in rising to move the third reading of this Bill, said, that the manner in which this Bill came before the House was in this wise. When the Central Board of Health was abolished the compulsory powers possessed by that Board fell with it, and the care of the public health was committed to the local boards. He did not regret that, for he thought it would be wrong to involve measures that were in themselves just and reasonable, under a load of general unpopularity. The Central Board, however, possessed certain powers that could not be given to local boards, and the question was whether these powers should be extinguished or vested in the Privy Council. The latter alternative had been adopted, and the Act of Parliament, which had been passed for one year, would expire in a few days. The object of the present Bill was to make these powers perpetual; but he did not propose to vest in the Privy Council any compulsory powers of general or perpetual efficacy. By the Diseases Prevention Act of 1855 certain powers were given to the Central Board of Health, to be exercised at periods when epidemics of a violent nature were prevalent. So necessary were these powers that in 1831, when the cholera broke out, and before legislation had provided for similar occurrences, the Committee of Privy Council felt bound to put in exercise the prerogative powers of the Crown, whatever they might be, and took a great many steps of an arbitrary character which were acquiesced in by the public as tending to the preservation of the public health. The principal powers conferred by the Diseases Prevention Act were that a visitation from house to house might be ordered, that provision was made for the speedy interment of the dead, and for the distribution of medicine among the poor. It was impossible to vest these powers in a merely local authority, and it would be rendering a service to the local boards themseves to place these powers in some central body, which, from its position and knowledge, might be able to exercise them for the benefit of the public, and exercise them in moments of consternation and terror. The second power proposed to be conferred by this Bill was a power of making regulations with regard to the qualification of those persons with whom the Poor-Law Board were empowered to contract for vaccination. This power was desirable on behalf of those who were to be vaccinated, who had an interest in the competency of the vaccinators. This, however, was a clause of regulation, and not of compulsion. The third power given under the Bill would enable the Privy Council to inspect localities alleged to be unhealthy, and make a report through their Medical Officer of the state of the district, which should be laid upon the table of the House. If the local Boards were left without instruction and stimulus, there was too much reason to suppose that the experiment of local government would fail in this respect, as in many others. Of course, the function of reporting upon unhealthy localities could not be performed by a lay body like the Privy Council, but would be carried on by their Medical Officer, Mr. Simon, whose high qualifications and experience need not be dilated on. He might be permitted to mention, however, that that gentleman had given up an income at least as great as that he would receive from the country, and he had also given up prospects second to none that could be enjoyed in the profession. There was another clause to which many hon. Members felt great objection, and which enabled vaccinators and others to sue for penalties against those who had wilfully neglected or refused to comply with the Act regarding vaccination. The Bill enabled the persons so proceeding to pay for the expenses of prosecution out of the funds of the Poor-law union of the district. He (Mr. Lowe) was no friend to compulsory vaccination, but he hoped that the people would in time become willing to let their children be vaccinated. He thought the best means of bringing about so desirable a result, however, would be by providing plenty of wholesome lymph, and of skilful operators. He was willing to consent to the omission of this clause in the House of Lords if hon. Gentlemen so desired, and he trusted that they would accept it as a peace-offering and a concession. He had been recommended to continue this Bill for another year, but his sense of public duty did not permit him to make this further concession. He was quite satisfied that it was impossible for these powers to be fairly discharged by anybody who held them only upon sufferance. The powers he asked were not of a compulsory nature, and could the Privy Council act with any moral weight if they were told that Parliament would not intrust them with powers for more than a single year? It was not likely that an officer engaged in such duties as those which devolved upon the Medical Officer could discharge them with the same fearlessness as if he enjoyed a more permanent tenure. He did not ask for the Medical Officer of the Privy Council the immunity possessed by the Judges of the land, but he was an officer nevertheless who had to judge of questions affecting the lives of thousands, and it was not too much to ask that he should be surrounded with the same protection that other public officers possessed. He trusted that the House would consider how weighty this matter was. It was proved that not less than one quarter of the deaths occurred from diseases that were entirely preventable. If a single person met his death from a railway accident, Inspectors were sent down to inquire into the circumstances, and would they be less careful where the lives of thousands were concerned? While they were so jealous where mechanical agencies were concerned that they thought no trouble or expense too great, were they doing their duty to God or man if they did not take as much care to mitigate those subtle agencies that slew their thousands where mere mechanical agencies slew their units? He should not be doing his duty if he did not earnestly entreat them not to continue this year-by-year legislation, but to adopt a permanent measure, which by evincing the confidence of the House would obtain the confidence of the country.

said the exceedingly temperate manner in which the right hon. Gentleman had moved the third reading had almost disarmed opposition; but he (Mr. Ayrton) was of opinion that any such measure as the present was quite unnecessary. He regretted, moreover, that the discussion on so important a measure was postponed to the third reading. His hon. Friend the Member for Finsbury, who had paid great attention to this subject, had assured him the perpetuation of the powers given by this Bill were unnecessary. The right hon. Gentleman had correctly stated the provisions of the Diseases Prevention Act; but that Act had, last year, been allowed to pass without deliberation, simply because it was a mere temporary measure which was to be seriously considered in the present Session. The powers given to the Privy Council with regard to epidemics, endemics, and contagious diseases, were of so large and extraordinary a character, that he could not conceive that Parliament would confer them permanently upon any body whatever. The Act provided that in the event of any "formidable" epidemic breaking out—that was a loose phrase— the Privy Council should have power to order, in the first place, the more speedy burial of the dead. That was inconvenient enough. In the next place, it might order house-to-house visitations. That was a very large power, and ought not to be exercised except under the direction of some body which had to pay for it. Again, it gave power to dispense medicines; but that was an object already sufficiently provided for by the Poor Law. Next came powers for guarding persons from contagion; a phrase under which anything in the world might be done. All these provisions, he it remembered, did not apply to epidemics only, but to endemics, which was a very different matter. Consumption was an endemic; for it was of the nature of an endemic that it should be a disease to which people were ordinarily liable. But the question arose who was to pay for all this? The Bill imposed the burden upon the local authorities, so that while it gave the Government power to interfere with all the regulations of life, it gave power likewise to throw the whole cost upon the local authorities. Would the House make such a state of things the ordinary rule? It was one thing to say that such powers should be given from year to year, and another thing to say that an Act giving such powers should be permanent. If the country were unfortunately threatened with another visitation of cholera, it would be quite enough if the Government and the House of Commons should deal with it when it came. With regard to vaccination, there were already very ample powers given to the Poor Law Board; and he did not see why, having already one expensive Board, they should give new powers to a department of the Privy Council to deal with the same subject. The Poor Law Board cost this country £200,000 a year, and he thought it would be much better to leave this subject entirely in the hands of that body. That part of the Act, therefore, appeared to him to be entirely unnecessary. With regard to the clause relating to investigations, he should not object to the Privy Council being invested with that power; but he should strongly object to having a new Department set up for that purpose. He should certainly have thought, after the precedent set in the Local Management Act, that it would have been better to confer the power in question upon the Secretary of State for the Home Department. He doubted very much whether there would really be work enough in making the proposed investigations to occupy one person's time; and it seemed to him, therefore, that this branch of the Act vanished with the two former, and that its existence was wholly unnecessary. Under these circumstances it would be better to let the existing Act expire by the efflux of time. As for the objection suggested by the right hon. Gentleman about the Privy Council exercising its sanitary powers, sub terrorem, he had only to say that he might just as well attempt to make the Mutiny Act permanent, and give up the system of maintaining the army from year to year. In truth, it was because the measure had hitherto been a temporary one that it had proved so innocuous. He therefore would beg leave to move that the vote for the third reading be discharged, in order that the Bill might be recommitted.

said, that whatever might have been the justification for passing the Act in 1855, there was none for its renewal, as since the passing of the Metropolis Local Management Act, the most eminent members of the medical profession had been appointed to watch over the public health. Amongst them he might particularly instance Dr. Letheby, of the City of London. These gentlemen, he had been informed, had made arrangements for meeting in the event of an epidemic breaking out and suggesting precautionary measures, which would of course govern the whole country. The Bill, if passed, would involve an unnecessary expenditure of public money, and, instead of recommitting it, he thought it ought to be rejected at once. In Lambeth he was aware of one most eminent medical gentleman connected with the local Board who had only £400 a year, whereas this Bill proposed a permanent salary of £1,500 a year.

said, that for ten years hon. Members had been brought down to the House in the hottest part of the Session to discuss a Public Health Bill. He objected to this Bill, as he had done to previous Bills, as one which was satisfactory to no one. To perpetuate the existing Act without amending it would be absolute nonsense, because it depended entirely upon the working of the Local Management Act. It recited that Act in almost every page, and the whole question of penalties depended entirely upon the construction of the Local Management Act. In Worcester so strong was the objection to the introduction of the Act, that it was only after scouring the whole city and getting up all the old people, between 90 and 100 years of age, to vote for it, that at length they succeeded in introducing it. In other towns its provisions were considered so objectionable that it had not been introduced at all, and considering the monstrous power it placed in the hands of certain parties, he was decidedly of opinion that if it were necessary to enact it at all, they ought only to do so from year to year.

said, he thought the Bill involved larger principles than the right hon. Gentleman who introduced it appeared to suppose. No one could demur to the objects of the Bill; namely, that in a time of epidemic, power should be conferred upon the Government to take all the means which science pointed out to mitigate the evil; but it was another matter when the House was asked to make perpetual an arrangement with new machinery and less safeguards than existed before. The system of house-to-house visitation was an invasion of the domestic privacy, but it could only be done heretofore under an order of the Privy Council, to which the Lord President or one of the Secretaries of State was a necessary party. That requirement gave the public confidence that the matter had been brought to the cognizance of the Cabinet, and that the vast machinery of the Act had not been improperly put in motion. But the fiat of the Vice President, which it was now proposed should be sufficient, would not give the same confidence, notwithstanding the great abilities of the right hon. Gentleman who now filled that office. Then, again, the House had not any experience of the working of the new system. The right hon. Gentleman had told them that the Privy Council had no special knowledge upon this subject, and could only be guided by the reports of their Medical Officer. That officer was undoubtedly a very competent gentleman, but he did not think it was satisfactory that the whole matter should rest with that gentleman. He would not have objected to the Act being continued for two or three years, in order that some idea of its working could be formed from actual experience; and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would consent to limit the operation of this Bill to a certain time instead of making it perpetual.

