said, he begged to ask the hon. Gentleman the Vice-President of the Board of Trade whether any correspondence had taken place concerning the return, duty free, of articles sent to the Exhibition in the United States; and whether he could state what arrangements had been made with the French Government concerning the transmission and return of articles sent to the Exhibition at Paris? The House might be aware that it had been stipulated that all articles sent to the United States' Exhibition should be admitted duty free, and that the cost of their carriage to and from the Exhibition should be defrayed. One of the gentlemen who had sent some articles to that Exhibition wrote to request that they might be returned, and he was informed by his agent in the United States that the association by whom the Exhibition was conducted were unable to fulfil their engagements, the funds being entirely exhausted; that there was no possible chance of the association being able to return foreign articles to the exhibitors; and the agents further stated that they would have taken possession of the particular articles referred to, but that the articles being in bond the Government would not allow them to be withdrawn without payment of duty.

said, that the Board of Trade had never undertaken any responsibility with respect to the goods sent to the Exhibition at New York; they had nothing to do with the sending of those goods; they had had no correspondence with respect to them; and they knew nothing whatever of the articles which had been sent to the United States, and which it appeared had not been returned. If, however, the hon. Gentleman referred to one of the columns of The Times of that morning, he would find some correspondence on the subject. He (Mr. Bouverie) would, however, state what the arrangement was with respect to the French Exhibition. The articles exhibited from this country might be divided into two classes—those connected generally with industry and manufactures, and those connected with the fine arts. With respect to articles connected with industry and manufactures, the arrangement was that they should be deposited at Irongate Wharf in the City at the expense of the exhibitors; the Government of this country then undertook their conveyance to the frontiers of France; and the French Government undertook to forward them from the frontiers to the Exhibition at Paris free of expense to the exhibitors. The French Government further undertook to return these articles to the frontier; the British Government would then convey them back to Irongate Wharf in London, and thence they would be removed by the exhibitors. With regard to articles connected with the flue arts, the British Government undertook to convey them from the houses of the exhibitors to the frontiers of France; the French Government would provide for their conveyance from the frontiers to the Exhibition; and they were to be returned in the same manner. All articles of the first class connected with industry and manufactures would be sent entirely at the risk of the exhibitors, but the Government undertook the risk with respect to articles connected with the fine arts, and had insured those articles for a sum of 140,000l. He believed the Paris Exhibition was to be opened on Tuesday, and he understood that this country was not at all likely to lose its high pre-eminence with respect to those articles for the manufacture of which it was celebrated throughout the world.

said, he begged to ask the right hon. Baronet the Chief Commissioner of Works whether it was intended to curtail the area of the Victoria Park by letting portions of the land for building purposes; and whether there was yet time for the Government to withdraw from any treaty in which they might be engaged for the erection of houses in a locality where places of recreation needed to be increased rather than diminished?

said, that when a park was constructed in the metropolis the strip of land that surrounded it became very valuable for building purposes, and, instead of allowing that increased value to be acquired by the owners of the adjoining property, the Government had generally, when a new park was formed, purchased more land than was required for the area of the proposed park. This course had been pursued in the case of the Regent's Park, Battersea Park, and Victoria Park. The Act 14 & 15 Vict. c. 46, defined the area of Victoria Park, and, consequently, the Government had no power to curtail the area of that park.

said, he begged to ask the First Lord of the Treasury if he had any objection to inform the House who the persons are to whom Lord Dundonald's plans for the destruction of the Russian fortresses have been submitted by Her Majesty's Government?

Sir, I have no objection to state that the invention in question has been referred to several eminent scientific men, amongst whom are Professors Faraday, Playfair, and Graham. But I would submit to the House whether there can be any advantage attained by going into the discussion of the question at this time, whether the invention in question is adopted or not?

I understand, Sir, that the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Layard) proposes to bring on the Resolutions of which he has given notice upon going into Committee of Supply on Monday. I should be very sorry to deprive the House of the opportunity of discussing those Resolutions as a substantive Motion, and therefore I am quite willing to postpone the Orders of the Day on Monday, so as to enable the hon. Gentleman to propose his Resolutions as a substantive Motion, providing that other hon. Members who have notices standing for Monday will also give way to the hon. Member for Aylesbury. Monday is not a notice day. [Mr. ROEBUCK said that it was a Government night.] Yes, but several hon. Gentlemen have given notices of Motions which they might insist upon making. On the understanding that these Motions will not be pressed, I intend to move on Monday that the Orders of the Day be postponed until after the discussion upon the Resolutions of the hon. Member for Aylesbury. I may also mention that Her Majesty's Government think it very important that the Bill of my hon. Friend the President of the Board of Health with reference to the local government of the metropolis should be proceeded with as speedily as possible, and I therefore propose to take that Bill to-morrow, after the Newspaper Stamps Bill has been disposed of. The Vice-President of the Board of Trade will not, therefore, bring on the question of limited liability in partnership to-morrow.

said, that it did not appear to him that there was any chance of the adjourned debate on the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill coming on to-morrow.

said, that many persons were remaining in town at great expense and inconvenience, in order to be present at the adjourned debate; and he therefore hoped that the Government would give notice of their intention with respect to this measure as soon as possible.

said, he wished to ask the right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the Irish Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill would be introduced before the day fixed for the second reading of the English Testamentary Bill?

said, the second reading of the English Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill had already been debated at considerable length a fortnight ago, and the adjourned debate would be resumed as soon as a day could be found not required for more urgent business. The Irish Bill would not be introduced until the House had come to a decision on the second reading of the English Bill, but it would be brought in before they went into Committee upon the measure now before them.

said, he wished to know if any Member of the Government could state on what day it was their fixed intention to bring on the adjourned debate upon the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill?

said, that it was quite impossible. The day when this subject would come on must depend upon the pressure of public business. It would be brought on on the first day on which it could be done without interfering with more urgent business.

I beg, Sir, to ask the hon. and learned Solicitor General for England whether the Government are prepared to introduce a Church Discipline Bill before the second reading of the English Testamentary Bill; and whether the Church Discipline Bill will deal with the United Church of England and Ireland as one Church; and also whether the Government will introduces Matrimonial and Divorce Bill before the second reading of the English Testamentary Bill?

Sir, in reply, I have to state that a Bill on the subject of Church discipline, which at the present moment is in a state that involves great reproach, was prepared, under my direction, at the same time with the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill. When the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill was introduced, it had not been submitted to the consideration of the Government. It has since been so submitted, and the Government have thought it right that the opinion of the right rev. Prelates, or at least of some of them, should be taken on the Bill before it was introduced to the House. The Bill had been accordingly submitted to some of the bishops, and has not yet been returned by the right rev. Prelates who have it under their consideration. It was prepared upon the principle of treating the United Church of England and Ireland as one Church. In fact, I know of no other leading principle on which it could have been proposed. With regard to the time of its introduction, the House will see from what I have stated that it is impossible for me to say that it can be brought in before the second reading of the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill. Individually I may express the hope that the Bill, if brought in, may be introduced before the third reading of the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill—at all events, before that time shall arrive, if it ever shall arrive, the Government will have come to a decision. [Laughter.] The hon. and learned Member for Wallingford (Mr. Malins) and his Friends, who laugh at that statement, need not be under the delusion that the Government have any notion of abandoning the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill. I have been compelled to yield to the pressure of other business. I am even afraid that the adjourned debate cannot be resumed to-morrow night; but I can assure the House that it will be resumed on the first opportunity that occurs after the more pressing business to which the Government think fit to give precedence. With regard to the Matrimonial and Divorce Bill, it has been prepared, and delayed only in order to see, from the second reading of the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill, what shall be the character of the tribunal to which the testamentary jurisdiction shall be committed. As soon as the opinion of the House upon that point, as expressed on the second reading of the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill, has been obtained, the Matrimonial and Divorce Bill will be introduced.

Sir, I beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, on the addition of 2d. per gallon to the spirit duties, he is prepared to introduce a measure for the use of malt and sugar, duty free, in the distilleries in Great Britain and Ireland, to take effect on and after the 1st of October next?

Sir, the statement which I made the other evening referred exclusively to malt, and did not extend to sugar. There is an obvious difference between malt and sugar, inasmuch as malt can be made by the distiller on his own premises, whereas sugar can only be brought from bonded warehouses. However, I have not had time to go into the question with regard to sugar, but shall be prepared on a future day to state the intentions of the Government on the subject.

said, he begged to ask the hon. Under Secretary for War the cause of the detention of the Candia, and whether demurrage was to be paid, and, if any, to what amount per day, and from what date, for such detention; also, whether any special report as to her sea-worthiness had been recently made, that the lives of those sent out in her might net be endangered? It appeared that the Candia about six weeks ago underwent some repairs, in consequence of a previous report made regarding her; that then she had orders to start with troops and artillery, but that in consequence of a dispute between the military and naval authorities the latter had washed their hands of her. It was found, on trial, that the horse-boxes were too slight and narrow for the horses, and that no proper berths were left for the passengers. About a fortnight ago, after further alterations, she was sent from Blackwall, but was found too crank, and taken back again to Blackwall, where she received sixty tons of shot and shell on board. The passengers were then directed to proceed to Greenhithe, and go on board the Candia there; but when they got to Greenhithe they were sent back again to London, on the ground that it was uncertain when the vessel would sail. In these circumstances he should like to have an answer to his question.

said, the detention of this vessel was caused by an opinion expressed by the officers at Woolwich, not favourable to its safety, or to its being rightly fitted up as a horse transport. The members of the Transport Board, however, inspected the vessel very carefully, and were fully satisfied that apprehensions from that cause were entirely groundless. Consequently, the vessel proceeded to sea, and the detention did not exceed four or five days. No demurrage was paid, the vessel being a hired one.

asked if he was to understand that the vessel had sailed?

Yes.

Then it must have been within these twenty-four hours.

The vessel has sailed.

I beg, Sir, to ask the hon. Under Secretary for War if the Commander in Chief has ordered any Court of inquiry to examine into the late transactions at Canterbury amongst the officers of the Inniskillen Dragoons, and the causes which led to a hostile meeting, or, as is reported, mock duel, between Cornets Baumgarten and Evans, in which Adjutant Webster and Sergeant Brodie were concerned, and if Sergeant Brodie has again been placed under arrest for any offence?

An officer appointed by the Adjutant General is making an investigation into the case referred to by the hon. Gentleman. I was not aware that the hon. Gentleman intended to put this question this evening, and therefore did not make myself master of the facts, but I hope to be able to answer the question to-morrow.

said, he wished to ask the hon. and learned Member for Kilkenny what course he intended to pursue further as regarded the Tenants' Compensation Bill for Ireland; and also whether he had not surrendered the conduct of the Bill to the Government?

I beg leave to state, Sir, that it is my intention thankfully to accept the offer of the Government to take charge of the Tenants' Compensation Bill. With respect to the question whether I accept that offer upon the terms which the Government have proposed, I beg to say that I do not exactly know at present what those terms are. I understood the Government to have assented generally to the principle of the Bill, and no more. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for Ireland announced that he did intend to propose to the House certain alterations of the Bill in Committee. I reserve to myself, as an independent Member of Parliament, the right to deal with the alterations proposed by the Government when I see them printed.

I beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he is prepared to state, on the part of the Government, what course they intend to pursue with regard to this Bill? I trust he is ready to put on the paper the exact terms of the Amendments which he proposed the other evening.

I will immediately prepare the Amendments which I propose to make in the Bill, in accordance with the views I stated the other evening on the part of the Government, and as soon as they are ready will place them on the Votes of the House. I shall also endeavour to fix as early a day as possible for going into Committee on the Bill.

Sir, I have to ask the noble Lord at the head of the Government a question which arises from the papers which were laid before Members this morning with respect to the Vienna Conferences. I observe in the last protocol there is a passage which gives the opinion of the Austrian Government with regard to the Russian propositions for peace. The Austrian Minister states that the last Russian proposition admits of practical application and negotiation, and that it contains the elements out of which the Austrian Government would endeavour to offer something which may lead to a settlement of the questions now at issue. I wish, therefore, to ask the noble Lord whether the Austrian Government have submitted any propositions since the 26th of April, which is the date of the last protocol, and whether he will have any objection to lay that proposition before the House in the same way as the others? I should like also to ask the noble Lord whether there was any other proposition than that to which I have referred, as there is a strong rumour of one having come from Paris? I have further to ask the noble Lord if we are now to understand that the negotiations are finally closed? My reason for putting that question is, that I should not wish to bring forward anything with regard to the negotiations if I thought they were not absolutely terminated.

There has been, Sir, no formal or written proposal made by the Austrian Government since the period to which the hon. Gentleman alludes. There have been verbal communications passed between the Austrian Government and the Governments of England and France, and also between the French Government and the English Government; but I am sure the hon. Member and the House will feel that, considering the state of the relations between the three Governments, it would not be prudent to enter into detailed explanations in regard to those communications. With respect to the question whether the negotiations have been entirely broken off, I can only repeat the answer which I gave upon a former occasion—namely, that the elements of a conference permanently exist at Vienna—that the representatives of England, of France, of Turkey, of Austria, and of Russia reside at Vienna; and therefore, if at any time any proposition were made, either by Russia directly, or by Austria on behalf of Russia, which appeared to afford any prospect of a satisfactory settlement of the question at issue, there are the elements at Vienna for forming a conference and resuming negotiations.

Am I to understand from the noble Lord that the matter is in that condition that any Motion on the subject of the negotiations and the fullest discussion in this House upon them would not be regarded by the Government as prejudicial to the public interests? I do not want to take the responsibility of injuring the public interests by originating a premature discussion, and therefore I am anxious to ascertain from the noble Lord if we are perfectly free to express our opinions on this subject at length?

If my own opinion is asked, I do not think that public advantage would arise—on the contrary I would say public inconvenience would result—from the Government being compelled, in the present state of things, to enter into a detailed discussion of what was past—of proposals made and proposals rejected—of proposals which might have been made and proposals which might have been rejected—in short, entering into a wide field of discussion with respect to the relations of the different Powers which have been concerned in these negotiations. Such is my own opinion; but, of course, I have no right to control the conduct of others.

:^* Sir, I now rise to bring forward a motion which has been on the paper for many weeks, and which the noble Lord at the head of the Government has deemed to be of sufficient public interest to warrant him in allowing me to bring it on for discussion on a Government night. As I have in some degree varied the terms of my motion, it may be well if I explain at once what the purport of it is. Sir, the motion is, essentially, one for inquiry; for however strong the convictions may be in my own mind as to what sound statesmanship requires with the Indian army, I feel that I have neither weight enough in the House to enforce, nor eloquence to express my opinions on a subject which has not been very minutely canvassed in later times. All I ask is, that the House will institute inquiry, and with this view, I addressed myself to many most experienced Members as to the best course to propose. I found the opinion to be unanimous that for a fair, searching, and able inquiry there was nothing to be compared to a well chosen Select Committee of this House. But some wary tactitians suggested to me that as this was a military question, it might be more palatable to the powers that be, and more conducive to the object of the Motion, to ask for a Royal Commission, and when I heard the noble Lord at the head of the Government suggest, in answer to the motion of the hon. and gallant Member for A bingdon on a kindred subject, that a Royal Commission was more appropriate than a Select Committee, I at once framed my motion for the former. But when I came down to the House on a former evening, when my motion stood a good chance of coming on, I found that the Government were about to oppose it, because it asked for a Royal Commission, which it lay in the power of Her Majesty to grant or refuse, and as to which it was unprecedented for the House of Commons to interfere. I thereupon reframed my Motion in the terms in which it now stands. At any other period than the present I should have deemed it necessary to apologise to the House for bringing before it a subject that, in many respects, might be more fitly treated by a military man. But as no one appears to have applied his mind to the subject of my Motion, I thought that from my long residence in India, where the improvement of civil and military organisation forms the subject of daily discussion amongst all active administrators, and by fortifying my personal observation with careful attention to the question, I might be able to bring some views before the House which I believe to be sound and practical. I can assure the House that I am fully alive to my own incompetence to deal adequately with a very grave question, but I approach it, at all events, without any bias or prejudices to prevent me from forming a sound judgment, or from discussing impartially what the true interests of the empire require. I have alluded to the present period as being one that eminently calls for an inquiry such as I have placed on the paper. For who is there in this House, or out of this House, that can foresee how long the present war is to endure? I will yield to no man living in love for peace, or in detestation of war. I came most reluctantly to the conclusion that war was expedient, but having engaged in a contest in which the most generous motives that can animate the human breast have impelled us to draw the sword, I feel that there never was a moment since the war began when it behoved all men of firm mind to envisage calmly, and resolutely the dangers which environ us, and to gird up our loins for a fiercer encounter with the enemy of Europe and liberal ideas than has yet been witnessed. If peace, then, is not at hand—and, as I firmly believe, is not desired by Russia, except on humiliating terms to the Allies, it is obvious that all the military resources of the Empire must be called forth, and I do not hesitate to affirm that it is absolutely necessary for England to look to the armies of India for an auxiliary force. So obvious is this suggestion, that it has forced itself into every military discussion which has taken place during the present Session. Those who opposed the Foreign Legion, and who by their ill-timed, and I must say unjust, because untrue, sarcasms have thwarted its formation, objected that, instead of relying on a foreign stipendiary force, we should draw a contingent from India! So again on the formation of the treaty with Sardinia, which appears to me to have raised that gallant country to a moral eminence which other European powers, physically greater, have not had the magnanimity or the wisdom to assume, the principal objection of the right hon. Gentleman, the Member for Buckinghamshire, was that we ought not to seek for military aid from foreign powers whilst we had such a magnificent force available in our Indian Empire. But these suggestions, though pointing undoubtedly to undeveloped resources of military power, yet when made in a casual off-hand manner were easily, and I think properly, encountered with plausible objections, which require to be previously dealt with. The whole subject, therefore, evidently needs to be thoroughly discussed and sifted, so as to bring into one view the interests of the whole Empire, both in Europe and in India. Before I go further, I trust I may be allowed to lay before the House some details as to the strength, organisation, and efficiency of the Indian army, for the facts connected with these subjects do not lie on the surface; and with respect to the strength of the army, I confess, that after close inquiry, I have not been able to ascertain the exact amount. By the strength of the army I mean the total amount of military force which the Government can muster and employ on an emergency. The late Sir Charles Napier soon after assuming the Commandership in Chief of India, set himself to inquire what the strength of the force he commanded was, but after getting up to 400,000 men he found there were still others to be enumerated, and he gave up the task. I moved for a return on the subject, but it does not give me all the details I want, so I prefer taking the full military accounts which have been already laid before Parliament. By them I find that the ordinary peace establishment of the regular Indian army, according to the returns of 1853, consists of 289,529 men of all ranks, of whom, speaking in round numbers, about 50,000 are Europeans, namely, 30,000 Queen's troops, cavalry and infantry of the line—20,000 Company's troops, artillery, engineers, and infantry. To these are to be added the contingents furnished under treaty by native States, which, with the exception of a small force, are officered by British officers, and are in a high state of efficiency; they amount to about 36,000. Then there has to be included numerous police corps, militarily organised, whose numbers I take from a return lately laid before the House, and who amount to 24,015. Many of these corps are not so efficient as they might be, but they are capable of rendering good military service, and of replacing regular troops on an emergency, and some of them did excellent service with Sir Charles Napier in his hill campaign. There are then to be added thirty-five battalions of militia, with three European officers each, and whose numbers may be estimated at 28,000. The numbers I have thus given constitute a military force of 377,544 men of all ranks, and I have not enumerated with these troops many corps whose services in the time of danger may be commanded, such as the Nizam's forces, the troops of the King of Oude, of the Gaekwar of Baroda, and of other Native Princes in close alliance with the British power. I believe, therefore, that Sir Charles Napier's estimate of 400,000 men is not exaggerated. And it should be added that the Native Princes of India, with whom we are in alliance, have a force equally large, namely, 398,918 men. This great force has a peculiarity about it which I would beg to bring into due prominence, as it is not to be found in any other large army in the world. It is all raised by voluntary enlistment; and such is the facility with which military service can be obtained, that I believe firmly, the rank and file of the Indian army could be doubled in two or three months, if the occasion should arise for it. If an explanation of this remarkable fact be sought for, it is to be found in what I apprehend would secure voluntary enlistment in all countries of the world, namely, pay above the ordinary wages of labour—prospect of rising to the grade of officer—well-devised provisions for pension after long service. The British forces in India are divided into three distinct armies, each having its Commander in Chief, with a distinct general staff, and distinct in every arm, artillery, engineers, line, medical and commissariat departments; a most cumbrous arrangement, I will observe by the way, as has been well shown by Sir John Malcolm and others, and injurious to effective discipline and economy. The Commander in Chief of India is also Commander in Chief of Her Majesty's forces in India, but he has nothing whatever to do with the other Commanders in Chief with regard to the remaining part of their armies. But the whole force, it should be carefully observed, is placed, as it ought to be, entirely under the Civil Power. The Governor General in Council is supreme over the army: the greater part of the military patronage is in his hands; general and divisional commands are made by him, frequently without reference to the Commander in Chief, and the latter has not even power to order the movement of Her Majesty's troops, or of a single regiment from one Presidency to another. Indeed, as the late Lieutenant General Sir Charles Napier described himself, though he was nominally in command of more than 400,000 men, he was nothing more than a monster Adjutant General; but this, I maintain, is absolutely necessary in a dependency like India, and is accordant with the fundamental principle established by all modern Governments, that the army should be subordinate to the Civil Power. Connected with this part of my subject, I will submit to the House a return which I have prepared with some care as to the total strength and charges of the military forces of the British Empire including the army of India, and I have subjoined to it for the purpose of comparison the strength and charge of the French army:—

