said, he wished to point out the great disregard which had been shown for the rights of owners of land in this Bill. The Bill provided that a deviation might be made of a hundred yards from the projected line. Now a deviation of such an extent might completely destroy the value of a piece of land, the subdivision of which the owner never contemplated when he gave his consent to the line running through his property. There was an appeal to the Board of Trade, but that was, in his opinion, all nonsense.

said, that when he first came into that House he had sat on many Committees, and had foolishly believed that the railway companies were actuated solely by a public spirit; but he had since then become wiser. He was glad, therefore, that the gallant Officer opposite had brought the rights of the public before the Committee. The railway companies were large and powerful bodies, and could protest themselves: but the landowners, though very powerful in their own way, had not the same means, and were often sufferers. But there was one class whom nobody protected. He meant the public. This Bill was most shamefully negligent of the rights of the people. Before the construction of railways the people possessed their full right to the use of the public ways. There was no right more ancient or better established. But no sooner was a railway projected than it unhesitatingly interfered with every right the public possessed; too often crossing and destroying their ways to the public markets; and, where it did not destroy, very often interfering to a serious extent of inconvenience; and none of those who had charge of these public ways had any power of preventing the interruption. He would be told by the advocates of railways that they were of the greatest public utility, and that minor considerations must give way to them. Why should passengers be put to such inconvenience? Let all ways be put upon the same footing, but he hoped that foot passengers would be equally protected as others were. With the view of giving better protection to them, he proposed to strike out the words "carriage road," and substitute "highway," so as to include footways as well as horse roads.

could not consent to the proposed addition, which he thought would too much extend the scope of the Act. He by no means intended that au existing railway company coming before Parliament with their own capital and own resources to ask for further powers, should be obliged to obtain a Bill which should contain all the provisions in this Act.

entirely disapproved of the constitution of the Board of Trade, and of the powers intrusted to it. He looked upon the Act as a humbug altogether. The public interest was not at all regarded. Footpaths ought to be attended to as well as carriage roads.

said, that better provision ought to be made for the preservation of footways, and driftways, and the tracks by which large droves of cattle were accustomed to be driven, and as it was a matter of great public convenience he should divide with the hon. Member for Cockermouth.

objected to the obligation upon the companies to advertise in the newspapers notice of their intended deviation being limited to one paper only circulating in the district where such deviation was to be made. Some gentlemen saw one paper and others saw another, and the object of publicity would not be gained. Why should they not give notice in the London papers? He had a great respect for them all, though they did attack him sometimes.

did not think the proposition of the hon. and gallant Member would effect his own object. Some persons in the country did not see the London papers at all, and of those who did, some saw the Times, others the Chronicle, and others the Standard, in the same way as the hon. and gallant Member had remarked of the provincial papers. Was it necessary to advertise in all?

said, that by Clause 10, it was provided that no deviation should be made by the companies without the consent of the owners and occupiers of the land having been first obtained. Then by Clause 11, the owner of any land affected might appeal to the Board of Trade, who would have the power to set aside the arrangement that had before been made. Now, upon what ground was this power to be given to the Board of Trade? Here was an arrangement guarded by not only the consent of the owners having been first obtained, but by the consent of certain public functionaries, the Trustees or Commissioners, or Justices of the Peace, and yet the Board of Trade was to be invested with power to upset the whole decision. So that any one owner or occupier might re-open the whole question before a secret and irresponsible tribunal.

thought that if the consent only of the parties owning the land was required, the justice of the case would not be met. This was a most important clause, and its object was to protect small proprietors and residents near the line, who would have no other means of protection, and it was necessary such persons should have the power of appeal.

viewed the clause as a benefit to the public, and adverse to the interest of companies, as it enabled the Board of Trade to prevent a deviation being made, even after a consent had been obtained from owners.

supported the clause as being a benefit to small proprietors, who would otherwise have no power of protecting themselves, and he thought it right they should have some tribunal to appeal to.

thought the clause was too vaguely worded in regard to the situation of the property of those persons to whom this right of appeal was to be given. The words "lying near to the place of such proposed deviation," expressed nothing. "Near" might mean two hundred yards or a mile, or a quarter of a mile. Some definite distance ought to be fixed. It was well known that landowners threw obstacles in the way of railroads, in order to get a high price for the land.

said, that the clause had been vaguely worded in this respect on purpose to give the Board of Trade a latitude of discretion in judging as to who were really affected or not by the deviation, and as the subject was decidedly to benefit the smaller class of proprietors and occupiers, he thought it important to effect that object that the Board of Trade should have that discretion or scope for judging.

thought, that the test which ought to be applied was, whether the land was really or not affected by the deviation, irrespective of its exact distance from the line, and for that purpose he moved to leave out the words in line 15, "lying near to the place of such proposed deviation, and whose lands shall be—"so that the clause would by such amendment stand—"It shall be lawful for the owner of any lands affected thereby, &c., to apply to the Board of Trade," without reference to the situation of the land relatively to the railway.

said, that he could not sit there and hear the misrepresentations of the hon. Member for Plymouth as to the small proprietors of land. The hon. Member had said these proprietors had thrown obstacles in the way of railway companies, in order to increase the amount of their compensation. The small landowners were fully entitled to make the most of their property, but he would deny that they had ever resorted to such means as the hon. Member had intimated. He was inclined to retort the charge on railway companies. They inserted advertisements for the purpose of catching and humbugging the public, stating that the holders of their shares would realise 15 per cent. for their money. The small proprietors of land were never guilty of such conduct.

said, that the hon. and gallant Officer had entirely mistaken him. His reference had been to the large landed proprietors, and not to the small owners. The question was not whether the place was lying near, but whether it was affected by, the deviation from the original line. He would, therefore, propose to strike out the words "lying near," and substitute the words "prejudicially affected;" and that the prejudice to a property and not its neighbourhood should entitle it to compensation.

said, that he quite agreed with the hon. Member for Plymouth, for property might be very greatly injured though it was beyond the appointed range of deviation. For instance, a man might build a house commanding a view over the distant country. A railway embankment was raised above the level of the original line, and immediately the house was shut out both from prospect and air. The house which before was worth 200l. a year, would now be hardly worth half that sum. Again, he conceived, that if there were to be appeals, the onus of proof ought to lie on the railway companies, for it was an utter impossibility for a small landed proprietor, who resided one hundred or two hundred miles from London, to come all that distance and be at the expense of bringing his witnesses, and keeping them here during the delay of the Railway Bill before a Committee. Hs hoped, however, they would not conclude this point at the present moment, but would maturely consider it, and that when it was concluded they would substitute the words which the hon. Member for Plymouth had taken from him, "prejudicially affected" for "lying near."

said, that he thought the constitution of appeals to the Board of Trade was good for the railways themselves. By that means they were saved from falling into the hands of an attorney, who hurried them into litigation and disputes for the sake of running up a bill. For these reasons he thought this cours of appeal would be better for the companies themselves. The hon. Member for Cockermouth thought that the present wording of the clause limited the facility of appeal, and he entirely agreed with him in the observation.

, conceiving the general feeling of the Committee appeared to be in favour of the amendment, he would not offer any opposition.

objected altogether to the jurisdiction of the Board of Trade, and consequently to the range of appeal being extended. If the Board were to have this new, extensive, secret, and irresponsible power given to them, let it be as definite and narrow as possible. He objected to the clause altogether, but would rather retain it as it was, than adopt the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Cockermouth.

said, that all that was intended by the clause, was to give relief to parties in cases where it could not otherwise be obtained, and he thought that none better could be proposed than the Board of Trade. The power could not be given to the local magistrates; that was out of the question, and to put it within the jurisdiction of a jury in the courts of law, would involve a much greater expense. This, however, was not the proper time to discuss the general question of the jurisdiction of the Board of Trade.

did not agree with the noble Lord that the present was not a suitable opportunity for discussing the power to be given to the Board of Trade; for little by little, and clause by clause, they were going on to give powers to that Board. Powers were given not only to the Board of Trade, but powers that were calculated to embarrass the Executive Government of the day — embarrassments that were calculated to lead to the overthrow of any Government. He maintained that the Board of Trade was armed with an irresponsible power. With that Board, as constituted at present, he had no fault to find. It could not be composed of better or more honourable men; but it would be well for Ministers to weigh well the embarrassments they were entailing upon the Executive Government, and the odium to which they would expose it by the course of giving a departmental jurisdiction in matters involving property. It was not for him or any one on his side of the House to say what the tribunal ought to be; but the Government were instituting a dangerous precedent, and if he were not mistaken, not many years, nor even months, would elapse before they would themselves come down to the House to propose an alteration in it.

wanted to know how the complaining parties were to go before the Board of Trade, and who was to bear the expense; for if his hon. Friends in the "land o'cakes" had to come to the Board of Trade in London, and were to pay their own expenses, he believed that the clause would be rendered nugatory, as it would in the case of all poor persons residing at a distance from the metropolis.

said, that persons at a distance could surely write to the Board of Trade. With regard to what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Perth (Mr. F. Maule), he must say, that he was quite alive to the evil of mixing up the Executive Government with matters of property. It was an odious power, and one that could only be justified by necessity. That necessity, he contended, however, did now exist. There certainly must be an appeal to some tribunal, and he could not conceive a better one than the Board of Trade. Would the right hon. Gentleman have it decided by the Court of Chancery?

Amendment agreed to.

wished to ask the noble Lord whether he would object to the insertion at the end of the clause of the words "provided always, that the parties interested may appear by themselves or their agents before the said Board of Trade." He did not, of course, care about the precise words, but he did wish (speaking now without prejudice to any future Motion with regard to the abolition of the tribunal altogether) to know whether words to that effect might not be appended to the clause. What he wanted now to know was, whether the Railway Department of the Board of Trade was to be an open or a secret tribunal; because, if it were to be an open tribunal, of course, a great many of his objections would be removed.

said, that the question was one of such great importance that it would be quite impossible for him, even if he had a very definite opinion upon the subject, to answer it at once off-hand. Whatever his own opinion was, he might, perhaps, state that the proposal appeared at first sight to have reason on its side. He thought, that the best plan for the hon. Member to adopt, would be to prepare a specific and distinct clause, containing the whole of his opinions with regard to the Board of Trade tribunal, and to bring it before the whole House. There were certainly not a sufficient number of hon. Members then present to discuss satisfactorily a matter of such importance.

concurred that this was a very important question, and must be fairly raised and fully discussed, if the public were ever to have any confidence in the decisions of the Board of Trade, which could not be done at a morning sitting; he should, therefore, recommend his hon. Friend to give his notice of Motion, and to endeavour to make some arrangement with the Government, by which it might be discussed with as little delay as possible.

said, that he would raise the question on the 47th Clause, and he hoped the noble Lord would give the opportunity for discussing it in a full House. He would in the first place move to omit the 47th Clause, on the ground of objecting to the tribunal of the Board of Trade; and if the noble Lord would give him the benefit of the legal assistance enjoyed by the Government, he (Mr. Hawes) would endeavour to frame a clause which should raise the question. Then two propositions would be before the House. The first, whether this tribunal should be created; and secondly, if so, whether it should be a secret or an open tribunal.

trusted that the hon. Member would in the meantime consent to let the clause pass pro formâ, and he would promise to consult other authorities upon the subject, and he should then be able to state what course he intended to pursue with reference to this point on Thursday next.

wished to ask a question of the right hon. Baronet the First Lord of the Treasury, respecting Holyhead harbour. In the early part of the Session the right hon. Baronet had said—

"With regard to one harbour the Government had come to a decision. They thought it of great importance to improve the harbour of Holyhead, for the purpose of facilitating the intercourse between the two parts of the United Kingdom."

He wished to ask whether Her Majesty's Government had determined on proposing any grant of money during the present Session for the improvement of that harbour, and whether any plan had been fixed upon?

, upon the part of the Government, was most desirous of seeing a line of railway established between Chester and Holyhead, and had given every encouragement to the promoters of that railway. A Bill had been passed last year, with the exception of the railway crossing the Menai Straits, as objections were made to the present bridge being used for that purpose. At present the subject was under the consideration of the Board of Trade and the Admiralty, and he hoped a Bill would soon be produced which would meet the sanction of Government. Retaining the same opinion which the Government had before expressed that Holyhead was the proper channel of communication with Ireland; if that Bill, in its provisions, met the views of the Government, he should be prepared to propose a grant for the improvement of Holyhead harbour in this year's estimates.

rose, in pursuance of notice, to move for leave to bring in a Bill that would enable the Government for the time being to reduce the number of Judges composing the Court of Session from thirteen to any other number, and to extend the jurisdiction of the stipendiary County Judges, called Sheriffs, by giving them the power of awarding the punishment of transportation, in the event of the Judges in the Court of Session being so reduced. The time had arrived when this reduction ought to take place. There were two divisions of the Supreme Court of Review, or Court of Session, as it was termed. In one of those divisions very little business was transacted. It had been said that his interfering with this subject had been attended with evil effects upon the conduct of the Scotch Courts; but he had good proof that since he had made it his duty to watch these Courts there had been greater attention to the business of the Courts, and that his interference during the last five years had been beneficial. He had before him a comparative view of the business of the First and Second Divisions of the Court of Session since 1841. In the First Division the number of reclaiming notes against the judgments of the Lords Ordinary, was from the 1st of January 1842, to the 1st of January 1843, 204; from the 1st of January 1843, to the 1st of January 1844, 174; from the 1st of January 1844, to the 1st of January 1845, 207. In the Second Division the same description of business was, from the 1st of January 1842, to the 1st of January 1843, 216; from the 1st of January 1843, to the 1st of January 1844, 145; from the 1st of January 1844, to the 1st of January 1845, 82, This showed the opinion entertained, not only by the legal profession in Scotland, but also by the people of that country, of the conduct of the Judges in these two divisions of the Supreme Court. He might mention another description of business transacted in these Courts—namely, incidental applications not followed by litigation. In the First Division these applications were—1842 to 1843, 587; 1843 to 1844, 563; 1844 to 1845, 558; In the Second Division they were:—1842 to 1843, 312; 1843 to 1844, 369; 1844 to 1845, 330. This was an incontestable proof of the opinion of the inhabitants of Scotland as to the merits of these two divisions of the Court, and clearly demonstrated that the Second Division, over which the Lord Justice Clerk presided, had fallen into disrepute. The number of defended causes which had been brought from the Outer House, and which had been enrolled for review before the First and Second Divisions of the Court of Session since the 12th day of November, 1844, to the 20th of February, 1845, being rather more than three months out of the four which constituted the winter Session of the Court were: defended causes enrolled for review by the First Division, 298: defended causes enrolled for review by the Second Division, 46; showing a difference between the two Courts—which, let it be remembered, had co-ordinate jurisdiction, and had four Judges of the Supreme Court sitting in each—of 252, another incontestable demonstration of public opinion, of more than six to one, in favour of the Judges in the First Division over those in the Second. Formerly similar returns proved that not more than one-fifth of the defended causes enrolled as above found their way to the Inner Houses, or Courts of Review; thus showing that the proportion likely to go to the Second Division for more than three-fourths of the present winter session would be nine causes only. A pretty state of matters for a Court of four Judges of the higher grade and salary, and costing the country not less than 25,000l. a-year. The number of causes in a certain period before the First Division had been 323, and in the same period before the Second Division, the number of causes was only twenty. The hon. Member next adverted to a comparative view of the number of stipendiary Judges in England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, and read to the House the following document:—

"Abstract of the return of the stipendiary Judges in England, Ireland, and Scotland, respectively, being No. 314, Session 1844:—Calculations to show the proportional number of stipendiary Judges to the population of England and Wales, and of Ireland and Scotland, respectively. The population is taken in round numbers. The population of England being about 16,000,000, and the number of Judges 145; it follows that there is one Judge to every 110,000 souls in England and Wales. In Ireland, the population being about 8,000,000, and the number of Judges 124: it appears there is one Judge to every 64,000 of the Irish people. In Scotland the population is about 2,600,000, and 94 Judges; that is, one Judge to every 27,000 of the people; being one Judge in Scotland to every 27,000, whilst in England you have only one for every 110,000. There is another way of stating the case. In England there are 22 superior Judges, which gives one superior Judge to every 727,000 inhabitants. In Ireland there are 16 superior Judges, which gives one superior Judge to every 500,000; and in Scotland, 13 superior Judges, which is one for every 200,000 inhabitants. Of inferior Judges, England has 123, which is equal to one inferior Judge to every 130,000. Ireland has 108 inferior Judges, or one to every 74,000 inhabitants: whilst Scotland has 81 inferior Judges, or one inferior Judge to every 32,000 inhabitants. There is still another test of the wasteful expenditure in forcing upon Scotland a number of Judges far beyond the wants and wishes of the people, which is brought out as follows from the above return: The judicial establishment in England, costs 208,976l., showing that for every 1,000 inhabitants, 13l. 1s. 2½d. is expended. In Ireland, the establishment costs 116,087l., being for every 1,000 inhabitants 14l. 10s. 2½d, whilst Scotland's establishment costs 76,970l., being for every 1,000 inhabitants 29l. 12s.; being considerably more than double the cost in England, or even in Ireland, and consequently considerably more than for both of these countries put together."

