched a single penny. He was glad, that the right hon. Baronet, the Member for Tamworth, had spoken of the propriety of the British Legislature pursuing such a course as would stimulate France and America to emancipate their slaves also. America, more than any other nation of the earth, was disgraced by pursuing this horrible traffic; for she had gone to war with England on the ground that England desired to enslave her, and proclaimed, at that period, that every human being had an inherent right to freedom of action. The Spanish, the Dutch, the French, and ourselves, had slaves in the West Indies. Of all these task-masters, the Spanish were the best; he was very much afraid that he must say the English were the worst. Yet the negroes had presented themselves before them in an attitude which it was as impossible to praise too highly as it was difficult to overstate their fitness for emancipation. He must say, that the entire weight of evidence was in favour of immediate emancipation. Many of the provisions of the Slavery Amendment Act were a downright insult to the negro. The proof of the negroe's freedom was made to consist in the fact of his working five days out of the seven for nothing. What substantial benefit had he gained by that act? Undoubtedly, he could not be flogged by the master without the master subjecting himself to a penalty. But then he could be flogged through the intervention of the special magistrate, who, if he objected, was forthwith transferred to England, as witness the case of Dr. Palmer. He invented nothing; but who, he would ask, was to talk to him of danger? The whole danger was in continuing the system. He contended, that the 20,000,000l. was paid to the planters in violation of the law, and that the English people had been blindfolded. In prematurely paying that money a debt had been incurred to the negro—the debt of protection, which had not been paid; and a debt had also been incurred to the English people. That debt had been incurred, he contended, against the statute. By section 44 of the Emancipation Act, it was enacted,

"That no part of the said sum of 20,000,000l. shall be applied, or shall be made applicable, to the purposes aforesaid, unless an order shall have been first made by his Majesty, with the advice of his Privy Council, distinctly stating, that an adequate and satisfactory provision has been made in the said colony for carrying into effect the present act of Parliament."

It was, therefore, an essential condition that this satisfactory provision should be made. The Privy Council had stated that it was so; but the fact was otherwise. It was now admitted on all hands that no such satisfactory provision had been made. He (Mr. O'Connell) therefore arraigned them of this crime before the people of England. They had stated in their Order of Council that which was not the fact. In their recent legislative enactment they had admitted, that it was not the fact. He turned on them, then, and said, "At length make compensation to the nation." While, to the Representatives of the people of England assembled before him, he said, that they would have to answer to their constituents, to their God, and to their own consciences, for tolerating the continuance of this abomination.

, after the unanswerable speech of his right hon. Friend, the Member for Tamworth, would have felt wholly discharged from the necessity of trespassing on the House, even though, from the official situation which he had formerly held, he might be supposed to have a peculiar connexion with the measure which was now under consideration, but for some observations which had fallen from the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just sat down. That hon. and learned Member had commenced by saying, that the mode adopted by the hon. Baronet, the Member for Warwickshire, so far from being liable to objection, was the most convenient which could be pursued; because—a most singular reason—he avoided entering into details, and contented himself with laying down a broad abstract principle: this was, in his opinion, exactly the same thing as to laud the hon. Baronet, because neither upon himself nor upon those who acted with him, did he take the responsibility of carrying his resolution into effect, and because he also retreated from the minor responsibility of submitting to the House those details by which alone a bill could be arranged—by which alone any effect could be given to the resolution. This was undoubtedly a most convenient course for Gentlemen who were desirous to act upon the feelings and passions of hon. Members—not to appeal to their reason and judgment—who loved to jump at once to the conclusion which they desired to reach, and pronounce the wholesale condemnation of a system. To Gentlemen entertaining such views, the difficulty of their task was materially diminished by generalizing, and undoubtedly the most convenient course for them was to proceed at once by resolution, rather than to grapple with the real difficulties of the case, and bring in a bill. The hon. Gentleman should recollect, however, that the Government must either act upon that resolution, or decline to act; and while the hon. Gentleman recollected that he placed the Government in that situation, he should also remember, that his right hon. Friend, the Member for Tamworth, would feel himself equally deterred by feelings of humanity and justice from carrying such a resolution into effect. Did the hon. Baronet himself propose to carry it into effect? If he did not, did he think it possible, that the resolution could rest unrescinded, uncorrected, on the journals of the House of Commons, without the danger