Strength and charge of the British Army (including Company's troops) in time of peace, compared with strength and charge of French Army.
	Horses.	European Officers.	Men of all ranks.	Charge.
Queen's Army, exclusive of troops in India (1847)	6,400	4,549	107,794	£9,222,943
Indian Army maintained by Company (1851)	30,944	7,556	289,529	£11,373,830
Militia, thirty-five battalions	…	105	28,000
Police Corps, militarily organised	…	35	24,015
Contingents of Native Princes	…	86	36,311
Total British Army	37,344	12,331	485,649	£20,596,773
French Army (1852), (Budget de Guerre)	84,935	19,604	377,130	£12,340,162

I will not venture to trespass on the attention of the House with any opinions of my own as to the efficiency of this gallant Indian army, nor will I even allude to their various feats of arms in India, or on foreign service, in the Persian Gulf, in Egypt, at the Mauritius, or in China. But I trust I may be allowed to read a few short extracts containing the opinions of men most competent to form a sound judgment, and whom, for obvious reasons, I have selected exclusively from Her Majesty' service. The first passage I will read will be from a speech of the Marquess Wellesley, which is important not only for his views on the efficiency of the Indian army, but also for its relevancy to many collateral points connected with the present motion. He said:—"

"He came now to a point of the utmost delicacy and difficulty; but which notwithstanding would be benefited by discussion in Parliament, before which discussion delicacy and difficulty had often vanished. The army in India rested too much on the footing of profit without reference to honours at home. An army more full than the army in India of honour, loyalty and valour, he had never seen; and he could not have conceived that it would under any authority have become otherwise. But it did happen somehow or other that the officers of the army in India were not held forward to public view as much as other officers in other parts of the world; and they felt that honour and distinctions were conferred for services not more meritorious or important than their own, which were denied to them."

A little later he said:—

"He had had great opportunities of trying them (the Indian army) under great difficulties and privations, at a distance from their homes and families, and yet their zeal and energy never abated. In the wars of Mysore and Egypt the native troops did not hesitate to embark in ships, although that was contrary to their usages and prejudices; and the reason that they so cordially consented to embark was from seeing there was no compulsion."

I will now read the opinions of four Commanders in Chief who have had the amplest opportunities of testing the efficiency of the Indian army both in cantonments and in the field. I will commence with Lieutenant General Sir Charles Napier, who, I should observe, arrived in India, as I can personally testify, with most violent prepossessions against the East India Company, and unfortunately he had pledged himself to such unfavourable opinions in print. But after having served several campaigns, and won some battles, which will make his name for ever famous in story, with an Indian army, this is his opinion of it:—

"My opinion of the army," he said before the House of Commons' Committee in 1852, "generally is, that it is a very fine army. The Indian artillery I really think is the most efficient artillery in the world. Its practice is admirable; I have seen a good deal of it. The Royal artillery may be superior as a scientific corps; but as a practical corps in the field, in crossing mountains, jungles, rivers, and in everything that artillery can be called upon to do in the field, I never saw anything better than the Indian artillery."

Lord Gough said on the same occasion:—

"I think the Indian army is nearly perfect. There cannot be an army more loyal, better disposed, or more ready to do their duty. It is quite impossible to have a more brilliant set of officers or a finer body of men than the artillery of Bengal. I must say of the natives, as well as the Europeans, that a more devoted set of men cannot be found."

Then as to the Bombay army, my gallant Friend, Lieutenant General Sir Willoughby Cotton, Commander in Chief of the Bombay army, has often expressed to me what he told the Committee in these terms:—

"I do not conceive that there is a more effective army, certainly not in India, and I think I may say not anywhere than the Bombay army; they will go anywhere, they never make an object- tion to embark to any place; wherever you may require a contingent to succour, you can send whatever number of men you please. If they are alone they fight well, but if they are mixed with European troops, I think they are fully equal to any in the world."

My hon. and gallant Colleague, the Member for Devonport (Lieutenant General Sir George Berkeley), who was Commander in Chief of the Madras army, was asked, "What is the state of the Madras army with regard to efficiency?" Answer, "Very good indeed; it is excellent." Then as to the Medical Staff, hear my Lord Gough:—

"It was my fortune to serve during the whole almost of the Peninsular war, and I have served through several campaigns in India, but in the Punjab campaign I do not think that at any one period there was a wounded man without his dooly (litter), nor wanting any comfort it was possible to give him."

So also as to the Commissariat, the same noble Lord said—

"During the Maratta campaign, the Sutlej campaign, and the Punjab campaign, the army under my command was never one day without its regular provisions."

Sir Willoughby Cotton also stated, "that it was remarkably well supplied throughout the Affghan war.". Now, Sir, what use has been made, or is proposed to be made, during the present war of this fine army whom I have attempted briefly to describe? I maintain absolutely none. It is true, that by inducing several officers who are present in England on sick leave, or on furlough, to volunteer, you are organising a transport service which no doubt will form a very useful corps; but it is a service wholly in the rear, in which no glory or military distinction is to be obtained. And you are attempting to form a Turkish contingent, in which certainly the talents and experience of Indian officers who have commanded irregular troops might be most usefully brought to bear; but Her Majesty's Government seem by some curious infelicity to have excluded such men from the service, although it is well known there are officers of the highest Indian reputation, and of approved service now in England, who are willing to sacrifice much finer appointments in India for the purpose of doing good service to their country in the hour of danger. Sir, I will not dwell on individual cases, and it would pain my gallant friend, Colonel Mayne, to hear his name coupled with a grievance, but I must express my own opinion that the non-employment of such men as himself, of General Patrick Grant, of Colonel Hodgson, and of others I could name, is a national loss at this crisis. Sir, after much close attention to this subject, and repeated communications with military friends of great experience, and belonging to both services, I have no doubt that on proper arrangements being made it would be quite practicable to draw from India an efficient European force of all arms, furnishing a complete corps d'armée, with probably a division of Native Irregular Cavalry, such as Jacob's Horse and the Nizam's Cavalry, who have already volunteered for the Crimea, and who would be ready to take the field in the next campaign. For it must be observed that measures like these require a long forecast, and the season is past for embarking troops from Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay, for the Red Sea during the present season. The inquiries which I have made, lead me also to believe, that if in the opinion of military men an expedition to the Persian Gulf and along the valley of the Euphrates were deemed expedient, so as to effect a junction with an army sent from Europe and to operate against the Russians in Georgia, the British army of India would be enabled to supply a force of sixty or seventy thousand men of all arms. There may be differences of opinion as to the expediency of the latter operation, but there can be none as to the value of a European contingent of twenty-five thousand men from India, who should be landed at this moment in the Crimea. The field of action in the Crimea and in Turkey is essentially oriental; there are no roads, or well ordered means of communication; an armed force moving through it must provide all that they require for themselves, and they must carry with them on mules, on bullocks, or in arabas everything that is needed for an army, and often even forage for their cattle. But all these conditions are of normal occurrence in India, and therefore an army trained in Indian campaigns must be the most serviceable that can be supplied; and it is obvious to all acquainted with the military resources of India that the various blunders committed during the last campaign, arising out of defects in commissariat, medical, and transport arrangements, and from an untrained staff, are exactly those which an Indian army would have been most certain to avoid. Unfortunately, it is too late, in the present year, to obtain any such reinforcements from India. Two regiments of cavalry, it is true, numbering between six and seven hundred sabres each, have found their way with perfect ease from India to Balaklava by the route of the Red Sea and Egypt, thus demonstrating the practicability of the operation, but the great heat in India, which sets in during the month of April, and the stormy months which follow during the South-west Monsoon, forbid any further embarkation of troops till the month of November. But then the placid seas which wash the coasts of India, and the delicious temperate climate which prevails, would allow of every port pouring forth its quota from adjoining military stations, and Karachi, Bombay, Cannanore, Ceylon, Madras, and Calcutta, might each successively send out its complement to rendezvous at Cairo, or at Alexandria, so as to be ready for the ensuing spring campaign. And it should be observed that, as if to facilitate a military operation of this kind, the Indian navy has been lately set free from all postal and packet duties, and is available exclusively for a transport service. If schemes like these are practicable, and my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Control must know, that men of the highest military experience in India entertain them, I think this House has a right to ask why they are not put in execution, or if there are any weighty reasons which appear to forbid them, that an inquiry by competent men should consider the subject fully. Never, if I can trust to my knowledge of history, was a War Ministry so stedfastly supported by the people, or such a praiseworthy spirit to make all due sacrifices manifested; and in justice to the opposition, I must say, that never was less party spirit shown to thwart the Government in any vigorous and effective movement that may have been determined on or proposed. But it may be said, it is easy enough for an irresponsible Member, like myself, to start plausible schemes, and to get over the difficulties by the use of vague generalities; and in the language I have used, of "proper arrangements needing to be made," I admit there is something of vagueness. Sir, I could not justify myself to the House if I had ventured to bring this subject before it without fully considering the practicable mode by which the object in view may be accomplished. To the employment of a contingent from India in the present war there are two immediate obstacles; the danger of denuding India of European troops, and the inferior military position of Indian officers serving out of India. But the first objection may be easily overcome by directing to India all raw regiments (by the route of Suez if it be thought desirable), instead of sending them at once to the seat of war as has been already done, where the experience of the last campaign shows that whole regiments disappear almost to a man. A year or two in India, where it will be observed that no seasoning for climate as in the West Indies has to be undergone by new-comers, would make them efficient troops, and their advent in India would let loose a contingent fit for European warfare. With respect to the local and restricted rank of Indian officers which has lasted up to the last few days, I must say it is the most inexpedient, the most unwise—I will add the most illiberal—arrangement that ever existed in an army. There is not a shadow of an argument that I have ever heard producible in its favour; it may be demonstrated to operate injuriously to the public interests. I hold in my hands the commissions of distinguished Indian officers, which have been sent to me unsolicited, with the view of bringing the subject to the notice of the House, and I find throughout the service one universal feeling of dissatisfaction at the invidious distinction. In the year 1853, there were two Indian officers, who by the exhibition of greater moral courage and the assumption of a larger responsibility than perhaps were ever before incurred by men in the subordinate service of Government, absolutely saved the British army and the British empire in the East from disgrace; yet, when in the subsequent year, Generals Nott and Pollock appeared in the presence of their Sovereign, they were not even entitled as of right to wear their swords by their side, or to designate themselves by that military rank which they had so gloriously illustrated. From the first moment I applied my mind to the present subject, I felt satisfied that if no other result emanated from my Motion, this hateful and pernicious distinction could not be permitted any longer to exist—that it was incapable of bearing the breath of public discussion. I think I may fairly congratulate myself that, whatever be the purport or extent of the late order in The Gazette—whether it be, as I hum- bly believe, a mere step in the table of precedence to Indian officers, or general military rank to them enabling Her Majesty to command their services in any part of the world—it is attributable to the accident of my having called public attention to the matter by the present Motion. If the effect of the alteration be to give general military rank, and to enable Company's officers to command Queen's troops in Europe as they may now in India, and thus to enable the Crown to employ the right men in the right places, it is no doubt a very beneficial innovation. But I do not believe the late memorandum has this operation, and at all events it stops very far short of what the State requires in the organisation of its military forces. We want the British army, which I have shown consists of nearly 500,000 men, to be organised in as efficient a manner as any army in the world—we demand that our 12,000 British officers shall be as superior to all other officers in military attainments, as they are already in some other things. The great military questions of education for the army, training of a staff, recruitment, the mode of granting first commissions, promotion, military funds, and pensions, require to be treated on fixed principles, and with reference to one main object—the exigencies of the State. But general principles can only be applied efficiently when the army is dealt with on these subjects as a whole. Company's officers, who have an opportunity for acquiring military experience greater than is afforded to any other army of Europe during peace, far greater for example than the French army in Algeria, ought to be made available for the service of their country in every part of the world. Queen's officers ought to have all the same opportunities afforded them, and to be closely intermixed with Indian regiments, so as to be continually importing into India the latest results of military science and discipline. Above all, the Indian army ought to be placed on a footing of complete equality in all respects with the Royal army, and I affirm boldly that all these objects can only be fully accomplished by the amalgamation of the Queen's army with that force which nominally serves the East India Company. By such amalgamation opportunity would be afforded to select all that is excellent in the organisation of each army—for each has its excellencies—and to weed out the defects in each army, for undoubtedly each has its defects. But there is higher ground even than this—for the sake of good Government in India the amalgamation would be incalculably advantageous. I maintain confidently I that the organisation of your present system, and the relations between the civil and military power in India do not, to use a French expression, function well. What is it that is needed in India from the Queen's army? The youngest and most efficient major generals that that army can supply, men who from personal activity are able to take the field, and who by their knowledge and study of military science in Europe are able to import into Asia all that is required to prevent our fine Indian army from becoming a mere militia? What is it that our system actually produces at the head of the Indian army? Old men from the top of the Army List, some of whom have done no service at all, nearly all of whom are incapable from years to do any service, but who, at the most preposterous military salaries that the world ever saw, wile away their time at hill stations, pottering over courts martial with their Judge Advocates. If, on the other hand, the exigency of the times requires a vigorous general able to take the field, collision immediately ensues with the civil authorities, as in the case of Sir Charles Napier. Amalgamation of the two armies with the Civil Government strengthened by their ablest military servant as a War Minister, and military justice (which is a grave question of itself) placed in the hands of the local Governments, would enable you to employ the most efficient general officers we possess in true military functions, without setting up rivals to the Civil Power in every Presidency. So again with respect to the natives, I affirm that your Government would be much strengthened by the army being in the direct service of the Crown, and on this point I am enabled to give the House some valuable native testimony. Ali Akbar, an Arab gentleman, who fought most gallantly by the side of Sir Charles Napier, at Meeanee, and who in that gallant general's opinion, did him more service in the conquest of Sind than 1,000 soldiers could have done, is now in London, and having observed my Motion on the paper he writes to me as follows—

"24, Maida Hill West, 12th April, 1855.

"My dear Sir Erskine,

"I read with great interest your notice of Motion in the House of Commons for the amalgamation of the Indian troops with Her Majesty's army, and I think it will be highly beneficial to the interest of the army in general and Indians in particular.

"It is quite true that the natives of India have not much love for their country, but they love their Sovereign not minding who he is. Everybody knows how the Seikh troops fought on the Sutledge: it is certain that if it was not for the treachery of their Sirdars, they were quite capable of inarching to Delhi and Benares right over the Indian troops. Why were these men so courageous? four-fifths of them were natives of Hindoostan, the same class of men who fill the ranks of native troops in British India. Because they were fighting for their Sovereign; and when that Sovereign was no more, they dispersed and desisted, and so the Punjab was pacified.

"The change will give a new era to the native troops; they will consider themselves superior to those serving the native Potentates, and it is fact that the natives of India look to the Queen's troops far superior to their own; they are called Padeshahee Fowj (the Royal army), and themselves Beparee ke Fowj (the merchant's army).

"I enclose for your perusal a memorandum of few facts which came to my knowledge while in India, and "I remain, my dear Sir Erskine, "Yours very sincerely, "M. A. ACKBAR,

"Sir T. Erskine Perry, Knt., M.P., &c."

But there is another and a very important point of view in which this subject should be regarded. It is not safe to keep such a large army as you now possess in India attached to this country by so slight a tenure as that which exists. The Indian army, at the present moment, is altogether sound; the men, so long as you treat them as they have been treated, are not likely to be otherwise than well disposed; but a body of 6,000 officers, who leave England as boys, who pass the greater part of their lives in Asia, many of them at out-stations, have a tendency to become insensible to public opinion—to overrate their own importance—to become deadened to the claims of their mother-country. Such evils have manifested themselves formerly in the Indian army. Indian history tells us of more than one mutiny, and what has once happened may recur. I contend that in an old-established monarchy like ours the Sovereign's name is a tower of strength, and it is ineptitude to forego the use of it. No one more than myself places higher the qualities of Indian officers, especially of its lieutenants and captains, but no one is more impressed than I am with the necessity of a close intermixture with Her Majesty's service. The strict discipline, the unwavering allegiance, the chivalrous tone of Her Majesty's army are examples which Indian regiments are proud to imitate; nor can I forget that all the most brilliant deeds of war have been accomplished in India by Queen's officers—by Lawrence, Clive, Wellesley, Lake, and Napier. All these arguments suggest a closer incorporation of the two armies. So far I have only considered the interests of the State, but the interests of each service would, I think, be equally furthered by the amalgamation. The Queen's officers in India would have thrown open to them, as of course, all staff and political appointments in India, and they are very numerous. Company's officers would have higher military rank and distinction presented to their ambition, they would find a wider field of service in Europe, and they would have the proud military distinction of being in the immediate service of their Sovereign. I have not the slightest doubt that all the elites of the Company's service would hail such a change with delight, and I am glad to be able to read to the House an extract from a letter to me by my gallant friend, Colonel William Mayne, whose name is so familiar to the British public—

"I am one of those who consider the amalgamation of the two armies as desirable, and for the advantage of both services. There of course must exist many obstacles to such a measure; but I cannot see any which might not be got over. I conceive the days of the purchase system in the Queen's army are numbered, therefore, without discussing the expediency of purchase being done away with, we shall find, by such a measure, the principal obstacle to the union of the two armies removed. I do not anticipate any evil from officers of the Royal army exchanging and being put into native regiments, or vice versâ. Really good men will soon become acquainted with the difference of the system of the two services, and will do generally as well in one as in the other, whilst indifferent officers will find their level, and will not have it in their power to do more harm in this corps than in that. … As regards the civil appointments in India which are filled by military men, there have been and are many officers of Her Majesty's army, such as Havelock, Mansfield, Markham, Lugard, Fisher, &c., &c., who are peculiarly qualified and much more fit than many of the East India Company's officers for appointments now open to the latter only; whilst there also are and have been several officers of the Company's army, whose names are Well known to you, who might be employed with great advantage to the State in our European wars, and whose services it is ridiculous to lose. This anomaly would be got rid of by the amalgamation proposal."