The above is the result, of No. 314 of last Session; but from tables which he had constructed, printed, and circulated from equally authenticated documents, he could prove that the cost to the nation of the judicial establishment of Scotland, in place of being 76,970l., was 170,148l., which would show that for every thousand souls in Scotland, the judicial establishment there, in place of costing 29l. 12s., actually amounts to 65l. 4s. 2d. At present the Scotch bar was very much diminished, both in the general number of counsel and in the leaders; some years since he had stated the number of leaders at seven, then it was reduced to five, next to three, and at this moment, independently of the Lord Advocate and the Solicitor General, it had only one, viz., the late Lord Advocate. He objected also to the length of the recesses, and insisted that the Court of Session might be much more fitly denominated the Court of Vacation. With reference to the Jury Courts of Scotland, he must remark that for 20,546 causes decided without the intervention of juries, there were only thirty causes tried by juries. He admitted that the reason why he again brought the subject before the House was, that he had hitherto failed in persuading any Government to afford to Scotland an improved system of criminal jurisprudence. In his opinion much of the present state of crime in Scotland, especially among juvenile offenders, was owing to the fact that they were generally taken before police courts, and inadequately punished with brief periods of imprison- ment not exceeding sixty days. This was why Scotland was at this moment overrun by "habit and repute thieves," who were not severely punished until they had committed a certain number of smaller delinquencies, when their offences were accumulated and they were visited for many under one sentence. In England and Ireland the better system enabled criminals to be brought to justice in a short period; whereas in Scotland there was a long delay; and at last the prisoner was only sent to such penitentiaries as that at Perth, which however well conducted, had failed in the effects it was hoped it would produce. Besides, this system did not get rid of those who were in the habit of bringing up and educating young thieves. The speedy punishment of delinquents was extremely advantageous also, inasmuch as it had a powerful effect in deterring others from the commission of crime. In Scotland six or seven months sometimes elapsed between the perpetration of the offence and the conviction of the party. In the city of Edinburgh, it was true, by an old law, they could and did try and convict within a week; and he saw no reason why this rule, with certain modifications, should not be applied to Scotland generally. Another evil was, that parties and witnesses were frequently brought from great distances for the purpose of prosecuting offenders. He would state to the House the number of prisoners tried between the years 1834 and 1840, at the assizes in Glasgow, with the number of witnesses, and the average number of those congregated in Glasgow for eight or ten days at a time, to try criminal cases only, from the three counties of Lanark, Dumbarton, and Renfrew. It was—Prisoners, 1,454; average yearly number, about 242. Witnesses, 14,667; annual average, 2,444. That statement showed the enormous absurdity of collecting all the offenders within three populous counties into one town, and forcing jurymen to leave their homes and their business, over the whole surface of three counties of not less than seventy miles in length; and adding thereto the drudgery, the inconvenience, and the great loss of valuable time, besides the cost incurred by the reckless mode in which the Law Officers of the Crown drag witnesses from every corner of Scotland, to prove the usually enormous proportion of trumpery cases which are chiefly the work, now-a-days, of circuit courts, which, as to witnesses, is demonstrated in the above statement as respects assizes held at Glasgow; and all, be it remembered, on criminal cases of an average of 2,444 annually; while, in one of these years, the enormous number of 3,836 witnesses were dragged from their homes, distance some thirty or forty miles, as the case might be, to be called into Court or not, as often happened to many of the witnesses whom the underlings of the Lord Advocate compelled to leave their homes and their families. That something must be done, he was perfectly satisfied. The present system must be altered; and at county meetings it had been frequently declared that the Perth Penitentiary had failed in its design, and that some other course must be adopted to check the increase of crime. He imputed the fault to the system, and not to any want of humane endeavours by the hon. Member for Perth and others to remedy the growing evil. There was at present a great want of confidence throughout Scotland in the Second Division of the Court of Session, which was only looked upon as a stepping-stone for appeals to the House of Lords, which must be remedied. He must urge, too, the expediency of giving Sheriffs of counties in Scotland the power of transportation for offences which would meet with that punishment if the criminals were detained and tried by the Judges of Assize. He believed that such a change would much improve the whole system of criminal jurisprudence. The hon. Member concluded by submitting the following Motion:—

"That Leave be given to bring in a Bill to repeal so much of the Act 1 Will. 4, c. 69, as provides that there shall be thirteen Judges in the Court of Session in Scotland; and to extend the Jurisdiction of the Stipendiary County Judges, called Sheriffs, by giving them the power of awarding the punishment of transportation, in the event of the Judges in the Court of Session being reduced below the number of Thirteen."

submitted to the House that the hon. Member for Greenock had not made out any case for altering the constitution of the Court of Session. The hon. Member had said that the Court was not satisfactory to Scotland, and being of that opinion, he had with a laudable perseverance from time to time endeavoured to effect an alteration. He, however, would venture to say, that the hon. Member was altogether mistaken, and that the constitution of the Court of Session was not un- satisfactory. With respect to the Sheriff Courts, the hon. Member had spoken in terms of praise to which he most readily responded. They had performed their duties, both as regarded their civil and criminal jurisdiction, most satisfactorily; nor were the Supreme Courts less satisfactory. In 1840 a Motion similar to the present was urged by the hon. Member, and a Select Committee was appointed to inquire whether any alteration should be made in the constitution of the Supreme Court. A very elaborate investigation took place. The right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. F. Maule) was the Chairman of that Committee, and some hon. Gentlemen whom he saw opposite were Members of that Committee. Many witnesses were examined, and the Report made by that Committee unanimously, with the exception of the hon. Gentleman himself was, that it was not expedient to reduce the number of Judges, though it was expedient to make certain suggested alterations in the form of proceeding. These alterations had since been adopted with advantage. One effect of them was to render necessary a fuller oral discussion in the Inner Chamber of the Court, the consequence of which was that each cause that came before those Judges occupied more time in Court. The hon. Gentleman had said that one branch of the business of the Inner Chambers of the Court was to review the judgments given by the single Judges, and that there was a great deal less business in one of the Chambers or Divsions of the Court than in the other. Now, the amount of business in the Courts of the country necessarily fluctuated from accident, the state of the country, and various other circumstances, exclusive of the merits of the Courts. Thus in 1839 and 1840 the number of causes before the Inner Chambers of the Court remaining undecided at the end of the summer Session was smaller than in 1841 and 1842; and if in 1840 the number of Judges had been reduced because the number of causes was smaller than in some previous years, the result would have been that the Courts would have been unable to get through the business. A similar fluctuation might be observed in comparing the business of one Court with that of another. It often happened that one Judge or one Court would get more cases than another, from the fact that there were feelings and impressions among suitors as to the preference to be given to one over another; and practitioners might be of opinion in reference to certain classes of cases that they should go before particular Judges. At the same time, such preference should in no way disparage any of the other learned Judges. There happened to be at the present time in one of the Chambers of the Court a more fortunate combination of various orders of talent and character than he had witnessed since he had been a practitioner. But that was no disparagement to the eminent Judges who sat in the other Chamber. In 1836, and for five or six years before, the number of cases in the First Division of the Court was, as now, greater than the number in the Second Division. In 1837, and for five or six years thereafter, the reverse was the case—the greatest number was in the Second Division. But the mere circumstance that there was more business in one Court than in another was no evidence against the efficiency of the Court having the least business. It sometimes happened, indeed, that cases were taken into the Court which had fewest cases, because they were deemed deserving of extended inquiry, or were of more than ordinary importance, and that just because that Court had more time to devote to the investigation of them. It so happened that, of cases published in the Reports as of importance to the profession during the years ending in November 1843 and 1844, the larger number were decided by the Second Division. In 1843 there were 108 cases, and in 1844 eighty-eight cases reported in the First Division of the Court; while in the Second Division there were 128 cases in 1843, and 111 in 1844. That was the natural course of events; for if one Division was overpowered with business, cases requiring much time or despatch would flow into the other. He contended, therefore, that no case had been made out by the hon. Member for the reduction of the Second Division of the Court, or of the number of Judges. The hon. Gentleman had complained that the Judges did not devote much time to their duties. Perhaps the House was not aware that from the Report to which he had alluded, it fully appeared that the learned Judges underwent a great deal of labour at their Chambers, and that the number of hours they sat in Court daily was no criterion of the time they devoted to their duties. The Judges began their sittings for the winter on the 1st of November. In the three weeks of the Christmas recess few of them had a single day of rest, with the exception of Christmas Day and the first day of the year, having civil and criminal cases to dispose of. The spring vacation did not commence till after the middle of March, and then there were the circuits. The Court reassembled in May, and the Session, which should end in July, was generally prolonged for another fortnight, to the 12th of August. Then they went the circuits again, and met on the 1st of November, so that there was scarcely any cessation of business. Having thus dealt with the observations of the hon. Member on the Supreme Civil Court, he would now proceed to notice what had been said in regard to the Criminal Courts. He understood the object of the hon. Member to be to do away with the circuits of the Supreme Judges; and to give the Sheriffs the power of pronouncing sentence of transportation. He agreed with the hon. Member on the importance of discouraging crime; but he differed from him as to the mode of accomplishing that object. But what he had now to deal with more particularly, was the proposition of the hon. Member to give the Sheriffs the power of transportation. He thought the proposal quite unnecessary. At present transportable offences were sent to be tried before the High Court at Edinburgh, and the Circuit Courts; and those not deserving such severe punishment were tried in the inferior Courts, and it rarely happened that the Sheriff exhausted the power of the milder punishment, so that it was not necessary to make the alteration. Did the hon. Member mean to say that the Courts having power to transport could not overtake all the cases to which that punishment was appropriated? The fact was, that they not only overtook all such cases, but many others which they did not consider deserving of so severe a punishment. If they should at any time be found unequal to the task, by the 9th of George IV. the Crown, by an Order in Council, could constitute as many additional circuits as might be necessary. It was not only unnecessary, but it would be injurious to give this new power to the Sheriffs, for thereby thirty odd new Judges would be created, who were separately to exercise their discretion as to this punishment of transportation. By that means the foundation would be laid for a great want of uniformity in the punishment attached to particular offences; and if the hon. Gentleman would give the power to the substitutes as well as to the Sheriffs, it would double the chance of that want of uniformity. The effect of the hon. Gentleman's proposition would be, to give the power of adjudicating upon high and grave offences punishable by transportation, to persons not educated as Barristers, though very excellently qualified persons for their present duties. The effect of it would also be to deprive prisoners of the aid of Counsel to conduct their defence. At present, no man in Scotland could be tried, subject to the risk of transportation, without being defended by counsel. In the High Court of Justiciary, in Edinburgh, every man could be defended by any counsel he chose to ask for; and, however serious or odious the charge against the delinquent, no counsel at the Bar would refuse. He recollected a case which attracted a good deal of attention in the country, and to which a good deal of odium was attached, in which the junior counsel claimed the assistance of some of their senior brethren, and at once received that assistance from Lord Moncrief, Lord Jeffrey, Lord Cockburn, Lord Robertson, and others. Another ground of objection to the proposition of the hon. Member was the increased expense it would occasion in conducting prosecutions. Unless a case of very great necessity were made out, the proposition could not be justifiably entertained; and he (the Lord Advocate) thought he had shown that there was no necessity for it, and that great evil, instead of any good, would result from its adoption. He therefore hoped that the House would not agree to the Motion.

admitted that the hon. Member for Greenock had always brought the subject forward in a manner that could not give any personal offence. He did not, however, agree with the hon. Member in any of his propositions; and he had combated them so often that it was needless to go over the ground again. As to one part of the hon. Gentleman's Motion, he concurred with the learned Lord Advocate, that if it were granted it would lead to great inconvenience, not to say to much mal-administration of justice in Scotland—he referred to the proposition to give inferior Courts the power of inflicting the punishment of transportation. Those Courts were of the greatest benefit to Scotland, and the gentlemen who presided over them discharged their duties admirably, for which the public were greatly indebted to them; but if they were to be put in the position proposed by the hon. Member for Greenock, duties would be imposed upon them which they could not perform with satisfaction to the pub- lic. Another point which had been alluded to, he would make an observation upon, namely, the business in the Court of Session. A statement had been made of the disproportion of the cases in the two divisions of the Court of Session. He did not agree in the opinion that such disproportion was altogether a matter of precedent, for he believed it was to be attributed to the fact of the profession having more confidence in the manner in which a certain class of cases would be dealt with in one Court than in the other. He thought that matters should be permitted at present to remain as they were; and if the disproportion of cases continued, it might be a subject for the serious consideration of Government, whether they would not devise some means whereby the First Division of the Court, combining as it did the greater amount of talent, might not be overburdened with business. Whether this might be effected by taking away from parties the power of choosing their own Court, or by a division of the Lords Ordinary, he would not say; but it would be for the Government to consider whether they could not lessen the labour of the First Division in some way, if the discrepancy continued for another Session or two. This was the only observation he wished to make; and for reasons which he had previously and repeatedly stated, he should oppose the Motion of his hon. Friend.

, in rising to move for the production of Correspondence and Papers relative to liberated Africans, said, that he did not wish to introduce, and he hoped he should be able to avoid, anything which might provoke an angry discussion. He bore no ill-will to those for whose more immediate benefit the removal, or he might say the exportation, of negroes from the coast of Africa to the West Indies had been sanctioned by Her Majesty's Government; and certainly he could not be supposed to bear any ill-will to the other party engaged, namely, the negroes themselves. In the year immediately after the abolition of the Slave Trade, an Order in Council was issued, by the terms of which the case of the negroes had been governed up to the year 1844, namely, "that when landed in any place where there was a Court of Mixed Commission, the slave should be protected and provided for;" and the Government had acted upon the fair and liberal interpretation of the words which he had quoted to the House. It must be recollected that the slaves were taken upon the high seas with as little regard to their own will as they were taken from the interior of Africa to the coast. It was in the exercise of (if they pleased) a benevolent despotism that the slaver of Spain or of Portugal was captured, and its living cargo transferred from the hold of that vessel to the British Colony of Sierra Leone; the slaves themselves had no voice in selecting the direction in which they should go when taken under the charge of an English officer; they were for the purposes of option and free will as little entitled to the description of free agents as when still in the hold of the slave ship. Now, first of all, the actual sufferings of the slave while at sea were pretty nearly the same in the most favourable case, whether the vessel were commanded by a Spaniard or Portuguese, or had been captured by an English Lieutenant; and in many cases those sufferings were aggravated to a degree which human imagination could scarcely have conceived, if it had not become a matter of history. In the Narrative of Fifty Days on Board a Slaver, published by the Rev. Pascoe Hill, the horrors described, the perfect accuracy of which was guaranteed by the character of that gentleman, exceeded greatly anything, he believed, which appeared at the time when almost every heart in England—he wished for the sake of England he could say every heart—was desirous of abolishing the trade itself; and those horrors took place under an endeavour to mitigate the evils of the Slave Trade, and they took place almost necessarily, in consequence of storms and adverse winds preventing the early arrival of the vessel at the port of adjudication. It might be asked, perhaps, why he adduced that illustration, when he admitted in the same sentence that these calamities originated, not in any fault of the British officer, but in physical necessity; but he did so, for two reasons, first, because it was far from a solitary instance; and they had it in evidence in the course of the inquiries which were prosecuted two or three years ago, that a large proportion of those who were taken in the slave ships, and intended to be carried for adjudication to the Mixed Commission Court of Sierra Leone, perished in the endeavour to carry them thither. In some instances the number, as was stated in the Report of the West African Committee, ranged from one-sixth to one-half. But it was not even the mortality, frightful as that was, which would justify the introduction of the subject to the notice of the House; his second reason, and his more direct, more justifiable object, would be, to show to the public the physical condition in which the survivors of the slaves must often be brought into port; and thence to prove how little could such persons be able to exercise, at the instant, any discretion for their own benefit. One of the witnesses examined on the state of the West Coast of Africa, himself for many years a Governor on the coast, Colonel Nicolls said, "I have seen them come out of the ships like ghosts." Mr. Hill's account of their state while in the slaver, and, above all, his account of their condition when landed at the Cape, proved that their condition, dreadful as it was when they were in the midst of the voyage, was, though preferable, still most deplorable as they approached the shores on which they were to be landed. These were the persons who, whether they would or would not, being landed and adjudicated to be free, were to exercise their freedom by going at once to the West Indies. He begged the House to consider that he was not impugning the conduct of any Administration, Whig or Tory. Up to last year the present and preceding Governments had acted upon the principle which he desired to see restored; and the object of his Motion was very earnestly and very respectfully to call upon Her Majesty's Government to reconsider the case, and to review the proclamation which, under the authority of a despatch from the Colonial Department here, the Governor of Sierra Leone issued on the 12th of June in the last year. He had intimated that the condition and sufferings of the negroes when landed at Sierra Leone were such as to render it extremely improbable that persons in such circumstances could exercise a fair and real discretion whether they would remain in Sierra Leone or should migrate to the West Indies. He advisedly used the word "migrate," because he was unwilling to beg the question for the moment by using a phrase which implied the absence of volition, and therefore he would give the benefit of the supposition of its existence, though he believed it could not be exercised. But still, supposing that in ordinary circumstances they were able to exercise the discretion attributed to them in the despatch of February 10, 1844, and the Governor's proclamation issued under it at Sierra Leone on the 12th of June, 1844, even that could not apply to a large proportion of those who were seized in the holds of slavers. In the particular voyage to which he first referred, the case of the slaver the Progreso, in which Mr. Hill was a voluntary witness of the horrors which he had described—and he was glad to have an opportunity of mentioning that that gentleman went as an interpreter, to alleviate the sufferings of those unhappy beings, so far as such assistance could—the proportion of children in the ship was no less than 213 out of 447. In other slavers the proportion, though not so large, was still considerable; in one instance there was a child of six years of age. Now, the proclamation to which he desired to call the special attention of the House was one in which, acting upon the terms of a despatch from the Colonial Office, the Governor required that all persons who had been liberated in Sierra Leone, as soon as such liberation should take place under the adjudication of the competent tribunal, should decide at once whether they would or would not remain in the Colony, and whether they would or would not migrate to the West Indies. He (Sir R. Inglis) contended that it was a perfect mockery to give choice and option to the children, or even to the grown-up men. The Proclamation stated—

"That Lord Stanley has been pleased to notify to us" (his Excellency William Ferguson, and so on), "that liberated Africans landed in this Colony should be apprised, that in case they prefer remaining in this Colony to emigrating to the West Indies, they must provide entirely for themselves; now, therefore, we do hereby publish, promulgate, and proclaim, that all allowances, of whatsoever description, heretofore issued to captured negroes by Her Majesty's Government, on their being landed in this Colony, will discontinue and cease, excepting clothing and maintenance while under adjudication, which will be supplied to them as formerly" (public decency would not allow of their being left in the streets exactly in the state in which they were liberated from the hold), "until they have an opportunity of emigrating to the West Indies, and no longer."