observed, that if the right hon. Gentleman would consent to limit the Bill to one year, it would be unnecessary to continue the discussion. [Mr. LOWE made a gesture of refusal.] In that case he hoped the House would agree with the right hon. Gentleman who last spoke, and would support a limitation of time in respect to the Bill. As the matter stood now, it appeared to him that a grosser attempt at jobbery, or a grosser violation of good faith towards that House had never been attempted by any public department. It must not be thought, that because two or three metropolitan members had spoken, that the metropolis had any special interest in the matter. In 1848 a Public Health Act was passed for five years, which Mr. E. Chadwick administered at a salary of £1,000 a year. That Bill did a great deal of good, but after a time Lord Llanover thought fit to commence an attack upon it; and of course the Government was a good deal puzzled. They asked the noble Lord if he would undertake the thing himself, and he consented. Accordingly he was appointed to the head of a new department, with a salary of £2,000 per annum, and the Act was continued from year to year, until 1855. The President of the Board of Health appointed Mr. Simon Medical Officer, at a salary of £1,500 per annum. In 1858 the late Government brought in a Bill which was passed, and had acted well, permitting of local control in those matters; but now it was proposed to hand over the whole matter to the Privy Council. But then came the question, what was to be done with the Board of Health, Mr. Simon and the secretaries of the Board. Well, the Vice President of the Committee of Education had but little to do. His office was almost a sinecure, and so it was proposed to assist him by another sinecurist, a Medical Officer, and the whole thing would be comfortable. Such an arrangement would not be tolerated for a moment by the Members of any popular constituency; but the Member for Calne—a rotten nomination borough—saw no objection to it; and so he had undertaken to look after Mr. Simon, and to establish a nuisance all over the country. But the country had something to say upon the point. It was not only a question of expense but of constitutional principle. New powers were given, the Privy Council was to be transformed into an executive department. If these powers were to be given to the Privy Council, why should not others be transferred also? All the acts of that body were done in secret without any responsibility to that House. Then it was to cost £6,000 a year, and all that was to be got for it was the blue-book, containing Mr. Simon's reports, showing his visit to Windsor and two other places. The truth was, no permanent medical officer was necessary. When an epidemic came, there would be plenty of qualified gentlemen who would give their services, and at a much cheaper rate. When objections were urged against the Bill last year, the then Home Secretary (Mr. Walpole) admitted it was an experiment, and therefore consented to limit its operation to the 1st of August, 1859, in order that the matter might be fully discussed during the present Session. Circumstances, however, had prevented any discussion during the Session, and therefore he (Mr. Duncombe) thought he was only making a reasonable request when he asked that the Bill be simply a renewal for one year, in order that in the ensuing Session the attention of Parliament might be given to the matter. To make the thing permanent was such a proposal as a Whig Government alone dare to make. There were compulsory clauses in the Bill which the right hon. Gentleman had promised to strike out, but which still remained. He should certainly support the Amendment of the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets.

said, he thought the hon. Member for Finsbury, from his monomania against public health legislation, could hardly have given his mind fairly to the consideration of this subject. Misled by the name, both the hon. Gentleman and the hon. and gallant Member for Brighton (Sir G. Pechell) appeared to think this was the renewall of the Bill that had been the subject of contest in Mr. Chadwick's time, In the old Bill there were two portions— one which was unobjectionable, and another to which much objection was made. The objectionable portion—the interference with local government—had been made permanent in the Local Government Act, while the unobjectionable part only was dealt with in the present Bill. The hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) had asked why meddle with the matter till the cholera came? But you might just as well make no military preparations until the enemy was thundering at your gates. Everybody would remember that at the last visitation of cholera everybody was asking, and asking with justice, why the Government had not taken precautions, at a time when the public health was good? The same hon. Member had also spoken of the acts of the Privy Council as done in secret; but surely a proclamation by the Council, as provided for in the Bill, would give publicity to all their acts. The Diseases Prevention Act was a permanent Act, although its provisions were at first administered by a temporary body—the Board of Health. If this Bill were not passed, the result would be that there would be upon the Statute book an Act with no one to administer it. The real question was whether medical science was to have a voice in a department of the Executive. For to be of use the sanitary branch of the Council Office must be permanent. Take the case of public vaccination. That operation being left to the public practitioners uncontrolled, vaccination was often performed inefficiently by persons ignorant of the right way of doing it. As the Legislature had enacted that vaccination should be compulsory, they ought to take care, by responsible authority, that it should be properly performed. The hon. Member for Finsbury had accused the department of the Privy Council of being a sinecure; it was certainly not so at present, but he was trying to make it so by depriving it of its present functions and requiring new ones. Mr. Simon had rendered his office a laborious one, and the last report of that gentleman of visits to Windsor, Conway, and another town, where epidemics had broken out, showed the utility of such investigations in discovering the sources of disease. Those who complained of the salary earned by Mr. Simon should recollect that he had given up the emoluments of a lucrative profession in which he held a good position. He was selected as the great authority on sanitary subjects. He took the appointment as a public duty. Had he considered only his private advantage and ease he might have done better by refusing it. There were 100,000 lives annually lost from preventible causes. No measure had been proposed so useful as this, for preserving the life and health of the working classes. It would be the saving of many lives from fever, cholera, diphtheria, and other diseases that ravaged families and made widows and orphans, and yet this was a Bill which Gentlemen who professed to advocate the popular cause opposed. It was thought very reasonable when the newspapers sent their own correspondents to inquire into the diseases and mortality of the Crimea. Well, this Bill enabled the Privy Council to send their "own correspondent," a scientific medical officer, to report upon the causes of death and offer recommendations for the prevention of disease. For these reasons he should cordially support the third reading.

said, that he was sorry his right hon. Friend the Member for Stamford, Sir Stafford North-cote, was not present to take part in this debate, but he believed if he had been in the House, he would have supported the Bill; nay, further, that had he remained in office he would no doubt have endeavoured to persuade the late Government to introduce it. For his own part he thought it would be better if the Bill were re-enacted from year to year. No one in that House proposed to repeal it; and all they asked was, that sufficient time should be given to enable the House to judge of its general effect. On the other hand to reject the Bill altogether would interfere with a great sanitary movement. But the House were asked to put upon the Statute-book, as a permanent Act, the measure of last year, and he doubted whether the time had come for such a proceeding. By that Act the power of the Privy Council to make the order depended upon the concurrence of the President of the Council or the Secretaries of State, whereas by the present Act any three members of the Council might put the powers of the Act into operation. As soon as the country understood that their legislation was for the public good opposition would cease, for it had never shown any reluctance to raise the money necessary to carry out sanitary enactments. At the same time he thought the whole law relating to the public health ought to undergo a thorough revision, with a view to prevent all clashing of authorities. If they made this Act permanent they ought to take out of it all the powers relating to vaccination, which ought not to be exercised by a central Board, but by local Boards of Guardians. All that the Privy Council should concern themselves with should be to take care that the lymph was sound and good. It was desirable that the country should know a little more of the working of the Act of last year, and if the right hon. Gentleman had proposed to continue that Act for two or three years no one would have objected. Mr. Simon the medical officer, under the present Act, had done his duty very well, and his reports were very interesting; but he did not see how the Privy Council or their medical officer would be in the slightest degree impeded in the exercise of their functions by continuing the Bill as a temporary measure. If at the end of a year or two the results that were anticipated should be shown, then, instead of carrying a permanent Bill by a narrow majority, the right hon. Gentleman might come before the House and pass a permanent statute amid the general concurrence of the House.

said, he objected to the perpetration of the present Act from a fear that if Parliament permitted the Privy Council to supersede the local authorities the latter would become lethargic. He should be glad to know whether the failures as well as the successes of the Boards of Health were recorded in blue-books, because, in that case, the House might hear something of Croydon, Hitchin, Folkestone, and Chelmsford—in two or three of which towns indictments had been brought against the local Boards for fouling the streams, by emptying their drainage into them. He should not object to passing a Bill for two or three years, but he did most emphatically protest against the attempt to make this a permanent measure.

observed, that though he did not wish to reject the measure, he thought it unadvisable to make the Bill perpetual. Time had not yet been given to see how it worked.

said, he saw no harm in making it a permanent measure.

said, he saw no harm in passing a permanent Bill, as it would not prevent any future legislation that might seem desirable. The hon. and learned Member (Mr. Edwin James) had complained of the injury done by local Boards, but this only proved the necessity of some central body to supervise the proceedings of the local Boards.

said, he must deny that there had been any sanitary failure at Croydon, though he could not but admit that there had been some mismanagement in carrying out the drainage. The pipes at first employed were too small. They had thus got clogged up, and that circumstance, joined to an unusually wet season, had led to an outbreak of fever. But subsequently the health of the town was im- proved, and the death-rate diminished, as had been the case in every instance where improved drainage had been carried out. A more efficient public officer than Mr. Simon could not be found. His earlier reports when Medical Officer of Health to the City of London were a text-book on sanitary legislation. He should also be sorry to see vaccination performed by improper persons.

replied, observing that when the Central Board of Health was destroyed with it fell the compulsory powers. There were some powers which could not be vested in the local Boards of Health, and, consequently, the Government of the Earl of Derby sought to vest them permanently in the Privy Council. The hon. Member for Finsbury used against that Bill the same arguments which he had used that day, and the Government made terms with him, and took the Act for one year rather than run the risk of losing the Bill altogether. Yet hon. Gentlemen opposite now joined in the opposition to the act of their own Government, and he was rather disappointed that he could not count upon their support. He must, however, take his stand upon right, justice, and the public interests. By them he must stand or fall, and not by the permutations or combinations of parties in that House. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Oxford-shire (Mr. Henley), was wrong in supposing that the powers given by the former Act were by this Act given to an inferior authority. The powers transferred to the Privy Council by this Act were not the powers vested in the Privy Council of declaring that a formidable epidemic, endemic, or contagious disease had visited the kingdom. Those powers were possessed by the members of the Privy Council, of whom the Lord President of the Council or a Secretary of State must be one. It was only the subordinate power of the present Act that was given to the Privy Council, and which might be put in motion by the Vice-President of the Committee of Privy Council. With regard to vaccination, it might not be generally known that it was no part of the examination for a surgeon that he should be a vaccinator at all, and it was therefore necessary for the public to have some protection. He had been told the Privy Council might hire a medical adviser when they wanted one for any special duty. But what was wanted was a medical man who should devote his whole time to the consideration of disease in masses, and who was possessed of all the facts and deductions that the new science of health might supply, and which the most experienced physician and surgeon who was confined to private patients could not he expected to possess. The hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. Duncombe) had talked of an outlay of £6,000 on this new Board. Mr. Simon's salary had not been raised beyond the sum proposed by the Government of the Earl of Derby and that which he received from the Board of Health. It stood at £1,500, and last year a sum of £1,500 had been taken to meet contingencies, of which £300 had been spent. So that the outlay for the past year had been not £6,000, but £1,800. [Mr. T. DUNCOMBE: Take the previous year.] If he were asked why the Bill should be perpetual, he replied because the local Boards, upon whose proceedings the medical officer might have to report, were permanent bodies. If this Bill were continued from year to year the proceedings of the Privy Council would be stamped with a mark of want of confidence. If the medical officer gave offence to any one in his reports he would be told he should hear of it when the Bill was renewed next Session. If the powers now asked for were improper, let them be withdrawn altogether. Let the House visit with its displeasure any excess or abuse. But let not the House paralyze the arm extended over the local bodies. The Privy Council would have to contend with many local elements of prejudice, ignorance, and self-interest, and unless they could bring evidence before the people that would rouse them, the question of sanitary science would not advance, but would retrograde. The victims of a want of good sanitary arrangements were to be counted, not by thousands, or even by tens of thousands, but by hundreds of thousands, and there was no parsimony more miserable, and no jealousy of power more misplaced, than to put an officer like Mr. Simon in a position which showed that the department he administered did not enjoy the confidence of Parliament. It was his duty to state that the powers proposed to be granted under the Bill might not long remain unused. The cholera had broken out at Hamburg, several fatal cases had occurred, and who knew how soon it might reach this country? They knew the temperature, the state of the river, and the predisposing causes that were now in existence. He hoped it would not be said that they were unwilling to hear this fearful visitation named, or that they refused to consider this important question.