Sir, whether this amalgamation should be effected by a complete incorporation of the Company's army with the Queen's, as is the case with the West India regiments and colonial corps generally, or that the army in India should be maintained as a distinct branch of Her Majesty's forces is a subject worthy of grave consideration, and requires to be minutely considered in all its details by military men. The latter course was suggested by a very great statesman, Lord Grenville, who, in his speech on Indian Government, in 1813, advocated most strongly that amalgamation of the two armies which I am now venturing to propose. I avail myself most gladly of his great authority, because the perusal of that speech will, I think, convince all acquainted with Indian Government that it is animated throughout by the highest spirit of statesmanship—a prophetic prescience of things to come. I would only observe on his proposition, which I am informed was also that of the Duke of Wellington, that its tendency would seem to be to make the Indian army a local corps, and therefore to place it on an inferior basis, which, in my opinion, would be extremely inexpedient. But there is higher authority, if possible, than that of Lord Grenville for such an amalgamation as I propose. Lord Grenville, though a great statesman, was no soldier, and he had never been in India. I will refer the House now to one who was a great Indian statesman, a triumphant general, and who had for many years been Governer General of India—the Marquess of Cornwallis. During his voyage home from India, in 1794, he applied himself for some months to the special consideration of the Indian army, and the clear conclusion he came to was that, as a foundation for all good administrative military reform, the incorporation of the Company's with the Royal army was indispensable. In 1796, the then President of the Board of Control, Mr. Dundas, having heard that Lord Cornwallis had drawn up an elaborate plan for the amalgamation, addressed him, by His Majesty's desire, in a letter from which I will read an extract—

"His Majesty is desirous of knowing your opinion on the best mode of new modelling the army in India, with a view to give safety and permanence to our Indian empire, and to prevent the continuance or revival of those discontents and jealousies which have so often manifested themselves between the King's and Company's troops, as well as between the Company's troops belonging to the different presidencies."

And one passage only from Lord Cornwallis's reply—

"I do not conceive it possible that any system can be devised which would have a permanent and useful effect for the satisfaction of both services and for the public good, unless as a preliminary measure the whole of our force in India, as well native as European, shall be transferred to Her Majesty's service, and with a few modifications be regulated arid conducted in future according to the rules which have long operated in the King's army.

"It must, however, at the same time be clearly understood that all His Majesty's troops serving in India are to be perfectly subordinate to the Company's Government in that country, and to obey all orders they may receive either directly from those Governments or through them from the Court of Directors."

I could explain to the House why these wise suggestions were not then adopted, though they are well given by Sir W. Keir Grant in his evidence before the Common's Committee in 1833. In 1811–12 and '13 the question was again revived before the Parliamentary Committees, and the House has already heard what the views of Lord Grenville on the subject were. In the Committee that sat in 1833, the Secretary of the Board of Control addressed a circular on the same subject to a great many military men, and the answers elicited displayed many variances of opinion; but with the exception of Sir John Malcolm, who appeared to be favourable, and of Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone, who was adverse, to the amalgamation, no very eminent names are to be found, either as Indian authorities or as English statesmen. In the last inquiry before Parliament, which took place three years ago, this subject, like many others of surpassing interest to India, was unaccountably blinked, but thence a very powerful argument arises for the necessity of a searching Parliamentary inquiry at the present moment. Sir, I have only one other argument to urge now in favour of an amalgamation, but it appears to me important. Whatever is done in this direction should be done extremely slow. The first and only great change at first would be in the denomination of the army, and the admission of Company's officers to universal rank. The systems in each army should be maintained at first Unmodified. The sound principles to be applied to the united army would emerge from experience, discussion, and the opportunity afforded of observing the comparative excellencies and defects of each army. I have trespassed so long on the attention of the House that I am unwilling to say another word, yet it is not treating the subject fairly to leave the difficulties and objections which environ the subject wholly untouched. For I admit, fully, there are grave difficulties in the way, but what important question of statesmanship is without them, and where he the glory of successful statesmanship if its course were entirely simple and smooth. But this I assert most unhesitatingly that having thrown myself into communication with all the best minds acquainted with India to whom I have had access, and having courted criticism and objections of every kind, I have met with no difficulties hitherto that have not been deemed superable by those best qualified to form an opinion. And as I ask the House to pledge themselves to no definite action, the mere existence of difficulties would seem to be a strong argument in favour of the inquiry which I propose. The difficulties which present themselves on a proposed amalgamation are of two kinds, and fall under the distinct classes of principle and detail. Of the latter sort are those which affect the different mode of pensions in the two armies, the military funds, the grounds on which exchanges should be permitted, and Queen's officers allowed to command native troops—all these are questions for military and professional men. The military secretaries in India, actuaries in London, could treat them far better than any discussion in this House. I have discussed with both classes of men the arrangements necessary to be made, and I believe firmly that no serious difficulties in practice would occur. But there are principles to be laid down which only the legislature can determine. The first that meets the view is founded on the doctrine propounded by Lord Grenville—that the army in India cannot be made Royal unless the Government is administered in the name of the Crown. With great deference to that illustrious statesman, I think our subsequent experience of Indian Government, running over forty years, enables us to see that this consequence is by no means inevitable. During the great part of that period we have had a Royal army in India of thirty thousand men, and I have shown that the absolute command of these troops is vested in the civil servants of the Company. But I will not rest on this argument, I will frankly confess that in my opinion the constituting the army of India a Royal force would sooner or later, bring about the introduction of the Queen's Government into India; but I would ask the House whether this is not the tendency of all our legislation with respect to India. The Company is, in point of fact, extinct for nearly all purposes of good; the three last Charter Acts have successively taken away from them all real power, and the Act of 1853 has so completely reduced them, that they are waiting in humility for the coup de grace, which it is not improbable the present House of Commons will deal out to them. Still if the Legislature choose to continue them in existence with their enfeebled powers, there will be no difficulty about it, and the Company will be able to exert a useful function by dispensing military patronage till some better system is adopted. Sir, a more serious difficulty than this presents itself. The Indian services are afraid that if India is directly and nominally administered by the Government of the Crown, as it is indirectly under the name of the Company, it will be the signal for introducing aristocratic and Parliamentary influence, that is, jobbery of every kind. The Indian army would be justly discontented if the Horse Guards were to determine their staff appointments, or if home influences were allowed to operate on Governors and Commanders in Chief. I will admit, most frankly, that the evil of such results would be enormous to India, and I declare, solemnly, that if I thought there was the remotest probability of their occurrence, I never would utter a word or breathe a wish for the abolition of the Company's Government. But these are not days, believe me, for the introduction of new abuses; it is not always easy to eradicate old ones, yet we see them extinguished one by one, but no man of our generation has witnessed the growth of a new plant of this species. India, fortunately, whether by accident or design, or perhaps by the existence of special interests in England, has furnished a principle for the distribution of Colonial patronage of the utmost value, and which ought to be held up to view and be hallowed as a fundamental maxim in the treatment of dependencies of the mother-country. In India, after the first appointments have been made from this country, the Home Government has no right or power, or means to interfere in promotion. A Governor General, who was as great a jobber as Bubb Doddington himself, would not be able to gratify his propensities. To preserve purity in administration, there fore, you have only to continue things as they are, and an Act of Parliament which should transfer the Government of India to the Crown in one clause, and enact that the local authorities only should have authority to distribute patronage in another clause, would justly claim to be the Magna Charta of India. There is only one other topic that needs to be noticed, but it is too important to be passed over in silence. Promotion in the Indian service takes place, speaking generally, by seniority; how is the English system of promotion by purchase to be reconciled with it? Sir, I do not stand here to defend a rigid, inflexible system of seniority—which, however, the Indian system is not—but I am prepared to contend most confidently that, as between purchase and seniority, the latter is by far the fairer, the better, and more military system of the two. If the amalgamation should take place, the two systems of seniority and purchase might co-exist as they do already in the Royal army. At this hour I will not discuss which is the better system, but will make only one remark; the system of purchase is based wholly on one producible argument, there may be others that no one avows, but the only military or public ground which can be vouched is, that it tends to bring young efficient officers to the front. On this ground it has signally failed, as is admitted indeed expressly by the Commission on Army and Navy Promotion. But, singularly enough, it has proved itself inferior on this head even to the Indian system, for whereas in time of peace, under the system of purchase, the age of a Major General in the Queen's army averages sixty-five years, in the Indian army, as I have ascertained by reference to the India House, the average age is only sixty-two. I am satisfied that whenever this subject is referred to a Committee of competent men, having the interests of the public service alone in view, a mixed system of seniority and selection will be decided upon as the proper one for all promotion, civil or military. Sir, after the kind attention which has been extended to me, I will not detain the House one moment by attempting to recapitulate my arguments. I have necessarily left a great many topics untouched. I have therefore opened a wide field for objection to all those who are interested in maintaining things as they are, or who believe that no improvement can be introduced into the organisation of the army of India. But I intreat the House to observe that on looking back to the discussions in Parliament during the last seventy years respecting the relations of England with India, they will find that every improvement in Government which the wisdom of Parliament has thought fit to adopt has been invariably opposed by the East India Company on special and local grounds, nearly always extremely plausible, but which subsequent experience has completely falsified. And if, in the present case, the House should think fit to support the Motion of which I have given notice, I am satisfied that a full Parliamentary discussion on the evidence brought before it will be equally fruitful in its results for good government in India, with those other Indian measures which Parliament has framed, notwithstanding the opposition of the East India Company.

seconded the Motion.

said, he did not see how any amalgamation could be accomplished between the Indian army and the European army. The expense of removing an army from India to the Crimea would be enormous. To induce the sepoy to leave India, he must have doubly pay and double batta. But he was perfectly certain that the sepoys never would be able to endure the march and the service that would be required of them. Under all the circumstances, he saw no possible benefit likely to arise from the appointment of a Committee, and he should therefore oppose the Motion.

said, the Motion divided itself into two distinct parts; first, as to how many troops could be spared from India to go to the Crimea. That was a question for the Executive Government to decide. It was a question of policy to be considered by the Government, and not one to be sumitted to a Committee of the House of Commons. No doubt, if the East India Company said they could spare 20,000 troops from India for the purpose of prosecuting the war in the Crimea, it would be the duty of Her Majesty's Government to avail themselves of their services. The second proposition of the hon. and learned Gentleman was to amalgamate the Indian army with the Royal army, but that was a proposition which had always been strenuously op- posed by the East India Company, and until the whole Government of India was transferred to Her Majesty's Government it would be unadvisable to have an army paid by one Government and acting under the authority of another. The recent appointments of Indian officers to commands in the East had been greatly detrimental to the officers of the Royal army, and but little compliment was paid to Her Majesty's officers when they were told officers from India were to receive commands over their heads in the Crimea. References had been made by the hon. and learned Gentleman to the appointments which had been made to the Turkish Contingent. He (Colonel Dunne) was, however, of opinion that a Turkish Contingent would never exist, because it would be impossible to induce Turkish soldiers to serve under Christian officers. The officers of the Royal army had, nevertheless, been passed over in the commands which had been distributed with respect to foreign troops. One gallant friend of his, Major General Chesney, a highly distinguished officer, and a man well acquainted with the East and with Oriental languages, had actually been appointed to one of these foreign legions, and after having received his appointment was removed to make way for an Indian officer. To make a rule that the whole of the commands in Her Majesty's service should be thrown open to Indian officers would hardly be dealing fairly with officers of the Royal army. Her Majesty's officers felt proud of the high honour and chivalrous conduct of their Indian comrades, but he did not think it either Just or fair to transfer them to commands in the Royal army over the heads of the regular officers of that army. He was acquainted with several officers who had served through the whole of the Spanish campaign, but they were only recognised to this moment as civilians, notwithstanding the distinguished services they might have performed, and under such circumstances the hon. and learned Gentleman had no right to complain that the recent order merely conferred upon Indian officers honorary rank. If the propositions of the hon. and learned Gentleman were acceded to, he (Colonel Dunne) believed that the services of none but officers could be obtained, because it could not be expected that the Indian army could be transferred from India and placed in Her Majesty's service. Indeed, most of the Indian troops would be useless out of their own country. Many of them objected to cross the sea, and at the siege of Mooltan they refused to work in the trenches. They were an admirable Force in India, and admirably commanded. The hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir E. Perry) had quoted orders of General Sir Carles Napier. There were orders of Sir Charles Napier of a very different tendency, and it was notorious that, however good the East India army was, it was necessary to mix up with it European troops, who were expected to take and had taken the lead upon all occasions. He trusted, therefore, that Government would not agree to the proposal. He had forgotten to notice one point. The hon. Member had compared the relative ages of major-generals in the two services, but he forgot that in the East India Company's service they had had several wars during the last few years, which had brought down the average.

said, he had listened with great attention to the suggestions made by his hon. and learned Friend (Sir E. Perry) in introducing the Motion, and, having heard his hon. and learned Friend's panegyric upon the Indian army and its efficiency in every department, he had certainly been somewhat surprised to find that his hon. and learned Friend, knowing the authority under which that army served, had arrived at the conclusion that it ought now to be transferred from the authority by which it had been organised, and under which it had gained its present state of efficiency. The hon. and learned Gentleman spoke of some possible diversion that might be made by the Indian army in the present war, and then proposed that a Committee of the House of Commons should sit upon the question, and arrogate to themselves the functions of the Government both as to the policy of the war and the mode in which it was to be conducted. [Sir ERSKINE PERRY: "No, no!"] The hon. and learned Gentleman had certainly spoken of expeditions to the Persian Gulf, to the Crimea, and to the valley of the Euphrates, mentioning them only as several suggestions for the consideration of the Committee. Surely, to call upon a Committee to discuss such subjects would be to transfer to them the functions of the Government. The Motion of his hon. and learned Friend as it stood on the paper was this—to consider and inquire, in the first place, how the army in India might be made most available for the present war; and certainly it was a most gloomy anticipation with regard to the war, to say that, after a Committee had been sitting month after month, reporting to the House, and discussing the conduct of the war, another Committee ought to be appointed to inquire how far the Indian army might he rendered, not effectual for general purposes, but available for active service in the present war. He would, however, tell his hon. and learned Friend that that was not the question which ought to be considered. The real question was, whether the Indian army, or any part of it, could be spared from India consistently with the safety of our Indian possessions. That was certainly not a question for a Committee of the House of Commons to determine. Nay, it was not a question to be determined by the Government of this country. It was a question to be decided by the Governor General of India alone. The Governor General, if he were the man he ought to be, and if he were a man of such experience and talent as he ever had been, was alone competent to say whether a soldier could leave India with due regard to the safety and security of that mighty empire. This question, with regard to the Indian army being available, was not one of speculation; it was a question of fact. The experience of half a century showed that the Indian army had always been available. Had there been any difficulty in rendering that army available for the expeditions to Egypt, Ceylon, Java, the Mauritius, the Eastern Archipelago, China, and Affghanistan? He must, in passing, express his opinion that the Affghan war, though fought by the Indian army, and paid for by the Indian treasury, was essentially a European war. His hon. and learned Friend might say that he referred rather to the Indian officers than to the Indian army; and that was not so much a matter of speculation as of fact. Her Majesty's Government had stated that they wanted the services of Indian officers, and what was the result? Within a few days, almost within a few hours, hundreds of Indian officers volunteered, and at this moment there were many Indian officers serving this country under Generals Williams and Cannon. His hon. and learned Friend had thought fit to constitute himself a judge as to whether the proper officers had or had not been selected. His hon. and learned Friend had named men whose distinction was recognised throughout India, and he (Sir J. Hogg) would be glad to see those gallant officers employed in the service; but he must say that the officers who had already been selected were men of high distinction, and he was satisfied they would show themselves deserving of the confidence that had been reposed in them. His hon. and learned Friend proposed, by his Motion, to inquire into the steps which it might be necessary to take if it should be deemed advisable to constitute the Indian army a Royal army. He thought his hon. and learned Friend would have been a little more logical if he had established the condition precedent, instead of proposing to enter into au inquiry which was consequent upon a condition that did not exist. His hon. and learned Friend had told the House that he had nothing definite to suggest. It appeared to him (Sir J. Hogg) that the hon. and learned Gentleman was enamoured of some change, and that if he could only obtain some change he did not care what it was. In order to give to the arguments of his hon. and learned Friend the consideration which the importance of the subject demanded, he should proceed to deal, one by one, with the principal heads upon which those arguments were founded. The hon. and learned Gentleman first put upon the paper a notice of Motion for a kind of roving commission to inquire and see what Heaven would send them. The hon. and learned Gentleman, however, now asked for a Committee. He (Sir J. Hogg) was sure that if the hon. and learned Gentleman was sitting on the bench where he had so long presided with honour to himself and with advantage to his country, and if any one were to make to him such a proposal as he had now submitted to the House, he would regard it as a kind of political bill of discovery, to see if anything could be discovered upon which something could be founded. His hon. and learned Friend had directed attention to three prominent points—the amalgamation of the two armies; whether there should or should not be a distinct, separate, local army for India; and, if there were to be a separate, distinct, local army for India, whether or not that army should be a Royal army. The hon. and learned Gentleman said he felt a little difficulty with respect to the subject of amalgamation, and he (Sir J. Hogg) was not surprised that he did so. Indeed, his only surprise was that his hon. and learned Friend had not been more sensible of the difficulty, for he (Sir J. Hogg) regarded such an amalgamation as not merely a matter of difficulty but of impracticability. The two armies were, indeed, absolutely antagonistic the one to the other. In the Queen's army they had the system of purchase and exchange, and they had continual reliefs to different parts of the British Empire, but in the Company's army there was neither exchange nor purchase. In that army officers were gratuitously nominated to commissions; they did not rise by purchase, but solely by seniority; and so rigid was that rule of seniority that exchange was precluded. In the Indian army, the junior lieutenant not only had a right to have the stipulated number of lieutenants above him, but by the rules of the service he was entitled to have the same identical individual officers, alone his superiors in rank, and the rules of the service did not permit of any exchange under any circumstances. Then, with regard to the system of reliefs, the Indian army was a local army, and not only were its services confined to India, except under circumstances of peculiar emergency, but, as a general rule, the army of each presidency was confined to its own particular presidency. He thought, then, he was justified in saying that the constitutions and arrangement of the two armies were not only different, but that they were actually antagonistic the one to the other. There were, however, some other matters which his hon. and learned Friend had slurred over, but to which he (Sir J. Hogg) would ask the attention of the House. In the Indian army every officer, after a certain number of years' service, was entitled to retire upon the pay of his rank. There were also different funds—as, for instance, funds for widows and orphans, the contribution to which was compulsory—peculiar to the Indian army. How, then, was an amalgamation to be effected? Would they assimilate the Queen's army to the Company's army, and give the former these boons, or would they assimilate the Company's army to the Queen's and deprive them of their vested rights and interests? He asserted most confidently that amalgamation was absolutely impracticable. What he had said so far applied to the English officers and men; but how would the suggested change affect the sepoys? He would ask the House to listen to what the right hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. Macaulay) said of the sepoys. He said—

"A hostile monarch may promise mountains of gold to our sepoys, on condition that they will desert the standard of the Company. The Company promises only a moderate pension after a long service. But every sepoy knows that the promise of the Company will be kept; he knows that if he lives one hundred years his rice and salt are as secure as the salary of the Governor General; and he knows that there is not another State in India which would not, in spite of the most solemn vows, leave him to die of hunger in a ditch as soon as he ceased to be useful."