This was found, even by the Governor who issued it, to be too monstrous a proposition (he would not qualify the word) to be carried into execution; for the House would observe, there was no exception either of age or sex; the Proclamation included the child of six years of age as literally as it included the full-grown and healthy labourer. The governor, therefore, on a representation being made to him, withheld from the operation of the Proclamation, but upon his own responsibility, all children under nine years of age. The hon. Member the Under Secretary for the Colonies (Mr. G. W. Hope) would, no doubt, say, that the despatch, upon the authority of which this Proclamation was issued, did but follow out a portion of the Report of the Committee, which sat upon the affairs of the West Coast of Africa in 1842, of which he (Sir R. Inglis) was a Member, and that he did not take exception to it at the time. He should not be ashamed, indeed he should be very glad, to be able to own that in the year 1845 he could think himself, or be thought by any one else, to be wiser than in 1842; and therefore he did not admit, that even if he had concurred entirely in that passage in the Report, he was so bound thereby as not to be able to lift his voice against it, if on further consideration he should feel it required. The passage ran thus:—

"Your Committee had next to consider whether in achieving this object" (the civilization of Africa, by the removal of negroes to the West Indies, and bringing them back again from the West Indies, with improved habits of order and civilization, and knowledge of agricultural improvements, and so forth), "any danger existed of creating a real, or plausible suspicion of a real, Slave Trade, under another name. Under proper regulations they think there is not. A free passage may be offered to the African already settled within the Colony, and to the free settler or other native, who shall have remained long enough in the Colony to give the authorities sufficient time to ascertain the circumstances under which he came, and to assure themselves that they were entirely free from all suspicion of fraud or force. To such as thus leave their homes a free passage back at the end of a certain period, say three or four years, might be promised, with full permission to them to return at any time at their own expense. To the homeless African, newly liberated, the option should be given of settling at once in the West Indies, if he please, with permission to return hereafter at his own cost, or of removing from Sierra Leone, or of remaining in it on the first adjudication, if he undertake for his own maintenance, or can find friends or relations who will undertake it for him."

Now he should not have felt unwilling to maintain the accuracy and the justice of the statements, and opinions, and views, recorded in that paragraph, because he might have hoped it was not improbable that any man reading it would not have adhered so strictly to its literal meaning as not to give to the weaker party the benefit of the fair liberty of interpretation it would bear. Perhaps the Committee did not watch their words as they ought in framing and adopting that Report; it appeared to him now that the passage was susceptible of a meaning which did not occur to him at the time; namely, that instantly upon adjudication the negro should be required to make his election between maintaining himself at Sierra Leone and emigrating to the West Indies. "Homeless," as that paragraph staled him to be, houseless, naked, without knowing one word of the language of his captors, a stranger in the midst of strangers, without any skill to exercise trade or agriculture, and without any implements or tools of any kind, absolutely without assistance from the Government, or, as it seemed, from any fund or source provided in the Colony itself, he was to decide whether he would or would not starve (he might say) in the Colony, or become a forced labourer in the West Indies. He denied the right of the Government so to fetter the discretion (if such it might be called) of the liberated negroes. It must be recollected, that the Government took upon itself the whole system of dealing with these slaves, leaving no discretion to the slaves. He doubted how far the Government could be said to be at liberty after this engagement to free themselves from the obligations which it imposed. Upon the terms of that compact upwards of 52,000 slaves had been liberated and provided for in Sierra Leone up to the 31st of December, 1842. The expense of this, it was alleged, had been considerable, and they had to consider whether they would retain these unhappy beings in Africa at the cost of this country, or whether they would remove them to the West Indies, where their labour would be profitable. But he might ask his hon. Friend the Under Secretary for the Colonies whether, admitting that the expense had been 12,000l. one year, and 9,000l. another, or taking it on an average at 10,000l. a year, had they not on an average of three years an excess of income over expenditure in the Colony of Sierra Leone? He did not hesitate to say that there was. He did not, however, rest on this point; but, if he understood the engagement which was entered into when the Slave Trade was abolished, it was, that Sierra Leone, and the other places where the courts of adjudication were established, should be con- stituted as a refuge for the benefit of the liberated African, and not with the view to a profit. The engagement we had entered into was a national one, and was proclaimed under the authority of the King of England in Council, and had been reported in treaties made by our present Sovereign in the exercise of her prerogative. It was not enough to say, therefore, even if it were correct, that this cost was a burden on the revenues of Sierra Leone; make it a burden (if they chose to use that phrase) on the imperial revenues, rather than forfeit the pledge they had made. He knew much had been said at different times against the Colony of Sierra Leone; but he believed from the Report of the Committee to which he had referred, that the evidence, which was of a very mixed character, would show that there had been a larger proportion of persons admitted to the benefits of education in that Colony than in any other country connected with England. The Report stated, that nearly one-fifth of the inhabitants of that Colony were under a course of education. If that were so, surely the founders of that Colony had in some degree discharged their obligation. He believed, that in no part of the world would there be found so large a proportion of persons receiving the benefits of education as there. One of his objections to the course taken by the Government was, that they were interfering with the course of a great experiment. He referred more immediately to the conduct of the Government last year in respect to the schools of Sierra Leone. He had the authority of the letter of an individual who was in the Colony at the time, that not only were the liberated Africans of every age, or of either sex, required "immediately on adjudication either to maintain themselves, or to emigrate to the West Indies; but the liberated African children in all the Government schools were, in June last, by a most peremptory order received from Lord Stanley, required either to emigrate to the West Indies, or to be immediately given out to their country people, the liberated Africans in the villages. The Lieutenant Governor (Ferguson) retained a certain number of the school children under the age of nine years on his own responsibility, until a reply should be received from his Lordship to a letter of remonstrance." Not less than 100 boys and girls were induced under these circumstances to leave their place of education, and to embark on board the Glen Huntly, the 4th of July last for Jamaica, He had not said one word which implied the slightest objection to the free ingress into the West Indies of any man who was really free, whether taken from England, or Germany, or Africa. His objection was to the plan of the Government in making those go there under the semblance of free will who could not exercise any option whatever. They were really acting in the spirit of Dr. Johnson's definition of a congé d'elire, which was, throw a man out of a window, and recommend him to fall softly to the ground. It has been stated, that something under 3,000 persons had freely returned to their native countries in the interior. They returned with many advantages derived from the instruction they had received. One of these parties was accompanied by a native clergyman. He never could speak but with feelings of the greatest respect of the conduct of the Wesleyan Missionaries there; but even more strongly might he allude to the proceedings of the Church Missionaries amongst the negro population there. They had not only elevated the character of a large number of the population, but they had raised up three of these liberated persons of colour to the station of ordained ministers of the Church of England. One of these persons, the Rev. Samuel Crowther, who had been Chaplain to the voyage up the Niger, he had the pleasure of being well acquainted with. Now this person and his colleagues had been long accustomed to carry on their labours at Sierra Leone, and they had been, and they might still continue to be highly serviceable to the liberated negroes brought from the coast of the adjoining parts to that colony; or, as in the case of Mr. Crowther himself, to his own people at a distance. He did not wish to prevent any who were arrived at the age of discretion from going to the West Indies; all that he desired was that Her Majesty's Government would be pleased to consider their determination, and to examine the course of action which they and their predecessors had followed. Already on that principle 52,616 Africans had been liberated and located. Up to the 31st of December, 1843, there were in the schools of the Colony 4,974 scholars, and 1,330 communicants in the Church Missionary Society. There were 46 schools, 35 native lay teachers, and 26 training as such. Now if there were any security that there could be a real bonâ fide freedom of will on the part of those liberated negroes, when they were asked whether they would emigrate, he should not complain; but this was obviously not the case. In the first instance, an interval of six months was allowed between the adjudication in the case of a liberated negro, and his being called on to say whether or not he was willing to proceed as an emigrant to the West Indies. This period was afterwards reduced to sis months; afterwards to three months; then to six weeks, then to four weeks; and then, by the Proclamation of Governor Ferguson, they were required to come to an immediate decision as to emigration, or return to their native country. Again, Lord Stanley, in the first instance, when he sanctioned this species of emigration to the West Indies, directed that in every case a certain proportion between the sexes should be preserved on board of each vessel conveying emigrants from Sierra Leone to the West Indies; and that proportion was, that out of every number shipped, at least one-third should be females. In the first instance, it was ordered, that the proportion between the sexes should be one-half; but it was found that it was impossible, under the circumstances of the Colony, to adhere to this rule. It was, no doubt, the intention of the noble Lord at the head of the Colonial Department that something like an equal proportion between the sexes should be preserved in this description of emigration. This requirement was subsequently not enforced; for he found it stated in Minute of Council in Sierra Leone, that the restriction requiring a certain proportion of females to accompany each shipment of emigrants might with safety, in a moral point of view, be altogether abolished; the consequence was, that whole cargoes of males could be taken from Sierra Leone, just the same as slaves were conveyed from the Gold Coast forty years ago. When he considered what the horrors were of a population consisting only of one sex, carried in such multitudes to a dependency in any part of the world, he owned he should be very sorry to be a party to the bringing about any such wicked deed. He bore no ill will to any of his fellow subjects, the planters of the West Indies; he knew the sufferings they had sustained in consequence of the great and humane Act for the Abolition of Slavery in our Colonies; and he also knew that if they could procure a due supply of labour, that they would be enabled to raise as large a quantity of Colonial produce as any other country. All that he now objected to was, that they should receive the benefit of an additional supply of labour, by means which the public, both in England and other countries, would regard as the infliction of great and unnecessary torture on so many of their fellow-beings. He knew that strong statements had been made in foreign countries as to the mode in which this emigration was carried on, and that it was alleged to be only slavery in disguise. Now, although he would not refrain from doing what he considered to be right because his neighbour thought it to be wrong; yet they should not forget that the highest authority asserted, "that they should not do good in such a way that it should be spoken evil of." He conceived, therefore, that they should so regulate their acts as not to allow any one to speak ill of them. Up to a very recent period, he could not conceive that there was any objection to the proceedings of the Government, in connection with this matter; but recently there had arisen grounds for serious complaint. Many observations had been recently made in the French Chambers on this subject, which must be familiar to hon. Gentlemen. The House was well aware with how much jealousy the people of France regarded our proceedings with respect to emigration to our Colonies; and they not merely watched our proceedings relative to the Right of Search, but also to the cultivation of sugar in our Colonies, by what we called free labour from Asia and Africa, but which they called slave labour. Again, in Spain, he perceived that a similar feeling of jealousy had manifested itself on this subject, as would be seen from the Slave Trade Papers before the House. The Spanish Minister Gonzales, in writing to Mr. Aston, on the 20th of December, 1841, said, — "Mr. Barclay, of Jamaica, has been authorised by the British Government to transport thousands from Sierra Leone." And though this was a gross exaggeration of the number, we could not conceal from ourselves that we had sanctioned the introduction of persons of the African race as labourers into our Colonies, without giving them that freedom of action which we ought. In the Report of the Commission of the Cortes, in January, 1845—on the 27th of last month—the Minister, acting upon our conduct, had claimed the freedom of doing what we had taken the freedom to do; and the Report said,—"Our right to introduce free negroes into America remains untouched." It was hardly necessary to do more than refer to the use made of our conduct in these matters by Mr. Calhoun, in his celebrated letter to Mr. King. It appeared, therefore, to him, if this plan were to be adopted, that there was nothing to prevent the Slave Trade being carried on under the allegation that the slave ships were only carrying free labourers on board to their own Colonies. There was too much reason to believe, that under this change of name, the Slave Trade would still exist most extensively. He now came to another part of the subject, with respect to which he conceived there were great grounds of suspicion. He alluded to the proceedings on the Eastern Coast of Africa, to supply the Mauritius and the Cape of Good Hope. In the Mauritius he understood that an Ordinance had been issued—a copy of which he understood was in this country, but which he had not seen—in which a regular bounty was offered on the importation of negroes from the Eastern Coast of Africa to the Mauritius,—namely, of 5l. for each male, and 6l. 10s. for every female. In the Slave Papers marked A, which were laid before the House last year, there was a long account of the manner in which the negroes were induced to emigrate, and the manner in which the voyage was carried on. The agents were told that "you will predispose and captivate their good-will, to induce them to come to this island" (Mauritius); and they were to be promised plenty of farina, and other food. It was probable that their condition as to food might be improved; but the greatest caution and control ought to be exercised in sanctioning these proceedings. In connexion with this subject, he would refer the House to the testimony of Colonel Nicholls before the Committee appointed to inquire into the state of our possessions on the Coast of Africa. He was asked,—

"With respect to any extensive emigration at present, you think that it could not be carried on?—My impression is, that in the present state of Africa, it is impossible. If Her Majesty will accept the sovereignty of territory such as was ceded to me opposite to Fernando Po, by the native chiefs, who came over and took the oath of allegiance voluntarily, that when you have got the cession of the territory, you will have a population which will become free; you may then have freemen to go to the West Indies; you cannot prevent a freeman going where he likes; and if he chooses to go to the West Indies for the wages he would get there, you might have an emigration to some extent, but under present circumstances it is impossible, for this reason; I went over to Old Calabar, and said to Duke Ephraim, 'What will you let me have a thousand men for, to clear the bush at Fernando Po, and I will send them back when I have done with them?' 'No,' said he, 'I will have nobody here that is educated by you; they would soon become our masters here; but I can sell you a thousand men, and you can make them free.' Now, it would have a noble appearance, if it were said that a person had bought a thousand men, and made them free, and sent them over to the West Indies to work as free men. But look behind the picture, and see the consequence; with the price of those thousand men Duke Ephraim would go into the interior, and buy 2,000; there you at once double the mischief. But still that is not half the mischief, for in taking those men in the interior, I have very good proof that there are generally two, three, or four people destroyed in taking one. So that 1,000 would be the destruction of 6,000, which would be altogether a complete renewal of the Slave Trade. Then, again, that would not be half the mischief; because if you did this, would not every power in Europe demand the same right, and Africa would be torn to atoms for everlasting, and still be made the scapegoat of cupidity."