said, he rose to disclaim any such motives as those which the right hon. Gentleman opposite had chosen to impute to the Conservative party. They had not supported the Bill last year merely because it was introduced by the Earl of Derby's Government, nor did they now oppose it because it was brought in by the present Government. The only reason that he and other Conservative Members opposed the present Motion was because they considered that further trial was necessary, and if it had been a question of renewing the Act for one year, or rejecting it altogether, he should vote for its renewal.

said, the object of the measure was to remove from the Statute-book certain declarations now required to be made by Nonconformists, Jews, and Quakers, and which were said to prevent them from accepting certain municipal offices. Some of the statutes it proposed to repeal were of very ancient date, and he could not consent to that course except after mature consideration. He thought that, as the question was one of religious disabilities, it would be better that the second reading of the Bill should be postponed, and that the subject should be referred to a Select Committee. If that course should not be adopted he should feel himself compelled to oppose the Bill from want of sufficient information in the House to consider the subject. He would therefore move that the whole subject of declarations required as qualifications for the exercise of municipal offices he referred to a Select Committee.

said, that it would be a disgrace for the House to pass a Bill which had only been printed seven days, for the repeal of numerous Acts of Parliament, and with respect to the introduction of which the promoters dare not state their reasons. The real effect of the Bill would be to lower the honour and dignity of the Church, and he was surprised that it was proposed to pass it in such a summary manner.

said, that the disqualifications in question were only galling restraints and not useful tests, and ought therefore to be removed. If he thought it was an attack upon the Church of England he should not vote for it, but he believed it would in no way injure the Established Church.

said, it appeared to him that the present short Session was to be chiefly used for a general attack upon the Church of England. Surely no Dissenter would wish to relieve himself of an obligation by which he was bound not to take advantage of the influence his office gave him to injure the Church of England. Power was granted to them on certain conditions, and what was now asked was that the power of the State should be used by those who held such office to attack the Church of England. If a man were chosen as a municipal officer by his fellow-countrymen he ought not to be permitted to use the powers which the State conferred upon him for the purpose of destroying the Church which the State maintained. The introduction of this Bill was, in effect, the laying the foundation of an internecine war, for he could not understand its object if it was not to attack the Church. The declarations having been accepted they were the conditions of the relation between the Church and the State, and the House was now asked to alter the law in that respect. For what purpose were they asked to do so, if it was not to enable those who had become vested with that power to attack the Church? They had already conflict enough upon these subjects, and he should, therefore, only say that he should vote against the second reading of the Bill, and should take every opportunity, at all events, of deferring these painful subjects until Her Majesty's Government had had an opportunity of considering them in conjunction with the questions that had arisen under the Roman Catholic Relief Act.

remarked, that the declarations were useless; and that in Scotland they did not exist, although the Scotch corporations had what the English had not —namely, ecclesiastical buildings.

said, that no more righteous measure could be proposed. It was a general measure to do away with a declaration, which was generally distasteful to Nonconformists of all kinds, and he cordially supported the second reading.

said, he had heard no reason assigned for the Bill. No grievance had been pointed out, no injury had been shown to be inflicted upon any one. Some persons desired to destroy the Church of England and to reduce it to the level of a mere sect in the country, and if it was desired to pass this Bill to enable persons in corporate offices to carry out that wish, the existence of the restraints complained of was undoubtedly an inconvenience, but whether it should be abolished was another matter. He thought some Members of the Government ought to state their opinions upon the subject.

said, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the Judges have reported on the West Riding Assize question; and, if so, whether it is his intention to lay the Report on the Table of the House?

said, he was not aware that the Judges had made any formal Report on the subject; but from a document he had found in the Home Office it appeared that the Judges had given to his Predecessor in office their opinion that with respect to the expediency of holding the Assizes for the West Riding at Leeds they agreed in the unanimous judgment of the Commissioners appointed by Her Majesty to consider the question that it would not be expedient with a view to the administration of justice.

said, he rose to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether any appointment has been made under the Act of Parliament passed in the last Session, enabling the Judges of the Superior Courts of Common Law to appoint Commissioners for taking Affidavits in those Courts in the City of London; and, if not, what is the cause of the delay?

said, he was not aware that any such appointment had been made, but he would make inquiries on the subject.

said, he wished to ask the Secretary of State for War, whether it be true that the Worcestershire Militia have been called out four times, have been embodied twice, and stationed at the two principal training camps, Alder-shot and the Curragh; that during the whole of that time the men have never had a ball cartridge served out to them, and have the old musket to carry about; and whether this is equally true as regards the North Glocester and other militia regiments?

said, it was true that the Worcestershire Militia had been twice out in training, in 1853 and in 1859; and they had also been twice embodied— from November, 1854, to Juno, 1856, and from November, 1857, to May, 1858. They had been at Aldershot, and also at the Curragh. He found that 6,000 rounds of ball cartridge had been served out for practice. He, as Secretary for War, gave no orders as to the practice of any particular regiment. All he had to do was to honour the orders that were sent for material. It was quite true that at the time referred to the Militia had not got the Enfield Rifles; but now they had them, and he hoped that all the embodied Militia would have them soon. The military authorities, the Colonels commanding the regiments, and the Generals inspecting where the militia regiments were quartered, were the persons to decide on the nature of the drill to which they should be subjected, and how far it should be carried.

said, he would beg to ask the Secretary for war whether the Enfield Rifle alluded to in the War Office Circular of the 13th instant was the short Rifle furnished to the Rifle Brigade, or the long Rifle used in the Line?

was under-stood to say that the long Rifles were those of which the Government had the largest store, and which would consequently be issued at present; but he hoped that no long time would elapse before there would be a sufficient supply of short Rifles to enable the Government to issue them to volunteers.

said, he would beg to ask the noble Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether the document which has appeared in the public journals, purporting to be a copy of a despatch addressed by the noble Lord to the Court of Berlin, is authentic? A similar question had been put in another place when it was stated that some errors had been committed in the translation and retranslation of the despatch, and he wished to know whether the noble Lord will lay an authentic copy of the document upon the table?

replied, that with the exception of some errors made in the translation, the document as it had appeared in the public prints was correct, but if the hon. Gentleman would move an Address to the Crown he would have no objection to produce the despatch in an authentic form.

had understood the noble Lord to say on a former occasion, that he had received a reply to the despatch from the Government of Prussia, and he wished to know whether he would object to lay a copy of that document upon the table along with his own Despatch?

said, if the hon. Gentleman would allow him to take a day or two for consideration, he would state whether the Government were prepared to lay upon the table the further correspondence on the subject.