That was a true description of the sepoy at the present time. Now, the sepoy had failings, and his prominent failing was suspicion, dislike, and fear of innovation. (He (Sir J. Hogg) did not exceed the bounds of fact when he said that any innovation alarmed and excited the distrust of the sepoy, even though it were for his own benefit. He would read to the House the opinion of an officer of the Indian army, the historian of the Affghan war, with respect to the danger of tampering with the sepoys, in consequence of their dread of innovation. Mr. Kaye said,

"The people of India will bear a great deal, so long as they are used to it. They are very intolerant of change. They do not understand it. They are timid and suspicious. Benevolence and wisdom may go hand in hand in our measures, but the people are not easily persuaded that what we are doing is for their good."

This apprehension of change was peculiar to the people of India, and every man who had ruled that country had acted upon the principle of altering as little as possible the condition of the sepoys for fear of exciting some misapprehension. He (Sir J. Hogg) thought he had thus shown that the amalgamation of the two armies was impracticable, and he contended that, as they could not have such amalgamation, the army of India must be a separate, local and distinct army. At this moment nine-tenths of the army were natives. It must not only be a separate and distinct local army, but it must be a native army. We could not hold India by an exclusively European force. This country could not stand the drain of money and treasure; the two treasuries of England and India could not stand the drain that would be necessary to hold India exclusively by a European force. If they could do so it would be perilous in the extreme, fatal to India, and fatal to our hold on that country, from the disaffection and jealousies which it would excite in the native mind. The army, then, must be local and native, but it must be officered by British officers in order to be effective. These officers must be familiar with the language, the religion, the usages, and the prejudices of the sepoys; and, if such were their qualifications, they could not fail to conciliate them and command their affections. Without such qualifications, instead of conciliation, we would have alienation; and this brought him to a remark of his hon. and learned Friend, who spoke of Indian officers as if it were an advantage to be always looking to his native country. Now, he (Sir J. Hogg) contended for exactly the reverse. The Indian officer, to be effective and useful in the capacities he had indicated, must go out young—he must go out not too old to be transplanted. He must take root in India, and feel and look at India as his home; and not only must he remain in India, but remain in the same regiment, that he might know the pecularities of the natives at large, as well as every man individually in the regiment. The result showed that this was the fact. At the present moment there were 1,100 officers in the Indian army who, if they pleased, might retire on pensions, but who were so much attached to the country and so devoted to their profession and their men that they did not avail themselves of the privilege. A European force could not be in itself a local force in any sense similar to that of the native army. It ought to be identified with the native army. If it was so, it would be a source of strength and confidence; if it was not, it would fail to be either. Then there were about 30,000 Queen's troops for the defence of the Indian empire; but these were only auxiliaries to the native army. They went out as auxiliaries and remained such, their stay being usually short. In 1827, the Duke of Wellington said with reference to this very topic, "The Queen's army are, and must always be regarded as auxiliaries, and auxiliaries only to the Indian army. "Now, was this the effect of mere speculation? Was this army in its present condition the work of any theory? No; like the best institutions of this country, it grew up and was altered as the exigencies of circumstances required. It commenced from small beginnings, gradually increased, and slight changes were made in its constitution till sat last it arrived at its present state of efficiency. It was a fabric reared by the wisdom of a hundred years. With it was associated mighty names and mighty interests. That fabric might be pulled down and destroyed by the imprudence and folly of an hour. In the early periods of the Indian empire we had no army, there were jealousies and apprehensions in the way. The first soldiers we had were few in number, and they were Europeans. We had then no natives, and to show the jealousy that existed, he might state that the first troops we employed were the descendants of Portuguese, who were called "topasses." About the middle of the last century, however, we got into disputes with the native princes, and then commenced the organisation of a native army. At first there were only three British officers to a regiment, and the Indian army had no officer holding the King's commission till 1780. The first regiment was formed, he believed, in 1750, and was at the battle of Plassy, under Lord Clive. Such was the origin and constitution of the army as it now existed in India, a separate and distinct local army, having the aid of Her Majesty's troops, which were changed, as he had previously stated, after particular periods of service. It might be said, why could we not have a local Indian army which would at the same time be a Royal army? Now that raised the question, ought the army to be transferred to the Crown? His hon. and learned Friend said he would change it from being a local army, and thereby add to its honour, dignity, and consequence. Now he was decidedly of opinion that the effect would be exactly the reverse. As an Indian army it had acquired glory and distinction such as no other army could exceed. Instead of having the distinction of being a separate army, if we transferred it to the Crown it would become a kind of local army, it might become a sort of Ceylon regiment, or a West India regiment, but we should do away with all its prestige and its glory, and it would be without any of that proud spirit of hereditary renown by which it was now animated. In 1832, Mounstuart Elphistone, in reply to questions put to him on this subject by the President of the Board of Control, first spoke of the separation of the two governments, the civil from the military, as follows:—

"The separation of the civil government from the military would probably not answer in any country, but least of all in India. The great problem there has always been to maintain the subordination of the military power to the civil, and to prevent clashing between the governors and commanders in chief. In this we have not always been successful, even when both drew their authority from the same source."

Then, speaking of the transfer of the army to the Crown, he said—

"In that case, if the pride of officers was for a moment flattered by a more immediate connection with the King, that feeling would probably be altered when they discovered that, from a separate service, which had a reputation and pretension of its own, and was the sole object of attention to the military department of its Government, they even sank into an inferior branch of another army, and were scarcely known to the Commander in Chief."

That would be the fate of the Indian army if it was transferred to the Crown, the civil government being left with the East India Company. His hon. and learned Friend (Sir E. Parry) seemed to assume that he was fighting the battle of the Indian army and Indian officers, and, as a foundation for the assumption, he read a single extract from a letter of a distinguished Indian officer. He (Sir J. Hogg) denied that his hon. and learned Friend spoke the wishes of the Indian army. He did not pretend to speak for the Indian army on this subject, but he had at least as good means as his hon. and learned Friend of knowing its sentiments, and he believed that nine-tenths or nineteen-twen-tieths of that army would strenuously resist that amalgamation or transfer to the Crown, for which his hon. and learned Friend was contending. His hon. and learned Friend referred to the opinions of Lord Cornwallis on this subject, and gave a short statement of what had passed at that time; but, as he did not give the whole statement, he would supply the deficiency. It was true that before Lord Cornwallis left India he entertained the idea of an amalgamation of the Indian army with the Royal, and that on his way home he matured a plan which, on his arrival, he submitted to the Government. But the moment the intention of Lord Cornwallis to recommend such an amalgamation became known in India, the greatest ferment was created in the army, committees were formed and sat in London and different parts of the kingdom, and delegates were sent from the army in India to express their disproval of the proposed scheme. His hon. and learned Friend stated that the East India Company had collected evidence. Now, he denied that the East India Company had collected evidence. What was done was the spontaneous act of the officers themselves, alarmed at the change contemplated. As far as his recollection of the facts served him, the "delegates" sent over here by the Indian army were requested to change their names to agents, and they were received by the Chairman of the Court of Directors and the President of the Board of Control as individual officers. He would now simply read them a portion of one report made by these delegates while the matter was pending, and another when it was concluded; and the House then might draw their own inference as to the value of the argument founded on the opinions of Lord Cornwallis. Here was the report of the delegates—their own account of one of their verbal communications to the Chairman—

"That we felt it our inclination, as well as our duty, to treat the Court of Directors with every respect; that our situation was unprecedented, as was the cause which had principally induced it. In all other cases, as public servants, we could look with confidence towards them alone as the channel of redress; but in the present instance, where we had every reason to believe a change of masters was intended without deigning to consult us, we conceived that our being officers did not deprive us of the liberty enjoyed by every other description of British subjects, namely, the asserting, by every legal means, our natural rights as men. We were not slaves, to be transferred at the will or caprice of a master. No Power had a right to convey its armies to another. That the officers in India had contracted to serve the Company; if they were to be transferred to the King, it must be with their own consent, and not on such terms as they chose to stipulate."

That was the case which his hon. and learned Friend coolly and deliberately cited as a precedent for the change now suggested, and represented as likely to be acceptable to the Indian army. When it was all over, and these same delegates made their report to the various committees constituted in India—a nice state of things, truly, for an army to be forming committees, and sending delegates home to represent them—they said—

"It is with the sincerest gratification that we are at length able to congratulate you on the final adjustment and transmission of the new military arrangement. … Our brother officers will, we trust, need no assurance from us, that we have not been deficient in zeal and exertion to obtain for them the solid advantages of rank, respectability, and ultimate independence, at the price of as few pecuniary sacrifices as possible. They will recollect that at the opening of the negotiation the subject was novel and the result hazardous; that a system had been formed and supported by the highest authority and the most overbearing influence, which threatened the subversion, root and branch, of those establishments to which, from long habit and from conviction of their peculiar adaptation to our situation, we are firmly attached. We have happily succeeded in obtaining an arrangement constituted in most parts on the principles which our constituents have themselves recommended. The reform has been temperate and cautious, and promises in time to be effectual. The principal causes of complaint have been removed, improvements have been introduced, and room left for further ameliorations when the system shall have stood the test of experience."

Now, that was the course which the Indian army adopted in 1793 and 1794. What was the state of that army in 1793 and 1794? He meant as to the advantages they enjoyed. They resisted the transfer to the Crown at a period when they did not enjoy any one of the advantages which had since been conceded to them. At the period he had mentioned there were upwards of 1,500 English officers in the Company's service. Would not the House be astonished when he told them that the highest rank to which those officers could attain was that of colonel; that there were only twelve colonels, twenty-three lieutenant colonels, and twenty-three majors; that there was no retiring pension, no privilege of furlough to Europe, none of the advantages which they now enjoyed? But yet, in spite of the position in which they were then placed, they resisted, as he had shown, the proposed amalgamation. Mr. Dundas, then President of the Board of Control, was not an advocate for the amalgamation. He proposed not amalgamation, but a transfer to the Crown. However, Mr. Dundas and Lord Cornwallis both saw what his hon. and learned Friend (Sir E. Perry) had not seen, namely, the difficulties of the case. They both consulted, which his hon. and learned Friend, he feared, had not done—the wishes of the Indian army. They were practical men, and they abandoned the scheme, which, until this moment, had never since been deliberately revived. His hon. and learned Friend had alluded to Lord Grenville. Now, there was a very distinguished officer who took a part in these very discussions, and who, when he had attained a mature age, was again, in 1832, interrogated on the subject of amalgamation or transfer to the Crown. This was what Colonel Sherwood said in reply—

"A period of nearly thirty-seven years has now passed over since the Bengal, and, indeed, the whole of the Indian Artillery, were informed that Lord Cornwallis had proposed to the home authorities to 'incorporate them with the Royal Artillery, and to relieve them regularly from Woolwich.' I have a lively, and, I may say, a painful, recollection of the sensation produced by this promulgation. The major part of the regiment was then at Dum-Dum, at their annual practice. A meeting was held upon the occasion, where the proposition was looked upon with absolute horror, as destructive of all those hopes, rights, and prospects with which we had entered the service and had remained with every disadvantage for years. The road to Woolwich was pointed out as the road to ruin and despair. We thank God that this calamity was averted from us, and we fervently pray it may so continue."

That was the opinion of Colonel Sherwood, looking back to the transactions of past times and answering the question put to him deliberately in writing. But, upon general principles, could it answer that the civil authority in India should be vested in one body and the military in another? His hon. and learned Friend was conversant with Indian history. He would ask him whether such an arrangement answered in the early periods of that history, and whether he remembered the endless differences which existed between the Queen's and the Company's officers before the harmonious union now established? At that period the Queen's officers went out with a great idea of their importance. They held their commissions from the Crown, and did not serve a company of traders; and the result of such ideas was that constant collisions occurred. But let the House look not alone to the military, let them look at the peaceful profession to which his hon. and learned Friend belonged. Look to the Supreme Court of Calcutta—to their arrogance when first constituted—to the injuries they did inflict, and the ruin they would have inflicted, upon India, if their career had not been stopped by an Act of Parliament. Why, it had been the aim and object of Parliament ever since to try, as far as lay in their power, to remove these anomalies, and they had at last succeeded in rendering the authorities, civil and military, subservient to the civil Government. His hon. and learned Friend had spoken as if he would give the Company's officers the advantage enjoyed by the Queen's officers—namely, of coming home here, and of getting commands; but he had omitted altogether to grapple with the exceedingly difficult question of reciprocity. If you gave the Indian officers commands here, the necessary consequence was that the Queen's officers must be eligible to all the civil, military, and staff appointments in India, from which they are now entirely excluded. But it would be impossible to employ the Queen's officers for the purpose of filling such appointments. No person could fill those appointments without passing some kind of examination. At the present moment there were 5,000 officers in the Indian army, 1,000 of whom were upon detached civil or military service. His hon. and learned Friend would allow that this at present formed some sort of vested interest, and were they to withdraw from the Indian army the whole of these advantages, and let in the whole of the Queen's officers? Could those officers be severed from their regiments, and if they could, had they the necessary knowledge of the country, the language, and the prejudices of the natives? It was quite impossible that the Queen's officers, going out to India for a short time, could be so qualified, and this was quite inconsistent, moreover, with what he considered a requisite for India—namely, that you should have a local army. He did not think he was addressing a single individual who did not wish to do justice to the Indian army, and who did not recognise the glorious deeds of that army. But his hon. and learned Friend had read a most unfair catalogue of victories, and had told the House they were fought under Queen's officers. Now, why were they so fought? Because the Company's officers had been carefully excluded from such commands. So, those officers were not only to have their pride wounded and their interests destroyed, but were afterwards to see held up, in a kind of juxtaposition injurious to them, the exploits which the Queen's officers had achieved. During the last fifteen or sixteen years there had been eight great occasions on which the Indian army had taken the field—namely, in the campaigns of Afghanistan (two), Scinde, Gwalior, the Sutlej (two), the Punjab, and China; and only on one of those occasions was the chief command given to an officer of the Indian army. Was not that an injustice of which the Indian army had a right to complain? And what was the solitary occasion when it was vouchsafed to employ officers of the Indian army in chief command? It was when Generals Pollock and Nott were employed to retrieve the disasters of Affghanistan. He could not, then, be told that the reason why they were not so employed was, that Indian officers were inferior to and could not compete with the officers of the Queen's army; for, without pretending to say they were superior to the latter, he need not hesitate to assert that they were in every respect on a par with them. But it might be said that when there was a mixed army of Queen's and Company's troops, that might be a reason for giving the chief command to a Queen's officer. Admitting that it was so, he then asked, what did they do with their divisional commands? For those divisional commands officers were required with a knowledge of the localities, languages, and population, which none but Company's officers were likely to possess. How did they divide the divisional commands in the eight great campaigns to which he had referred? Fourteen were given to Queen's officers, and nine to Company's officers. Was that fair? Was it fair, not in reference to individuals, but to the public service, to keep these divisional commands for Queen's officers, who, perhaps, might have arrived in India only just before obtaining these appointments, and who were placed over the heads of the Company's officers, who had carved their way to distinction by their swords? But there were other employments in the Indian army, from which Indian officers were practically excluded. Had an Indian officer ever had the chief command at Calcutta, Madras, or Bombay? Perhaps the House would be astonished when he told them that in Indian history, from the days of Plassy to the glories of the Sutlej and the Punjab, they had never had an Indian officer fitted for any of those chief commands, if, indeed, such an inference were to be drawn from the fact, that no Indian officer had ever been selected to fill any of them. This matter had been urged again and again on the Government by the Indian authorities, and had been urged by himself as strenuously as he could urge any suit, but unsuccessfully. During the time he had mentioned there had been twenty appointments to chief commands in India; four of those appointments embraced the whole Indian territory; and as he had already stated he was ready to admit that with 30,000 of the Queen's troops in the country it was not unreasonable that such appointments should be confined to officers in Her Majesty's service. But the other sixteen vacancies had also been filled up by Queen's officers, despite the anxious remonstrances of the Indian officers. There was an excuse for this course during a certain period. The illustrious Duke then at the head of the army had a strong opinion on the subject, and he (Sir J. Hogg) was not ashamed to say that he respected even the prejudices of such a man. He therefore did not blame the Government for yielding to the strong feeling of that great man on the point. He was bound to say that on one occasion the noble Lord the Member for London (Lord John Russell) did use his efforts to obtain a subordinate command for an Indian officer, but they were unsuccessful. The illustrious Duke bad so strong an impression of the necessity of employing a Queen's officer that it was painful to press him to take a step in opposition to it. But three appointments had been made to commands in Madras and Bombay since the death of the Duke of Wellington; and he wanted to know why the Indian officers had been passed over in each of those cases? In the month of May last, when he had heard a rumour of the proposed appointment to a command in India of a distinguished officer—a man, he believed, qualified to fill any office, civil or military, with credit to himself and with advantage to his country—he meant General Anson—when he had heard that rumour, he had written to the right hon. Baronet the present First Lord of the Admiralty, who had then presided over the India Board (Sir C. Wood), for the purpose of asking him whether it was the intention of the Government to appoint an Indian officer to the vacancy to which that rumour referred; and to his application he had received a very curt, and, he was sorry to have to say, a not very courteous answer, to the effect that "Her Majesty's Government had not taken the matter into their consideration." That might be the case, but the rumour that General Anson was to be the man turned out to be true, and he (Sir J. Hogg) made up his mind to adopt a different course in future; and, on the occasion of the next vacancy, he gave notice of a Resolution, rather a strong one, in their little Parliament in Leadenhall Street, with respect to the conduct pursued towards the Indian army. The result was that a letter was written by the Chairman of the Company in accordance with the Resolution, and to that a brief, but very courteous, reply was written by the same right hon. Gentleman, giving, on behalf of the Government, an assurance that in future the claims of the Indian officers to those appointments would be fairly considered. He (Sir J. Hogg) had no doubt but that assurance had been given in perfect good faith, and would be strictly adhered to by the Government. Some persons might think it desirable that there should be no Company's army in India; but he believed that the levying and the organisation of troops were essential privileges and functions of any ruling power. Without a Company's army they could have no Company's Government. He stated that deliberately. A civil authority supported by an army not its own might aspire to the name of an agency, and might be potent for mischief, but it could not aspire to the name or the dignity or the utility of a Government. That was true of every country, but it was especially true of India, where the sword had ever been the attribute of power. If they thought it would conduce to the public interests to reverse that settlement of the Government of India at which they had so lately arrived, let them do so; but let them do it openly. He prayed the House not to tamper with such a subject as that; he prayed the House not to trifle with such a toy as the Indian army; he prayed them not to give their support to measures which would strip the existing Government of India of all substantial power, and would degrade it in the eyes of the people, while it would continue, and he firmly believed, increase the evils which were complained of in the present system.

said, as he understood the object of his hon. and learned Friend (Sir E. Perry) in proposing the appointment of a Committee, was to carry out the very object which he had himself more than once advocated, he had no option but to support the Motion, without, however, binding himself to any proceeding which such a Committee might think proper to adopt beyond that of giving power to the Government to employ the officers of the Indian army in Europe, as they were employed in India. He did not think the actual terms of the Motion justified some of the arguments which had been advanced by the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down. The hon. Gentleman supposed that a question was to be submitted to a Select Committee, as to the propriety of sending an expedition to the Persian Gulf——

said, that the hon. and learned Member (Sir E. Perry) had used that argument in his speech.