of consequences ensuing of the most alarming and mischievous nature? He had mentioned, that many persons had been led away by exaggerated statements, and the hon. and learned Gentleman afforded him a happy illustration of the manner in which the best-disposed were frequently misled whilst stating circumstances which were afterwards proved to be false. The hon. and learned Gentleman had stated, that the Legislature of Barbadoes had come to the determination not to pass any measure of emancipation themselves, but had resolved to throw it on the British Parliament. Now, it turned out, that this had been proposed by only two or three of the principal speakers of the Legislative Assembly, and surely it was not to be taken as the determination of the whole body; for although the hon. and learned Gentleman was one of the principal speakers himself in the British House of Parliament; yet he should be sorry if the opinions of the hon. Member were taken as expressing those of the House generally on important questions. The hon. Gentleman had stated a case which had occurred in one of the colonies, of some children of a slave having been turned out of doors, and having been left in a state of destitution; but, unfortunately for the hon. Gentleman's correspondent, the case had been sifted to the bottom, and proved to be utterly void of truth. He held in his hand a despatch from Sir Evans Macgregor, Governor of Barbadoes, to Lord Glenelg, dated the 12th of June, 1837, containing the result of the inquiry, that had been made into this case, and stating, that the charge had been totally refuted. He could mention other instances in which misstatements had been made; one in particular which had been made in that House by Mr. Buxton, than whom there was no man more conscientious; but, from having been misled, he stated facts which seriously reflected on the character of the Solicitor-General of Barbadoes. By a special committee, the charge proved unfounded, and Mr. Buxton then declared his regret at having stated anything which was untrue, and of which he had been misinformed, that had wounded the feelings of any member of the Colonial Government. The charge, that had been made, he would repeat, had been most distinctly answered in the negative by the authorities of the colony, and several letters had been received from the stipendiary magistrates, saying, that no such fact had occurred. But cases like these, which could not be sifted here, were made the subject of exaggeration at public meetings, and credulous persons assented to the statements they heard; whilst the authors of them, who refused to agree to a committee of the House being appointed to investigate them, might act, perhaps, with honest feelings, but were doing great injustice to the planters of the West Indies; and if their views were acted on, they would involve this subject in interminable difficulty. The charge, that he had alluded to was said to be taken from a paragraph in a newspaper—surely not a good foundation for such a charge—and arrived only that day; but it was only a repetition of a charge, that had been already made a matter of inquiry, and had been refuted. That was not the time for discussing the merits of the apprenticeship system in the first instance; it was not the question then whether unqualified freedom ought to have been given or not; whether danger might have arisen from the former course, or whether a preparatory condition ought to be imposed. He certainly entertained strong opinions on that point, and he had never uttered those opinions, that if in 1832 unqualified freedom had been granted to the slaves, the safety of the West-Indian colonies would have been hazarded, and the happiness of the negroes endangered. Those, too, were the opinions held at that time, and he believed now, by persons who had been advocates of the measure, and had since watched its progress, by persons who had been examined by Parliament as to the feelings and influence that then existed in the West Indies. It was not possible to argue now on a course which had been taken five years ago from the experience gained since that time, but he was quite prepared to take upon his shoulders the responsibility, as a Minister of the Crown, of having passed a measure, which without bloodshed, violence, or ruin, but with justice to all proprietors, had produced such great and satisfactory results, and which had been thus characterised after an inter- val of five years by his successor in the Colonial-office. Lord Glenelg in the latter part of 1837, speaking of the apprenticeship system, although the hon. and learned Member (Mr. O'Connell) observed, that nothing had been done under it, said "that the experiment had been such as to justify the most sanguine hopes of the authors and advocates of the measure, after deductions had been made for the abuses which necessarily existed in consequence of the previous colonial system. That he felt himself entitled from satisfactory evidence to assert, that in the comparatively short period a great improvement had taken place in the society of the colonies, and, that there had been an accession to the sum of the honour and happiness of the colonists. "He further said," that it was not the least gratifying part to know, that instead of causing any relaxation of those bonds by which the Sovereign and the people were united, it had, on the contrary, created a greater respect for the law, had increased the sense of security from better notions of the value of property, and, that a foundation had thus been laid for the safe accomplishment of the transition from slavery to freedom which was so near at hand". That was the statement