said, he rose to call the attention of the House to that portion of the Report of the Commissioners upon the Indian Army which referred to the amount of force to be maintained in future. He should hardly have had the courage to detain the House, even for a very short time, in such weather, had he not found that in the opinion of many of those most versed in Indian affairs this really was a matter of vital consequence. The proposal of the Commission was that an army of no less than 190,000 sepoys should henceforth be maintained, with 80,000 European troops, making a total force of 270,000 soldiers; and it was highly important to observe that this force was quite independent of the military police corps, of which the Commissioners said that "They have been formed, or are in course of formation, throughout India; and, neither in numerical strength, nor yet in military organization, does this force differ in any essential respect from the regular Sepoy army." Now this military police force, scarcely differing, as the Commissioners said, from a regular army, amounts already to 97,000 men, and was rapidly increasing, so that before long we should have a force of something like 400,000 men in arms, of whom more than 300,000 would be natives. Now, it might seem very presumptuous for a civilian like himself to throw any doubt upon a proposal emanating from a Commission composed of ten distinguished generals. Nor could he venture to do so. All he wished was to draw attention to the subject, so that at any rate it might be thoroughly sifted; for, whatever the counterbalancing arguments might be, no one, he supposed, would deny that the evils and risks attendant upon the maintenance of so vast a force would be most serious. At the outset the financial aspect of the matter was, he might fairly say, alarming. Every thoughtful statesman, he believed, felt the greatest anxiety as to the financial prospects of India. In spite of all the expedients that could be devised it seemed impossible to make both ends meet, except by means of loans, and he need not say how shortsighted—in the long run how ruinous—it would be to depend on that delusive aid. So far from their being in a position to aggravate Indian taxation, all those most intimate with that country urged emphatically the importance of lowering the taxation from its present height. There was no doubt that in Southern India, at any rate, the cultivators of the soil were oppressed almost beyond bearing by the assessment on land. Mr. Kaye, the celebrated advocate of the East India Company, said, "It would be well that it should be clearly understood how, at the bottom of all our misdoings and all our shortcomings, is this miserable want of money." He would dwell no further on this point, because he was well aware that no man who knew anything of Indian affairs would dispute the vital importance of bringing her finances into a better state. But if they were to keep up a force of 270,000 soldiers besides military police corps throughout India it would be impossible to avoid financial embarrassment. The people would be still more crushed. Those public works from which so much was hoped for the happiness of India would be brought to a standstill. In short, a heavy blow would be dealt to the best interests of the empire. Now, of course these evils would have to be cheerfully encountered if they were necessary to the security of our dominions. But, he put it to the common sense of every gentleman here whether, in organizing and arming a body of about 300,000 Natives, they were not running headlong into a fearful risk. That, at any rate, was the view of many men of high authority. But the Commission seemed to think that it had fully guarded against that risk, by proposing a force of 80,000 Europeans to keep the Native troops in check. The experience of the mutiny, however, showed but too clearly that the presence of even an overwhelming British force, that even the impossibilty of success, that even the certainty of destruction, would not keep a Native regiment from mutiny if it once had caught the infection. Of course he allowed that, if they were to put arms into the hands of 300,000 Natives, they must have 80,000, or perhaps 150,000 Europeans to suppress, even if they could not prevent mutiny. But it must not be supposed that by such a force of English they secured themselves from an explosion. And it was again matter for serious thought that the maintenance of so great an European army, which would be necessitated by the maintenance of so vast a Native army, would involve a really awful sacrifice of life and health to those English soldiers. No one who had not had occasion to look into that point could have an idea of the waste of life that would ensue. To use the words of one of the witnesses before the Commission, "The sacrifices in men and money caused by the climate are astounding,"—"the medical statements would almost stagger belief." In fact, Colonel Tulloch's statistics showed that out of a force of 80,000 English nearly 6,000 would perish every year. But the permanent loss of health to thousands upon thousands more was no less painful to reflect upon. It seemed inexpressively mournful that so many of our brave defenders should perish miserably on the plains of India. A grave responsibility therefore rested on those who made a proposal tending inevitably to that result, unless the necessity for it could be shown to be a real and dire one. But further, the replenishing of so large a force, and one dwindling away so quickly, must seriously interfere with the recruiting for the home army. Colonel Tulloch proved that if all the proposals of the Commissioners were carried out, there would be just 30,000 annual passages of soldiers between India and England; and as the voyage took four months, this gave a force of nearly 10,000 men always at sea, whose services therefore would be utterly lost both to England and India. He knew that very great doubt was felt by those competent to judge whether it was not literally impossible to keep up the force recommended by the Commission without dangerously skimping our home defences. He thought it would be allowed that these were serious considerations. But of course the question was, what there was to counterbalance them, and here the Commission left us altogether in the lurch. On one of their other proposals they launched out into very long arguments, but not a single word did they say in support of this proposal. In one of his letters to his brother Joseph, the great Napoleon said, "There never was a general who did not cry out for a large army." And as the Commission consisted of ten Generals and only one civilian it was perhaps but natural that they should recommend the employment of a large force. He doubted however whether that House would be disposed to receive their ipse dixit as conclusive. But perhaps it might be thought that, although the Commission did not reason the matter out itself, it gave the conclusion from the reasonings of the witnesses who were examined. But it was the fact, and a very remarkable fact, that in no one instance did the Commissioners inquire from any witness the grounds of his opinion as to the amount of force. Nor after long and patient search through the blue-book had he been able to discover one instance in which any witness volunteered such an explanation. Was it thought, on the other hand, that although neither the Commission nor the witnesses reasoned out the question, still the proposal of the Commission was founded, if not upon reasoning, yet upon the greater number or greater authority of the witnesses whom they called before them. Quite the reverse. For instance, the Commissioners recommended 50,000 Europeans for Bengal; yet out of the twenty-seven witnesses examined on that point, eighteen recommended a force varying from 20,000 to 45,000, but largely below 50,000, while only one third recommended 50,000 or upwards. But, what was most remarkable, they proposed 15,000 Europeans for Bombay, although not one witness recommended so large an amount, and General Griffith, who seemed to have gone fully into the question, only demanded a force of 7,000. And again, as to Madras, they recommended a force of 15,000 Europeans, though Earl Canning placed the amount at 11,000, and no single witness went beyond, except a civilian named Thomas. Thus it would be seen that the proposal of the Commissioners was not borne out by the bulk of the evidence which had been given before them. Amongst those who recommended a smaller force than that which the Commissioners named were General Pollock, General Low, General Ashburnham, General Sir Arch-dale Wilson, General Jacob, General Cotton, and others. Now, it would be absurd to doubt that arguments of some kind or other must exist in favour of the proposal of the Commission; and as it was a matter on which no human being could have any personal or party feeling, he had sincerely endeavoured to make out what those arguments were. Though foiled in his study of the blue-book, he had made inquiries among gentlemen of large Indian experience, but wholly without success, and he had in vain exerted his humble ingenuity to the same end. Would they be told that the object of this force was to escort treasure? He found the Commander-in-Chief speaking with some indignation of what he called "the most unnecessary guards and escorts required to be given by the army," and one officer of great experience declared that the whole system of escorts could be put an end to by giving orders on the Native bankers, instead of sending backwards and forwards vast amounts of treasure. Would they be told that the army had great police duties to perform? That was true formerly; it was true no longer. Those duties were to be devolved on the police corps that were being formed throughout India. The only object, then, of this army was to defend the country from some enemy. Where was that enemy to be found? No one dreamt of an invasion from Thibet. The wild tribes on our northwest border could be repelled by a small force supplied with Enfield rifles and Armstrong guns. There was literally no risk lest India should be invaded. The only motive that remained for keeping up this vast force was to secure our dominion from a domestic foe. But he again put it to the common sense of every hon. Gentleman who heard him, whether, instead of making ourselves more secure, we did not run a fearful risk by arming and organizing a body of nearly 300,000 Natives? What was the lesson taught us by the mutiny? Was it not this, that while we had nothing to fear from the unarmed population, the troops whom we had trained and armed might at any moment fly at our throats? We knew now for certain that this danger was a real one, that it was a portentous danger—a danger against which no precautions could insure us; and yet, with all the horrors of the mutiny still fresh in our recollection, we were actually going not merely to restore our Native army to its former strength, but to render it a great deal more powerful. Who could wonder that Indian statesmen should stand aghast at what he had heard one of them characterize as "so monstrous a proposal?" Presumptuous as it might have seemed to him to call attention thereto, he thought that he, or any man, however obscure, had the right to ask what the grounds were for a proposal which bore on its very front the strongly marked likelihood that it might lead to a renewal of the unspeakable horrors of two years ago. He now challenged the noble Lord the late Secretary for India, and the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the late Secretary for War, as the two Commissioners who sat in that House to furnish that explanation. He was very glad to have the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Stanley) to appeal to, because, if he in his heart disapproved the proposal made by his brother Commissioners, he was the last man to shrink from saying so. On the other hand, if there were some occult arguments which had satisfied him, they would be likely to set the minds of others at rest as well. But, as left by the blue-book, the case stood thus:—This proposal was not supported by one word of argument. It was condemned by the greater number and by the greater weight of the witnesses. It must lead to financial embarrassment; it might lead to financial ruin. It would again defer the long-hoped relief to the starving cultivators of the soil. It would stay the progress of education and of public works. It would involve a fearful sacrifice of life and health to the English troops. It would interfere with our home defences. Above all, it would prepare the materials for an explosion that might again fill India with carnage and ruin. In conclusion, he would beg the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn, to inform the House what were the reasons on which the proposal of the Commission was founded.

rose to reply.

intimated that there was no Motion before the House.

said, he would move that the Report of the Commission be laid on the table.

There is no Motion before the House.

I move that the House do adjourn.

Sir, I will avail myself of the opportunity now afforded me to answer as briefly as I can the question put to me by the hon. Member opposite. The hon. Gentleman has challenged me to state whether my opinion agrees with or differs from that of the Commissioners generally on the subject of the amount of military force which ought to be maintained in India. Upon that point I will merely say that I do not believe it is possible for any set of men in this country, whether they be civilians or military men—I doubt whether it is possible for any set of men even in India—to lay down positively and precisely what is the amount of force, not at the present moment required to maintain tranquillity in India, but which will be wanted when the disturbances have entirely ceased, and when peace is completely restored. That is a question which does not admit of a precise reply, and when the hon. Member says that the Commissioners have adduced no arguments to show that 80,000 Europeans are required to preserve peace in India, I do not know in what manner you are to argue the question, or to prove that the exact number required is 60,000, 70,000, or 80,000, otherwise than by taking the opinion of the most experienced and competent witnesses whom you can find, and ascertaining what is their view as to the amount of force which is sufficient to maintain tranquillity in the various districts in India. But when the hon. Member says that, in the recommendation the Commissioners have offered, they have gone against the evidence which was laid before them, I should like to state in half a dozen words what the substance of that evidence is. I have looked through it to-day, so far as the number of European troops is concerned, and I find that of the witnesses, General Low gives a force of 45,000 for Bengal; Colonel Wylie, a force of 40,000; Captain Browne, 40,000; Sir G. Clerk, 50,000; Colonel Master, 40,000 to 50,000; Sir S. Steel, 40,000; Sir C. Trevelyan, 40,000; and Colonel Durand, who was sent over from India by Earl Canning, expressly to represent the views of the Indian Government, forty-five battalions, which, I presume, means 45,000 men. The recommendation of the Commissioners, expressed in very general terms, was that something like 50,000 Europeans would be required for Bengal. With respect to the whole of India, Major Baird told us that in his opinion 80,000 Europeans would be required; Colonel Felix gave the number at 60,000; Sir R. Vivian at 60,000 to 70,000; Colonel Holland at 60,000; while the Earl of Ellenborough thought we ought to have 60,000 local European troops, I have also had an opportunity of ascertaining what the opinion of Sir John Lawrence was upon the subject, and no man either in India or England appeared to me to be more strongly impressed with the necessity of maintaining a large and even a preponderating force of European troops. As for the number which may be required at a subsequent period, I do not think it can be denied—no one who sat upon the Commission desires to deny—that a considerable reduction may and ought her after to take place when certain results have been attained which are at present only in course of attainment. No doubt, when you have connected all the principal military stations in India by railroads, when those comparatively new acquisitions, which form so large a portion of your Indian Empire, have been consolidated and become accustomed to your rule, and when that disarmament, which is now in progress in several provinces in India, has been more effectually and extensively carried out, such a military force will no longer be required as at the present moment, and for some time to come, will be wanted to maintain the tranquillity of the country. But I do not think it can be said with truth that a powerful military force is not now required in India. If you take the actual population of India, including those Native States over which England exercises a military supremacy, and compare it even with that large force of 300,000 men which has been referred to by the hon. Member, you will find that the proportion borne by the army to the population is considerably less than in the majority of European States. But I repeat now what I stated on a former occasion, that the recommendations of the Commissioners were directed to the military question—that they were offered subject to many qualifications—and that it was never intended to act upon them irrespective of financial considerations. A force so large as that mentioned in the Report of the Commissioners, may, in the present state of Indian finance, be greater than the revenues of the country could bear; and if so, you may be justified in incurring one risk to avoid a greater, and in maintaining an amount of force, lower than that which you would think expedient with a view to the preservation of tranquillity. With respect to what has been actually done, I am able to say that very urgent instructions were sent out from this country, and have been repeated on more than one occasion, to the effect that a considerable reduction should be made in the number of Native troops. The Native force, when I last received any official account of it, was larger than at the outbreak of the mutiny. But this has not been the result of any pre-conceived plan, nor has it arisen from any intention to replace the old Native army by a new one of equal extent; it has taken place simply because in the actual circumstances of India, the Government were obliged to take soldiers wherever they could find them, and could not disband them until the danger had gone by. However, there is a considerable reduction now taking place in the number of Native troops, and that diminution will be carried much further. But with respect to the question of expense, I should say that a Native force is by far the least costly, the calculation being that one European soldier costs as much as eight Natives. I do not think the House would desire to go into details on the present occasion, and therefore I will merely repeat, in conclusion, that while the Commissioners have stated what amount of European troops is required in a military point of view, they at the same time, I conceive, would readily admit that their views ought to be largely modified by those financial exigencies which at the present moment press so heavily upon the Government of India.