That which was true with respect to the Western Coast of Africa took place, in his belief, wherever there was a demand for slaves. The native kings had an absolute command over the liberties of their subjects. When they could find their own subjects in sufficient numbers, they were ready to sell them to the first comer who applied for them; and when they could not, they would make an inroad into the territory of some neighbouring State, and sell all the captives they succeeded in catching. It was true these remarks did not apply to the state of affairs in Sierra Leone, to which the first part of his Motion referred, but it was emphatically applicable to the case of the Mauritius, which constituted the second part of his notice. He, therefore, thought it right to call the attention of the Government to the subject; and he would ask them to follow not merely the example of their predecessors, but their own example up to last year. The Marquess of Normanby declared that no precaution which had been or could be devised could prevent discredit being brought on such a system, and on the nation which allowed it; and Lord John Russell said "he was not prepared to countenance a measure which might lead to loss of life on the one hand, or to a new state of slavery on the other." Such were the sentiments of the distinguished individuals to whom he alluded on something like the system of exporting negroes, to which he wished to call the attention of the Government; and he trusted they would not be lost sight of on the present occasion. He was sensible of the claims which their fellow-subjects in the West Indies had to every indulgence that could be extended to them, consistently with good feeling and humanity towards others of the human race; for he was not unmindful of the fact that in the course of the great experiment made ten years hence, and for which England paid not less than 20,000,000l. sterling, the West India proprietors were repeatedly told that it was true they would be deprived of the compulsory labour of the 800,000 human beings who were to be liberated from slavery, but that their bodies would still be left in the Colonies; that they would be obliged to work for their subsistence; and that the proprietors would pay them little more in wages than they had hitherto paid for their support, their medical treatment, and their clothing. He thought the experiment then made was never to be regretted; but he, at the same time, felt that the promises to which he alluded as having been held out to the proprietors had not been realized, and that there was not a sufficiency of labourers in the West Indies to compensate for the abolition of the system of compulsory labour. He believed that the climate of the West Indies was not unsuited to the negro constitution, and that the soil was in general such as to repay any amount of toil that was expended upon it; but he still felt that notwithstanding these circumstances, and the claims of their fellow-subjects in the West Indies to every consideration that could consistently be given to them, he was not at liberty to weigh the purse of the West India proprietor against the sufferings, the blood, and the lives of the Africans—he was not prepared to do evil in order that good might follow; he felt that he was bound as a legislator of the nation, as well as an individual, to take care that whatever he did should be consistent with good faith; and, above all, with those specific contracts under which they had undertaken to watch the interests of those sufferers of the African race to whom they owed so much, and whom for five and thirty years they had not only protected, but provided for to a certain extent. He had to thank the House sincerely for having listened to him with so much attention for perhaps a longer period than he had asked their indulgence; and he then begged leave, in the words of his Motion, to move for the following Papers:—

"Copies of despatch from Lord Stanley to Governor Macdonald, at Sierra Leone, dated the 10th day of February, 1844.—Of Proclamation of Lieutenant Governor Ferguson, at Sierra Leone, dated the 12th day of June, 1844.—Of Letter from the Lay Secretary of the Church Missionary Society to Lord Stanley, dated the 26th day of November, 1844.—Of reply from Mr. George William Hope on the part of Lord Stanley, dated the 24th day of December, 1844.—And of any ordonnance, proclamation, law, or proceeding on the part of any authority in the Mauritius, relative to the introduction of negroes into that island in the years 1842, 1843, and 1844."

said, that as there was no wish on the part of the Government to withhold this information, he would second the Motion. The only objection he had to the Motion was, that documents which he should have occasion to refer to, were not in the possession of the House. He must, however, protest strongly against the concluding sentence of the hon. Member, when he said, that he would not weigh the purse of the West Indian against the blood and lives of the African, or do evil that good might come, and that he could not consent to this course, however beneficial to the West Indians, if it involved the breach of the solemn contract which England had entered into with the African race. He could assure the House that if he could conceive that the course the Government were taking involved any of these consequences, he should be as sorry as his hon. Friend to adopt that course; but he contended that the very reverse was the case; and he trusted that he should convince the House that there was no breach of faith in the proceedings of the Government, but on the contrary complete and substantial observance of it. Shortly after the stopping of the Slave Trade, measures were adopted for disposing of captured Africans. His hon. Friend wished to adhere strictly to these measures; but the question was, whether the means now adopted in lieu of them for promoting the immigration into the West Indies from Africa, were not better means, which, while they were beneficial to other parties, would be more beneficial to the Africans themselves. His hon. Friend had referred to a proclamation of the Governor of Sierra Leone, and the mode in which he did so left it to be concluded by the House that the negroes taken on board slave ships by British cruisers were landed at Sierra Leone in a state of debility, and, being incapable of exercising a proper discretion as to whether they would emigrate to the West Indies or not, were left to starve at Sierra Leone, if they would not emigrate. That was the inference from the terms in which his hon. Friend had referred to the procla- mation. The proclamation stated, that all allowances of whatever kind which had, previous to the date of it, been issued to the captured negroes by the Government on their being landed in the Colony, would cease and determine from the date thereof, except clothing and maintenance, while under adjudication, which would be supplied to them until they could find an opportunity of going to the West Indies, and no longer. But that was not an inflexible rule; it was addressed to the negroes only, and was not binding on the Government. The proclamation undoubtedly was intended to be carried out in a spirit of justice and moderation; it was not intended to compel emigration, but to provide against the negroes remaining in a state of idleness in the Colony, alike damaging to themselves and to the Colonists. The negro was not asked to exercise this discretion until he had enjoyed ample opportunity of recovering his health and strength after the voyage, and ample opportunity of considering the question of emigration. In one case only had anything in the nature of an extreme measure been taken under this Proclamation. That was in the case of a body of 180 liberated Africans, who, so far from being forced to emigrate immediately on landing, were not turned out of the Government yard until they had several times refused to take advantage of the offers that were made them. Therefore, he thought his hon. Friend must see he was not right in the view he had taken on this point. But his hon. Friend had spoken of the children, and said, that with reference to them this option, which was a mockery in the case of grown-up persons, was still more a mockery in the case of children; and he said that the system was so strongly established, that by a special regulation, children up to nine years old only were exempt from its operation. Now, his hon. Friend knew how soon the human frame came to maturity in those climates; and he must know, therefore, that it was a material difference when he (Mr. G. W. Hope) stated, that twelve, instead of nine, was the age at which the system was brought into operation; and no person who knew how soon the negro was fit for labour, would deny that twelve instead of nine years was a very material difference. His hon. Friend, in reference to the schools for liberated negro children in Sierra Leone, had said that a Government agent had been sent through these schools to offer the children the option of emigrating or being turned loose in the Colony, and that the result was that 100 children had emigrated to Jamaica. Now, he thought he could satisfy his hon. Friend's fears on this point. It was perfectly true that these 100 children had emigrated; but what were the comparative advantages of Sierra Leone and the West Indies? Having emigrated, charge was taken of them by the Government, and the greatest pains taken in allotting them to proper masters, special contracts being enforced in order to secure their rights and comforts. The situation of these children, then, was this, — they were well educated at Sierra Leone up to twelve years of age, and then, on being taken to the West Indies, they were engaged under special contracts providing for the carrying on of their education and training them in moral principles. A more complete answer than the case of the children presented to the observations of his hon. Friend, he thought it impossible to imagine. As regarded the children, therefore, he should not further trouble the House; and he came back to the charge of forcing the liberated negroes immediately upon their landing, to choose between Sierra Leone and the West Indies. His hon. Friend seemed to imagine that the effect of the regulations enforced at Sierra Leone, was to leave no option to the negro. He might be allowed to say that the plan of a gentleman who was eminent in the annals of emancipation—aplanwhich doubtless emanated from the best spirit towards the African race—he meant the plan of Mr. Hook, Commissioner of the Mixed Commission Court at Sierra Leone, whose name need only be mentioned to convince every friend of the African that his recommendation emanated from the best and purest of motives, had, indeed, recommended that no option should be given, as the negroes were in the predicament of persons who were entitled to exercise no option; and he wished to substitute a decision by the Government on their behalf; but that proposition was rejected by his noble Friend, and the option remained as before. He would endeavour to trace a picture of the comparative advantages of Sierra Leone and the West Indies; but, though his hon. Friend had referred to the concluding passage of the Report of the last Committee who sat on this subject, and owned that he was wiser than he had been in 1842, he confessed that he remained of the same opinion still, and he thought that the House would be found to agree with the Committee also. The Committee commenced their labours by inquiring into the condition of the Colony of Sierra Leone, and especially the condition of the negro population. They showed that there was a deficiency of employment for labour in Sierra Leone, and a great deficiency in civilisation. Indeed, they stated that the arts of civilization, and particularly agriculture, were in a state of total stagnation. They, on the other hand, referred to the West Indies, and stated that as regarded the moral condition of the immigrant labourer, nothing could be more complete or perfect than the means which were taken to secure it. They quoted the number of churches and the number of schools that were, establshed for them, giving the opinion of numbers not only of the clergy of the Established Church, but of other religious ministers, as to the state of that class of the population; and having done that, they drew the result that it was of the highest advantage and the greatest blessing to the Africans to make the exchange from Sierra Leone to the West Indies. In Sierra Leone the rate of wages was from 4d. to 7d. a day, when they were earned; in fact, the extent of good soil was so limited, that the inhabitants were sometimes obliged to wander out of the Colony in search of subsistence, as stated in Dr. Maddens Report. Compared to his situation in Sierra Leone, where there was a great and striking deficiency of agricultural knowledge, there could not be a greater advantage to the negro than to find himself a free labourer in a British Colony. He could assure the House he fully expected to show that no one act had been done by the Government which did not fall within the spirit of the conclusion of the Committee's Report, to which his hon. Friend had referred. That conclusion recommended that the captured African should have the option of being taken to the West Indies, to return at his own cost, or to stay in the Colony, and that, he said, was the course that had been pursued by the Government. The option had been a bonâ fide one. There had been lately an inquiry undertaken on the part of the West Indian proprietors as to the cause which stood in the way of a more extended emigration, of which the result would be laid before the House before long; at present he might be allowed to quote a few lines from one of the documents to which that inquiry had given rise, in order to show for what purposes certain parties resident in Sierra Leone threw obstacles in the way of this plan of emigration to the West Indies. The author, Mr. Butts, writing from Sierra Leone, said—

"The original settlers here and their immediate descendants are not accustomed to labour, having heretofore procured apprentices, who, by that name, worked and were treated as slaves, without the protection or remuneration, small as was that remuneration, by slaves enjoyed, and also by persons from the tribes in the neighbourhood, who were frequently obliged to fly here for refuge from their own country people."

And Mr. Guppy, in his Report, said,—

"The old residents here, when they have scraped together enough of money to set up for themselves, get a grant of a lot of land, plant provisions, traffic, and, as soon as possible, procure a liberated African, who then becomes their drudge,"

All experience showed that this would be the case. It came to this—that, living in the Colony of Sierra Leone, they became the drudges of persons who treated them not with any regard to the benefit of the negroes, but solely to their own advantage. But the state of the liberated negro in Sierra Leone would perhaps more satisfactorily be learned from a person who could not be supposed to write with a bias against the negro race. Nothing could be stronger than the statements of the Governor of the Colony to Lord Stanley. The present Governor was Mr. Fergusson, a man of colour, who was well known among those who took an interest in the African. He said, in a despatch of the 30th October, last,—

"Those persons who have thus refused to emigrate, and have been so readily picked up by the already located liberated Africans, are employed by them altogether as unpaid servants; they are fed—scantily, if at all clothed — and have no pecuniary allowance whatever."

That was the condition of the liberated African at Sierra Leone; and he did fearlessly ask, therefore, whether the Government did bonâ fide perform their contract with the African, by allowing him to remain at Sierra Leone, or by giving him the means of going to the West Indies? Such being the position of the negro at Sierra Leone, he might next refer in more detail to the situtation in the West Indies. The papers for 1843 and 1844 contained statements showing most conclusively the advantages derived by the liberated Africans in the West Indies. Perhaps the House would excuse him if he referred to one or two of those statements. The first to which he would call their attention was contained in a Report of Governor Light, of October 1842, in which he stated that he had minutely inspected the liberated Africans in the Colony, and found them well dressed, and cheerful, and that many of them earned high wages. He could quote fifty passages to the same effect, but he would only refer the House to another, at to the state of education. Mr. Stephenson, the rector of a parish, stated that scholars of all ages and of both sexes were under a course of instruction; and that many of them were taught mensuration, algebra, and the use of the globes. The general tendency of the opinions obtained from various quarters showed that nothing could have been more successful than the endeavours which had been made to promote education among these liberated negroes in the West Indies. He considered that it was a matter of great regret that the liberated Africans at Sierra Leone should be left, as was stated in the letter to which he had referred from Mr. Hope, wandering about like savages. Certainly, when he compared the condition of the liberated Africans in the West Indies with those at Sierra Leone, he considered the comparison was vastly in favour of those who had emigrated to the West India Colonies. The hon. Baronet (Sir R. Inglis) had referred to the regulations as to the proportion of the sexes. Now it was a singular fact, of which probably the hon. Baronet was not aware, that it appeared from returns of the numbers of the sexes in the West Indies, that in many of the colonies the number of females exceeded that of males. In Dominica, out of 22,000 of both sexes, the preponderance of females over males was 1,000. In Trinidad and Guiana the numbers were nearly equal; and in Georgetown, Demerara, there was a considerable excess of females. The hon. Baronet had spoken with great horror of the disproportion of the sexes; but, if he instituted inquiries on the subject, he would find that the proportion which at present existed gave no cause for apprehension. Indeed, he believed that the proportion of females in the West Indies was greater than in Sierra Leone. He ought also to state, that before the regulation which had been referred to as to the proportion of the sexes was adopted, the opinions of the Governors of the West India Colonies, as well as of the Governor of Sierra Leone, were obtained, and the measure was adopted with their concurrence. The hon. Baronet then referred to the subject of bounties for immigration into the Mauritius; and he had stated, with perfect accuracy, that an ordinance with reference to this question had lately been received from the Mauritius, That ordinance was received only this morning. He believed, that at the period when it was despatched from the Mauritius, it had not been brought into operation in the Colony. An ordinance granting a bounty on the emigration of labourers into the Mauritius from the coast of Africa was issued in 1842; but (as we understood the hon. Gentleman) it was disallowed by the home Government. It would probably be satisfactory to the hon. Baronet to learn, that from the time when the ordinance to which the hon. Baronet had alluded was adopted, to the period of its despatch from the Colony, no labourer had emigrated from Africa at a bounty. He did not give any opinion as to the propriety of granting a bounty; but he stated this fact for the satisfaction of the hon. Baronet. The provisions of the ordinance had not yet been examined. It would undergo a careful and close examination; and the hon. Baronet might rest assured that nothing would be approved which could in the slightest degree contenance the Slave Trade. The hon. Baronet had referred to a note presented to the British Government by the Government of Spain, and had stated that our motives were liable to misconstruction. He was well aware of that; but, though our motives might be misconstrued, that was no reason for abandoning the principles we had adopted. He would refer the hon. Baronet to an answer to the note of the Spanish Government, which he would find at page 16 of the Papers for 1843, and which, in his opinion, was most conclusive and complete. His hon. Friend had expressed an opinion, that by promoting the immigration of free Africans to the West Indies, we were throwing a great obstacle in the way of the civilization of Africa. His belief was, that successful endeavours to civilize Africa must be carried out from the west, and not from the east. If they raised up in the West Indies a body of well-educated men—liberated Africans—they would be the most successful agents in civilizing their native country. It was unnecessary for him to say, that in order to civilize a barbarous people, they must be brought into contact and intercourse with those who enjoyed the advantages of civilization; and they were well aware what serious and almost insuperable obstacles prevented Europeans from taking an active part in the civilization of Africa. He need scarcely remind them of an enterprise undertaken some time ago with that object, when the lives of 58 persons out of 168 who were engaged in it were sacrificed; and in the case of another expedition, which proceeded up one of the northern rivers of Africa, three captains died within six weeks. The dangerous nature of the climate, however, he might observe, was not the only difficulty they had to encounter in similar attempts. He was fully convinced that, before they could adopt any effective measures for the civilization of Africa, they must establish a nursery in which they could civilize Africans, where they could instruct them in useful knowledge, impart to them the arts and sciences, and fit them to become the agents for disseminating the blessings of civilization among their own countrymen.