of Lord Glenelg; not an ex parte statement derived from false reports of atrocities made by stipendiary magistrates, but a statement made after a calm and general review of all the colonies as to the operation of a most perilous experiment. When he read such testimony as this, and knew, that the question before Parliament was not whether the system should be perpetual, or some change be made to move corrupt freedom, but whether within two years, when no preparation had been made in consequence of the advocates of the negroes having objected to such preparation until the last moment, a system which might terminate safely if well provided for, but might be attended with danger if changed before, was to be at once given up; he must say he thought no man could be found who would risk the result of an experiment which had succeeded so much beyond the hopes of its most sanguine advocates. The hon. Member for Coventry had said, that under no circumstances would he agree to the suspension of the Legislatures of the colonies; but how could they hope for their serious co-operation if on such grounds as these the House took on themselves to do that which the colonial Legislature had con- tended, and which he contended, was a breach of faith in a national engagement? The hon. Gentleman, the Member for Oxford, had said, there was no contract; but he must distinctly say, that he brought forward this measure, with the clauses for compensation-money, and the apprenticeship system, as part of the stipulation with the planters to give up their slaves. These two points had been matters of discussion and negotiation with the West-India body, and though the money had been afterwards augmented by Parliament from 15,000,000l. to 20,000,000l., the term of apprenticeship had been diminished from twelve years to six. But what was the condition proposed at the time? That the compensation-money should not be received by the colonists until provisions had been made, for carrying the measure into perfect execution. It was then stated to His Majesty in Council, that adequate and satisfactory provision had been made, and all the consequent Orders in Council were laid on the table of the House. If Parliament had not then trusted the declaration of Ministers, that such provision had been made, it was their duty to have called for the act of the colonial Legislature, and to have interposed, but they were then allowed to be sufficient for the purpose. He admitted there were defects in the acts, but Lord Mulgrave, then Governor of Jamaica, had thought them adequate. The Government, however, did not rest on his authority alone for the acts were examined by Mr. Stephens and other authorities, and they then decided, that they were satisfactory to the full extent required by the statute. To those who said nothing had been done under the apprenticeship system, he would read a portion of a despatch received from Sir James Carmichael Smyth last year in reference to this subject:— "He congratulated Lord Glenelg on the improved state of the colony (British Guiana), and the increased moral and religious feeling, evidenced by the number of marriages, by the communicants at the sacraments, by the children who attended the schools." He spoke of the "improved condition of the labouring classes, proved by the quantity of manufactures exported, and said, that the transition from the dejected and almost naked slave to the cheerful and decently clad labourer could only be believed by those who had recently revisited the colony after an absence of several years. The apprenticeship system was to teach the negroes to depend on their own industry." The extracts he had read were a vindication of the system, and proved what a positive infatuation it was on the part of those who wished to interrupt so happy, and at the same time so rapid a progress to emancipation. The governor, Sir J. C. Smyth, said also, that looking to the change which had already taken place, he looked forward to the change of 1840 without any great degree of apprehension. Now, if in a colony the highest, perhaps, of any except Antigua and Barbadoes, where the preparations were more advanced, the governor only looked forward satisfactorily to emancipation by the present course, how could the House think to secure the safety, happiness, and increasing prosperity of a colony less advanced, where there had been less preparation by law, if they broke in on its progress, necessarily slower than in Guiana, by violently seizing on that term which had become the right of the proprietors, and thereby setting the parties in irreconcilable hostility with each other? He would ask the House whether it was not double madness, knowing, that the resolutions proposed could not be carried into effect, to send them out to the colonies as the resolutions of Parliament; which, by the excitement they would cause, would tend to destroy the peaceful spirit that at present existed there? He hoped the House would not be led away by the declamations on the one side against the sound and logical arguments employed by the other. Let it be understood that the British Parliament would not permit the smallest infraction of the obligations entered into; that it would not listen to any proposition to prolong the term of negro apprenticeship; and he did entertain a hope, that by the joint efforts of the British Government and the colonial legislatures, the two years yet to elapse, which were not one moment too long, might be usefully employed in devising those laws which were necessary to lead the negro population from the transition condition of apprenticeship into the state of wholesome and constitutional freedom.