said, he was not quite sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman had introduced such an argument judiciously; but, after all, it was a mere argument. There was one part of the statement of the hon. Gentleman (Sir J. Hogg) with which he most cordially concurred, and that was as to the injustice done to eminent and distinguished officers of the East Indian army with regard to their appointment to high command; but, while he admired the good feeling displayed by the hon. Gentleman in touching upon that subject, he had been much surprised at hearing him adduce that circumstance as an argument against the present Motion, for it appeared to him to be a strong argument in its support; because, if there was any result which could be expected from the inquiries of a Committee, that result was, that full and ample justice would be done to all ranks of officers in the service of the East India Company. In his opinion the East India Company's army was an admirable army. It afforded an example for which he thought history could show no precedent—of an army, the privates of which were of one nation and the officers of another, and which nevertheless had displayed a feeling of loyalty to supreme authority, a courage and a capability which had never been surpassed. He felt thoroughly convinced that the arguments used by the hon. Gentleman (Sir J. Hogg,) were arguments in support of, rather than against, the present Motion, and, when he took the objection that the present was not the fitting time for a Motion like the one before the House, he could only say that, in his opinion, no time could be more appropriate—a time when it was necessary to look to all quarters for support and for reinforcements. The hon. Gentleman appeared to have a desire to keep everything connected with the East India Company in statu quo, and every alteration, whether good, bad, or indifferent, which had been proposed had been opposed by him and by the other hon. Gentlemen in that House who might be said to represent the Court of Directors, as being likely to prove ruinous in its results. A short time ago, however, a considerable alteration had been made in the Government of India, not without disastrous results being prophesied by the hon. Gentleman; but those forebodings of evil had, fortunately, not been realised, nor did he think that the anticipation of the hon. Gentleman on the present occasion would be fulfilled if the House assented to the proposal now before it. There was another argument used against the Motion by the hon. Gentleman, which he thought was still more strongly in favour of it. The hon. Gentleman stated, that in the army of the East India Company there existed a strong propensity to mutiny; but, in his opinion, that disposition could not be in creased by placing that army on the same footing as the Royal army. One most serious consideration connected with the disposition to mutiny in the Indian army was, that there had been tendencies to mutiny of a most alarming description, entirely confined to the officers of it; but would any one believe, that if those officers were placed upon the same footing as officers of the Royal army, that if they were called upon to recognise more directly the Royal authority, they would be as likely to threaten to throw off that authority as the hon. Gentleman had alleged they had been to throw off the immediate authority under which they at present served? He was not prepared to support the present Motion on account of any particular expedition which had been or might be undertaken, nor in order that any serious change might be made in the organisation of the Indian army, for he believed the organisation of that army to be good, but in a case of great emergency, such as that which now existed, he thought that it was worth the while of that House to allow a Select Committee to investigate the question as to whether some useful alterations affecting the availability of that army in other places besides India, and more especially of the European portion of it, might not be desirable? So far from sharing the fears of the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir J. Hogg) as to the results which might arise from the appointment of this Committee, he thought that the Motion was a very reasonable one, and one which ought to be acceded to by the House; and, although he had himself never brought forward a Motion upon the subject of so formal a character, he had, on previous occasions, urged the propriety of giving to the officers of the Indian army military rank and available duty in Europe. If nothing resulted, from the Committee but affording to the European force in the Company's army available duty in Europe, that alone would be, of great advantage. If now it were found by that Committee that our Indian territory was in a state of tranquillity, such as to afford the assurance that there was nothing to fear from domestic convulsion or from foreign aggression for a considerable period, why, he would ask, should the Government of this country, by a mere technical difficulty, be deprived of the advantage of being able to employ elsewhere a portion of the European force of the Indian army. He said European force, because he was not one of those who thought that it was desirable to employ sepoys in the present war in the Crimea, as they did not possess sufficient strength for that species of work; but the English force in the service of the East India Company, he considered, might be employed to advantage. They would also derive benefit to themselves by being brushed up a little in European warfare, and would return to India with additional confidence and experience. He was not aware whether the Government had not at present the power of employing that force, but if they possessed it, he must suppose that there were difficulties which prevented them exercising it, and the appointment of the Committee now moved for might remove those difficulties. In order to secure the services of Indian officers in the present contest, high additional local rank had been offered to them; but he should like to know the reason for such a supercession of Royal officers. There would be no necessity for adopting such a course if the Government would only make known that the officers of the Indian army should rank equally in Europe with Royal officers and should be as available for service. With regard to appointments to high command in India, the present state of things in that respect also might be remedied by the appointment of the Committee now moved for. It appeared to him to be a most scandalous thing that officers of the Indian army, who had gained laurels in many a hard-fought field, should be deprived of the prospect of holding high command, and should be placed under the orders of officers, who, no doubt, had an opportunity offered, would have distinguished themselves, but who had never seen anything of practical service before the enemy. A promise of a change had been made, but he should like to see something more than a promise, and he, as a Queen's officer, could only say that, if any high command were offered to himself, he should be ashamed to accept it over the heads of men whom he believed to have a prior claim to himself. He thought that these were very strong reasons in favour of the appointment of the Committee. The position of the Indian officer was altogether an anomaly. He enjoyed the opportunity of being appointed to a number of offices to which considerable emolument was attached, but they were not of the highest honorary character. He might distinguish himself in India, and find when he came home that his position was not recognised. The other day some slight social advantage had been accorded to the Indian officer, but still he had no official position. [Some expressions of dissent from the Treasury benches.] If the right hon. Gentleman would inform the House that it was intended practically to render those officers available for the Queen's service in Europe, he should alter his opinion upon that subject, but he had not yet heard that such was the intention. Without charging the Government with anything like an attempt at equivocation, it certainly appeared to him to be very doubtful what their real meaning was. Different interpretations had been given by different Members of the Government to the document to which he referred. The Premier, however, was present, and let the noble Lord plainly inform the House, that all legal difficulties to the employment of those officers in Europe were removed. He looked upon the Motion as a very limited and modest one, considering the great importance of the subject to which it referred, and as one from which no fearful consequences were to be apprehended. He believed it to be extremely inconvenient and injurious to the public service of the country, that able and eminent and distinguished officers should not be eligible to be employed upon every service which might be required of them. We could not have too many officers of eminence and ability available for the service of the Government, and he therefore begged leave most heartily to support the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend.

said, that as the office over which he had the honour to preside had been so pointedly alluded to by his hon. and learned Friend who had brought forward the Motion, and by others, as if it were entirely responsible for a decision on the combination of the Indian army and the Queen's army, he trusted, although perhaps he might think that the War Department was the more responsible of the two, that the House would indulge him while he addressed a few observations to the House upon the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend. He was not urged thereto on account of any great favour with which the Motion had been received by the House; indeed, his hon. and learned Friend seemed in his speech to shrink somewhat from his own proposition; and the hon. and gallant Member for Westminster (Sir De Lacy Evans), who had seconded it, stated that he did not look to the "result" of the Committee, and that he only wished to show that he was still favourable to the proposition that some use should be made of the Indian army for the Queen's service. Now it was to the "result" of the Committee, however, that the House of Commons was bound to look. If he entertained any apprehensions in speaking to the present Motion it was not because he feared that he should be unable to show that a Committee would be a very improper tribunal to investigate this question; but lest in dealing with a subject of such delicacy and difficulty anything which he might utter might, from his poverty of speech or some other deficiency, be considered as offensive to the officers either of the Indian or the Queen's army, to both of whom he wished to pay the utmost deference. The real question before them was, whether this was a subject into which a Committee of the House of Commons should be entrusted to inquire? He entreated the House, in considering it, not to be led away by that very natural anxiety which agitated us all in the present state of warfare, and induced us to look in every quarter for every means and chance of success which could be provided. It was not for that, he hoped, that the House would plunge itself into a scheme which, instead of promoting the good it sought, might engender such confusion as must militate against success. At the same time he was perfectly prepared to say that it was the duty of the House and of the Government to search for assistance in every direction, both in India and other quarters where it could reasonably be expected. In pursuance of that view officers who had distinguished themselves had been brought from the Cape of Good Hope and elsewhere, and their services had been made use of in the Crimean expedition. He, therefore, saw no reason why the services of Indian officers should not in the same manner be sought for a like purpose. He entirely agreed with his hon. and gallant Friend (Sir De Lacy Evans) that Indian officers ought to be promoted to commands in India; but he did not agree with him by any means that that would be the necessary result of a Committee, or that it would emanate any more from a Committee than from the Government. His hon. Friend the Member for Honiton (Sir J. Hogg) stated that he had made representations upon this subject to the Board of Control which had been curtly and very ungraciously received. He (Mr. V. Smith) could promise his hon. Friend, if he would again address that Board on the subject, that he should receive as long an answer as he pleased. He would not, at all events, be either curt or discourteous; but he could not promise that in all cases the Indian officer should be preferred to the Queen's officer, if the latter were a man of greater merit and distinction. He thought that the general rule should be that the best man should be put in command, whether he belonged to the Queen's service or to the Company's service. That was the only rule which should be established throughout the service. At the same time there was another thing which must not be neglected in any of these considerations. We must not consider, because at this moment we were absorbed in one thought—how to carry on the war in the Crimea—that, therefore, we must neglect every other part of our empire. That was a delicate subject to touch upon; but he would ask, was not India an important part of our empire, and had there not been pamphlets, and speeches, and warnings without number during the last century that we should beware of Russian aggression in India? For his own part, he undoubtedly thought that the difficulties of the country, the embarrassments which would arise from hostile tribes, the difficulties of commissariat, and altogether the impediments to the progress of a Russian army in India were such as to render the idea of a Russian aggression almost a chimera. But if we thoroughly denuded India of her army and stripped her of her best officers, we might so lose the prestige of power in India as actually to offer an invitation to such aggression. That was a question, therefore, which must not be left out of sight. So far as he was concerned, he had no prejudice; or, if he had, it would be rather in favour of the Indian army, because it was connected with the department over which he presided, and he likewise had many interests and associations in that country. At this juncture he quite agreed that we ought to lay aside all those ties which might be very beneficial in less arduous times; Etiquette and Routine, which were the handmaids of Discipline in times of peace, should now be thrown aside, and that there was nothing to do but to select the fittest men for every situation which the Queen's service might require. It was upon that ground, therefore, alone that he consented to argue this question; and he could not agree with his hon. Friend the Member for Honiton, when he sad that we had no right to take from India any portion of her array or officers, and that that was a matter only to be decided by the Governor General. In looking at the Motion now under consideration, there were two great questions involved—one was the very large subject of the amalgamation of the two armies; the other was apparently of inferior importance, although, owing to the irritation to which it had given rise, it could not be regarded as a very insignificant one. With regard to the first of these questions—the amalgamation—he thought that his hon. Friend the Member for Honiton had hardly dwelt sufficiently upon the difficulties of reciprocity; because he quite agreed with his hon. Friend that the whole question had been argued upon a one-sided principle. People talked of transferring Indian officers here, but they forgot the transfer of Queen's officers there. That was the greatest danger of all. Under an amalgamation, of course, Queen's officers would seek employment in India if Indian officers were brought here. Then there would be this difficulty, that we must put our Queen's officers over native regiments, and that they would have to deal with sepoys and with irregular cavalry, a duty for which they would be totally unfitted from their want of knowledge of the habits and language of the Natives. Notwithstanding what had been stated by hon. Members, he feared that the danger of appointing Queen's officers to sepoy regiments was not altogether imaginary. The experiment had often been tried, but always without success. In 1818, a remarkable case occurred. Major Bunce, a major of dragoons, a gentleman of very great capacity, possessing an admirable temper and good qualifications for command, an Oriental scholar, and perfectly acquainted with the native habits, was put in command of a native regiment, and he believed that that officer was the only instance of the commander of a native regiment being cut to pieces by his own soldiers for attempting to suppress a dangerous mutiny. The totally different discipline, too, of the sepoy regiments must be taken into consideration, the different mode of enlistment, and all the various qualities which it was necessary an officer of native troops should possess, and which could only be thoroughly acquired by long and early study. The question of amalgamation, therefore, he took to be all but impracticable. He certainly was very much surprised when the hon. and learned Member for Devonport (Sir E. Perry) among other authorities, quoted that of Lord Grenville) in favour of amalgamation. Like many other hon. Members, no doubt, he had looked to that famous speech of Lord Grenville, delivered on April 9, 1813, on Indian affairs, and he certainly did not find that that noble Lord was an advocate of this amalgamation. These were his words—

"To blend, indeed, as has sometimes been recommended, into one indiscriminate mass the general army of the Crown and the local force of India would be the inevitable ruin of the empire. I have no doubt of it. The military patronage of the Crown, already so great, would then exceed all bounds; we should lose the inestimable advantages of local education, knowledge, and habits, so necessary for the command of native troops; and the unjust partialities, preferences, and supercessions, to which the distant service would infallibly be exposed, must soon break down its military character; must, too, probably renew—I shudder to pronounce it—the criminal scenes, which we have so lately witnessed, of military and public rebellion."

A stronger opinion against amalgamation could not well be expressed. Lord Grenville then went on to say that he did not see that the same objection applied to making the Company's army a King's army in name merely, securing to it a complete parity of rank and promotion with the King's army, but still preserving its local character and local advantages. The same argument applied also to the quotation from the speech of the Marquess of Wellesley. That illustrious authority spoke of something which ought to be done, but he acknowledged the difficulties of dealing with the sepoys, and he pointed out that the reason why they consented to embark so readily in the Egyptian expedition, though contrary to their usages, was because the officers were acquainted with their feelings on the subject; and it was on these very points in dealing with the natives that the Company's officers must naturally be superior to the Queen's officers. The same line of argument applied also to the authority of Sir John Malcolm. He also spoke of something which ought to be done; but in a note on Lord Cornwallis's scheme he pointed out the difficulties which would arise on the question of "exchanges," and he confessed himself entirely unable to deal with those difficulties. But the hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir E. Perry) had entirely omitted this point from his consideration. The hon. Member for Honiton (Sir J. Hogg) had so entirely disposed of the argument founded on Lord Cornwallis's scheme that it was not necessary for him to touch on that part of the case. It should, however, be borne in mind that that House had already pronounced upon this matter in 1813, in 1833, and in 1853, in each of which years Acts of Parliament had been passed which contained the army of the East India Company. Besides this there were many eminent authorities against amalgamation; for instance, Sir Jasper Nicholls, General Scott, and Sir Lionel Smith, in their evidence before the Committee of 1832, expressed their strong disapproval of the project. The hon. and learned Gentleman had omitted, too, from his consideration that, if the Queen's and Company's armies were amalgamated, it would be necessary to amalgamate the armies of the three presidencies together, so that the scheme must be one for the amalgamation, not of two, but of four armies. One very important question, which ought not to be lost sight of, was, that by this amalgamation the whole patronage of the Indian army must be thrown into the hands of the Government at home, and, considering the disposition which was now manifested in certain quarters to criticise every appointment made by the Commander in Chief, it was certainly rather an unexpected proposition to make to throw into his hands about 5,000 additional appointments. With regard to the withdrawal from India for the purposes of the present war a large body of the European troops in the Company's service, that he conceived would have a very injurious effect on the Indian army, for he had always heard that the mingling of European with sepoy troops was of the greatest advantage. The hon. and learned Member for Devonport professed to hold very cheap the memorandum which had lately appeared in the Gazette, giving Indian officers equal rank with the Queen's officers everywhere. From what he had heard from Company's officers, however, he did not think that the boon was regarded by them as an insignificant boon, nor would it appear as though the hon. and learned Gentleman really had that opinion of it, for he had attempted to appropriate it to himself in some degree, by declaring his belief that, if it had not been for him, the memorandum would never have appeared. He (Mr. V. Smith) must, however, claim some share in the responsibility for this memorandum, for it was on his suggestion that the Commander in Chief had made the change, and, as the House appeared to take great interest in this subject, he would take the liberty of reading his first letter to the Commander in Chief—

"My Lord,—I have the honour to transmit to you the draught of a memorandum the object of which is to give to the officers of the East India Company's army, in all parts of Her Majesty's dominions, the same rank and precedence as that to which their respective commissions at present entitle them in the East Indies. If you approve the memorandum, I request that you will take an early opportunity of submitting it to the Queen; and that, in the event of Her Majesty being graciously pleased to signify her acquiescence, you will cause it to be notified in the London Gazette. It will also be necessary that instructions should be sent to the Commander in Chief in India, directing him to insert in the commissions which in the Queen's name he issues to the Company's officers the words 'with corresponding honorary rank elsewhere,' after the words 'to hold the rank of——in the Queen's army in the East Indies.'"