said, it was almost impossible for Members, generally, to discuss a question of this kind at the present moment, when some of the Papers alluded to by the hon. Under Secretary (Mr. G. W. Hope) were in possession only of the Colonial Office, although others had already been laid before the House. He was glad that the hon. Gentleman had agreed to produce the Papers moved for by the hon. Baronet opposite, because they would afford additional information on this very important subject. He (Mr. Aglionby) sympathised with the West India proprietors, who had, he conceived, laboured under very great disadvantages. He had, in his place in Parliament, opposed and voted against the loan, and subsequently against the grant of 20,000,000l. as compensation to the West India proprietors; and he had never had cause to regret the course he then pursued. Were those measures required by the West India planters, or by the slaves themselves? No. In his opinion they would have derived far greater advantage from a system of good government; for he believed few places had suffered more from misgovernment than the West India islands. He hoped the speech of the hon. Baronet would not have the effect of inducing the Government to relinquish a course which, in his (Mr. Aglionby's) opinion, would tend to promote the interests and prosperity of our West India Colonies. He would not have obtruded himself on the attention of the House on this occasion, but for a remark which fell from the hon. Under Secretary. He understood that hon. Member to express his belief that there were in Sierra Leone interested parties who exercised their influence to prevent the emigration thence of liberated Africans. That, if he mistook not, was the substance of the hon. Gentle- man's statement. He wished to ask the hon. Gentleman to state, if he could without impropriety, who were the parties to whom he alluded. He would be very reluctant to mention any class of individuals whom he believed to have been indicated by the hon. Gentleman, because he might thereby do them an injustice he should afterwards regret; but he hoped the hon. Member would favour him with an answer to his inquiry. It was, he considered, most desirable that the hon. Gentleman should do so, because there was a feeling abroad—which he would mention, though be did not wish to do injustice to humane and worthy individuals in this country and at Sierra Leone—that the missionaries were the parties who had done this mischief. He mentioned this as a common feeling. He might stale, with reference to New Zealand—a Colony with which he was well acquainted, and with regard to which a Committee, of which the hon. Member for Oxford was Chairman, was appointed last year—that it had been asserted openly and publicly, and be had every reason to believe it, that the missionaries were the parties who had retarded the progress of that, one of the first Colonies under the control of the British Crown. It had been stated, that the missionaries had there produced injuries without end; that they had almost destroyed the British settlers, and that they had retarded the advancement of the aborigines themselves. He hoped this question would be hereafter a subject of inquiry, when the matter might be fully investigated. He mentioned the subject to-night in order that he might bring it to the notice of the House, and of those high-minded and influential individuals who constituted the Church Missionary Society, to the missionaries of which he had particularly alluded, than whom a more humane set of persons, he believed, did not exist. But he feared those worthy individuals had been misled; and he mentioned this subject openly, in order that if any members of that Society were present, they might look rather more strictly after the proceedings of their agents. He was himself most anxious for the extension of Christianity and civilisation; and on this ground he was desirous that the conductors of this Society should take care that no mismanagement occurred on the part of those to whom they gave their confidence. The hon. Baronet had moved for the return of a letter addressed to Lord Stanley by the Lay Secretary of the Church Missionary Society, on the 26th of November, 1844. He could not, of course, express any opinion with regard to that letter at present; but he was glad that an opportunity would be afforded him of seeing the letter of the Lay Secretary, whose name, he believed, was Mr. Dandeson Coates, as they might be able to judge from it how far he had been successful in dictating to the Colonial Secretary and to Members of Parliament. He must say that he thought the Church Missionary Society should pay more attention to the conduct of their officers. He could state that circular letters had been sent to many influential constituents in various parts of the Kingdom, requesting them to hand a pamphlet by Mr. Dandeson Coates to their respective Representatives, and callling upon them to induce those Representatives to oppose the recommendations made by the Committee on New Zealand. He would read to the House a copy of one of these circulars, which had been ad dressed to an elector in a borough in England. [The hon. Gentleman read the letter, which requested, on the part of the Committee of the Church Missionary Society, that the person addressed would transmit, or present through some influential medium, the inclosed pamphlet to the Member for —; and also use his in fluence to induce such Member to op pose the recommendations of the Select Committee on New Zealand in the ensuing Session of Parliament, and thus enforce the just claims of the New Zealanders to their lands.] He hoped he would not be accused af any discourtesy to the Church Missionary Society; but he did think it right to call attention to this subject, more especially as a letter from the same source had found its way into one of their blue books. He might also be allowed to allude to a denial which had been given to the statement that the missionaries in New Zealand possessed large tracts of land, when he held in his hand a paper stating they had claimed no less than 196,000 acres. He hoped that nothing he had said would be regarded as conveying the slightest imputation upon the motives or conduct of any member of the Church Missionary Society; for his only object in mentioning the matter had been to state to the conductors of that institution that a strong feeling existed on this subject, and to give them an opportunity of investigating the conduct of their agents.

, in answer to the question of the hon. Gentleman, might state that the remark he had made had no reference to the Church Missionaries. He was not now going to enter into the New Zealand question; but what he had stated with reference to Sierra Leone was this:—that Africans who had been liberated, and had amassed a small sum of money, were anxious to take into their employment other liberated Africans, and were consequently averse to emigration. The Gentlemen who had been commissioned to inquire into the causes which prevented emigration to the West Indies had reported that the merchants and inhabitants of Sierra Leone generally were averse to emigration, which they said could not benefit the West Indies, and had a tendency to lower the rate of wages there. In all the passages on this subject the impediments to emigration were attributed to the old residents, who were afraid of losing the labour of the liberated Africans.

thought the observations of the hon. Member for Cockermouth (Mr. Aglionby) had no bearing upon the question before the House. He would defy any person to trace any connexion, however remote, between the subject of emigration from Sierra Leone to the West Indies, and the conduct or misconduct of the Church Missionary Society. He would not enter into the question raised by the hon. Member as to the conduct of agents of that society on the coast of New Zealand. But the hon. Gentleman complained that circulars had been issued by the Committee of that Society, recommending a pamphlet to the attention of constituents in different boroughs, and requesting them to urge the advocacy of certain view supon their Representatives. Why, if the hon. Gentleman opposite had chosen, he might have issued counter-statements in the same manner. In reference to the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for the University of Oxford, the question had been so completely exhausted by him that very little was left to be said upon it; but he regretted to find that his hon. Friend was recommencing the old battle. He had hoped his hon. Friend would not have brought the Motion forward. What could his hon. Friend mean by "the blood and the suffering" of the African? If there had been no option allowed to the African, he might then have been able to make out a case of hardship; but the facts were that there was an option—that they were transported in vessels provided under the care of the Colonial Government—and that they were removed from a Colony where they had no chance of rising in the scale of civilization to where there was every means and appliance for their doing so. He confessed he regretted this Motion of hit hon. Friend. He did not wish to refer to the Report of the Committee; but he must say it proved that every means had been taken to prevent even the suspicion of wrong—that the principle had been scrupulously adhered to of not allowing any African to go to or from any but an English Colony—and that every precaution was taken that the patties who migrated were not exposed to any violence. It was satisfactory to him to hear from the Under Secretary for the Colonies that the apprehensions which had been inspired in certain parties in this country, that the missionaries had interposed obstructions to immigration into the West Indies were entirely unfounded.

said, that having been a Member of the Committee of 1842, it appeared to him no fact had been brought forward by the hon. Baronet which had not been under the consideration of that Committee. The Committee patiently and elaborately entered upon a consideration of all those points, and after having done so they made a Report decidedly in favour of that immigration which the hon. Baronet had advised in part. He did not generally follow the views of Her Majesty's Government, but he was bound to give his cordial support to their policy on this question. He only regretted that the same policy had not been adopted earlier, and that it had not been voluntarily carried oat. It was impossible to deny to the hon. Baronet the praise of having stated his view of the case with considerable moderation and fairness. He only wished that some others would follow his example. He was convinced, that if Her Majesty's Government would only pursue boldly the course they had now adopted—if they would turn a deaf ear to mischievous meddlers—if they would throw Often oar West India plantations to the free immigration of the African race, they would promote the cause of improvement to an extent that he believed scarcely so much could be accomplished by any other single line of policy. This policy, he knew very well, would not give satisfaction to all parties; but for a moment let the good be considered which it set before us. He would remark, then, that by pursuing this policy we should repay that debt we owed to the African to which the hon. Baronet had referred; the African race, so long oppressed, we should raise in the scale of civilization; we should rescue the West Indies, to which we owed a great and heavy debt, from a position of difficulty; and at the same time we should have the satisfaction of throwing open to our own country a great extension of Colonial empire. By such means, he was persuaded we should realize the dreams of Wilberforce, Clarkson, and Buxton, and throw off the manacles of slavery all over the world. If, he repeated, we only allowed the West Indies the opportunity of cultivation by the free immigration of the coloured race, slavery, which had resisted all our attempts to overthrow it in the United States, in Mexico, and in the Brazils, would be entirely prostrated, because we should be able to undersell the employers of slaves. We should also put down the African Slave Trade, without collision or quarrel with our powerful neighbours, because these means were more certain than any which the treaties of politicians could ever effect, inasmuch as they would ruin its supporters. He therefore called upon Her Majesty's Government to carry out this policy honestly and courageously. We had long enough tried the system so much contended for by the trading philanthropists of Exeter Hall, the consequence of which had been that we had reduced our West India Colonies almost to the verge of ruin, prodigiously increased the price of sugar, and given a great impetus to the unspeakable horrors of the Slave Trade, besides sacrificing the lives of numbers of gallant seamen upon the What good had been derived from all this? With the exception of hearing some of the gentlemen of Exeter Hall and Mr. Dandeson Coates, we had derived no advantage whatever. He rejoiced to hear from the Under Secretary of State, that Her Majesty's Government was not disposed to submit to dictation; and he hoped they would continue boldly to pursue the course they had adopted with regard to our Colonial concerns.

recollected nothing whatever in the speech of his hon. Friend the Member for the University of Oxford, to justify the observations that had fallen from the hon. Member (Mr. Hutt). The noble Lord (Lord Sandon) also appeared to have rather misinterpreted the observations of the hon. Baronet (Sir R. Inglis). The hon. Baronet had been assumed to have argued as if he thought it was a very objectionable course of proceeding to remove the liberated Africans from Sierra Leone to the West Indies, in the circumstances under which the regulation to do so was established. He did not understand his hon. Friend (Sir R. Inglis) to mean that. His motive in bringing forward the Motion was, that in his opinion a change had been introduced into the regulations for the removal of the African population which was not consistent with justice towards them, and not likely to conduce to the successful result of the operation. His hon. Friend, if he thought that, was justified in introducing the Motion, and he deserved no little praise for having submitted it to the House, because there was no question, if we were to carry this system out, and give the negro in Sierra Leone an option on the question of his removal to the West Indies, it was desirable on all grounds that the option should be properly guarded. Above all, it was desirable that regulations should be made as effective as possible in order to secure that option. Whether it were desirable to continue the option was another question. There were those who thought the option should be altogether withdrawn—that when the negro was liberated he should be told there was a market for his labour in the West Indies, and the Government would remove him there without any option; but as the option was to be given, he contended that it behoved the House and the Government to see that regulations were adopted to secure to the liberated African the proper degree of option. His hon. Friend had moved for these Papers, asserting a change restricting the regulation; and he could not be sorry at the Motion, because it had elicited a reply from his hon. Friend the Under Secretary for the Colonies which must be satisfactory to all who had paid attention to the question. The regulation now was, that the African should be required to proceed to the West Indies by the first opportunity; and this being so, he could not help thinking, with his hon. Friend, that it contained within it something of hardship; for it was impossible to suppose that parties in the position of the unfortunate Africans, immediately after liberation from a slave ship, could either sup- port themselves in the Colony or exercise an option. He did not mean to contend that from this time forward it would be undesirable to believe that the African benefited by the change from Sierra Leone to the West Indies; on the contrary, he believed, that under this regulation, if properly carried out, the advantage to the African was inevitable; but, at the same time, it was our duty and our business, when we placed them at Sierra Leone, to provide such assistance as should secure them the power of option. He could not help thinking that his hon. Friend, instead of deserving blame for the Motion he had made, deserved the thanks of the House.

could scarcely believe that the hon. Member for the West Riding had correctly heard the speech of his hon. Friend (Mr. Hutt); for, so far from casting any discredit upon the hon. Member for the University of Oxford, he appealed to the House if his hon. Friend had not spoken in terms of praise and commendation of the temper and moderation in which the Motion had been brought forward. The hon. Member, for instance, had expressed his earnest wish that all parties who took the same views as the hon. Baronet would conduct themselves with equal moderation and with equal regard to strict verity and truth. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Wortley), under cover of the hon. Member for the University of Oxford, had defended parties whose conduct his hon. Friend (Mr. Hutt) did impugn; but anybody who knew the history of the West Indies since the emancipation, and who knew anything of the efforts made to introduce slavery into those Colonies, must know there had been parties, mistaken, misguided, and short-sighted, who had done their utmost, in a suicidal manner, to verify all the predictions of the enemies of emancipation, and to falsify all the statements of its friends. As to the attack which had been made upon the operations of the Church Missonary Society, he must say that he was a member of that Society, and could bear testimony that on India, where the missionaries were under the eye of a strong; Government, the Society had conferred great blessings; but he must admit that in some other places the efforts of the missionaries had had an injurious effect.

said, it was not his intention to prolong the discussion by any observations. As to the labours of the missionaries, he must be permitted to say that to these labours, by which this country was highly distinguished, and in which our Colonial Empire was deeply interested, he was willing to award due praise. It was very possible that the interference of missionaries might in some cases have been found injurious. But every Englishman who had his country's interest at heart, and who was desirous of availing himself of all opportunities of usefulness—let his object be the promotion of commerce, the spread of religion, or the advancement of science—did naturally come home to the Government of this country, being assured that if his object were one likely to be beneficial, he would have an impartial hearing. Therefore, if it was found that parties had besieged the Colonial Office a little more than was usual or desirable, forgiveness might readily be extended to them for so doing. But his principal reason for claiming a moment's indulgence of the House was, that a reference had been made to him by the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary for the Colonies upon a subject which was once one of the most hopeful and buoyant among the English public, and which afterwards turned out to be one of the most painful. The hon. Gentleman appealed to him whether he was not conscious of the difficulty of any attempt to attain the beneficent objects of this country, and whether he should not justify him (the Under Secretary for the Colonies) for being cautious in the exercise of his power in sending Europeans into climates that had proved so very disastrous. Now, he (Sir T. Acland) was certain that every one who took part in forwarding that not useless expedition—he meant the expedition to the Niger, which it did not please God to crown with success—had done considerable good. For the result of that expedition was, he felt certain, the forwarding the commerce of Africa nearly a quarter of a century; and its beneficial effects would, he was persuaded, be experienced a century hence. But, with all the hopeful expectations they might justly entertain of the benefits to accrue at a future period, they could not help remembering and lamenting the loss of human life that had taken place in the expedition that had been referred to. The partial failure of this expedition was a great disappointment, in the midst of his anxious and beneficent solicitude, to one of the ablest sons of British humanity. He meant Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, who was at the head of that expedition, and who had lately been removed from among us. He (Sir T. Acland) was sure that there was no one in that House who would not willingly render to the character of that distinguished philanthropist the merited tribute of praise. There were some circumstances which he thought had not been fairly brought before the notice of the public. It had been very much the custom, and it was to him a great disappointment—it had been very much the custom to imagine that the expedition to the Niger was one of the most disastrous expeditions in which this country had ever been engaged. But such was not the case. The first efforts made, either for the promotion of commerce or religion in an uncivilized country were generally attended with disaster; and in the expedition to the Niger there had been sacrifices which they all deplored; but that expedition had not been so disastrous as was imagined by many parties. Sacrifices had always taken place in such cases. The hon. Member proceeded to mention, that five months had been spent by a party in the country referred to, and that the loss of life was comparatively small. And he took courage from a fact mentioned in the United Service Gazette, in the early part of 1842—it was a most singular coincidence. It was stated, that in one of the West India islands, there was a regiment which lost almost the exact proportion of men during that summer which was lost in the Niger expedition. That fact might, he thought, tend to a certain extent to relieve the feelings of sorrow and disappointment caused by the partial failure of the expedition. With respect to the subject brought immediately under the notice of the House by the hon. Baronet the Member for the University of Oxford, he entirely agreed in the recommendation that the labour of liberated Africans should be made available in the West Indies. He thought that much good would result from an interchange between persons resident on both sides of the Atlantic. He remembered that when the question as to the employment of Coolies was under discussion, he took no part whatever against that Motion, because he could never understand why, if they refused a man slave labour, they could turn about and say that he was not to have free labour. The only question they had at that time to consider was, the regulations; and the only question they had at the present to consider was, the regulations. They must take care in their regulations respecting the liberated slave of Sierra Leone that they gave him a bonâ fide—a free choice or option as to remove to the West Indies—not confined to a day, or a week, or a month. The hon. Baronet proceeded to observe that native missionaries were being provided for the distant scenes of the operations of the missionary societies. The Bishop of London had lately ordained two or three Africans as missionaries; and one of the most distinguished missionaries of a society unconnected with the Church Missionary Society was the son of an African; and he was glad that the employment of native agency was sanctioned by the example of the Colonial Office itself.

believed that the Church Missionary Society had performed its labours well. He defended the Lay Secretary from the imputations that had been cast upon him. He had had a long acquaintance with that gentleman, and he must say that he was wholly undeserving of the censures made upon him.

replied. He had perhaps used too strong an expression, since it was so regarded by his noble Friend (Lord Sandon); yet he could hardly admit it, after it had been so kindly vindicated by his hon. Friend the Member for the West Riding (Mr. Stuart Wortley). As the papers were to be granted, it was not necessary for him to say much; but he must rejoice in the assurance of his hon. Friend the Under Secretary for the Colonies, that, while the words of the Governor's Proclamation might bear the interpretation put upon it, it was not intended to act upon it literally. His hon. Friend told him, that he was mistaken in assuming that nine years of age had been fixed as the period at which children were removed from the schools; whereas it was twelve, "a great difference in a tropical country." All he could say was, that the earlier age was stated in a letter which he held in his hand, from one who had been in the Colony at the time. He again thanked the House for their patient attention.

said, he was about to ask some information from Her Majesty's Government with reference to a matter which was well entitled to the attention of the House. In bringing forward the subject, it was not necessary to refer to the interest which the proceedings in China had created in the mind of this country, or to the grati- fication with which public opinion regarded the brilliant and successful career of Sir Henry Pottinger in that country, rendering the position of any one who succeeded that distinguished individual one of considerable difficulty, from the disadvantageous contrast in which he would necessarily be placed. It must be the universal wish of all parties in England, that all our proceedings in that country should be characterized by prudence and wisdom, and that no impression should be left upon the inhabitants of our newly-founded Colony, or upon the extraordinary people amongst whom that Colony was placed, which might be unfavourable to the character of the English people. Proceedings which had recently taken place at Hong-Kong, and with respect to which he wished to obtain some authentic information, were of such a nature, that they could scarcely fail to leave an unfavourable impression with respect to us; and therefore it was desirable that the House should be fully informed upon the subject, so that if the statements which had reached this country through unofficial channels would be explained by facts of an authoritative character, the error and mistakes which appeared to have been made, might be excused or explained. For according to present appearances the conduct of the Governor of Hong-Kong had been hasty—injudicious—indefensible; and he should, previously to requiring information upon the subject, lay before the House what had been communicated to him with reference to the circumstances to which he he alluded. On the 21st of August, 1844, an ordinance was prepared by the Governor and Council of Hong-Kong, which was not promulgated until two months after, which showed that the document was not rashly issued, but that it had been promulgated after long consideration. The document to which he alluded stated that

"To secure tranquillity and good order in the Colony of Hong-Kong and its dependencies, and to prevent the resort there of abandoned characters and of persons without any ostensible means of subsistence, it was expedient that a registry be established of persons resident therein."