was understood to say, that the system of apprenticeship, which the noble Lord opposite considered it almost madness to touch, had been established by a majority of seven votes only, and that it was, in point of fact, condemned by the act lately passed to compel the colonial legislatures to carry into effect the intentions of the Slavery Aboli- tion Act. He had been disgusted with some of the observations which had been made in the course of the debate. The hon. Member for Waterford had thought fit to argue this question in the same way as if he had been discussing the sale of a horse or the purchase of an estate, when the subject under consideration was, in reality, the happiness, prosperity, and freedom from oppression, of 700,000 human beings. The right hon. Baronet opposite had referred to 'the state of Guiana; and he, therefore, begged to inform the right hon. Gentleman that the acting governor of that colony had in a despatch, dated the 17th of March in the present year, speaking of one of the largest estates, the proprietor of which had received the greatest amount of compensation-money, observed, that he viewed with the deepest regret and indignation the hospital system, and expressed his astonishment that it should hitherto have escaped detection. The hon. Member for Coventry had told the House, that he was not prepared to legislate on the subject unless in connexion with some proposition for a poor-law. He could tell that hon. Gentleman that he had carefully investigated the working of the poor-laws existing in some of the colonies, and the result of his examination was, that out of 100 persons receiving relief, ninety-eight were whites, and two only were blacks.

having been expressly appealed to by the hon. Member who last addressed the House, and by other hon. Members, he felt he should not be doing his duty if he did not declare his determination to support the motion of his hon. Friend near him, and to oppose the amendment of the hon. Baronet opposite; and, in reference to the petitions which had been presented to the House, praying for the immediate abolition of the apprenticeship system, he wished at once to state the opinion which he entertained of the petitioners. He believed the hon. Member for Dublin was guilty of no exaggeration when he said that a large portion of those petitioners were pious, religious, and most estimable individuals; but, although he fully admitted, that such was the case, yet, a large majority of them were the same individuals who had petitioned the House on the subject previous to the passing of the Act of 1833, and who held a conscientious opinion that slavery in any form was a sin of so deep a dye, that nothing short of its immediate and entire abolition ought to be tolerated or contemplated. He respected such persons, but, at the same time, he must say, that in many instances, their opinions were not formed from investigation, and that they did not take into consideration the certain consequences which would result from such measures as they advocated. Combined with those individuals, there were many, he was persuaded, who had yielded to the representations which were made to them, and who did not act from the impulses of their own reason. There were, however, others—he hoped they were but a few—who acted from a desire to injure a party opposed to them in their views, or from a wish to injure political opponents. Now, he did think, that entering on this great question which involved the welfare of—cousands of their fellow-creatures solely from a desire to injure certain members of the Government in the estimation of their constituents and supporters, was a course of proceeding tending to degrade a great cause, to lower such persons in the estimation of the country, and make them unworthy to associate with those most estimable individuals who conscientiously advocated the immediate abolition of slavery. As to the question before the House, the debate had already shown how that stood. When they first entered on any legislative measure for the emancipation of the slaves, they saw other nations holding in a state of oppression hundreds of thousands of their fellow-creatures, and the attempt made by Earl Grey's Government was to put an end to slavery, and, by gradual means, to introduce social improvement throughout the slave colonies. That great experiment was now in progress, and they had arrived at a period when they might confidently expect a happy conclusion to their undertaking. But in order to the attainment of that desired object it was necessary to have all parties in the colonies and at home acting together in perfect harmony, and it was essential that nothing should take place tending to irritate the feelings of any party, or to create disunion in the colonies. It was for that reason that he had looked with apprehension at any motion similar to the one which had been moved by the hon. Baronet opposite: and he looked on that motion with the more apprehension, from the conduct of the hon. Baronet after he had carried his resolution. When the resolution was carried, he had asked the hon. Baronet what steps he intended to take; and the answer he had received was, that the hon. Baronet did not intend to take any immediate steps to carry out the object of the resolution which the House had sanctioned, but that he reserved to himself the power of taking any steps he might deem necessary at some future period. Now that, in his estimation, was a most dangerous course, and it became therefore necessary for the Government to take steps to inform the colonial population whether Parliament intended to carry the resolution which had been adopted, into effect or not. If the resolutions proposed by the Government were carried, the effect would be that the act for the emancipation of the negroes would go on, and time would then be given for the preparation of the various measures necessary on the alteration which would take place in the condition of the negro population in 1840. If the House did not interfere to limit the period stipulated for the continuance of the apprenticeship system, and thus create irritation, the best results might be expected; but if those expectations were disappointed, then the House would have to thank itself, or those who had attempted to mar a fair experiment, should confusion and irritated feelings take the place of order and harmony.

The House divided on the original motion:—Ayes 250; Noes 178: Majority 72.