said, it was clear that the course adopted by the late Government had altogether failed in settling the great question of the reorganization of the Indian army. The Military Commission they had appointed had produced a most unsatisfactory report, or rather two reports, for there were two, one of which was opposed to the other; and it was for the House to consider which of the two should be adopted. Although the question to be determined was far more a civil than a military one, inasmuch as it embraced considerations not only of finance but of the principles of Government to be adopted in India, the Commission consisted of a number of generals and only one civilian, and of its military members the majority were not at all acquainted with India. The consequence was, as one might see from every line of their Report, that the main subject present to their minds was not the Indian army, or the interests of India, but the British army, and the interests of their profession, He complained, also, that the Commissioners kept out of sight the views of Indian officers. From having brought forward some years since a Motion for the amalgamation of the two armies, he knew the opinions of Indian officers upon the subject, and that what those officers dreaded above all things was, the influence and favouritism of the Horse Guards; and yet it was a fact that, although the late Secretary for War, who, as Chairman of the Commission, acted impartially, ruled that inquiries respecting the Horse Guards and the sort of appointments they made in India might be addressed to the witnesses, the Indian general (General Hancock) who had expressed a wish to ask such questions was not allowed to put them, and accordingly he made a separate report. In that report he has had the courage to put on record his opinion as to the jobbing displayed in placing in the chief commands in India men incapacitated from age, infirmity, and inexperience. Whether the military force in India should be a force of the line, or a local force combined with a detachment of the line, was a question which had been left by the Committee altogether in doubt. He was very glad to hear the noble Lord opposite (Lord Stanley) give in his adhesion to what was the almost universal opinion of those who were acquainted with India, that for the good of India, and for carrying on the administration of government without collision between different departments, it was desirable to have a local European force. Her Majesty's Government had not yet expressed any opinion on the subject, but proceeding upon his recollection of what fell from the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston) when his measure for India was before the House, he (Sir Erskine Perry) had little doubt what the opinion of the Government would be when it came to be expressed. The question of the army of India was one that went so deeply into questions of finance and questions of government that he hoped to be forgiven if he should dwell somewhat more at length upon it. There were two theories prevalent in Indian circles as to the mode of carrying on the Indian Government. The one was that Natives were so thoroughly untrustworthy, so false to their European masters, and so unreliable, that in order to prevent a sudden outbreak of rebellion, it would be indispensable that we should keep up an overwhelming European force. During the last two years, accordingly, that force had been raised to three times what it was. There were now 111,000 European and 270,000 Native troops in India, altogether, as his hon. Friend said, nearly 400,000 men under arms. These views, even if they were sound in policy, would yet be altogether incompatible with the present condition of India. The revenues of India were not sufficient to meet the expense, and England, as the Crimean war had proved, could not furnish the men. As regarded the question of finance, they knew that even before the outbreak of the rebellion the expenditure was greater than the revenue. The rebellion itself had cost the country no less than £40,000,000, and before all was paid for the permanent charge upon the revenues would be upwards of £3,000,000 per annum. It was clear, therefore, that instead of an increase of the permanent military forces, the better opinion was that which recommended a reduction of the number of our gigantic army to limits which the country could bear. That object could only be attained by carrying out the second theory to which he had referred—namely, by governing with the co-operation of the Natives, by engaging their sympathies. That was the opinion which his twelve years residence in India had implanted in his bosom. He felt it was impossible that our system could endure if the Native was to be religiously excluded from every place of profit and honour in his own country; and he had accordingly, on every occasion that offered, advocated the introduction of a more liberal policy towards the Natives by employing them in places suited to their abilities. He hoped that the late rebellion had taught us many valuable lessons. And he appealed particularly to the Conservative side of the House in behalf of the Native landholder and gentry. What was the system which we pursued with the Native army? Our system was to give high pay to the rank and file, more than double the amount which could be gained by a day labourer; and to provide excellent pensions for those obliged to retire from the ranks, making it thereby the best conditioned army in the world, as far as regarded the common soldier. But it also excluded the Native gentleman from every field for the exercise of his ambition and the employment of his abilities. Now the system had completely and confessedly broken down. He was satisfied that the employment and encouragement of the landed gentry of India was the best security which we could find for the future. The corps to which they were admitted formed not only a better but a cheaper force than could be obtained from Native troops drilled and equipped on the European model. The Native cavalry, for instance, equipped and drilled in the European manner, cost us £102 per man, whereas the Native irregular regiments commanded by Native Gentlemen, cost but £35 per man; and he (Sir Erskine Perry) did not hesitate to say before the present and the late Secretaries for India that the irregular forces were by far more efficient and serviceable than those tightly dressed dragoons, drilled and equipped after the model of the Prussian cavalry. Lieutenant Merewether's evidence before the Army Commission will be found most interesting. He had commanded a corps of Jacob's horse, and he spoke of the efficiency and trustworthiness of these irregular forces in the highest terms, and testified to his readiness to face any foe with them in any quarter of the world. They had achieved deeds of renown on every field where they had been employed in India and in Persia. Sir John Lawrence, in the Punjab, acting on a similar opinion, raised ten battalions of irregulars, in which only five Europeans were employed, the corps otherwise being officered by Sikh and Mahomedan gentlemen. That corps had done signal service to the Queen of England. It was on these grounds, and with that experience before him, that he (Sir E. Perry) contended that we ought to give encouragement to the Native gentlemen, and engage their sympathies by the same liberal policy as we should wish others to pursue to ourselves if we were overrun by a triumphant enemy. Let the House look to the French in Algeria, where we heard of their employing Arab generals in command of native troops. That course also had been recommended by the ablest men that had appeared in India. Sir Charles Napier was in favour of it, and set them the example by the employment of two Native gentlemen as aids de camp in places of equality with Europeans. General Hancock strongly recommended the formation of corps of cavalry, which would cost them £35 a man instead of £102, and of infantry, at an expense of £15 a man instead of £25. And when it was said that that system would endanger our supremacy in India, his answer was that our supremacy depends upon our own just government, and on non-interference with the religious views of the Natives. Let the House attend to the solemn opinion of Sir John Lawrence, who is often cited by those anxious to introduce the Bible into all Hindoo and Mahomedan schools. In a paper lately laid before the House, he states that he did not trace the slightest sign of conspiracy in the late rebellion, but that it was all founded on the fears of the Native soldier that it was the intention of Government to interfere with their religion. He (Sir E. Parry) would give as another reason for the outbreak the exclusion from offices of profit and command that was so rigidly enforced against native Indians. In future the government of India must be made more congenial to the feelings and wishes of the people. In this country we acted on the principle of justice to all classes, whether Churchmen, Dissenters, or Roman Catholics, and non-intervention with the religious opinions of any class. If this principle were acted on in India that empire would become a great blessing to this country, and civilization would at the same time be widely diffused. He was not sanguine as to our being able to establish very good government in India, because we were so different from them in race, colour, habits, and religion that real amalgamation was well-nigh impossible. Nor is the fault entirely on our side as a race of haughty conquerors, much is owing to the unsocial character of the Hindoo. They would not eat with us, or drink with us, or intermarry with us. Their amusements are [not our amusements, their social life is wholly different from that which we lead. But with all these drawbacks, he believed that England by the observance of just principles, and by the same strict neutrality in matters of religion, which is adopted towards Dissenters, Catholics, and Jews in this country, would introduce a better system of government than India had ever known. He trusted that the right hon. Baronet, who bad got the power into his hands, would carry out the same liberal views with regard to the army that he had formerly shown in the case of the civil service, and that by attending to those principles of justice that were as strong in the Hindoo mind as in our own, by opening the way for them to offices of trust and profit, and presenting to them a fair field for legitimate ambition, he would promote the true interests and happiness of India.

said, he thought the country was indebted to the hon. Member who had raised this question, for it was a question on the proper consideration of which depended the future conditions of the finances of India, and by association the finances of this country. He would confine his observations, however, to the one subject before the House—namely, the number of European troops necessary to be maintained in India for the future government of that country. The noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Stanley) had expressed himself as being at a loss for any basis on which to come to any definite conclusion as to the number required for that purpose. But if the noble Lord wanted such a basis, he needed not to go further than the traditional policy of the East India Company. Now, what was the traditional policy of the East India Company? In the year preceding the outbreak of the Affghan war, the number of Royal troops in India was 16,040 infantry, and 3,711 cavalry; being a total of less than 20,000. Two years later, in consequence of the number of troops sent out from this country, the number of the infantry was raised to 25,000, and the cavalry to 4,000, still making a total of less than 30,000 of the Royal Army. The Company's European troops had risen from 15,000 to 20,000 men, so that from the period of the Affghan war down to the outbreak of the late mutiny, the number of European troops was always under 50,000. In the year 1857, when that outbreak occurred, the number of infantry of the Royal Army was 25,095 men, and the cavalry 2,955, a total of less than 30,000, while the Company's Europeans amounted to 20,000, and yet this force had proved itself amply sufficient to break the neck of the rebellion, and to crush it at Delhi, at Lucknow, and Cawnpore, before a single company of reinforcements arrived from Europe. If at such a time 50,000 Europeans were sufficient to crush the rebellion, surely in the future, when not a fortress existed throughout India which would require to be reduced, nor a Native power with a force capable of resisting half-a-dozen battalions, surely they would not be seriously asked to maintain 110,000 European troops in India in addition to the 21,000 in the depots in this country out of the revenues of India. Was such a demand reasonable, was it just to India, was it just to this country; which after all, whatever might be said to the contrary, must be ultimately responsible for the engagements of India? He did not hesitate to say that a body of 50,000 Europeans would be amply sufficient, and was the utmost number that the country would require. It was impossible for India to pay for more; and if the authorities persisted in maintaining a larger number, there would be a constantly recurring defalcation in her revenue. If they wished to govern India, it must be through the good-will and confidence of the people, and not by the sword.

said, he rose to express his concurrence in an observation that fell the other night from the hon. Member for Invernessshire—namely, that the actual amount of force that must be maintained in India would depend on the measures taken by the Indian Government. If the authorities in India were permitted to set aside the Royal Proclamation, then no amount of force England could send to India would maintain tranquillity in the country. It was high time, he thought, that the pledges given in Her Majesty's gracious Proclamation should be authoritatively carried out. The people of India were promised that they would be protected in their land possessions. In order to their being so, the resumption commissions ought to be utterly extinguished. The scheme of proselytizing the people by giving large grants to missionary establishments from the revenues of India should also be put an end to. We should also restore some of those chiefs and dynasties that had been deposed from positions of rank and influence. In his opinion, unless the Government was prepared to adopt measures for ameliorating the condition of the Natives of India, and securing their affections; unless they strove to rule the two hundred millions of India by love rather than the sword, they would signally fail to advance the prosperity or improve the financial position of India.

remarked, that the noble Lord (Lord Stanley), when he quoted the opinion of Sir John Lawrence as to the large force which should be kept up in India, omitted to mention another opinion of his, in favour of having a large irregular force. Allusion had been made to an opinion to which expression had been given by Sir John Lawrence, with reference to the origin of the mutiny in India, to which he wished to direct the attention of the House. The opinion to which he referred was contained in a letter addressed by Mr. Temple, Secretary to the Chief Commissioner of the Punjab, to Mr. Edmonstone, and was to the following effect:—

"Indeed, it is Sir John Lawrence's very decided impression that this mutiny had its origin in the army itself; that it is not attributable to any external or any antecedent conspiracy whatever, although it was afterwards taken advantage of by disaffected persons to compass their own ends; and that its proximate cause was the cartridge affair, and nothing else. Sir John Lawrence has examined many hundreds of letters on this subject from Natives, both soldiers and civilians. He has, moreover, conversed constantly on the matter with Natives of all classes, and he is satisfied that the general, and indeed almost the universal, opinion in this part of India is to the above effect. It may be true that discontented Sepoys worked upon the minds of their less guiltless comrades, and persuaded them that a sinister but systematic attempt was about to be made on their ceremonial religion; and that in many regiments the majority were misled by designing individuals. But, as a body, the Native army did really believe that the universal introduction of cartridges destructive of their caste, was a matter only of time."