The mode, however, of carrying out the objects proposed in that document was of so inquisitorial a character, that it was calculated to lead to great resistance, and to be warmly opposed by all who were subjected to its control. The ordinance spoke of Hong-Kong and its dependencies; and he would ask, where were those dependencies? He thought it would be well if the Governor had defined what those dependencies were. The first clause of the ordinance went on to say,—

"Be it further enacted and ordained, that from and after the first day of November next, all male inhabitants of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, or capable of earning a livelihood, resident in the Colony of Hong-Kong, shall be required once in every year to appear personally at the said office, or at such branch offices as may from time to time be established by the Governor in Council, to be registered in manner hereinafter mentioned."

That ordinance contained provisions which were to apply, not only to the British merchants, but to all persons resident in Hong-Kong; and some of those provisions were of such a nature, that they were opposed to the feelings, not only of the merchants, but were so much more especially so to the habits and usages of oriental countries, that it would be quite impossible to carry them out. It went on to say,—

"Be it further enacted and ordained, that the said Registrar-General, or such other officer, so to be appointed as aforesaid, shall and may in all cases where he shall deem it advisable, inquire into, and acquaint himself with the age, birth-place, and residence of every person so to be registered, and with his occupation, and the date of his arrival in the Colony aforesaid; and with the circumstances of his family and connexions, and with their places of residence, and occupation; and shall and may ascertain whether the said applicant be married, and of what number his family consists, and whether male or female: and that he do enter or cause to be entered all such particulars in a book to be kept for that purpose."

If such provisions were calculated to be repulsive to the feelings of the British at Hong-Kong, he (Dr. Bowring) could state, from his knowledge of oriental society and manners, that it would, in his opinion, be impossible to carry them into operation, when the retirement of the household could scarcely even be penetrated. Even at Cairo, a few years since, the Government wholly failed in an attempt to make a census of the population, being resisted by the universal feeling of the public. What was the consequence of this attempt at Hong-Kong? The result was, that a great number of persons left the Colony—the bazaar was in a state of great commotion, public works were suspended, and the market at Victoria was for a time thrown into great confu- sion. The details of the registration ordinance were as obnoxious as its general character. There was no appeal allowed against the decision of the Registrar-General; all headmen and contractors were made responsible for the registration of all those in their employment; and every one liable to be registered was bound, under the ordinance, to report himself, in order to be registered before the expiration of twenty-four hours after his arrival in the Colony, under a penalty of twenty dollars. It was further ordained that all tepos and overseers should be bound to give a return, when called upon by the proper officer, of the names and occupation, and all the particulars before-mentioned, of all persons residing in their respective villages or districts, with the number of each house, according to the register, and the number of persons residing in each house, or be liable to a penalty of twenty dollars for each and every person so required to be registered. It also ordained that every householder should give a return of the names, and the number of persons in his employment, or residing within his house or on his premises; and if the returns were not made before a certain day named in the ordinance, he was to be fined twenty dollars; then there was a fee of five dollars for registering every resident being a merchant, shopkeeper, or comprador, or being in the receipt of a monthly income of twenty dollars or upwards, with a fee of three dollars for registering any person who was a servant, clerk, or mechanic, or was in the receipt of a monthly income not exceeding twenty dollars, and no less than ten dollars; and the fee for registering every person being a Coolie boatman or labourer, or being in receipt of a monthly income of less than ten dollars, was to be one dollar. The appearance of such a document naturally created the greatest sensation in the Colony, for all were opposed to a system of such an inquisitorial nature, which inquired not only as to individuals themselves, but to their connexions; and a public meeting was held, at which the dissatisfaction of the inhabitants was expressed, and a memorial adopted on the subject. With reference to a meeting of the Chinese, which had been held on that subject, the Governor stated that he had received a communication from the assistant magistrate of police, to the following effect:—

"My information leads me to believe that other than Chinese influence has been exerted to mature the late movement. The leading part taken by the comprador of an English firm—the meeting of Chinese held at the house of that firm—the intimate knowledge displayed by the Chinese of the proceedings of certain English regarding the registration, and their adoption of precisely similar language—would seem to mark most clearly the assistance and co-operation of one or more Englishmen."

And the Governor went on to say,—

"He would fain hope, for the sake of the British character, that none could have been found capable of thus tampering with the Chinese population; but as the subject had come officially before him, he deemed it necessary to take that public notice of it, and to draw the attention of any who could descend to such unworthy practices, to the consequences entailed on the ignorant and unfortunate Chinese, who had been necessarily subjected by the magistrates to severe punishment."

That would show the view which was taken of the ordinance at Hong-Kong. The parties at that meeting distinctly repudiated, by resolution, all intention of disrespect, and again expressed their disapproval of the ordinance. He was not sure that without reference to the home Government, the authority of levying taxes existed in the Governor of Hong-Kong; but that the mode adopted was imprudent there could be no doubt. Subsequently a letter was received, in which it was stated, that the representations made to the Governor were of so disrespectful a character, that all further communications between him and the merchants must cease while such sentiments continued to be maintained by them; and that they were indebted wholly to the ignorance of the Governor and Council, occasioned by the delay of their letter of the 31st, for any answer whatever to what now appeared to be their third communication. Now this was not the friendly position in which the principal inhabitants of a new Colony ought to stand in relation to its authorities. He thought these parties had an undoubted right to represent what they considered to be a great grievance, and to state the fact that the ordinance had stopped their commercial affairs. The result was, that the present Governor was obliged to withdraw the ordinance. After the Chinese had been induced to submit to all the terms which we saw fit to enforce upon them, here was one of the first acts of the new Governor—a measure which he was obliged to retract—thus giving to those against whom it was directed a triumph, which must be most dangerous to good and regular Government, and must be a source of great confusion. The object which he now sought was to obtain a communication of the Papers, and to invite from the Government such an explanation as they might be disposed to offer; and unless something more were said than was contained in the Papers in his hand, he should feel it necessary hereafter to take further steps to ascertain whether there was any justification for the proceedings to which he had called the attention of the House. The hon. Gentleman then moved—

"That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, that She will be graciously pleased to give directions that there be laid before this House, Copies or Extracts of Correspondence relative to the issue and suspension of an Ordinance of the Governor of Hong-Kong, dated 21st August last, for the registration of the population of that Colony, and for establishing a Poll Tax on the inhabitants to cover the expenses of said registration."

could not, on the part of the Department with which he was connected, consent to the production of the correspondence; neither could he suffer the observations of the hon. Gentleman to pass without some notice. In the first place, he had to complain that the hon. Gentleman should, without waiting for the whole correspondence, so that the case might be fairly stated, have made an attack upon the conduct of Mr. Davis. That Gentleman had for years been superintendent of the trade in China, and had been selected by his right hon. Friend as especially fitted for the appointment, and be had given great satisfaction in the discharge of his duties. The hon. Gentleman seemed to consider such a law as a registration law inconsistent and difficult of application in a new Colony like Hong-Kong; but he thought it much more easy in a new Colony than in an old city like Cairo. He should be doing injustice to Mr. Davis, if he did not state that the principle of the law in question had received the sanction of the noble Lord at the head of the Colonial Department. The House would recollect that Hong-Kong was small in extent, and was close to a dense population of Chinese. It was infested by rogues and vagabonds of every description; robberies were committed in the most daring manner. As one instance, the House of a merchant had been attacked early in the night by 150 men. To restrain these excesses by a proportionate force was almost impossible; and the next best thing was considered to be a police regulation in the nature of registration, so as to prevent persons who were not of good character from residing there. As to the tax in question, it was intended to cover the expense of the proceeding, and that did not seem an unfair mode of supplying the means of carrying such a regulation into effect. At the same time the whole subject was under the consideration of Mr. Davis, and, until further explanation should be received, he (Mr. Hope) was not prepared to say more on the subject.

hoped that the Motion would be withdrawn. There was nothing which appeared to him more likely to retard the progress of the Colony than these premature discussions. In order to assist the House to form a just estimate of the impression which this ordinance made on the spot, he should read to them the following extracts from the Hong-Kong Gazette:—

"The clauses of the last ordinance which were felt to be so obnoxious have been withdrawn, much to the credit of the Government and Legislative Council. As it now stands we have little to find fault with. We hear objections from parties, whose opinions we respect, to some of the clauses of the registration ordinance. We confess that the whole document is un-English, but at the same time the state of affairs renders it indispensable. We must bear in mind that Hong-Kong is an anomaly in Colonial history, and that we must not seek elsewhere for measures which here are unavoidable."

The advices which he had received informed him that the ordinance had been withdrawn; at the same time, in the opinion of those who had an opportunity of judging of the facts, it had been rendered necessary by the state of the Colony. He was of that opinion, and entirely approved of the ordinances: they were absolutely required in the existing circumstances of the Colony. At the same time, he must remark, that the favourable Tariff of duties which had been conceded by the Chinese was undoubtedly a "heavy blow and great discouragement" to those who expected the prosperity of the Colony to be promoted by branches of trade which were not legitimate. Mr. Davis, as had been stated by the hon. Member opposite, was well qualified for the duties confided to him, as well by his attainments as by his natural abilities. He had given many proofs of his judgment and skill; and he was selected for the post which he filled solely on account of his high character and his qualifications. But whatever might be the talents with which he was endowed, his situation was, from the peculiar circumstances of the Colony, a very hard and difficult one. He had to deal with a population of 15,000 Chinese, all seeking to evade the contact or control of both the Chinese and the English Governments, and he found it necessary to control them by some stringent regulations. The differences which had arisen were not originated by any act of Mr. Davis. It was even admitted on the spot that he had done more to promote the prosperity of the Colony in six months than had been achieved in the two previous years of its occupation by the English.

said, that he did not understand the hon. Gentleman opposite to state decidedly that he would not by and by communicate the document to the House. He had said that at present the information was imperfect, and be (Dr. Bowring) would certainly not do Mr. Davis the injustice of resting the case upon imperfect documents. If there was any defence of which we had no knowledge, Mr. Davis ought to have the advantage of them. His hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth stated, that he had received information that the document had been wholly withdrawn. That was not the purport of the communication which he (Dr. Bowring) had received. The Hong-Kong Register, of the 12th of November stated, that the postponement of the Act had restored matters to their former state, that most of the Coolies who had left the settlement seemed to have returned, and the public and private works that had been brought to a stand were again in a state of progress. It proceeded to say, "We have heard that upwards of 3,000 left in the course of two days, affording a sufficient proof of itself how much harm would have resulted from enforcing the measure which has in the meantime been wisely withdrawn, and we hope will not again be promulgated without being divested of the offensive clauses." As far as he could judge, the amount of the justification of Mr. Davis came to this, that he had put forward an ordinance which he was not able to defend, which he had in consequence withdrawn, and that a great many of its obnoxious clauses had been removed; and he could not but think that such an exhibition in the Colony of Hong-Kong, or in any other Colony, did no credit to the British authority. With leave of the House he would withdraw his Motion in its present form, retaining to himself the right of bringing it forward by and by, when the necesary documents were in the hands of the Government.

Sir, I should not have considered it consistent with that duty which I am called upon to perform, to have troubled the House at any length upon the subject of the Motion which I am about to make had I not thought that a very great impression has been created on the public mind by misapprehension, and that a very great degree of anxiety exists amongst the medical practitioners, with respect to the alterations which it is the intention of the bills which I am about to ask leave to bring in, to introduce into that profession. I should not but for this have trespassed at so late an hour upon the attention of the House. But the House will no doubt remember, when I introduced, at the latter end of last Session, a Bill for the regulation of the medical profession, I then stated, that considering the various important interests which that measure would affect, as well with respect to the public at large, as to the medical practitioners themselves, hasty legislation upon such a subject would not only be inexpedient, but also unjust to the profession; and that I thought I should best consult the public interest, and accord that general justice which was due to all parties, if I laid the projected measure in its then state upon the Table of the House, in order that its merits, and the various enactments which were proposed in its clauses, might be canvassed and thoroughly sifted during the ensuing recess. It is not denied that this proceeding on my part was characterized by fairness and by a willingness to afford an opportunity for thoroughly examining the proposed Bill; and I am now prepared to admit also its usefulness, for the discussions which have since taken place with respect to that measure, have enabled me to state the changes which I am now prepared to submit to the consideration of the House. And, first, it will be necessary for me to recapitulate the leading objects of the Bill to which I refer, and then I shall state the change which I have introduced in the measure I am now about to propose. The first provision of that Bill to which I propose to adhere is the establishment of a Council of Health, which shall have the superintendence and control over medical and surgical education, and which shall constitute a Board, the seat of which shall be in the metropolis, so as to be easy of access to the Executive Government, in order to assist the authorities with its advice upon all questions affecting the health of the people at large, such as on occasions when the cholera rages, or when fevers or epidemics are abroad. The Sanatory Board will advise the measures to be taken by the Government with reference to the general health of the people in large and populous cities, and it will constitute a council easily accessible at all times to the Executive Government, for its seat will be in the metropolis. This is the first object of the Bill. The second object which the measure is intended to effect, is to abolish all monopolies of the medical profession, and to secure to all medical practitioners equal facilities of practice, as well as to afford the security to the public of an equality of attainments on the part of the medical practitioners, so that whilst on the one hand equality of practice is given to the profession, equality of attainments is secured to the public on the other hand; these attainments being certified and made notorious to the public by the registration of all the medical practitioners after they shall have undergone an examination before the constituted authorities, and thereby afforded a proof that they have come up to that standard which shall be deemed requisite to qualify them to practise in medicine and surgery; and by the law, as it will in future stand, no title to practise in the three kingdoms will be given in any one of the branches of medicine and surgery to those who shall not have undergone such an examination, and shall not have been found competent. These were the leading objects of the Bill which I introduced last year; to those objects I still adhere in the Bill which I contemplate; and if the House gives me permission to bring it in, it shall be my care that the provisions which I have pointed out shall be fully secured to the public. Having thus shortly stated the leading objects of the proposed measure, I will now proceed to lay before the House the alterations in the Bill of last Session which it is my intention to make. In that Bill I proposed to repeal the Statute of Henry VIII. (14 and 15, c. 5), which gives to the members of the College of Physicians the exclusive right of practising as physicians in the metropolis, and within seven miles of it. I do not now propose to repeal that Act entirely; but I do so only so far as to exempt from its penalties all physicians who shall be registered according to the provisions of the proposed measure; and I have also framed a clause whereby the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge will be exempted from the operation of the new Bill, and their graduates will consequently be secured in all their present privileges. There exists, I am sorry to say, both at Cambridge and Oxford, a great jealousy respecting their exclusive and peculiar privileges, which they have not as yet consented to forego, and to come within the operation of the proposed measure; I have, therefore, thought it expedient to introduce a clause into this Bill exempting their graduates entirely from its operation, and consequently conferring on them the right to practise according to their respective degrees throughout all England and Wales, save and except in the metropolis, and within seven miles of it. This provision securing the existing rights of the two Universities will be inserted in the proposed Bill, unless they shall, subsequently to its introduction, agree on certain terms to come under its operation. The particular arrangement which it is desirable to accomplish between the College of Physicians and the Universities, is, that assessors from the College of Physicians shall go down to Cambridge and Oxford, and have the power of granting medical degrees in conjunction with the academical authorities, which degrees shall confer on the graduate the same right of practising in the metropolis, and within seven miles of it, which they will possess with respect to all the other parts of England and Wales, under the operation of the clause I have already referred to. If the Universities shall, previous to the passing of this Bill into a law, consent to wave their exclusive privileges, and to place their graduates under its operation, then the exemption clause can be withdrawn in Committee, and the same arrangement can be made with respect to them, which I am happy to say the Universities in Ireland and Scotland have already acceded to. I now come to the question more particularly referred to in the petition just presented by my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesex; namely, the question of the repeal of the Apothecaries' Act. After having reflected upon this subject with great anxiety, I have come to the conclusion that it is not expedient to propose the total repeal of the Apothecaries' Act. It is my intention to propose the repeal of that Act only so far as parties who shall be registered under the Bill I am about to introduce shall be concerned. A great complaint made against the measure proposed by me last Session was, that I gave no additional security against empiricism, and that I abolished the penalties already in force. In the present Bill, whilst I propose the partial repeal of the Apothecaries' Act, I shall leave the full powers to enforce penalties untouched which the Apothecaries' Company now enjoys. The Apothecaries' Company will still be allowed to prosecute all those practitioners who shall not be registered under this Bill, and who shall practise without being licentiates of their body. I confess, Sir, that I do not attach much value to the enforcement of these penalties, but I am content to leave the power. Nor do I stop here; I do hope that I shall be able to give an additional security to that offered in the Bill of last year; and as I think it is a security which I can offer consistently with the principle I maintain, against the simulation of the right to practise by an individual who shall not be duly enrolled; I cannot regard it as an offence for any person not professing to possess the required standard of an examination, to practise surgery or medicine, subject to the risk which he runs of a criminal prosecution, and, I believe also, of a civil action, if any injury shall result from his practice. He will still be subject to the general operation of the law; and if he does not pretend to be what he is not, I cannot see why we should make any new crime to make him amenable. I propose, however, to go the length of saying that there shall be an additional restraint, by making it penal for any unqualified person to assume the title of physician, of surgeon, or of apothecary or doctor, or any other title recognised by this Bill. My best course, however, will be, as this is a most important clause, that I should read the whole clause, which runs in these words:—

"And be it enacted, that every unregistered person who shall wilfully and falsely pretend to be, or take or use the name or title of physician, doctor, bachelor, or inceptor in the faculty of medicine, or surgeon, or licentiate in medicine and surgery, or apothecary, (I retain that, because I do not now propose to repeal the Apothecaries' Act,) or any name, title, or addition implying that he is registered under this Act, or recognized by law as a medical or surgical practitioner, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanour in England and Ireland, and in Scotland of a crime and offence, and being convicted thereof, shall be punished by fine or imprisonment, or both, as the Court before which he shall be convicted shall award."