The hon. and gallant Member for Westminster (Sir De Lacy Evans) seemed to think that this was only a question of social rank, and he had called on him (Mr. V. Smith) to state what meaning the Government attached to it. The object of the memorandum, he conceived, was to give to Indian officers by right that which they hitherto held merely by courtesy. He had found, on inquiry into the subject, that Indian officers had had some grounds for thinking themselves slighted as compared with officers of the Queen's army. It might be very possible that the idea of "serving the Queen" had led the officers of the Queen's army to think they had a right to consider the Company's officers as inferior to themselves, for he had heard that in social meetings Company's officers had not been allowed to return thanks for the army when the toast was drunk, and this, though a petty, was to them a painful distinction. He had also been told of another instance, in which the lady of a Company's officer, on the voyage home from India, had been deposed from her precedence over the other ladies on board as soon as ever the ship passed the Cape of Good Hope. These things were certainly very ridiculous, but in a profession of honour they were, perhaps excusable causes of offence. Of course, local employment and local command must be given to every man, whether he were a Queen's or a Company's officer; but the effect of the memorandum would be that, where a man had become a major general in the Company's army, he might at once be sent to the Crimea, and would rank as a major general there, according to the date of his original commission in India, and not according to the date of such appointment. At present, when in India a Company's and a Queen's regiment were serving together, the officers commanding them ranked according to the dates of their commissions, and the effect of this memorandum would be to apply the same rule in Europe. The memorandum, though local employment and local command were given, would yet greatly facilitate the employment of Indian officers, together with Queen's officers; and it would not confer on Indian officers equal social rank merely, but equal military rank also, with that held by Queen's officers. The hon. and learned Gentleman quoted a letter from Colonel Mayne as to the question of the amalgamation of the two armies. Now, all must admit that there was not a more gallant or dashing officer in the Indian service than Colonel Mayne, and no one could more admire his high qualities than he (Mr. V. Smith) did; but be was not aware that that officer had directed his attention so specially to the subject of proposed amalgamation as to render him an authority upon it. But, with regard to the memorandum that had been issued by the Commander in Chief, he (Mr. V. Smith) had heard the opinions of several distinguished Indian officers, among whom were Sir George Pollock, Colonel Sykes and Colonel Oliphant, who all highly approved that document, and considered it a valuable boon and advantage to the Company's service. [The right hon. Gentleman here read the written testimony of Colonel Oliphant, the Chairman of the East India Company, as to the benefit which would be conferred on the officers of the Indian army by the Queen's warrant recently issued in their favour, and then continued]—Coming now to the more immediate question which the House had to consider, they were asked by the hon. and learned Gentleman to appoint a Select Committee to investigate how the Indian army might be made most available for the war. The Motion, in its original form, asked the House to agree to an address to the Crown, praying for the issue of a Royal Commission to prosecute the proposed inquiry. Now, the Government would certainly have equally objected to the appointment of a Commission as to a Select Committee; but, if such an inquiry as the hon. and learned Mover contemplated were to take place at all, a Royal Commission would certainly be the better mode of the two for its prosecution. On a Commission they might have the assistance of military men of experience in the Queen's or in the Indian army, who might be competent to deal with such a question; but with all due deference to that House a Select Committee chosen from its Members would be a most unsuitable tribunal for such a purpose. If the hon. and learned Mover had adhered to his previous intention of merely calling the attention of the House to this question and confined himself to doing that, there could have been no fair objection to his adoption of that course, because, however difficult, and even delicate, the topics on which he had touched, yet advantage accrued from their occasional discussion in Parliament, and it was only due to the public that they should be considered. The hon. and learned Gentleman, however, as had been justly remarked by the hon. Baronet (Sir J. Hogg), did not content himself with asking for an inquiry as to how the Indian army should be made available for the war in Europe, but actually took upon himself the distribution and arrangement of that army—matters, surely, which must be left to the Executive Government. Even if it were desirable that the Government should take advantage of the services of the Indian army in Europe, it was hardly necessary to have a Committee to inquire how those services might be made available. Putting out of view the expediency of the proceeding, the process would be very simple and easy. The Cabinet would meet and decide on the transfer of certain regiments in India from that country to the Crimea, and then send a request to the Court of Directors, that they would be good enough to prepare a despatch requiring the authorities in India to remove such, and such regiments from Bombay, Madras, or any other place where they were stationed. It would be extreme rashness, or even perfect madness, to do such a thing without first consulting the Court of Directors and also the Governor General. But it must not for a moment be supposed that although it would be unwise not to consult them, it would be necessary to do so. There was no doubt as to the power of compulsion in the Crown, but the discretion of the Company would never call it into exercise. Then, again, as to the granting of military commands to the Company's officers, surely it was not meant that the Government should be compelled to em- ploy those officers? Would not the hon. and gallant Member for Westminster allow them to exercise their discretion as to whether they would do so or not? The Crown had the power of commanding the services of Indian officers practically at present, because he would not consent to argue the question whether officers holding the Queen's Commission, when called upon to serve their country, would refuse, on the ground that they could only be required to serve in India, and need not, unless they chose, go elsewhere. Those officers, he was persuaded, if called upon by their Queen, would be ready to accept any honourable employment that might be offered them. On this part of the subject, therefore, no inquiry was needful. Then, as to "the steps necessary to be taken, if it should be deemed expedient to constitute the Indian army a Royal army," it must first be determined by the House whether the measure proposed was expedient or not, and then the Committee could consider the details. The hon. and learned Member for Devonport, however, took it for granted that the conversion of the Indian army into a Royal army would be expedient; he jumped at his conclusion, passing over all the details, although those details were the only matters into which the Committee could possibly enter, supposing the House to have first determined that the amalgamation was wise and politic and ought to take effect. Without undue presumption, the steps necessary for constituting the Company's army a Royal service could easily be pointed out. In the first place such a measure would necessitate the repeal of so much of the Act of 1853 as gave the East India Company power to organise and maintain troops. A Select Committee would have no authority to reverse the decision on this point so maturely and deliberately arrived at by the Legislature and embodied in an Act of Parliament two years ago. Again, the assimilation of the two armies would require the whole of the Indian army to be brought under the Mutiny Act of this country, because, there not being in India that constitutional jealousy which caused our Mutiny Act to be renewed from year to year, the Mutiny Acts passed there lasted for a considerable period; and the Government at home could not have the power of disposing of 300,000 Indian troops, as now suggested, without awakening the same popular feeling which had at all periods in our history been manifested in regard to the Crown's control over the army. He could not but think that his hon. and learned Friend brought forward this Motion more for the purpose of raising a discussion on this question than for any definite result. He hoped, therefore, he would not press his Motion to a division, but if he did he (Mr. V. Smith) must repeat the warning given to the House by another hon. Member to beware how they trifled with the question of the Indian army. On that army depended not only the preservation of India as a portion of the British empire, but the progress of civilisation and the amelioration of the condition of the people; for they must recollect that our empire in India rested upon the opinion entertained of our invincibility. One of the ablest men that England ever produced, or India educated, one whose attachment to his duty was so grand that he was the Wellington of civil life, who, when worn out by anxiety, and harassed by bodily agony, evinced the same cheerfulness of spirit and the same courage as when early in life he threw himself into the breach at the head of a storming party—he meant Sir Charles Metcalfe—had stated with reference to India—

"Some say that our empire in India rests on opinion, others on main force. It, in fact, depends on both. We could not keep the country by opinion if we had not considerable force; and no force that we could pay would be sufficient if it were not aided by the opinion of our invincibility. Our force does not operate so much by its actual strength as by the impression it produces, and that impression is the opinion by which we hold India."

He asked the House, therefore, not to raise questions of the most delicate nature, which, by shaking the faith of the people in that army, might tend seriously to endanger the stability of our empire in India.

said, the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Control had remarked that the hon. and learned Gentleman who brought forward the Motion for a Select Committee was only actuated by a desire for change; but he could not understand that at a time like the present, any hon. Gentleman could move a Resolution with such a motive. It had been urged that there would be danger in amalgamating the two armies, but this consideration had little weight with him, for sooner or later the amalgamation must take place. It was inevitable. Now, when he considered the character of the officers in the Indian service he could not help thinking that they were the men of all others who ought to be selected for the duties it was sought to impose on them. In the present position of this country, he thought their services could not be too highly estimated. It was an important consideration that in consequence of the casualties of war there were very few officers who had served a fitting time to supply the vacancies with efficiency; it was therefore the more necessary that they should open the door to the entrance into the Queen's army of the Indian officers. He had taken the trouble of ascertaining the length of service of the officers of the three regiments of Guards now in the Crimea, and he found that as regarded the Grenadiers, the officers had not seen on the average three years' service, that eighteen junior officers in the Fusiliers had not served forty years amongst them, and that in the Coldstream Guards there were eighteen officers who had only fifteen years' service amongst them. No doubt there were difficulties connected with the proposed amalgamation, but they were merely difficulties of detail which he considered could be easily overcome. The hon. Baronet (Sir J. Hogg) made an objection as to pensions. The answer to that was very simple, that the pensions might remain precisely as at present. When an officer was transferred to the Queen's service, that service would be counted as service in India. The hon. Baronet also said they must not tamper with the sepoy, for he was suspicious. But he did not suppose that by a transference to the Queen's service, the pay and emoluments of the sepoy would be tampered with. And, he would ask, had the sepoy's pay never been tampered with under the government of the Company? Had we not lately an instance of a regiment mutinying in consequence of such tampering? And was not Sir C. Napier obliged to disband that regiment? The hon. Baronet likewise said there ought to be reciprocity in this matter, and that if Indian officers were to be appointed to rank in the English army, English officers, on the other hand, should have the privilege of being appointed to places in India. Upon that subject, however, the right hon. Baronet formerly at the head of the Indian Board (Sir C. Wood) had stated to him last year, that a despatch had been sent out to India suggesting, if not requiring, that the Queen's officers should be appointed to staff offices in India, if properly qualified; and it could not be supposed that any officer would be so appointed who was not properly acquainted with the language and habits of the people of India. He was very glad to see the recent memorandum which had been issued on the subject of rank of Indian officers; but he should like to know whether by virtue of that memorandum any Indian officer who might be appointed to a position by Her Majesty, would be bound to serve wherever he might be ordered, and whether he would be liable to a court-martial in case of refusing such service. The President of the Board of Control said, the principle of his government was that the best man should be appointed when an appointment was made, and he gave him credit for wishing to be actuated by that principle. The right hon. Gentleman asked if they were to denude India of troops. Nobody had proposed to do so, but they surely might make them available. He thought it would have been well if they had sent the young soldiers to India, and there organised them, and had sent the seasoned soldiers of India to the Crimea. Then the hon. Baronet (Sir J. Hogg) said it would be unwise to give more patronage to the Horse Guards, and from what they had seen of the way in which the patronage of the Horse Guards had been exercised he should not be very willing to give them more; but that danger might be got over by giving more commissions to the students of military colleges, to public schools, and by giving a certain number to the orphans of those who had distinguished themselves in the service of the State. Another reason why he wished this change to take place was, that he believed if the Indian army came into contact with the Queen's army it would be impossible to retain in the latter the system of purchase. He believed that a combined system of promotion by seniority and selection was the best system, and to that they must inevitably come. It was not unwise to follow the example of other countries in this matter. In the Algerine army when a man attained the rank of captain in the Zouaves, he was immediately transferred into the army serving in the other portions of the world. In Russia it was much the same thing. He had seen lately in the newspapers that our troops had made a capture of a Tartar, armed with bow and arrow, serving in the Russian army. This showed that the Czar drew on all his vast hordes to recruit his army, and we would do well to follow his example with referencce to our Indian army. In giving his vote for the Committee he was mainly influenced, however, by one consideration, and that was a desire, in the terms of the Motion, that the House should consider and inquire how the army of India might be made most available for the war in Europe, and to inquire into the steps necessary to be taken, if it should be deemed expedient, to constitute the army of the East India Company a Royal Army.

said, he did not expect all the benefits which hon. Members anticipated from the change proposed, while he thought there were constitutional objections to bringing so vast a military power under the control of the Queen, without any of those safeguards which the constitution considered necessary. He should be glad to revise the ill-considered measure passed two years ago for the better government of India, but he did not suppose that any nation could govern another country if the military power was taken from its control. It was preposterous to say that the Government of India should be left in its present hands, or that the people of India could look up to the present Government with respect if they were to be deprived of their military power. The history of India teemed with instances of the danger of weakening the hands of the civil Government, and of the mutinies which had broken out when men were placed over the army in whom the sepoys were not accustomed to confide and when disputes took place between the Governor and the Commander in Chief He could not vote for this Motion, but he was ready to join in any measure for inquiring into the government of India.

said, that the project now before the House had been agitated since the days of Pitt, but he doubted whether this was exactly the time to consider the matter, because it was only two years ago that great changes were made in the Government of India which he believed would be followed by salutary results. Opinion in India was fermenting between the old and new state and it would be far from wise, he considered, to interfere with changes which were already working well. He did not think any dispassionate person could have followed minutely the improvements in the three Presidencies and not have recognized a great change in policy as compared with that which prevailed a few years ago. Some hon. Members had asked why the Government did not employ the European forces of the East India Company? The answer was, that the European force in India was very small, only amounting to about 14,000 men, and it was a subject of grave consideration whether, instead of being diminished, it ought not to be increased. The expense, too, of removing troops from India to any part of Europe was very great, and the men who had lived in the country, learnt the languages, and become accustomed to the habits of the natives, were far more likely to have influence over them, should anything like a revolt occur. But Her Majesty's Government had not neglected to inquire how far the military force in India could be diminished, and two regiments of dragoons, as the House was aware, and two regiments of infantry, likewise, he believed, had been withdrawn. The chief argument for this proposal was, that under existing regulations Her Majesty's Government were not able to employ Indian officers or Indian troops. He believed that was a total mistake, and that there was no obstacle, save the will of the authorities at the Horse Guards, to the employment of any officers or troops who had served Her Majesty in the preservation of her Indian empire. Whatever misconception might have existed had been removed by the memorandum of the right hon. President of the Board of Control, which had shown the liberal policy of the Government, and afforded great satisfaction to all Indian officers. An hon. Friend of his, a distinguished Indian officer, who had served in the battles of Alma and Inkerman, and also at Balaklava, informed him that before that memorandum in the army of the Crimea he was merely in the position of a civilian, whom no soldier was bound to obey, although he was allowed by Lord Raglan to serve as a volunteer in an infantry regiment. Consequently not the least effect of that memorandum was, that it allayed the jealousy which before existed between the two services. No doubt there was a feeling, perhaps a natural feeling, on the part of those who had served in Her Majesty's army, and had the power of appointment, to prefer their brethren in arms to officers with whom they were not acquainted, but the statement of the President of the Board of Control, that the only principle which actuated Her Majesty's Government was to regard the fitness of the person for each office as it fell vacant, and the expression of opinion which the debate had elicited, would have an effect on those who were, heretofore, influenced by prejudice, and tend without amalgamation, to secure for the service of the nation all those who were best qualified to conduct its armies in the present emergency. The refusal of the Government to accede to the motion rested upon the ground that it was impossible to separate this question from the great political question of the transference of the Indian Empire to the Government of the Crown. He thought that great organic change should not he lightly undertaken or suddenly executed, and that some interval should elapse between the curtailment of the powers of the Court of Directors and its ultimate dissolution. That important subject must be considered within twenty years, and then would be the time to take into consideration the military part of it, or, in other words, the amalgamation of the two armies.

said, he deprecated all rash conclusions, and he could not avoid expressing an opinion that that House was too prone to treat with levity questions of great importance. But he warned them that a deep sentiment prevailed throughout the whole British empire on the questions that now occupied their minds, and that they would be called to a solemn account for what they did, not only with respect to the question of the war in the Crimea, but also in regard to such questions as that which had been brought forward that night by a Gentleman who had highly distinguished himself as a Judge in India. Although the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had expressed himself with very considerable ability, yet let not the House be led away by his fallacies, but let them judge of the matters before them according to the dictates of common sense and sound reason. An immense responsibility devolved upon them in managing the affairs of India and the East, and he therefore hoped that the House would not that night divide against the question, but would give it further I consideration. He looked upon this as the commencement of a series of debates on questions of the most vital importance to the country, and he would take this opportunity of expressing a hope that his hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Layard) would not bring forward his motion on Monday next, but would wait the result of the motion of Lord Ellen-borough in the House of Lords, and then bring forward his motion on a subsequent day.

said, he fully agreed with the last speaker, in thinking that the Government had not treated the question he had submitted to the House with that gravity which it deserved. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Control, seemed to think that he (Sir E. Perry) had brought this motion forward merely for the purpose of provoking a discussion. He could assure the right hon. Gentleman that he was far too practical a man to waste the time of the House in endeavouring merely to get up a discussion without having any practical object in view. He had endeavoured to show the great advantage that would result from having an additional force brought from India into the Crimea, that force consisting of the Company's troops as well as those of Her Majesty. Ho believed that a force of 25,000 additional men in the Crimea would be most useful at the present conjuncture. How had his argument been met by the Government? First, it was asserted that the Committee for which he asked was unnecessary, because the Government already had the power by their own orders of sending such a force into the field. He would venture to tell the right hon. Gentleman that course was not so easy of performance as he supposed. He had high military authority for saying that there were many military difficulties in the way of any such orders being executed, as he appeared to consider would be sufficient. Whenever the Company's troops and Her Majesty's troops co-operated out of the Indian dominions, the Company's officers would always be inferior, and that would be an obstacle to the combination of the two services. The hon. Baronet (Sir J. Hogg), having convinced himself, had also endeavoured to convince the House, that the amalgamation of the two services was impracticable. But was he not aware that, two years and a half ago, the question was seriously discussed whether the Government of India should not at once be transferred to the Crown? Had that transfer taken place then, as a matter of necessity, the two services must have been amalgamated. The Committee for which he (Sir E. Perry) had moved had been objected to as not being Parliamentary; but he had shown that in the year 1833, the President of the Board of Control submitted an inquiry similar to that which he now asked for before a Committee of the House of Commons.

Sir, before proceeding with the Orders of the Day, I wish to say a word or two in order that there may be a clear understanding with regard to my Motion. I think the noble Lord at the head of the Government misunderstood my intentions when he stated that I was about to force my Motion upon the House on Monday next. I had certainly no such intention. When I requested the noble Lord to give me a night, he declined, and said I must find one for myself, and I then intimated that I would bring my Motion forward on going into Committee of Supply. I understand that on Monday night there will be an important Motion in another place, and perhaps it would be for the convenience of the House if my Motion were postponed till a later day. I think, therefore, that I had better avail myself of the kind permission given to me by the noble Lord the other night, and find a day for myself.

said, he objected to proceeding with a measure of such great interest and importance at that late hour (a quarter to eleven o'clock). Two hon. Gentlemen had occupied the attention of the House for eight hours in discussing the Bill of the right hon. Baronet (Sir J. Pakington), but the Bill of his right hon. and learned Friend (the Lord Advocate) had been as yet scarcely discussed at all. Under these circumstances he would move the adjournment of the debate.

said, it was most desirable that the Bill of his right hon. and learned Friend (the Lord Advocate) should be proceeded with as early as possible. The Government had been frequently taunted with putting off important measures, and now they were resisted when they proposed to proceed with one in which great interest was felt. He could not consent to the adjournment of the debate, and he hoped the House would feel that it was trifling with a measure of great importance to say that at that hour the House was not capable of duly considering it.

said, he should support the Motion for adjournment, believing that the Bill deserved to be more calmly and fully considered than would be the case if it were proceeded with at that late hour.

said, he thought it would be trifling with the question to proceed with it at that hour. He begged hon. Members to contrast the course taken by the Government with respect to a Bill concerning the whole people of Scotland with that which they had pursued with respect to one merely affecting the local management of the metropolis. He must complain that the Scotch Members were from night to night kept in uncertainty about the time the Bill was to be discussed.

said, he hoped the noble Lord would reconsider his decision, as there were several hon. Members who wished to express their opinions on this subject, as well as the hon. Member for Elginshire (Mr. C. Bruce), who had intimated his intention to speak at considerable lenghth. He (Mr. Disraeli) thought it would he very inconvenient to have an adjourned debate on the question of going into Committee; and he hoped, therefore, that the noble Lord would consent to the postponement of this Bill, and would proceed with the other business upon the paper.

said, that he felt there was the greatest desire on the part of the people of Scotland that this Bill would be proceeded with without delay. The principle of the Bill had been fully discussed on the second reading, and he, therefore, regarded the tactics of the hon. Gentlemen opposite, as directed to postpone, and eventually defeat a measure on which they had already sustained a defeat in a fair standup fight. In deference to the real feeling of the people of Scotland on this question, he hoped the noble Lord at the head of the Government would not consent to the adjournment of the debate.

said, he could not allow the noble Lord who had just spoken to assume to himself to represent the feelings of the people of Scotland, which he believed were hostile to the present measure. This Bill was one of vital importance to the people of Scotland, and it was, therefore, the duty of hon. Members from that part of the country to secure its full and adequate discussion. As he believed this was impossible at that late hour, he should vote for the adjournment.

said, he trusted that the noble Lord at the head of the Government would not consent to the postponement of the debate. There was now a much fuller attendance to discuss the Bill than (from the dryness of the subject to English Members) there was likely to be if the debate was brought forward at an earlier hour in the evening. The opinion of the people of Scotland on this question was sufficiently shown by the fact that there was a majority of three to one of the Scotch Members of that House in favour of the Bill of the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate.

said, he hoped that his hon. Friend (Mr. C. Bruce) would press his Motion for adjournment, as there had been an understanding that the debate on this Bill should not come on after half-past ten o'clock in the evening. Such understandings between the leaders of parties should be kept even if they were made in the lobby.

said, he must deny that there had been any such understanding. So far was that from being the case, that he positively refused to agree to such an arrangement.

said, at all events it was his impression, and that of those who were with him, that there was such an understanding. He could not, however, rest his case on such a trivial ground. It was trifling with the people of Scotland to bring forward a debate of so much importance at an hour of the evening when it was impossible that it could be fully and adequately discussed. So far from the opinion of the people of Scotland being in favour of this measure, it was clear from the petitions that it was directly the reverse; for while the petitions in favour of the Bill were signed by only 1,400 persons, those against it received the signatures of 20,000 persons. Believing that it was impossible to finish the discussion that night, and that the debate must, therefore, be adjourned, he should certainly oppose their going on any further at that time.

said, that Irish Members were accused of obstructing the progress of public business if they objected to proceed with any Irish Bill, however important, at one o'clock in the morning. They were never able to bring on their business at the hour at which the House had then arrived, and if it was to be settled as a rule that no Irish measure of importance should be brought on after eleven in the evening, he believed that not even one would be discussed in the course of the Session.

said, that, even if injustice had been done to the sister island, he thought there was no reason for committing an act of injustice with regard to the people of Scotland. The petitions presented from Scotland showed that there was this year, as compared with last, a great reaction against the Bill. To show the change of feeling that had taken place, it would only be necessary to compare the number of petitions presented this year with those presented last year in its favour. Last year there were for the Bill 651 petitions, signed by 61,476 persons; against the Bill, 753 petitions, signed by 40,635 persons; for alterations and amendments, 182 petitions, signed by 20,967 persons. During the present year there have been only thirty-four petitions for the Bill, signed by 1,412 persons; against it, 330 petitions, signed by 24,183 persons; while for alteration and amendment there have been 309 petitions, signed by 16,873 persons, showing the immense change of public opinion in Scotland which had taken place since last year. Under these circumstances, he felt himself fully justified in protesting against the House proceeding with it at that hour in the evening.