Now, his hon. Friend near him (Sir E. Perry) had represented Sir John Lawrence as saying that the mutiny was produced by an interference with the religion of the Natives. That was not exactly Sir John Lawrence's expression; he said that it was produced by an interference with their caste; that it arose in the army itself, and was not the result of any external conspiracy; the proximate cause of it being the cartridge affair, and nothing else: that it arose from the dread of an interference with their ceremonial religion, and the belief that the entire destruction of their caste by the cartridges was only an affair of time. The House ought also to know that it was Sir John Lawrence's opinion that were it not for the pains that had been taken to keep the army from any knowledge of Christianity, the Natives could never have entertained such an erroneous idea.

said, his own opinion of the way in which the mutiny had been brought about was, the manner in which the Sepoys had been pampered, until they had turned upon their masters. If the Government had raised the degraded classes of India into the condition of men, and placed them upon a proper foundation as subjects of Her Majesty, his belief was that the troops would hare remained loyal to the Crown. He denied that the missionaries received any subsidies from the Indian Government. They repudiated altogether the idea of engaging in the work as mere mercenaries, and he was quite sure that the society to which he belonged, and which had been very zealous in the cause of the missionary, would quickly cease to exist if it adopted any principles of a mercenary nature. So far from supporting the missionary efforts, the Government opposition to them was discreditable and disgraceful. Reason, justice, and truth, were the only influences brought to bear in support of the missions, and there was no greater enemy to Christianity than the Government of India.

said, that the opinion which he had formerly expressed with respect to the amount of European troops which ought to be kept up in India, remained unchanged by anything he had heard in the course of the debate. Hon. Members might say that we could dispense with our large European force if we instituted a better system of government, but he deprecated the use of such observations, for he thought that they were likely to mislead the public, and to have an injurious effect in reference to the Government of India. Our position as regards that country was somewhat peculiar, distant as she was some 15,000 miles from our shores. But, in addition to that circumstance, there was the fact that the character of the Natives of India was extremely impulsive, and that the greatest necessity existed for affording sufficient protection to those English capitalists who went out to settle in the country, by whose means civilization was extended, and who would be prevented from making it their home if the European force maintained there were to any great extent done away with. The subject was one of considerable importance, and he would recommend to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for India to deal first only with the Presidency of Bengal, and then if the plan succeeded there it might be extended to the other Presidencies. There was the more ground for such a course, as the mutiny had been confined to the former province. With regard to the Bengal army, however, he had seen some months ago a plan propounded by Earl Canning, which was so ably conceived that he would venture to submit it to the House. It was to the effect that forty regiments of European infantry should be raised for Bengal, and that to each of those forty regiments a regiment of Native auxiliaries should be attached, which should be commanded by a commandant, a second in command, an adjutant, an assistant-surgeon, and six non-commissioned officers from the European regiment with which it happened to be connected. It was also suggested that the Native force so constructed should have no separate parade, no separate colours, and no separate order or word of command, and it was expected that the result of the adoption of such a proposal would be that a sufficient precaution against treachery on the part of the Native troops would be taken, inasmuch as there would always be on the spot an European regiment to crush any attempt at revolt. By the adoption of that scheme we should also secure the advantage of having a hot. weather force, and if, out of an army of 113,000 men which might be thus raised, 40,000 were made available for the Punjab; 60,000 for the Northwestern Provinces, and 13,000 for Bengal Proper and Behar, we should have made an admirable provision for the defence of that portion of India, at an additional expense of about half a million a year above that which the Bengal army had cost before the mutiny had broken out. If the right hon. Baronet opposite, however, should object to this scheme he should recommend him to take into his consideration the evidence which had been given before the Commissioners by Sir Charles Trevelyan.

I shall not attempt in the course of this somewhat irregular debate to enter into the details of this ques- tion. The subject is one of the utmost importance, and the House is, I think, much indebted to the hon. Member who introduced it to our notice, as well as to the hon. Member for Devonport (Sir E. Perry) who, in his speech, adverted to many topics which are worthy of our most serious consideration. I rise mainly for the purpose of asking the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for India a question which I hope he will not deem me pertinacious in pressing upon his attention. The subject is one with respect to which, after what has taken place, he can scarcely fail to perceive an uneasy feeling prevails on both sides of the House. The question of Parliamentary Reform is as important; that of our financial position demands our most serious consideration, but I doubt if either of those important matters are of such immediate consequence as that which has been introduced to our notice to-night. It is because I am of this opinion, and because I never turn my attention to India without something of alarm, that I am anxious to ascertain from the right hon. Baronet when he proposes to bring the question of Indian finance before the House? It is certainly an unpleasant subject for a Minister, but the right hon. Baronet will best consult his future credit as well as the interests of England and India by inviting the attention of the House of Com-with the fullest confidence to the difficult —I had almost said—the insolvable problem of Indian finance. The noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn, who has filled the office of Secretary for India for more than twelve months, knows that no other department of the Government can compare with that for difficulty; and, notwithstanding the intelligence, the industry, and the absence from prejudice by which he is distinguished, his best friends feel that while he held that office he encountered difficulties which he was not able fairly to overcome. Those difficulties now stand in the way of the right hon. Gentleman who has succeeded him; and I speak not as a political opponent, but as a political friend, when I recommend him to ask the judgment and opinion of the House upon them in the frankest possible mauner. If there is any statesmanship among us there is here ample opportunity for its exercise and display. If this matter of India were settled so that we could feel satisfied about it, it would afford me greater pleasure than any change connected with the institutions or the Government of England which could take place. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see that I have pressed this question upon him repeatedly, not because I wish to worry him in his office, but because I am anxious that while Members remain in town, and while there is still the disposition and the power to consider the question, we should have brought before us this solemn and important matter, upon which every man should be asked to give his judgment to the best of the faculties and abilities which he possesses.

said, he gladly rose to inform his hon. Friend (Mr. Bright) that he should be the last person to complain of his pressing this matter on his attention. Knowing the great interest which his hon. Friend had taken in Indian matters for many years, he would say that no person was so well entitled to bring forward a question of this kind as his hon. Friend. He could assure him that he should be perfectly ready to take his advice and act upon the principle which he had urged by dealing frankly with the House—taking them into counsel, if he might so speak— when considering the difficulties which beset the subject of India. It was because he was anxious to deal frankly with them that he had delayed the financial statement until he could lay the matter fully before them. It would be easy for him to make a concise statement on Indian finance, while from not having precise information, the House would be obliged to take the matter upon his ipse dixit, and he really thought that he was acting more in the spirit of the advice tendered by the hon. Member by postponing his statement until hon. Members were in possession of all the information which he himself had upon the subject. He wished to keep nothing back from them. He had already laid upon the table all the financial despatches, and the only document he was now waiting for was the ordinary annual accounts. These would be on the table on the next Thursday, and when they were printed, and in the possession of hon. Members, he purposed, not only for his own sake, but for the sake of public business, to bring the financial state of India before the House at the earliest possible period. He could assure them that he would not lose a single day after those accounts were before the House. With regard to the question before the House, the number of our troops to be maintained in India, it was not advisable for him to go into the matter at any great length. He should on a future occasion have to bring before the House the great subject of the Indian army, and his statement would be more effective if it had not been anticipated by any partial statement. The question of the army was intimately connected with that of finance; and he could assure the House that during the short time which he had held office he had bestowed anxious and daily attention upon the subject of the Indian army, though he had not been able to see his way yet to a satisfactory result. He quite concurred with the noble Lord (Lord Stanley) that it was perfectly impossible at the present moment to fix the amount of the permanent European force in India, and indeed it was not a question which pressed for an early decision. We had now an enormous force which might be reduced, but yet we could not break faith with the men who had fought our battles, and turn them off at the moment we did not require their services. He did not expect that they could arrive at a normal state of things in India for a year or perhaps more. There was a great difference of opinion upon what the force in India should be; but he did not think, after the experience of the last two years, it would be wise to reduce the European force to the low point at which it stood before the rebellion. He quite concurred that the present European force in India might be considerably reduced; and he had a strong opinion in favour of the irregular cavalry force, which possessed advantages in point of expense, and in this, that it afforded employment to the Native gentry. Before he left the Board of Control he had entered into a correspondence with the Marquess of Dalhousie upon the subject of dispensing with the services of the regular Native cavalry. He did not think that it would be wise on that occasion to state more than he had already said.

said, he rose to move—

"That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty representing the inconvenience of protracting the Session of Parliament during the summer months, and praying that Her Majesty would be graciously pleased to provide a remedy for such inconvenience by assembling Parliament for the despatch of business before Christmas."