I shall meet many objections by this provision; and I feel it consistent with my duty to go this full length against empiricism, and against the pretenders to medical titles who have not the qualifications they claim. I propose, also, to repeal so much of the Apothecaries' Act as requires the examiners, who will hereafter be conjoined with physicians in the examination of licentiates in medicine, of necessity to be members of the civic Guild of Apothecaries of the city of London. The examiners are now part and parcel of a civic guild, the admission to which may be by purchase or by inheritance, without any medical knowledge or examination. In lieu of the present provision, I propose that the qualification for an examiner shall in future be, an apothecary of ten years' standing, who shall be in practice as an apothecary; or a licentiate in medicine of ten years' standing; anticipating that, after the lapse of ten years, the examiners will, in fact, be licentiates in medicine under this Act, and that under the general name of "licentiates" the examiners will be general practitioners. I come now to another alteration, to which I attach great importance. I confess that I could earnestly desire to see one admission to practice by an examination common to all, and that after all shall have passed one common portal, each should choose what branch of medicine he may wish to practise. My desire would have been to see that common examination; but I have found objections raised to that plan which appear to me to be reasonable and to be insuperable. The College of Physicians has always attached—and, as it appears to me, they rightly attached—great importance to a university education; and to enforce upon persons who have received that education another examination, such as would be enforced upon others at an earlier period, would greatly increase the protracted study of the physician, who could not, according to my proposal, enter into practice as a physician till he is twenty-six years of age, which is certainly not too late a period of life for a physician to commence practice. This objection is made—that academical education, which is his best foundation in arts, literature and science, is not so various, and not so full upon particular points of the curriculum of surgical and medical instruction as may be acquired by attendance on chemical lectures, and by walking hospitals. This objection, does not apply to surgeons; and I have great satisfaction in knowing, as far as my inquiries have gone, that there is not, on the part of the College of Surgeons, or of the surgeons generally, any objection to a provision in this Bill to which I attach great importance—that no one shall be qualified as a surgeon till he is twenty-five years of age, or unless he shall have been previously examined as a licentiate in surgery and medicine, and shall have passed the examination as licentiate in medicine as well as surgery. There was also an objection made to the Bill of last year, which was not so much a real as an apparent objection—that there was no direct provision for an examination in midwifery. I propose, that henceforth it shall be necessary to make provision in all parts of the United Kingdom for an examination in midwifery, and that there shall be in the registration a distinctive mark that the party has undergone an examination in midwifery, and has so passed. Now, my hon. friend the Member for Middlesex has just presented a petition requiring that the general practitioners should be incorporated. I have, Sir, given my most anxious consideration to that subject; and, at all events, I am desirous not to pledge myself to the adoption of any such measure, till the profession at large shall have had an opportunity of considering the very important alterations made in the Bill which I am now opening to the House. I had proposed to repeal the Apothecaries' Act, and thereby, for the purposes of medicine, to leave the Apothecaries' Company to act only as a guild of druggists. I have now departed from that intention, and I do not now propose to repeal the Apothecaries' Act. I should most deeply regret the separation of the general practitioners from the College of Surgeons. That might in some degree have been the consequence of the measure as it was proposed last year; but I think that evil has been met by the proposition that no one shall be able to qualify as a surgeon without having previously become a licentiate in medicine. I will not now anticipate a discussion on the new charter granted to the College of Surgeons: that there are defects in it I am fully aware; but when I introduced, for the first time, a particular order into that body, which existed in every other college in England, Scotland, and Ireland, namely, the order of Fellows of the College, it was necessary that I should create a constituency for the election of the Council, and it was also necessary that this constituency should in the first instance be nominated. I only state the difficulty in the recent change; but I now hope that the general practitioners and the College of Surgeons will be in a more close and honourable connexion than at any antecedent period. Now, reserving to myself the right of advising the Crown to grant a Charter of Incorporation to the general practitioners, and stating that I shall be ready to give that advice if I shall deem it desirable, I may say, that I am most anxious to sustain the station the honour, and the attainments of the general practitioners. I believe them to be one of the most useful bodies of men in this country. In large cities, where the numbers are great, a division of labour is not only possible, but it is also desirable, for it leads to increased qualifications and greater remuneration; in great cities the division of the profession into physician, surgeon, and general practitioner, arises by the force of circumstances; but we have to consider the interest of the community at large, and we know that the great body of the rural population must look to the general practitioner; and so far it is desirable for the interests of the public that we should use all our power to uphold the character, the station, and the attainments of the general practitioner. These, Sir, are my decided opinions; and, entertaining these opinions, I doubt whether we should be doing good, and should advance the honour and the character of the general practitioners, by dissolving the connexion between them and the College of Surgeons, and by giving them an institution which might be as good in time as the College of Surgeons, but which would be wholly new—a College of General Practitioners. I am anxious that the alterations I propose should tend to promote the spirit of conciliation; and I am ready to consult as far as I can the feelings and wishes of the whole body of general practitioners. They will have an opportunity of consi- dering the changes I have made, and of reviewing the requisition they have made for a new Charter of Incorporation. I shall be delighted if the result shall be that they will withdraw that requisition, and, as a consequence, form a close alliance with the College of Surgeons—a great and noble institution, which, with all its defects, has produced some of the most eminent and best surgeons in Europe; which possesses, at this moment, the finest museum in Europe, and one of the most renowned collections in physiology. It is impossible that such a connexion can carry with it any other effect than honour and distinction to the general practitioner; and I cannot anticipate any new arrangement which will be more conducive to the fair fame, the character and the station of the general practitioner. I pass on now to another alteration I propose in the Bill of last Session. It was an obvious error to provide that a gentleman seeking to be qualified as a physician should for the two years immediately preceding his examination at the College of Physicians have resided in the University. In many cases this would be found a great hindrance to attendance on Foreign Universities and to his attainment of useful knowledge by various studies in different quarters. I propose to change the necessity to two years' residence at the University after matriculation, instead of two years before examination. So also with respect to attendance on Foreign Universities; I think upon the whole it is expedient to propose that only one year's residence at a Foreign University should be required, if the student has pursued his education abroad. I now come to the general constitution of the Council, and it is a point of great importance. If, Sir, I filled any other situation than that which I have the honour to hold, I should perhaps have ventured to propose some alteration in the Bill in this respect. It is my opinion that it would lead to far greater safety if there were left to the Executive Government, acting on its responsibility in Parliament, the power of nominating the entire Council. I think there are evils arising from the election of Members by the general medical body, which would thus be avoided; but having proposed a mixed scheme of nomination and of election, on the whole I adhere to the proposition as it was introduced in the Bill of last Session. That point may still be open for discussion; but I beg to state distinctly that, in reserving to the Crown the nomination of six Mem- bers of the Council, I do not introduce that provision, without stating that any advice I may give to the Crown will be with the view of introducing into the Council a portion of general practitioners, and a portion also of country practitioners. Upon that point I am clear, that the general practitioners and the country practitioners have a right to be represented in the Council. There was also in the Bill of last year an omission which I propose to supply. There was no power given to the Council to remove a person from the register in case of any flagrant misconduct. I propose now to invest the Council with power to remove from the register all parties who may be convicted in a Court of Law of any criminal offence, or who have used any false or simulated testimonials to obtain admission. One other alteration I propose in a provision of the Bill, which arose from a misconception on my part last year. I proposed to give the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow equal power of licensing with the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Edinburgh. I made that proposition in the belief that the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons in Glasgow had in the four counties adjacent to that city power to license practitioners both in surgery and medicine; but by subsequent information I have discovered that they have no power to grant licenses for practising medicine. The question has been directly raised before a Court of Law, and it has been determined that they have not such power. I made the proposition on a false conception of their power, and on the whole I think it better to withdraw that provision, and to give the sole power of licensing to the Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons in Edinburgh. I am not aware that there is any other change proposed in the Bill, which I have omitted to state to the House. I have recapitulated the various provisions of the original Bill, and I have pointed out those alterations I intend to make, which, so far from being at variance with any of the objects of the original measure, are quite consistent with them, and conducive to their accomplishment. I have endeavoured to meet fairly the objections of the great body of medical men who have canvassed my measure. I do not complain in the least of the severity of criticism to which it was subjected. I was only anxious to avail myself of the knowledge of the subject which that criticism disclosed. I do now commit the Bill to the candid consideration of the profession and the public. I certainly have taken a calm and dispassionate view of the whole subject, with only one desire—to promote the interests, not of the profession only, but also of the public. No labour I have bestowed on it will be thrown away in the least degree if that object shall be gained; and I certainly lay this Bill in its amended form before the House in the confident hope and expectation that this Session will not close without some measure receiving the sanction of Parliament which shall better regulate medical practice throughout the United Kingdom. The right hon. Baronet concluded by moving for leave to bring in a Bill for regulating the profession of physic and surgery.

I have heard with very great satisfaction the statement of the right hon. Baronet, and I earnestly hope and really believe that the difficulties which beset this subject will be amicably arranged and finally settled. The right hon. Gentleman has shown by the alterations he has proposed that he is most anxious to consider every matter mooted by the general practitioners and the profession. I believe the right hon. Gentleman and the Government to which he belongs could be scarcely aware of the difficulties by which this subject is encompassed. There are so many various interests, so many laws affecting the profession, so many rights conferred by those different laws, in some instances opposed apparently to every principle of sense and reason, that more difficulties were in fact connected with this subject than almost any other requiring the legislative interference of the House. Sir, I must say, I felt very strongly opposed to the other Bill. I considered some portions of it most objectionable; but I do not now wish to refer to those topics of difference. I am so satisfied that the right hon. Gentleman, from the alterations he has proposed, is anxious to conciliate all parties in the profession, and to listen attentively and deliberately to the various suggestions that may be made, that I have only now to request that he will not propose the second reading of the Bill at an early period, but give time for the most mature consideration of its provisions by the profession. If the right hon. Gentleman will only pursue the course he has taken, he will receive, I can assure him, the gratitude of one of the most important bodies of men to be found in this country.

had heard with satisfaction the speech of the hon. Gentleman, who had met his proposition in a spirit of calmness and temper that was perfectly satisfactory. He certainly would not propose the second reading of the Bill until after Easter.

moved for leave to bring in a Bill for enabling Her Majesty to grant new Charters to certain Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons, which, he said, would serve to render more efficient the operation of the measure he had just now obtained leave to introduce. So far from rendering these bodies more close, the intended Charter would render them more open. He would be quite ready to lay on the Table copies of the four Charters proposed to be granted to the Colleges of Physicians in London, Dublin, and Edinburgh, and to the College of Surgeons in Edinburgh, and then, taking them in connexion with the other Bill, the House would have an opportunity of judging of the entire scheme.

rose in pursuance of the Motion of which he had given notice—

"That there be laid before this House a Return of any Correspondence which took place in the years 1842,1843, and 1844, between the Lord Chancellor of Ireland and the Earl of Lucan, relative to the dismissal of the latter from, and subsequent restoration to, the Magistracy: also for a Copy of the Commission appointing the said Earl of Lucan Lord Lieutenant of the County of Mayo."

The noble Lord was dismissed from the magistracy not more than two years ago, and, presuming the circumstances still in force which led to that dismissal, that nothing in fact had occurred to better his Lordship's case, it appeared to him that the recent conduct of the Government towards his Lordship must be wrong. The House had recently been occupied with matters of great public interest, and the present might appear but of comparatively small consequence; but be could assure the House that in that part of Ireland where the events to which he was about to call attention had occurred, the interest excited was quite as great as that which had been attracted to great public questions here. The House had always acted with promptitude on all occasions when charges were made against parties holding a public office in this country. Very recently the conduct of a magistrate had come in question, and twenty-four hours had not elapsed before it was brought under the notice of that House. There was also a case last year in which a Lord Lieutenant of a county was concerned. He referred to the case of "The Queen and Humphries v. the Duke of Marlborough," and this case was immediately referred to the cognizance of the Solicitor General. He hoped the same promptitude would be shown in cases of a similar character which related to public men in Ireland, and he trusted the case of Lord Lucan would meet with similar attention to that which had been conferred on cases to which he had just referred. Previously to entering upon Lord Lucan's case, he would briefly refer to another matter in which Lord Chancellor Sugden was concerned, and he was bound to say that he thought the learned Lord in the affair was a very ill-used individual. He begged to be allowed to say that he had not the smallest intention of entering upon questions of Government policy—all he wanted to show was, that it was very difficult to understand the principle upon which appointments were made in Ireland. He would just glance at the dismissals from the magistracy that had taken place. The first was that of Lord Ffrench—it was difficult to understand the principle which had prompted dismissal in this and in other cases. The subject of these dismissals had already undergone discussion in both Houses of Parliament. In the case of the dismissal of Lord Lucan the same course was adopted—the subject was canvassed, and the cause of his Lordship's dismissal was made public. He trusted that the grounds on which his Lordship had been reinstated would also appear in the correspondence which he was about to move for. With regard to the noble Lord he begged to say he had no personal knowledge of his Lordship; he had no personal motive in bringing forward this question. The only feeling which guided him was the desire of doing justice to the public, and seeing that justice was properly administered in Ireland. He had no intention of canvassing the propriety of the dismissal both of Lord Lucan and Mr. O'Malley from the magistracy. It was sufficient for his purpose that enough appeared on Lord Lucan's own showing to warrant their dismissals, and this rendered him quite unable to comprehend how the reinstatement of his Lordship could redound to the credit of the Government. From the statements which were made public in the correspondence between Lord Chancellor Sugden and Lord Lucan, it appeared that the terms "blackguard" and "miscreant" had been used in open Court by Lord Lucan and Mr. O'Malley to each other. After the dismissals had taken place, he found that one party was restored to the magistracy, and the other appointed to the dignity of head of the magistracy of the county. Now, if the statement of Lord Lucan to the Lord Chancellor was correct, then Mr. O'Malley ought not to have been restored; and if Mr. O'Malley's statement was correct, Lord Lucan ought not to have been placed in the honourable post he now filled. What he wished more particularly to direct the attention of the House to was an extract from the letter written to Lord Lucan at the request of Lord Chancellor Sugden. The letter was to the effect, that the Lord Chancellor having considered all the circumstances, had come to the painful conclusion that two magistrates, on the same Bench, in the characters of prosecutor and defendant, had used language towards each other which could not be justified, and which exhibited that want of respect to the law which, unfortunately, too much prevailed—and that it was impossible to have due respect paid to the Court as long as they were privileged to sit there as magistrates. It would appear Lord Lucan had said, that from certain expressions used by the noble Lord the late Secretary for Ireland, that he could not be persuaded that the act of Lord Chancellor Sugden had received the approbation of that noble Lord. That noble Lord was known to be the expositor of the policy of the right hon. Baronet opposite, and he recollected the right hon. Baronet stating that the conduct of that noble Lord had met with his entire approbation. The conduct of the Lord Chancellor had been approved by Lord Eliot, by Lord Wharncliffe, and also by Lord Lyndhurst. Notwithstanding this, it would appear that this very same Lord Lucan had been appointed to preside over the Bench of magistrates of that very county from which two years previously he had been dismissed, and who was considered by the great authorities he had mentioned as unfit to be even a private member of the magistracy. It could not be said that the Government had no choice. They might have selected Lord Sligo, a Nobleman who had taken no active part in politics, but had, nevertheless, taken great interest in the improvement of the condition of his tenantry. There were also many other influential noblemen and gentlemen in the county from among whom they might have selected a fit and proper person to fill the office. The present Secretary for Ireland had said, that Ireland was an integral part of the Empire, and was to be legislated for in the same manner as Lancashire or Yorkshire—that the conciliation of Ireland was necessary in every respect, while, at the same time, the Union was to be maintained, the Church upheld, and the law respected. He uttered the words that the law was to be respected at the very moment when this appointment was made, as if in complete mockery of what the hon. Gentleman said. Enactments were of little use, if the administration of the law was not respected. There was a great difference between this country and Ireland in this point. It was not that there was less crime in this country, but it was that there was here no sympathy for the evil-doer, and that the law was fairly and justly administered without respect of persons. The result of the appointment in question would produce a contrary impression in Ireland. Respect for the law in that country was a feeling but recently created. Lord Wellesley, by establishing Petty Sessions, and Lord Normanby, by appointing Stipendiary Magistrates, might be said to have called the feeling of respect for the law into existence. He could assure the House that this was a matter of grave and serious importance. It was of the last importance that the unpaid magistracy should be above all suspicion. He had no further observations to make; but he could not help stating that it appeared from Lord Lucan's own statement, that for two years previous to his having been dismissed he had not acted as a magistrate, and that since he had been restored he had never sat on the Bench. The hon. Member concluded by submitting his Motion.