Sir, I will yield to the expressed feeling of the House, and proceed—When the House thought fit, after a discussion of some three hours, which certainly, as far as its duration was concerned, bore no very just proportion to the importance of the subject involved in it, to reverse, in regard to the second reading of this Bill, the decision to which it came last year, it did appear to me that, as there were several Members who had desired to express, but had been prevented from expressing, their opinions upon it, there would be nothing unreasonable in an endeavour to afford them that opportunity by meeting the Motion now before the House with an amendment, that the House should go into Committee on this Bill this day six months." I, however, determined not to take that course, and for this reason:—The second reading of a Bill is held to involve its principle. Now, this Bill involves two principles, not necessarily associated with or dependent on each other in such a way as that the assertion of the one should of necessity involve the rejection of the other—yet they are so associated in this Bill. The one is the principle of the guaranteed union of religious with secular education; the other the principle, simply, and by itself, of the extension of the means of education. Those by whom this Bill was opposed voted from considerations connected with the assertion of the first of those principles; those who supported it, on considerations connected with the second. And yet it might very well be, and in respect to many Members—myself among the rest—actually was the case, that they entirely accepted and approved both those principles taken separately, and their votes were influenced by their greater or less appreciation of the principles which, improperly, if not unfairly, as it seems to me—are so connected in the Bill that it seemed impossible to accept the one without, in appearance at least, rejecting the other. Such being my views in respect to the Bill, and to the decision to which the House came the other night—by which, as it seems to me, the first of those principles was practically subverted—I have deemed it right to move the instruction of which I have given notice, with a view of enabling the House to affirm both principles; and I have, therefore, no hesitation in stating frankly at the outset that the object of my motion is to induce the House to consent, if it should agree to give to the Committee the instruction which I propose—that one of the Bills should be directed to the improvement and maintenance of the parochial schools in their existing connection with the Established Church—and the other to extend the means of education to localities where those means may be deficient, in such a way, and on such a system, as the House may consider more adapted to their alleged peculiar and different circumstances—and if this House agrees to give this instruction, I should propose to my right hon. and learned Friend that he should consent to the second reading of the Parochial Schools Amendment Bill, with a view to its being referred to the same Committee (Parochial Schools Bill). My right hon. and learned Friend seemed to taunt us the other night for having expressed our willingness, provided the existing parochial schools were left in their connection with the Church, to hand over the education of the towns and manufacturing rural districts to a system which was characterised as purely secular, and liable to all sorts of objections. But my right hon. and learned Friend did us injustice in this, and did not state the matter with his usual fairness. We never either said or sang—

"How happy could we be with either,

If only we both might enjoy."

What we said was this, that while we thought the existing system contained the best security for the maintenance of the religious elements of education, and, as such, that which we should have desired, had it been practicable, to extend to all schools; yet that, being of opinion, in consequence of the prevalence of dissent among large masses of the population, especially in the towns, that such extension was impossible—a melancholy proof, if proof were wanting, of the evils arising from the unhappy differences by which the Churches of the Reformation on points, in Scotland, at least, of very secondary importance are distracted—we were willing to assent to the principle of this Bill, as far as the extension of the means of education were concerned, reserving to ourselves the liberty of endeavouring to obtain in Committee some more reliable guarantee for the maintenance of the religious elements in the teaching of these new schools than were to be found in the clauses of the Bill itself. What we said was this—we have in the parochial schools a sound principle; in the absence of any reasonable pretence for interfering with it, as shown in the practical working of the schools themselves, we desire to maintain it. We should prefer to see it extended to all schools, but, as practical men, we see that there are great difficulties at present in the way of applying it in its integrity, in the large seats of manufacturing and commercial industry, and we are therefore willing that, in so far as they are concerned, it should be so modified as to obtain from it the greatest amount of practical good. My right hon. and learned Friend, therefore, was scarcely justified in this representation of the opinions we had expressed in this respect, or in representing us as indifferent to what might be the effects of his measure on the population of the towns. The difference between us in regard to them is simply this—we agree with you that it is the duty of the State to construct new channels of education where such may be required—but we think, and we contend that you should so construct them as that—to use the just and eloquent words of Wordsworth,—

"The flood

Of sacred truth may enter, till it brood

O'er the wide realm, as o'er the Egyptian plain

The all-sustaining note."

Now, having avowed that the object of my amendment is to preserve in the existing parochial schools the guarantee which they by law possess for the maintenance of a principle which we deem of inappreciable value—and at the same time to confer on the towns and densely-peopled agricultural districts extended means of education, retaining as much of that principle as their different circumstances will permit—I shall not think it necessary to criticise in any hostile spirit the provisions of the right hon. and learned Lord's Bill as it applies to the extended means of education which it proposes to afford. To many of those provisions I entertain very strong objections—still stronger objections to the omission of provisions essential to its professed object; but they are capable of being amended in Committee, and any proposals for their modification may more conveniently be delayed till the Bill is in that stage. My object will now be to show the House, as shortly as I can, that our national system, as it at present exists—and to the extent at least to which it at present exists—is deserving of support—that its maintenance would in no way interfere with conferring additional means of education where they may be required—and that the grounds on which it is assailed by my right hon. and learned Friend, if divested of the fascination with which his very captivating eloquence can invest arguments in themselves of little value—are really insufficient to warrant the conclusions he rests on them. First, however, I should wish, in justification of the course we have already taken, shortly to recall to the recollection of the House what that course has been. The House will remember that, in introducing this measure last year, my right hon. and learned Friend grounded it on the assumption of a great deficiency in the means and machinery of education in Scotland. We, by whom the Bill was opposed, and successfully opposed last year, based our opposition on these, among other grounds—that the existing system, which the Bill, if passed, would seriously injure—was fully adequate to meet the educational wants of the rural districts to which it applied—that it was at the present moment in a state of increasing efficiency—and that it afforded a security for the union of religious with secular education for which we looked in vain in the system which you proposed to substitute. We asserted, farther, that its maintenance would in no way interfere with your power of introducing increased means of education when they might be required. We conceded the existence of such necessity in towns and densely-peopled rural districts to which the existing system does not extend, and we professed our willingness to concur in supporting any measure more adapted to their peculiar circumstances, which might obtain the sanction of Parliament and the country as far as they were concerned, provided it contained some definite and reliable guarantee for religious teaching—all we asked was, that as far as the rural districts were concerned, the right hon. and learned Lord would let well alone—that he would leave the parochial schools iu their useful course of continuous and rapid improvement—conceding to us only in regard to them such changes of detail as might enable them more effectually to carry out the objects of their institution—changes which are admirably set forth in the Bill introduced by my hon. Friend, the Member for Perthshire (Mr. Stirling) and which, I trust, he will take an opportunity of fully explaining to the House—and, as a further inducement to the right hon. and learned Lord to agree to this most reasonable proposal, we offered to renounce all claim for increased pecuniary support from the State, and ourselves to contribute the additional funds required to bring the salaries of their teachers up to the standard of remuneration assumed in the Bill of the right hon. and learned Lord. The House is aware that already the salaries of the teachers, and the erection and maintaining the school-house and schoolmaster's accommodation, are defrayed by the proprietors of the land—of whom more than 2,000 have declared their earnest desire that the existing system should be maintained. The right hon. and learned Lord, however, has rejected all compromise. He rallies the forces of the Government to the cry of "The Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill;" and, as regards the existing system of the parochial schools, his only answer has been delenda est. Now, that answer leaves little hope to such Members as voted for the second reading in expectation of being able to persuade my learned Friend to consent to modifications in Committee, and, therefore, believing that a principle and a system of inappreciable value will be endangered and put in jeopardy if the Bill in its present shape should obtain the sanction of the Legislature, I have considered it my duty to ask the House to take the matter into its own hands, and by agreeing to this instruction, while it concedes all that has been proposed with regard to increasing the means of education where such increase may be required, to take care that an existing system of proved utility, and dear, as I believe, to the vast majority of the rural population of Scotland—a fact sufficiently proved by the petitions presented to the House—shall not be subverted and swept away. You all agree that it is most desirable that religion should lie at the foundation of instruction in your schools. This was the object of those by whom our present parish schools were established. We believe it to be adapted to that object, and that it has solved the difficult problem of the union of religious and secular education better and more effectually than it has ever before been solved by any system of national education—and we desire to maintain it till you have shown us that another system can more effectually work out this first necessity of education—properly so called—and why should you not consent to this? You referred in terms of merited eulogy to the speech of my right hon. Friend, the Member for Droitwich (Sir J. Pakington), and to the principles embraced in his Bill. I only wish that you had taken a leaf out of his book, and pursued the same fair and judicious course as he proposed with reference to existing schools. I was confident that we should have his support, because I felt sure that he would recognise, in dealing with a question of this kind, the difference which exists between our two countries—in the one of which a national system has long existed—in the other it was to be introduced for the first time. But what does he say with reference to the existing schools?—

"Another and very important point in this Bill is, that in no case will it interfere with existing schools or existing interests. We must not, in our wish for improvement or extension, lose sigh of the progress education has already made in this country. On that point I have to state distinctly that my proposal will interfere with no existing schools—it will be entirely optional whether they come into the unions or not—and even if they do, I will respect existing schools on two conditions, which I believe to be indispensable—the one is, that they will submit to a periodical and satisfactory inspection; the other, that they shall be subject to the provisions of the Act, with regard to religious teaching."

Now, this is precisely the course we ask you to adopt—and with regard to your new schools, he proposes an arrangement for securing religious teaching far preferable to your own—at present, indeed, you propose none. But my right hon. and learned Friend rests the justification—the necessity, as he asserts, of the changes he proposes in the constitution of the parochial schools on three grounds—1st, That, being connected with the Established Church, that Church no longer represents the religious opinions of the majority of the people of Scotland. 2dly, That, in consequence of this change in the opinions of the people in regard to the Established Church, the parochial schools have acquired, in consequence of that condition, a sectarian character; and, 3rdly, That their maintenance would interfere with the uniformity which he considers essential to a system of national education. Now, I shall not stop to inquire whether my right hon. and learned Friend has accurately represented this matter of the majority. The Census returns are, on the face of them, extremely deficient; but, such as they are, it would not be difficult to show that my right hon. and learned Friend—and still more the hon. and learned Member for Greenock (Mr. Dunlop)—has not examined the figures with his usual accuracy, but must have looked at them through spectacles less strongly tinged with a Free Kirk mixture. The educational returns, for which I moved, and which I hold in my hands, would lead to a different conclusion; for I find that, of the scholars attending school in Scotland the return stands thus—

"Parochial schools connected with the Established Church, 2,035. Free Church, 768; United Presbyterian, 54; Episcopal, 68; Roman Catholic, 28; Church of England, 1; Original Secession, 1; Reformed Presbyterian, 1; Congregational, 1; Baptist, 2—In all, 924."

Thus all other denominations, it will be seen, amount to only 924. A margin, returned "Non-denominational," amounting to 1,931 schools may be claimed also, to a large extent, by the Established Church. The scholars stand thus—

"Established Church, 151,590. Free Church, 67,000; other denominations, 27,586—Amount to 94,686. Non-denominations, 126,991."

But, besides the inference which may be drawn from this, it is notorious that the Free Church, on whose account this movement is made, are now rent by dissension; and that in some districts, as in Badenoch and the centre and north Highlands, their ministers are superseded by a set of fanatics called "the men," whose more attractive ministrations are emptying and shutting up their churches. I find it so stated in a paper sent to me this day from Inverness, and the fact—a very deplorable one—admitted by the advocates of the Free Church themselves. But when he objects to the parochial schools, as connected with a Church which is no longer that of the majority, the objection seems to me to rest on a fallacy, or rather on a misunderstanding of the principles on which these schools were founded. Those principles do not depend on the question of majorities and minorities. They are based on the general principles to which you assent, that religion lies at the foundation of all sound instruction, and this principle cannot be maintained without the intervention of some recognised religious body. Accordingly, when the parochial schools were established in 1816, and confirmed by Parliament in 1633, the Church established in Scotland was Episcopalian, not Presbyterian, and the control, now exercised by the Presbyteries, was vested in the ordinary or bishop. No one will pretend that the majority of the population was then more favourable to the Episcopacy than they now are to the Established Church, but this control was then, by our wiser ancestors, vested in the Episcopalian, simply because it was the Established Church, and, as such, the only one over which the State could exercise that control which it had a fair, and, as they thought, necessary claim to exercise in a matter of this importance—for, if it was its duty to provide for the education of the people, it was no less its duty to assure itself, so far as this could be done, that the education so given was such as it could approve. The results, as proved by long experience, have been so eminently successful, that they leave you no ground, even of expediency, on which to set up a plea for withdrawing the superintendence of these schools from the Established Church because of the so-called Free Church secession, without which, I believe, this proposal never would have been heard of. The State, in 1663, having determined that its duty called on it to educate the people, and that the education should be religious, vested the superintendence in the Established Church, not because it was the Church of the majority, but because the State knew what she taught, and must continue to teach so long as she continued to be the Established Church. I must say, that it appeared to me that you have advanced no argument based on this ground of majorities and minorities, which, if pushed to its legitimate consequences, does not apply, in Scotland at least, quite as strongly to the parish church as to the parish school—to the pulpit as well as to the master's desk. But, if it be really your object that she should cease to be the Established Church—a motive which I should be loath to attribute to the Ministers of a Sovereign who has sworn to maintain and to uphold her—to Ministers, whose duty, I should have thought, imposed on them the obligation of maintaining her as one of the great and settled institutions of the State; but, if this be your object, and I can conceive no course more calculated than that which you propose to bring about such a result, for no Church can long stand unconnected with any schools, an opinion of the truth of which the Free Church have largely shown their conviction; but, if this be your object, then I do say that it would be more manly and more straightforward to avow this at once, than to go on, year after year, with these covert and insidious attacks on her position and usefulness. We should then know how to meet you, and the question might be fairly raised, whether it was for the national interest to drive her from her place as an Establishment in order to make way—for such, I presume, would be your object, seeing that you hold by the principle of an Establishment—for a Church which rejects all intervention by the State, not only as regards the doctrine she holds, but in the arrangements of her ecclesiastical polity. That battle has been already fought, and Parliament most wisely, in my judgment, determined that it would not sanction the setting up again in Scotland a clerical power which, under the plea of asserting the independence of the Church in things spiritual—an independence which no one ever dreamt of questioning—refused obedience to the law, and submission to its legally-constituted tribunals in matters con- nected solely with her temporalities, and with the interpretation of the terms on which, as a condition of her alliance with the State, those temporalities had been conferred. But the right hon. and learned Lord tells us, also, that now, when, as he alleges, the Established Church no longer numbers among her adherents a majority of the people of Scotland, you impart to her parochial schools a character of sectarianism by leaving them in their connection with that Church; and this character of sectarianism he describes as a great evil, We answer you, and answer you truly, that the teaching in these schools never has been accused of being of a sectarian character. Parents of all denominations, including Roman Catholics, show no unwillingness to avail themselves, for their children, of the education afforded in them; and, except in cases of such bigoted and intolerant interference as has—I am informed—been exercised in one or two of the northern counties, where the Free Kirk minister has refused the privileges of the Church—admission to the Sacraments of Baptism or the Holy Communion—to persons who presumed to send their children to parochial schools, or who refused to withdraw them; except in cases of such excommunicating interference, I have never heard of any objection on the part of parents to avail themselves, for their children, of the advantages of the parish schools on this ground of their sectarian character. I am bound to say that these disgraceful proceedings were condemned and repudiated by the respected leaders of the Free Church; but, in fact, the mere circumstance of their connection with the Established Church excludes, to a great degree, this character; for there is in the very nature of the Established Church something adverse to the spirit of proselytism—an atmosphere of quiet and acquiescence unfavourable to its development and its growth. But you propose to substitute for it a state of things under which sectarianism can scarce fail to take root and flourish. Your schoolmaster, then, must belong to some religious denomination, and I should like to know on what ground you suppose that he will be less desirous of inculcating his own peculiar views than the teacher of the Established Church—or why the parents should be less jealous of the one than the other. Nor would the evils which you affect to deprecate as arising from the sectarian spirit be confined merely to the teaching of the schools; they would extend to the preliminary operations of the teacher—and on occasions of vacancy we should have every parish distracted by the influence of this spirit, and the different religious bodies brought into a state of angry and jealous collision. As the law now stands, the parish schoolmaster must be a Member of the Established Church, and no such contest takes place, because the people acquiesce in a law from which, for 200 years, the greatest benefits have accrued to them, and which, in its operation during that long series of years, has never been chargeable with the evils arising from the spirit of proselytism. The vast majority of the petitions in favour of the existing schools of itself puts this beyond all question, and my conviction is, that if you succeed in carrying this measure, as it relates to the parochial schools, you will throw a brand of discord into our hitherto peaceful parishes, and evoke that very spirit which you profess to deprecate; for remember that your movement is au aggressive movement—against the Church and its adherents—and aggression can scarce fail to rouse a spirit of resistance and retaliation. So much for your sectarian objection—your remedy would aggravate the disease—but I confess that in my view of it, you appear to attach to it undue importance. I agree very much with what Dr. Arnold says, in a letter to the Under Secretary of State, on the subject of the constitution of a college in Van Diemen's Land. He says—

"I am quite sure that the spirit of proselytism, which some persons seem so greatly to dread, would no more exist in a good and sensible clergyman than in a good and sensible layman. The master must be a member of some church, and if he be a sincere member of it, and fitted to give religious instruction at all, he must be anxious to Inculcate its tenets—but if he be a man of judgment and honesty, and of a truly Catholic spirit, he will find it a more sacred duty not to abuse the confidence of those parents of different persuasions who may have entrusted their children to his care, and will think that the true spirit of a Christian is not exactly the spirit of proselytism."

And that the practice of the schools in connection with the Church of Scotland was consistent with this view is proved by the instructions given by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland to the teachers of her schools, which say—

"It only remains to notice that a considerable proportion of those attending at several of the schools are of the Roman Catholic Church, and it is proper to state that the schools are always open to scholars of this class as freely, and on the same terms as to Protestants, and that the teachers have been directed not to press on the Roman Catholic children any instruction to which their priests or their parents may object, as interfering with the principles of their own religion. They meet, accordingly, in the Assembly schools, in most cases, without jealousy or reluctance, and have every branch of literary instruction in the same classes with the Protestants, in the same schoolbooks, and without distinction between the two denominations. At the same time the Committee have specially directed that the religious instruction given in the schools, whatever may be the number of Roman Catholics in attendance, shall be always accommodated strictly and exclusively to the principles of the Established Church."