When he brought forward his Motion on a former occasion both the noble Lord (Lord John Russell) and the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Disraeli) had fully conceded all his arguments in favour of the proposed change, and stated that they would be prepared to give it further consideration on a future occasion. With such great authorities in favour of the early assembling of Parliament, he was at a loss to know by what perverse arrangement it was that they inverted the order of the seasons, and protracted their sittings during the summer months. This system took its date from comparatively modern times, for in former times the Session commenced in autumn and terminated on the Royal birthday. He should prefer to discuss this question rather on grounds of public utility than on those of private convenience; but the House could not fail to see how the efficiency of their proceedings was interwoven with this subject. Calm debate and attention were scarcely to be expected at midnight at this time of year. He would frankly admit that hon. Members ought not to allow any consideration of personal ease or comfort to interfere with the discharge of duties which they had voluntarily undertaken, but yet they had a right to expect that those duties should not be rendered unnecessarily severe by their being exposed to the pestilential atmosphere of the overgrown sewer, in the midst of which they had built their House precisely at that period of the year when its foul abominations had the greatest power. The first sanitary officer of the City, writing on the 11th of June, gave it as his opinion that the state of the river was considerably worse than it had been some weeks previously, and that organic impurity was abounding in it. And it must be expected that each succeeding year, for some time to come, this state of things would grow worse, notwithstanding all the efforts which might be made to the contrary. While it was evident, therefore, that the present system must be most injurious to the health of Members, let them also see how prejudicially the public interests were affected by it. Under ordinary circumstances, at this time of the year, the noble Viscount at the head of the Government, and those who shared his kind and generous feeling, would be engaged in the doleful task known as the massacre of the innocents. Their hearts naturally beat with sympathy for the fate of those measures which had been ushered into existence with every appearance of prosperity, but which were thus cut short never to bloom again—it was natural that compassionate parents should mourn for their measures, and refuse to be comforted because their favourite Bills were not; but they were not the only sufferers. The House could not fail to perceive how much public time was lost, how many valuable interests were retarded, and how much public business was interfered with, through the necessity of getting rid of Bills by this summary process. But even in Bills which escaped the slaughter and arrived at full maturity, they might see the impress of this fatal season in the imperfect and unfinished state in which they left the House, it being perfectly impossible that they could receive that consideration which, under more favourable circumstances, would be their due. The House would remember the protracted debate on the Divorce Bill, when his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the learned Attorney General, who now fought tinder a common banner, had wielded and directed against each other those weapons of debate of which they were such perfect masters. That was a Bill of which, as affecting one of the most sacred functions of life, it was impossible to exaggerate the importance, or the beneficial effects which it was calculated to confer; but the House would remember that the most important provisions of that Bill were hurried over at morning and evening sittings with a feeble amount of energy and power. It could therefore be no wonder that it had failed to a great extent in the purpose for which it was designed, that of relieving Parliament from the number of private divorce Acts of Parliament which were continually introduced, and that, in order to carry out the objects of its promoters, they would be obliged to pass another Act for its amendment. His remarks with regard to that Bill applied to many others. So much of crudeness had the character of their general legislation acquired that it had become a standing reproach that three Acts of amendment were required to bring the original Act into working order, and this was to be attributed to the fact that the House would insist on passing them at a time when careful examination was almost out of the question. But it was objected to his proposal that, practically, it would not tend to shorten the duration of the sittings of Parliament. ["Hear, hear !"] He was prepared for that cheer, and he hoped he should be able to answer it. Reference was also made to the fact, that Sessions which had sometimes commenced in November had yet not terminated before the usual time. But he maintained that the experiment of an autumn Session had never yet been fairly carried out, for whenever such a Session had been held it was always with some special object, such as the passing of a Bill of indemnity, or to decide the fate of a Ministry, and not to enter on the general business of legislation. He submitted that in order to ensure a fair trial to an autumnal Session, to make their financial year commence, as it had formerly done, in January instead of April, and to alter the time for giving notice of private Bills, thus enabling themselves to dispose of the private Bills, and to Vote the Supplies before Christmas, so that the Chancellor of the Exchequer might be enabled, immediately after the reassembling, to make his financial statement, instead of being obliged, as at present, to wait till after Easter. If this arrangement were carried out, they might be able to lay it down as an inflexible rule, that the House would not sit for the despatch of business after the 1st of June. He was prepared for the opposition of Gentlemen constituting what might be called the sporting interest, but while he regretted that he should be doing anything that would interfere with their pursuits, he must say that he thought the first thing that ought to be considered was the engagements and business of the House. But he maintained that he was, in fact, giving more than he asked; all he proposed was, to take six weeks from those hon. Members before Christmas, and in return he proposed to give them the entire of the month of June to spend with their friends before the glorious 12th of August. If he encroached on pheasant shooting in November, he made up for it by allowing them to devote additional time to yachting, a pursuit which was daily growing into greater consequence. The argument, that the present system had been adopted at the time of the Union, for the convenience of the Irish Members could no longer hold good, by reason of the greatly improved postal and passenger communication, which rendered Dublin, for Parliamentary purposes, almost as near as Devonport or Portsmouth. The question which next arose was, as to the time this alteration, assuming it to be desirable, could be most conveniently carried into effect; and he submitted that, whether with regard to the general interests, or to those of the House, the present was the period at which it could most advantageously be adopted. There were just now some forty election petitions awaiting adjudication, and some of these, it was said, would give rise to a very protracted inquiry. Now, while on the one hand, a constitutional objection existed to the postponement of this inquiry to any very lengthened period, he could not help thinking that with the thermometer ranging between 80° and 90°, with the windows of the Committee rooms exposed to the fearful effluvia of the river, so as to exclude the only opening by which fresh air could be admitted, it would be most inconvenient to enter on such an inquiry, and that it would require all the dread power residing in Mr. Speaker and his officials to keep the election panel together. Lastly, he might remind the House that the great question of Reform had been bequeathed as a legacy to them by the late Parliament, the Sovereign had been committed to the subject in three or four successive speeches from the Throne, and no Ministry, least of all a Liberal Ministry, could afford to trifle with the question. He agreed entirely with the noble Viscount (Viscount Palmerston) in the reasons which had induced him to refrain from taking up that question during the present Session; but it would be accepted by the country as a gratifying proof of earnestness, if, instead of throwing it over to another year, when fresh complications might arise to prevent the fulfilment of that promise, he were to call the House together in November to consider that question, the immediate settlement of which was in every point of view so desirable. The noble Lord would, he thought, be rendering the country as well as individual men great service, if he were now to bring the Session to a close, with a view of assembling again immediately before Christmas, when both the Reform Bill and the election petitions could be carefully and properly considered.

said, that he wished every success to the Motion of his hon. Friend, though he was afraid its chances of success were much diminished from the strong opposition it would have to encounter from the legal as well as the sporting interest. Especially would this he the case from the Court of Chancery, which was often found to be as powerful in Parliament as it more legitimately was in another sphere. His principal reason for supporting the Motion was that it would bring the debates to a close in the month of June and he thought the hon. Member was en-titled to gratitude for making such a pro-position. The alteration in the time of their sittings would also be attended with another benefit, that of being able to devote a considerable portion of the day to the business of legislation. He considered that it would be much better for hon. Members to get up early—at six o'clock in the morning if necessary—than to be adjourning their debates very often at a time bordering on that hour. The British Parliament was to blame, he thought, for having allowed the evil habits of the days of Pitt and Fox to continue to the present time, and there was no reason why, when such changes had taken place in every other phase of society, Parliament should be the only body that refused to conform to the more enlightened spirit of the age. He did not know whether the noble Lord at the head of the Government would be the person who would have the merit of inaugurating the new and better order of things, but he felt convinced that a change more in accordance with the feelings and habits of the British people would some day be carried out, and that, whether the present Motion were successful or not, the more thinking portion both of the people and of the Parliament were favourable to its objects.

said, he did not think this was a Motion on which the House ought to divide without some consideration. Making every allowance for the eloquent speeches to which they had just listened, he must say that he thought the two hon. Gentlemen had mistaken the nature of the question with which they proposed to deal, fie did not think they quite understood the evils which they wished to cure. One of the principal evils was those interminable speeches in which the hon. Members indulged. Why did not the hon. Mover and Seconder propose to limit the duration of speeches, more especially of the speeches of the Treasury and Opposition benches? Did they suppose that they could alter the nature of the House of Commons by an Address to the Throne? What occurred every week in the Session? Most important questions, upon which the very existence of the country depended, were discussed in the presence of only thirty or forty Members; but let there be some question which involved no principle and was nothing but a fight for place, and 630 Members would run down to the House and attend debates for nine hours' duration for a month together. Could you, then, by a mere process of this kind change them all at once from politicians into men of business? The whole system of the House was one of procrastination and pottering with every question. Fifty questions were put down in the paper, two were disposed of and the rest were postponed. As long as that system continued no great reduction could be made in the time occupied by the Session. One great evil was the morning sittings on Wednesday, at which a rule prevailed not only repugnant to sound sense, but apparently calculated for the very purpose of shelving unpleasant questions. On that clay hon. Members who wished to obstruct any measure talked "by the clock," as it was called—that was to say, they talked until a quarter to six, when the Speaker was obliged by rule to put a stop to the debate, and the measure under discussion was therefore postponed to some other day. He believed that the House would gain 20 per cent in point of time if they had evening instead of morning sittings on Wednesday. The argument against the morning sittings on Wednesday was equally applicable to the proposition that the Session should terminate at a definite period. Nothing could be easier than to continally procrastinate with respect to any disagreeable question until at length the Session terminated. If the whole system of conducting their business were remodelled, they might get through their work perfectly well in four months.

said, that he was inclined to suggest that the House should meet within the first fortnight of January, so as to get really to work by the time they now usually assembled. There ought to be some rule as to the time within which measures should be introduced into Parliament, and the Estimates should be laid before the House soon after it met. He thought that no measure ought to be introduced after Easter, or, at all events, after Whitsuntide. The House of Lords had for some years made a rule to prevent the introduction of measures after a certain date. It was for the Government, and not for the House, to look to this matter.

said, the hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. Forster) proposed by this Motion to make a serious inroad upon English habits. A very large number of the Members of that House sacrificed their private convenience and comfort to an immense extent for public business. They lived in London during a great portion of the year, and during the rest of it they lived among their tenants in the country. If the Motion were acted upon, their present arrangements would be entirely broken up. He should, therefore, steadfastly oppose the Motion.

said, he would beg leave to remind the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken that the present system was itself an inroad upon English habits. The hon. Member for Walsall therefore simply proposed to revert to ancient English habits. Previously to the time of the Union the Members of that House used always to meet in the autumn, and the change was only then made out of consideration for Irish Members. The modern facilities for travelling rendered that consideration now no longer needful.

said, the hon. Mover and Seconder had entirely forgotten to submit any evidence that the adoption of this Motion would limit the action of Parliamentary eloquence, by which the duration of the Session was so much prolonged. Before the Reform Bill the number of hon. Gentlemen who thought it their duty to make speeches to satisfy their constituents was very much smaller than at present. Owing to the greater publicity now given to the discussions in that House, and the increased interest which constituents took in the speeches made by their representatives, a great number of Members who would otherwise wish to be silent were compelled to make speeches. It was perfectly obvious that if the Session should terminate of necessity on the 1st of June, a power would be given to a minority, unless the arrangements of the House were entirely changed, to stop the business of the country, in the same way as on Wednesdays business could be put an end to by debating until six o'clock. Again, if the House sat in November, not the smallest progress would be made before Christmas. He trusted that some Member of the Government would state the views of the Cabinet on the subject, but unless he heard something more practical than he had yet done he should oppose the Motion.

said, he thought the apprehension that, if a certain period were fixed for the termination of the Session, power would be given to any factious minority to stop the business of the country, was unfounded, because at present it was well known that there was a certain termination to the labours of the Session, and that was when grouse-shooting commenced. For his own part, he was obliged to the hon. Member for bringing forward the Motion, because the sacrifice he grudged most for the service of the country was the sacrifice of the warm and pleasant months. He did not suppose that the Motion would be successful on the present occasion, but he believed that the opinion in favour of it would become stronger.

Sir, I doubt whether there is in the House at this moment, or that at the present time of the year there could be obtained, such a full attendance of hon. Members as would be desirable to decide a question, which so much affects the conduct of business in this assembly. I did not, however, understand my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall to make the proposition that a particular day should be fixed at which the business of the country was to be brought to an end. Of course if he had made such a proposition the answer to it would be obvious, namely, that as on Wednesdays, when hon. Members do not like what is going forward, they go on talking until six o'clock, so would they delay the proceedings of the House if they objected to them, until, say the 1st of June, if that particular day should be fixed for the termination of the business of Parliament. I understand my hon. Friend's proposition to be this, that by meeting in autumn we should be enabled to do so much business before Christmas that we need not sit so long in summer as we are accustomed to do. Now, I cannot think that it can be said that such an arrangement would not afford a reasonable time for disposing of the business of Parliament. Whether the six weeks of the commencement of the Session be counted from November to Christmas, or at a much later period, it seems to me that we could do quite as much business in autumn as at any other period of the year. There is this to be said, certainly, in favour of an autumn meeting, we should not see that great desire amongst hon. Members generally of getting to the country, which is manifested when the House is found sitting in the middle of summer. I rather think it is probable that you would have the business more quickly and better clone in the winter months than it is generally in the months of July or August. I do not understand that the arguments of my hon. Friend are in any degree affected by what has happened when Parliament met in recent years before Christmas; because, as he very truly observed, it so happened that on the occasions alluded to Parliament had assembled for particular and special business. When it had disposed of that particular business before Christmas the early meeting of the House did not, of course, diminish the quantity of business in February or the following months; therefore it is in my mind no argument at all to say that when they had met before-Christmas they were not able to end the Session sooner than usual. As the hon. Member for Norfolk (Mr. Bentinck) properly remarked, there are, however, several other things connected with the conduct of business, which deserve likewise to be seriously considered. I do not think it is sufficient to say that by meeting early in November instead of February we should get at once over the difficulty. In the first place there is a much greater amount of business now for Parliament than in former times. I think it is deserving of our consideration whether we might not be able to facilitate and accelerate the conduct of public business by, in the first instance, submitting certain questions to persons who are conversant with their details, and by getting rid of some forms which were necessary in the times of our ancestors, but which are now quite unnecessary. Some of those forms occasion at present considerable delays. They regard especially the Estimates and Votes in Supply. By the Standing Orders of the House the Crown is debarred from getting Votes of Supply by any sort of surprise, a certain number of days being required to elapse after the meeting of Parliament before the Estimates can be laid on the table, though the Government may be prepared with the Estimates on the first day of the meeting of Parliament. Those arrangements, however, are in consequence of the Orders of the House, and are not the fault of the Government. There are many other instances in which the forms of the House interfere with a great amount of business. That is the main consideration, after all, in determining this question. I believe that the House of Commons goes through four times more business than any other legislative assembly in the world, and it does that business on the whole very effectually. There is, however, very little doubt but that the business of the country might, under different arrangements, be done within a shorter period of time. I cannot vote for the Motion as it at present stands, and I hope my hon. Friend will not press it to a division. There is no doubt a great change in our habits from what they were in former times. For example, Hannah More, when writing at the period of the accession of George III., said, "I have but one fault to find in our excellent young King, his birthday is on the 4th of June;—the consequence is that the people will be kept in London on that day. There will be no going out of town, and Parliament will be protracted as long as the commencement of June." Now that shows what the habits of the people were in that day. I think it almost time to return hack to the habits of former days.