had no objection to the Papers moved for by the hon. Gentleman. It was perfectly well known that the noble Lord in question had himself moved for them in another place, and had given notice of a Motion on the subject of this inquiry. The hon. Member, at the commencement of his speech, spoke of the jealousy with which the conduct of magis- trates was regarded in this country, and proceeded to draw an invidious comparison between the course taken by the Government of Ireland in this respect, and that taken by the Government of this country. He thought, however, that the hon. Gentleman had been extremely unfortunate in the instances which he adduced in support of his assertion; because, first of all, he adverted to the case of the noble Duke the Lord Lieutenant of the county of Oxford, and stated that when certain charges had been made against him, he proceeded to a court of justice, and vindicated himself. It appeared, then, that Government took no notice of that transaction, but left the noble Duke to vindicate his character in a eourt of justice. It appeared, therefore, that the vigilance exercised on the part of the present Government, with respect to the administration of justice and the surveillance of the magistracy in Ireland, was not worse than it was in England. That, in fact, a similar attention was paid by the Government to this matter in both countries. So much the hon. Gentleman opposite seemed to admit. But, in bringing forward the present case, the hon. Gentleman had not thought it necessary to go into the details of the circumstances and the transactions which had occurred at Castlebar, and out of which the present matter had arisen; and, indeed, he (Sir T. Fremantle) was glad that the hon. Member had abstained from so doing, as it relieved him also from the necessity of going into the case. The hon. Gentleman had only said that the Lord Chancellor of Ireland had thought it necessary to dismiss Lord Lucan from the magistracy, and that the Government of Ireland had supported the Lord Chancellor in that dismissal. But this was not the entire case. The question had been argued in the House of Lords, and Members of the Government in that House had there stated that they shared the responsibility of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland in the course he had pursued on this occasion. Then the hon. Gentleman, having assumed that it was right that Lord Lucan should be dismissed from the magistracy, had also jumped to the conclusion that it was highly improper that he should be subsequently raised to the Lord Lieutenancy of the county. In stating all this, however, the hon. Gentleman opposite had entirely passed over all the intervening grounds and circumstances which induced the same Lord Chancellor who had thought it his duty to dismiss Lord Lucan, to conceive it likewise his duty to reinstate that nobleman. Now, certainly if the hon. Member opposite had thought it right to have the Lord Chancellor for an authority in support of the case he was making out, in the first instance, surely it was open to him (Sir T. Fremantle), to claim the benefit of the same high authority. He was prepared to contend that the Lord Chancellor of Ireland was perfectly justified in reinstating Lord Lucan in the Commission of the Peace. That reinstatement had accordingly taken place; and he was, moreover, prepared to contend that what had occurred before the dismissal might be very fairly forgotten, and that the noble Lord could stand as a magistrate in as fair a position as he had stood before. Was it to be contended for, that an accidental error like that of which Lord Lucan had been guilty, the use of a single intemperate or hasty word, under circumstances of the greatest provocation, and that offence having been visited by those in authority with the highest punishment which such an offence could receive—was it to be contended, he repeated, that such an offence should be considered a bar against the noble Lord for the rest of his natural life; a stigma for ever, and that it should prevent him from ever after acting in the service of Her Majesty? The hon. Gentleman had stated that he (Sir T. Fremantle) had spoken on a recent occasion of conciliation towards Ireland, and that he had professed his disposition to assist in maintaining and creating a respect for the law in that country. The hon. Gentleman had, moreover, gone on to assert that the acts of the Government in the conduct of the prosecution of the case against Mr. O'Connell were in direct contradiction to the statements which he (Sir T. Fremantle) had so put forth. He contended that such was not the case. The Government had come forward to vindicate the law; and the sentence they had passed upon the noble Lord now in question, on a former occasion, was also calculated to vindicate the law and purify the administration of justice in the eyes of the people of Ireland. And though the noble Lord had been reinstated, the mere circumstance of his dismissal would impress on the minds of the magistracy of that country, as well as of the people generally, the determination of the present Government to preserve and secure the proper administration of justice. From the commencement of the proceedings on the day when the altercation took place between Lord Lucan and the other party concerned, this latter individual, by his offensive gesture and manner, as well as by his language, had provoked Lord Lucan to use an improper expression. Now, when a discussion had occurred in another place with respect to this matter, opinions had been expressed by persons not connected with the Government, to the effect that the sentence passed upon that noble Lord had been too severe, and disproportionate to the offence of which he was guilty. It had been admitted that great provocation had been given to Lord Lucan—provocation, indeed, sufficiently great to justify what had passed. Would the hon. Gentleman opposite take the opinion of the Marquess of Clanricarde? The noble Marquess had thought the offence was not such as to merit that, the greatest punishment which could be inflicted for its commission. Lord Brougham too had said that, after the explanation which had been given of the case, not the slighest stigma rested on the character of the noble Lord in his capacity of a nobleman, a magistrate, or a gentleman; and Lord Campbell had observed with respect to the conduct of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland that, though he did not agree with all that distinguished functionary's acts, yet he did in most of them; and he could not but say that he had fallen into error in dismissing Lord Lucan from the magistracy. The noble Lord had been reinstated in the situation he had formerly held before his present appointment, and no imputation could rest upon the Government on that account.

rose to express his sincere regret at finding that the professions of kindly feeling and conciliatory conduct towards Ireland, which were made so recently by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir T. Fremantle) on the hustings—professions which were still fresh in the minds of the Irish people—were followed up by the strange practical commentary they had witnessed to-night. That the right hon, Gentleman should (with the recollection of those professions fresh in his memory) have come forward to justify the extraordinary conduct of the Government was to him astonishing. He would appeal to the English Members pre- sent, whether, if an English magistrate had been dismissed from the Commission of the Peace for a gross insult offered in a Court of Justice to another magistrate (neither of them certainly acting in his capacity as a magistrate at the time), and that in two years from his dismissal, or even less, he was not only reinstated, but placed at the head of the whole list of magistracy as the Lord Lieutenant of that county; he appealed to them, would any of them bear that?—would any of them bear that? He asked them for the third time, would any of them bear that? [Lord Ingestre: Hear, hear!] The noble Lord the Member for Staffordshire then stood alone in that feeling. Was there another among them who would bear it? The Irish people were sometimes accused of over-sensitiveness; but with such acts passing before them—with such acts committed within their daily experience, and justified by a Government professing to be wishful to rule upon principles of conciliation—could they wonder that the Irish were occasionally rather more sensitive than they found convenient? But the right hon. Gentleman had talked of magisterial delinquency, watched over with great exactness by the Government of Ireland. He (Mr. M. J. O'Connell) supposed that he was one of the delinquent magistrates so hinted at. Yet he had held the Commission of the Peace for eight years, and he had been dismissed from it under circumstances which made him feel that dismissal to be no dishonour. He was dismissed for no misconduct on the Bench, but simply for having given expression to his political feelings. If delinquents in politics were to be so carefully watched, and delinquents in conduct in Courts of Justice were not only to be forgiven, but within a short time to be promoted, they could not wonder if there was no great confidence entertained by the Irish people in their justice. The right hon. Gentleman had said, that the hon. Member for Louth had assumed the Lord Chancellor to be right in his dismissal of Lord Lucan. Assumed it! Were they going back from their defence of their Colleague, of the conduct of Lord Chancellor Sugden, when he stated that the magistrates guilty of such a contempt of Court as that in question, ought not to continue in the Commission of the Peace, and that he felt it to be his duty to remove them both. The right hon. Baronet had spoken of Lord Lucan's apology and his regret for what had taken place. Was it since his dismissal that these expressions of apology and regret had been used? In the correspondence produced in another place, Lord Lucan stated that he had expressed his regret for what had occurred before he was dismissed. Had he made any further apology since? No, none that he (Mr. M. J. O'Connell) had ever heard of. On the contrary, had he not said in the House of Lords on the 10th of August last, that his dismissal was the greatest injustice, an injustice which could not be exceeded, unless by the re-appointment of Mr. O'Malley with him? Yet, after all, they were both thus restored to the magistracy together. That speech of Lord Lucan's was a violent attack upon the noble Lord the then Irish Secretary, now the Earl of St. Germans. Had Government now thrown overboard their late Colleague? Was the first appearance in his new capacity of the right hon. Gentleman, now Secretary for Ireland, to be in defence of such conduct and such principles as these? He would be allowed to refer to just one point more. The magisterial acts of Lord Lucan would have afforded just cause for his not receiving his recent promotion, but he would call attention to his last public appearance. That was on the occasion or his having refused to grant a lease for building ground in the town of Castlebar, for the purpose of erecting a convent for an establishment of the Sisters of Charity. He understood the sneer of the noble Lord the Member for Berkshire, when he mentioned the subject. It was a sneer at which he could not but feel indignant, and if the noble Lord were attached to the religion he professed, such a refusal to those having such claims to what they requested ought to have given rise to other feelings and gestures. But to return. Lord Lucan refused to grant the lease on a ground which was but the subterfuge of a bigot afraid to avow his sentiments. He said that he must decline to grant it, because he considered such establishments to be by statute illegal. The parties in communication with is Lordship immediately wrote to him to assure him that he was in error—that under the Act which he had alluded to, although such religious societies composed of males were illegal, yet that by its provisions female religions establishments were not interfered with. He then wrote back to say that he considered the spirit of the one as bad as that of the other; and that though he had at first dwelt on the letter of the law, he now preferred to act upon its spirit; thus bearing the full bigotry of his refusal to the Irish people. He told the Government that, if they meant their words to be anything more than mere words—if they had any intention to carry out the principles of conciliation which they professed, this one act should have made them pause before they proceeded to permit this man—the expression of his bigotry still fresh from his pen, and that expression, too, not an honest and a manly one, but sneaking and underhand, and as such an expression which even those who agreed with its author must despise, and those who did not agree with him must hate—he told the Government that such an act, such an expression, should have made them pause ere they permitted such a man to assume the head of the magistracy. It was all very well to talk of their intentions towards Ireland. But the opportunities of legislating for its benefit which they would have would be but few and far between; while, on the other hand, their administrative measures came into collision with the people's feelings and wishes, week by week, and day by day. It would be of no avail to promise benefits which could not come oftener than once or twice a year, if day after day the Irish people were to be galled by seeing men of this class promoted—men with no fair claim on the confidence of Government, called on to administer more annoyance to their feelings in months, than years of legislation could do away with. They should know—however low might be the opinion which they formed of Irish sense or Irish intellect—that his countrymen had keenness and perception enough to judge between the sort of movement going on now, that kind of vacillation dignified by the name of the policy of the Government to Ireland, making one futile step to annoy the Orange party, and another to provoke the great bulk of the Catholic population. They had acuteness enough to distinguish between what he had described, and the course of even-handed rectitude — they could tell the vacillation of indecision from the steady policy which true justice would pursue.

said, he thought it was desirable that the circumstances under which the Earl of Lucan had been dismissed from the magistracy should be fully known to the House. The noble Earl had been dismissed from the Commission of the Peace at the latter end of the year 1842, and in the course of the Session of 1843 the subject had been brought under the notice of the other House of Parliament. And what had been, then, the complaint made by the opponents of Her Majesty's Government in reference to that matter? Their complaint had been that the Government had acted harshly in dismissing the Earl of Lucan. The Marquess of Clanricarde had made a complaint to that effect in the strongest terms; and Lord Campbell took a similar view of the subject. It should also be remembered that the Earl of Lucan had been restored to the Commission of the Peace towards the end of the year 1843; and yet not one word complaining of that restoration had been uttered during the last Session of Parliament. Lord Campbell had even taken occasion to say, that the noble Earl had only been restored to a position from which he ought never to have been removed. It was certainly rather strange that the Government should first be attacked because they had dismissed Lord Lucan from the Commission of the Peace, and that they should afterwards have been attacked for having appointed him to another office. It was no matter what the Government did, it was always turned into a ground of complaint. Now, he was anxious that the English people should understand what these appeals to them really were. He was not about to justify Lord Lucan's conduct; but he trusted that when the circumstances under which he was placed, and the provocation offered to him, were taken into consideration—although there might be some hon. Members ready to cast the first stone—there was scarcely one among them who would not have given way to feelings of irritation. What was the transaction? It appeared, that two years previous to the transaction, Lord Lucan removed Mr. O'Malley from the office which he had held under his Lordship's father. From that time Mr. O'Malley adopted a constant system of annoyance towards Lord Lucan, manifestly for the purpose of irritating him. Among other things, it appeared, that he had been in the habit of trespassing on his estate in quest of game; although repeatedly warned to desist. On one occasion, he spoke to his Lordship's gamekeeper in the most offensive terms of Lord Lucan, and this was the origin of the case at the Petty Sessions. On that occasion, Lord Lucan was sitting on the Bench, but had not attended with the view of taking any part in the proceedings, and this he stated on the authority of the Mayo Telegraph, a newspaper politically opposed to his Lordship, in which it was stated that he attended at the Sessions, in company with his land agent, Mr. Ormsby, and four officers of the 47th Regiment, stationed at Castlebar, who were seated between Lord Lucan and the Bench. The right hon. and learned Gentleman then went through the facts of the case, and called attention to that part of it in which Mr. O'Malley asked Lord Lucan whether he was there in a judicial capacity, and upon his refusal to answer, stated that he could not find language sufficiently strong to express his contempt for his Lordship, and that his contempt for him exceeded his contempt for any other man. Now, he asked any hon. Member whether such language, addressed to Lord Lucan in open Court, in the presence of four military gentlemen, was not sufficient to excite the feelings of any man? Was no allowance to be made for feeling? He felt quite certain, at all events, that the people of England would not think that Her Majesty's Government had acted wrongly under the circumstances, or that Lord Lucan was disqualified, by what had taken place, from holding the appointment conferred on him.

He did not mean to defend Mr. O'Malley's conduct, who, no doubt, acted under irritated feelings. But the Attorney General for Ireland had taken a brief in this case against the Lord Chancellor. His argument went the length of proving the Chancellor to have been wrong in ever removing Lord Lucan. How did that square with the right hon. Secretary's (Sir T. Fremantle's) view of the case, who insisted on a strange infallibility for the Chancellor, who, he said, was perfectly right not only in removing, but in restoring Lord Lucan. The doctrine laid down in that debate struck him as exceedingly strange. It appeared that magistrates were to undergo a species of rustication, and that, like youths at our universities, they were to be sent away for a time, on account of their irregularities, and then restored to their dignity. That was not the case with political offences. Men, like his hon. Friend (Mr. M. J. O'Connell), one of the most unimpeachable characters, who had administered justice to the perfect satisfaction of their countrymen, were swept away in scores from the Commission of the Peace, on account of the honest expression of a political opinion. This was gross injustice. He was sure the people of Ireland would regard the present case as a repetition of that which he had brought forward last year—namely the case of Mr. O'Driscoll.