But you further object to leaving the parish schools as they are, because it would interfere with the uniformity which you consider essential to a national system. I confess I am at a loss to perceive the advantages of this nominal uniformity, I think it would prove opposed and adverse to real uniformity—the uniformity of object—and seeing that we do not object to your trying another system as regards your new schools in the towns, I should rather expect that the difference in their constitution would give rise to a healthy rivalry by which both might be stimulated into increased activity. But after all, what is this uniformity; what does it mean? Uniformity means centralisation, centralisation means Government interference, Government interference, especially under Governments of a certain character, means jobbing, a mismanagement, failure—the weakening of the healthful influence of local self-government—the drying up of the sources of individual generosity and individual Christian benevolence. The price is too high for an article of such questionable utility. Having now touched on what seem to me the main objections urged by the right hon. and learned Lord against the parish schools, will the House allow me to tell them what this mischievous parochial system is, against which the right hon. and learned Lord thinks it his duty to direct his exterminating attack,—and I will observe, first, that while we assert that the whole of these schools are in a state of high efficiency, of which I shall by-and-bye offer large proof, neither the right hon. and learned Lord, nor any of those Members who support his attacks on them, have cited one single instance of either failure or inefficiency which can be fairly assigned to the system of their institution. But we must look for a moment to what the main objects of education really are, or ought to be,—and I have no hesitation in asserting that there is no system of instruction which, in its original aim, goes more directly to the true purpose of education than that of the parochial schools of Scotland. If this be so, why seek to subvert it. Now, an authority to which hon. gentlemen opposite, professing the most liberal opinions, will be disposed to defer, thus defines the true purpose of education—Milton says, "the end of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love Him, to imitate Him, to be like Him, as we may the nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue; which, being united to the heavenly grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection." Now, the distinguishing characteristic of our parochial school education is, according to its first design and true practice, that it is religious. That such is its character was acknowledged by a high authority on the Liberal side of the Scotch Church—one whose name and memory will command respect even among the adherents of the Free Church, and persons professing the most liberal political opinions, the late Dr. Andrew Thomson, who, in drawing up a constitution for the local day-school institution in the parish of St. George's, in Edinburgh, founds it expressly on this, "that the object of the school shall be in conformity to the spirit and intention of our national establishment of parochial schools, to give the children of the parish a religious education;" and that he justly appreciated that spirit and intention is proved by reference to the first book of discipline in setting forth the necessity of schools. The work, as hon. Members know, is attributed to John Knox. It refers "to the purpose of God that His Church should be taught by Him, and not by Angels;" and because men are born ignorant of all godliness, and God has ceased to illuminate them miraculously, suddenly changing them as He did the Apostles and others; therefore it is most necessary to be most careful for the virtuous education and godly upbringing of the youth of this realm;" and, in pursuance of these views, the parish school was attached as an appendage and necessary part of the parish church, and placed in close and intimate connection with it. Now, so long as that connexion exists, we have a guarantee for the maintenance in our parochial schools of the union of religion with secular education. In your Bill we look in vain for any such guaran- tee, you pay us off in your preamble with certain general expressions of respect for the principle involved in this union, but we all know what is the value of a preamble unsupported by a single enacting clause in your Bill—you keep the word of promise to the ear, and break it to the sense. I cited to the House last year an instance of something much more likely to command the respect of a late posterity than the words of any preamble—the last advice offered to his countrymen by Washington, in which he exhorts them to maintain the religious character of their schools, but which, in the absence of positive enactment, has failed to prevent their public schools slipping down, to use the appropriate expression of my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxfordshire (Mr. Henley), into a purely secular system; and if you shrink from encountering the difficulties which you suppose to exist in applying this principle in its full extent to your new schools, if you are sincere in the respect you profess for it, you should rather desire to maintain it where it already exists, and keep your parish schools intact as examples to guide your new ones in the right path—as buoys to indicate the channel in which they may steer with safety. Now, our parochial schools embrace these two objects, as was stated by Mr. Menzies—religious culture and culture for life—for its duties and pursuits. They cannot be separated without depriving the most important part of education for life—for life extending to an existence beyond this world, but indissolubly connected with it—moral habit and duty, of the authority and influence of their Divine origin. The right hon. and learned Lord and others have urged on us the fearful amount of crime, which they attribute, with some truth, I doubt not, to ignorance—though the Austrian statistics of the right hon. Member for Oxfordshire might warrant the conclusion that false knowledge was quite as prolific of it as brute ignorance—and they urge the paramount obligation which lies on us no longer to delay the consideration of this question of the education of the people. They tell us that the very existence of our social system is endangered, as reposing on a volcano which may, at any moment, burst forth, and leave nothing but desolation and ruin behind it; and, undoubtedly, we have sufficient proof of the insufficiency of mere penal laws, and of the dread of punishment to deter from crime. But you will fail of your object if you limit your education to mere instruction in reading and writing, and what are called the higher branches of knowledge, if you neglect to impress on the mind of the child the sense and habitual influence of responsibility to a tribunal higher than any human authority, and the habit of referring every question of conduct to a law which prejudice and favour cannot change. To produce this impression, to form this habit, is the primary object of our parochial schools—and, till very lately, they were allowed to have so far succeeded as to merit the general approval of all classes and denominations amongst us. Has any such change taken place in them as to justify the subversion of that part of their constitution which, by connecting them with the Established Church, gives us a practical assurance that this object shall not be lost sight of? Quite the reverse. The living and advancing character of these schools may be proved by the increased degree in which they enjoy the public confidence. I will give the House some facts connected with the schools in some northern counties, with which I am familiar, which will bear me out in this. I take them from the excellent report of Mr. Menzies, Secretary to the Dick Bequest—you do not deny the efficient state of the schools subject to its operation—but I can cite others as efficient in other counties; besides, there is nothing in the operation or management of that bequest which might not easily be applied to all schools. I take 124 parochial schools in the counties of Aberdeen, Banff, and Moray—a large and fair induction. There are now in each of the parochial schools of those counties, on an average, thirty more pupils than there were in 1833. The entire number of schools, parochial and private, in these counties, excluding burghs, which in 1833 was 528, has risen during the same period to 731, an increase equal to ten new schools in each year. In 1833 only one in nine of the population attended school; in 1853 the number was one in six. The average number of scholars attending each parochial school in 1832 was eighty-five; in 1852 it was 115, being thirty more than in 1832. The total number enrolled shows an increase since 1832 of 5,197, a much larger increase than can be assigned to the increase of the population; the increase in the number of pupils being as 308 to 146 of the population, and this simultaneously with a large increase in the means of education generally, there being of schools, parochial and non-parochial, excluding the burghs, which have no parochial schools, 203 more than in 1833. The increasing appreciation of the parochial schools is further shown by the increase in the amount of fees received by the teachers. In 1833, the fees received by the parochial schools amounted to 1,867l.; in 1842 they had risen to 2,867l.; in 1852, they were 3,110l.; the average amount of fees being now to each teacher 25l. 7s. 4d., or 9l. 9s. 10d. more than in 1833; and this although the number of pupils taught gratis in 123 parochial schools is 3,406, or one in five of the whole scholars enrolled, and four times the number taught gratuitously in 1833. My right hon. Friend the Member for Droitwich expressed an opinion unfavourable to the payment of any fees by the scholars, but he will scarcely quarrel with the cost to each pupil for an education including, besides reading and writing, arithmetic, mathematics, Greek, Latin, French (in many cases), geography, history, and drawing. The cost of fees to each of 31,745 pupils is 7s. 4d. for all branches of education. The cost of each, including the salaries and expenses of buildings to the heritors, is only 12s. 10d. Then, with regard to the general state of education in these counties, there are returns for forty-nine parishes, in which they show that there was no person above six years of age unable to read—in upwards of thirty parishes, none unable, also, to write. In the parish in which I reside the number attending school during the past year was one in four of the population. Then, as regards the emoluments of the teachers, it is satisfactory to know that they are such as to hold out sufficient inducement to persons well qualified for the office. In the last twenty years they have increased from 55l. 12s. 6d. to 101l. while the accommodation afforded by the proprietors, which then was limited to three rooms, now averages five rooms. These salaries are doubtless augmented to the average extent of some 20l. by the payments from the Dick Bequest, but in some of the southern counties to which it does not extend, and with one of which I am connected, the emoluments are even higher; Larbert, in Stirlingshire, has for two years averaged 124l. In two neighbouring parishes the teachers have averaged 150l. There are doubtless many cases of retired parishes where the salaries should be increased, but we have offered ourselves to increase them. Now, what I contend is, that the state of things which I have described does not call for, or justify legislative interference, such as is proposed in this Bill with the parochial schools. It proves that they are in a high state of efficiency, and in the enjoyment of the public favour and approval—but if there be one circumstance more than another to which this state of things is to be attributed, it is to the connection existing between them and the Church, and to the superintendence and watchful interest of the parochial clergy and Presbyteries of the Church arising out of that connection. The right hon. and learned Lord may tell me that he leaves the superintendence practically with the parish minister; then, why interfere with the Presbyteries, supposing the parish minister neglects his duty—a possible case, among so large a number—Quis custodiet ipsos custodies—we require the Presbytery to keep him up to his work. But, in regard to the connection with the Church generally, Mr. Menzies tells us, in the Report already referred to (page 133), "That the trustees have always attached a high value to the connection between the parish schools and the Church," and the Report points out how fitting it is that institutions designed to train and mould the young should be under the guidance of those whose office is conversant with man's highest interests, where it connects the teacher with what his neighbourhood possesses of learning, intelligence, and respectability. He says further, that, so far from showing any jealousy of lay interference, the Reports of the Presbyteries are regularly transmitted to the Trustees of the Bequest, and that this communication has proved in the highest degree beneficial in directing attention to points of general interest and importance affecting the welfare of the schools; and he adds that in time of need the minister is the prop of the school, and that the records of the Trustees exhibit many instances of schools being taught for weeks—in one case for months—by the minister personally, when there was a vacancy, and difficulty in finding a qualified teacher. Why, then, should you endeavour to terminate a connection acting thus beneficially? Experience has shown that the sectarian spirit, of which you express so much dread, has really no action in these schools. The principle involved in it is approved by all the Episcopalian community, as may be inferred from the unanimous declaration of the Scotch bishops. The proprietors, by whom the schools are paid, protest against the change you propose. The maintenance of the present system in its integrity will not interfere with your extending the means of education where extension may be required. The separation of the parish schools from the Church is protested against by all the ministers and congregations of the Church, as well as by almost all the present schoolmasters, because it would involve the virtual withdrawal of all guarantee for the religious character of education in Scotland, while it dealt a heavy blow and great discouragement to the Church itself. I implore the House to consent to the instruction which I now beg leave to move.

said, at that late hour (it being half-past twelve o'clock), he would not oppose the Motion, as there seemed no likelihood of ending the discussion that night.

said, he hoped the Government would allow the debate to be continued on Monday next, which was agreed to.

said, he was very sorry to be obliged to trouble the House at that late hour with two or three observations, but the great importance of the question, and the novelty, as well as the very undesirable nature of the course about to be adopted, must be his excuse for doing so. The noble Lord gave notice of a Bill to enable Her Majesty to assent to an Act of the Legislative Council of Victoria as that Act had been amended. This was a very extraordinary Motion. He would say nothing now of the Bill, which could be discussed when it was before the House, but the form in which they were about to legislate was extremely objectionable, and he was the more inclined to oppose it because he saw from a notice that had been given, what was intended to be adopted in the Council of New South Wales. In 1850 a Bill was passed, giving to the Legislative Councils of the Australian Colonies power to frame new constitutions for themselves. Under that statute the Legislative Council of Victoria had passed a Bill, the preamble of which recited that power had been given it to do so by the statute of 1850, but then the Bills passed by the Legislative Council overleaped and transcended the powers contained in the Act of 1850, presuming to repeal numerous Imperial statutes, and also to invest the Council with a great many powers which it did not now possess, and which nothing but an Act of Parliament could confer upon it, while it likewise in many respects altered the relation of the Legislative Council to the Imperial Legislature. This Bill the Legislative Council of Victoria had no more authority to pass than had any small knot of persons assembling together in a room in the colony and calling themselves a public meeting. The Legislative Council, however, took it upon itself to pass this Bill, reciting the limited powers given to it by Parliament; and then, being conscious that it had exceeded those powers, it sent home, together with this Act, a short Act, which it suggested that Parliament should pass, in order to legalise what it had done. Now, it would be most inconvenient, as well as not very creditable, for the British Parliament to accede to such a request, while it would also be most inexpedient as an example to the other colonies. Certain limited powers having been granted to the Legislative Council, it ought to have confined itself strictly within its authority; and whatever was wanted beyond those constitutional powers should take the form of a gift and concession from the Imperial Parliament to the colony, instead of the colony taking it in a shape that was illegal and void, and then sending its Act home, accompanied by another short Act, asking Parliament to confirm and ratify its irregularity. If this Motion had been for a Bill to assent to the Act of the Legislative Council of Victoria, the course pursued by the Government would have been sufficiently objectionable; but it was more objectionable still, because it was not merely a Bill to enable Her Majesty to grant Her consent, but really a Bill to enable the Legislative Council to pass that which it had set up, though utterly void of law. The House was therefore asked, in fact, to give validity to a law which the Legislative Council had no authority to make, and which Her Majesty had no power to agree to. The matter, however, did not stop there. The Legislative Council of Victoria, having passed an Act which it had no power to pass, and then sent it home to be made valid, the noble Lord (Lord John Russell) did not approve of certain portions of this Colonial Act, and thought it not advisable to adopt them; and, therefore, he had amended the Colonial Act by striking out those objectionable portions of it and inserting others in their place; and then he asked Parliament to pass a Bill to enable Her Majesty to assent, not to the Act which the Colonial Legislature had adopted, but another one which the noble Lord had devised. An Act when thus altered was no longer the same measure, but must be regarded as an entirely new one, and therefore the Act now proposed to be legalised could not be considered as the Bill that was passed by the Legislative Council of Victoria, As the noble Lord had amended this Act, he presumed that the House of Commons could also amend it. If not, the simple effect would be to deprive the House of the power of amending an Act of its own, because the Act would be as much the Act of that House as if it had never passed the Legislature of Victoria, that Legislature never having had power to pass it. They were, therefore, involving themselves in a mass of inextricable confusion, difficulty, and anomaly, and they were placing the House of Commons in a situation in which it ought not to be placed—namely, in the situation of submitting to the dictation of a colonial assembly as to what laws it should pass. He objected, therefore, entirely to the course which the noble Lord proposed to pursue, but he would suggest two courses, either of which would be free from any objection in principle. The noble Lord might stand upon the Act of 1850, and say to the Legislative Council of Victoria, "You have exceeded your powers; you have done that which you had no right to do, and I therefore send back the Act, in order that you may amend it." But, as the case was one of emergency, the noble Lord might also introduce a Bill vesting in the Governor General of the Australian Colonies power to assent to the Act so amended at once in the name of Her Majesty. That Bill might also be coupled with another making such concessions to the Colonial Legislature as the Legislature had assumed to itself without the authority of Parliament, and giving to it the land fund, and anything else which the noble Lord thought it ought to have. The other course would be to do in effect what we were now asked to do in substance—namely, to sweep away the machinery of enabling Her Majesty to assent to a Bill which the Colonial Legislature had never passed, and to legislate directly on the subject. If the noble Lord thought the House ought to make a constitution for the colony, let them do it, but let them have the question brought fairly before them, so that they might know what they were about. He protested against the plan of passing a Bill to enable Her Majesty to assent, not to a Bill that had been passed by the Legislature of Victoria, but to another and a different Bill which, even had it been passed by that Legislature, had been passed by it ultra vires.

said, he did not think that either of the courses proposed by the hon. Gentleman would be preferable to that which the Government desired to adopt. The hon. Gentleman was mistaken in supposing that it was proposed to insert in this Bill provisions which the Legislature of Victoria had not sanctioned, but the hon. Gentleman was quite correct in stating that the enactments of the Legislature of Victoria were ultra vires, that they interfered with certain Imperial Acts, and that they touched upon matters which were strictly within the province of Her Majesty and Parliament. He proposed, therefore, to take generally the Bill of the Legislature of Victoria as far as concerned its own constitution, but to omit certain proposals which would limit the power vested in the Crown of disallowing the Acts passed by the colonies. The Bill, therefore, although it would certainly not contain all that the Legislature of Victoria had proposed, would not contain anything to which it had not given its assent, and thus, in his opinion, would be within the powers given by Parliament to the Australian colonies to form constitutions for themselves. It must be recollected that both of these constitutions arrived in this country during the last recess. If they had been sent back they could not have arrived in time to give validity to these Bills in the course of this Session. The hon. Gentleman said they would get into inextricable confusion, because a similar course would be pursued with regard to other colonies. With regard to New South Wales, it was quite true a similar course would be adopted; but the constitution proposed by the Legislative Council of New South Wales differed in some important respects from that proposed for Victoria. In Victoria, for instance, it was proposed that a Legislative Council should be elected, in New South Wales, that the Legislative Council should be nominated by the Crown. With regard to the Legislative Council, the Government thought it right that the wishes of the colony should be consulted; but when the Bill was passed with regard to Victoria and with regard to New South Wales he did not apprehend there would be any difficulty about the other colonies. With regard to Van Diemen's Land, they had already a constitution which was strictly within the powers given by the Act of 1850, and that constitution having been laid before the two Houses of Parliament, had already been confirmed and approved by Her Majesty in Council. With respect to South Australia, the constitution was agreed to, but the Council afterwards had several discussions and divisions, the result of which was a desire to indulge the Legislative Council in their wish to have it referred back to them; and, accordingly, the matter was referred back, with discretion to the Governor to propose to the colony, whether elective or nominative, a Council in such a form that he might be able to consent without further reference to Parliament. But he thought it inconvenient to send this proposal to Victoria and New South Wales to be re-discussed, when it appeared their mind upon the subject was not changed. He should be quite ready, in discussing these several Bills, to point out in what way he thought they ought to pass. As the hon. Gentleman said the schedules would be open to discussion, and if hon. members should think parts of those schedules ought to be omitted, it was in the power of Parliament to alter them, though, of course, it was a matter of discretion whether they would do so. With respect to general legislation upon this subject, he would only say that a great desire was expressed in Australia that the management of the waste lands, and the revenues arising from them, should be at the disposition of the Colonial Government. It was a matter upon which the Australian colonies set great value, and it would be most convenient if a Bill for that purpose were carried into effect.

said, he thought the difficulties pointed out by the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Lowe) had not been answered by the noble lord. The passing of a Bill to enable Her Majesty to assent to a portion and not the whole of the Bill of the Colonial Legislature was a course which, in his opinion, was open to very grave doubt. As he understood the law, a Bill sent to that House from the colonies must be assented to in its entirety, and not partially. He understood a part of the Bill was not to be assented to, as it was a matter which the Colonial Legislature had no power to frame a Bill upon. He thought, therefore, the noble lord ought not to press the Bill without further consideration. When the Bill came from the Colonial Legislature it was an entire thing; and he did not think it was competent upon principle, or, if competent, he considered it would be extremely inconvenient, that the noble lord should introduce a Bill to enable the Crown to assent to the valid part of the Colonial Bill, and to reject the other.

said, it was not his intention to oppose the introduction of the Bill.

said, he was quite opposed to the introduction of the Bill, as it was not the Bill of the Colonial Legislature, but a new Bill altogether.

said, the Bill which the noble lord was about to introduce did not alter any portion of the Bill which had been passed by the Colonial Legislature. It was simply proposed that certain portions of the Colonial Bill should be omitted.