said, the hon. Gentleman who made the Motion made it with great confidence, not only in the reasonableness of his proposition, but also in the anticipation of its success. The hon. Member who seconded the Motion did not appear, however, to entertain equal confidence. There was one defect in the speech of his hon. Friend who made the Motion—namely, that he could not prove in argument—very ingenious and very amusing as it was—any public ground for the change which he proposed. It did not appear to him that his hon. Friend showed by any argument or any statement of facts that six weeks between November and Christmas was a better period for the transaction of business than any other six weeks in the year, or that the country would obtain any benefit from the change. His whole argument rested on personal considerations; that was to say, that his hon. Friend found it very hot in the month of July, that he knew other friends of his who were like sufferers, that the Thames was disagreeable, that the Session had been interrupted, and that there had been a great loss of time. Appealing to those who objected to the change, the whole force of the appeal appeared to him to rest upon the personal feeling and preferences of those who supported the Motion. He unfortunately differed with his hon. Friend in opinion. He had had the misfortune to be present at several autumn Sessions, and he remembered being made exceedingly ill by the state of the House. It was true that they were very hot in the summer, especially when the summer was as hot as it had been last year and this year. But what was the state of the House in November and December? Why, hardly a man could hear himself speaking for the coughing, not coughing maliciously to interrupt a Member, but a mere effort of nature in consequence of physical affections produced by the fog, cold, snow, and the inclemency of the weather. You asked a certain Member to support a Motion, and you were told that he was confined to his bed by a severe fit of bronchitis or influenza caught by walking home the night before and geting wet to the skin from the disagreeable-ness of the season. Members came down wet and were obliged to sit in wet clothes. There were draughts of cold air, and they looked to the windows and complained of improper ventilation, which gave them cold. Taking the question simply on the physical ground, at which period of the year were hon. Members least likely to be rendered incapable of performing their duties by the state of atmospheric influences? But independent of these objections his opinion was that the early period of winter was much more unfavourable than the ordinary fine weather they were apt to have in the summer; and really it was paying too high compliment to the climate of this country to assume that the heat of the weather would ever interfere with the senatorial duties of hon. Members. He did not see, therefore, that there was any argument showing that the public interests would be better consulted by Parliament meeting in the end of November, instead of the end of January or beginning of February. The hon. Member himself had stated that the change proposed would involve considerable changes in other matters. The regulations as to the time when notices must be given of private Bills would have to be altered. The period of commencing the financial year must be altered, and these changes would necessarily produce considerable derangement. Of course, when once those changes were made there would be an end of the inconvenience; but as far as he had heard the subject discussed he had not heard any sufficient reason assigned for those changes. There were other considerations of another sort. It was said that Members thought of nothing but pheasant-shooting, hunting, and that sort of thing? but the fact was that in that and in the other House of Parliament there were many noble and hon. Members who had important functions in the country to perform. The public ought not to run away with the notion that all the Members of the Legislature were nothing but selfish men, having no other object of pursuit than their own personal amuse- ment. There were many who had great duties to perform in the country—hospitalities to exhibit, charities to administer, and functies and obligations to discharge, bonds which united class with class, the landlord with his tenant and labourers, which were of great importance to the well-being of the community to which they all belonged. The period at which those functions were called into operation more than at any other was the winter. That was just the time when the more wealthy had the means of showing kindness to those below them, and he should be very sorry if any unnecesary arrangement by Parliament interfered between the landlords and those who were dependent on them to prevent their mixing together at a period of the year when it was the custom of the rich to diffuse around them the advantages which their wealth enabled them to impart. There was one particular in which the public interest would be injured by the arrangement of his hon. Friends Nothing, in his opinion, was less conducive to the satisfactory performance of any sort of business, whether by an aggregate assembly or by an individual, than interposing a great break in that business. When once a man began he should go on. When the human mind got into a particular course of action, as long as the energies were kept directed to the object in view there was every probability that it would accomplish it well; but if the mind were called off from its begun course, and a long interval allowed to elapse, other thoughts would interpose, and before the original train of thought could be resumed there would be inconvenience and loss of time. If Parliament met in November it must adjourn over Christmas. For how long? A month at least—probably six weeks. [An hon. MEMBER: A fortnight.] There were country occupations, Quarter Sessions, and so forth, which would make it extremely inconvenient to adjourn for less than a month. They would not come back to work in the train of mind in which they left, and there would be a loss of time. It was said there was no reason why Irish Members should object, because now communication was not as in the time of Dr. Dagenham, who took a week to ride his hack from Holyhead to London, and a person could sleep one night in Dublin and the next in London. But Irish Members would not like to come over for a month's Session before Christmas, leaving their families in Ireland, and they would not think it worth while to bring them over, and take them back again to bring them over again. The same consideration applied also to Scotch and English Members, because hon. Gentlemen coming up for a short time before Christmas, with the expectation of going back, would not bring their families with them, and those separations would in many cases be exceedingly inconvenient to the person concerned. It appeared to him that they would gain nothing in point of despatch of the public business. The examples of the past were not encouraging for the future, It was very true that on many occasions Parliament had met early in consequence of some specific business to be done; but there were a great number of cases since the Union where Parliament had met early and sat as late as it would if it had not met until January. Parliament met on the 29th of November, 1802, and it went on sitting until the 12th of August, 1803. It met on the 22nd of November, 1803, and sat until the 31st of July, 1804. It met on the 30th of November, 1812, and sat until the 22nd of July, 1813. It met on the 4th of November, 1813, and sat until the 30th of July, 1814. It met on the 8th of November, 1814, and sat until the 12th of July, 1815. It met on the 21st of November, 1826, and sat until the 2nd of July, 1827. It met on the 6th of December, 1831, and sat until the 16th of August, 1832. It met on the 20th of November, 1837, and sat until the 16th of August, 1838. It met on the 23rd of November, 1847, and sat until the 5th of September, 1848. It met on the 11th of November, 1852, and sat until the 20th of August, 1853. It met on the 12th of December, 1854, and sat until the 12th of August, 1855. It met on the 3rd of December, 1857, and sat until the 2nd of August, 1858. These numerous instances showed practically that when Parliament had met before Christmas it sat just as late in the summer as it possibly could have done if it had met after Christmas. But his hon. Friend had touched the real point on which the whole thing turned. They might say what they pleased as to Parliament giving the tone to the manners and habits of the country, but it was the manners and habits of the country which influenced Parliament. Whether right or wrong, the habits and manners of the country had changed since the last century, when Parliament met earlier. All things were later. The hours of dinner were later. Perhaps people did not get up as early. But Parliament could not force them to rise early. They could not make a law that people should get up at six o'clock in the morning, and should go to bed at ten at night. They must adapt the proceedings of the House to the habits of the time. Morning sittings might be for the convenience of hon. Members, but if the House met every day at twelve, and went on meeting at twelve through the whole Session, it would be impossible for the departmental work of the Government to be carried on. He could assure the House from a long experience that it would be very inconvenient if hon. Members of that House connected with the different departments were to be sitting there all the morning, instead of attending to their official duties and transacting the business for which they were responsible. Parliament must adapt their proceedings to the habits of the times, and although an attempt forcibly to change the habits of the nation, and to induce them to revert to those of their forefathers a century ago, might be made by a despotic Government, it must be unsuccessful in a country in which no one would submit to be controlled in the daily arrangements of his occupation, whether public or private. He believed that something might be done in the manner suggested by his noble Friend the Member for London. The chief grievance after all complained of by his hon. Friend (Mr. Forster) was the great amount of business to be disposed of, and the short time allowed for its transaction. Certainly Parliament was now required to do much more business than it had to deal with in the last century. A much larger amount of private business was now brought before Parliament; private Members introduced many more measures for discussion, and the Government proposed many more measures for legislation. Frequent and prolonged discussions took place in Parliament upon questions of public interest, and if there was a large amount of business, private or public, to be dealt with, time must be given for its transaction. He thought the suggestions of his noble Friend deserved the serious attention of the House, and he was sure they would receive the best assistance and counsel from the Speaker with the view to the adoption of such measures as, without detriment to the public interests, might accelerate their proceedings. He hoped, however, that the House would not hastily adopt proposals founded upon merely temporary circum- stances, "for every summer might not be so hot as the present, the Thames might not always stink as it did now, and future Sessions might not be interrupted by dissolutions which necessarily delayed the progress of Parliamentary business.

said, he wished to express his readiness to withdraw the Motion. [Cries of "No, no !" and "Divide!"

said, he rose to move for a Select Committee to inquire into the Queen's Printers' patent in respect to the printing of the Holy Scriptures. The matter to which he asked the attention of the House was one of urgency, inasmuch as the letters patent of the Queen's Printers would expire from the lapse of time on the 21st of January next. If, therefore, Parliament was to express any opinion at all on the subject, it must do so during the present Session. These letters patent related to the printing of the Holy Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, the Statutes enacted by the Legislature, and several other works; but on that occasion it was his intention to confine himself to the provisions they contained, restricting to the Queen's Printers the right of printing the Scriptures. Notwithstanding this restriction, however, the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge possessed by law a licence to print and publish the Bible. He need not say that the Book to which his Motion referred demanded their utmost reverence and regard; nor that the authorized version of it, which he did not seek to alter, was one of the noblest monuments of the Anglo-Saxon tongue. The printing of the Bible had been made the subject of patents in all the three great divisions of the United Kingdom. The Irish patent, however, was in 1794 declared to be invalid by a decision of Lord Clare, then Lord Chancellor, who in delivering judgment was reported to have said,

"I can conceive that the King, as the bead of the Church, may say there shall be but one man who shall print Bibles and Books of Common Prayer for the use of churches and other particular purposes, and that none other shall be deemed correct books for such purposes; but I cannot conceive the King has a prerogative to grant the monopoly of Bibles for the instruction of mankind in revealed religion: if he had, it would be in the power of the patentee to put what price he pleased on the book, and thus prevent the instruction of men in the Christian religion; the patent could not mean to give an exclusive right to the printing of Bibles."

The Scottish patent was also put an end to by the Crown, in compliance with the recommendations of a Select Committee of that House which sat in 1837 and 1838. That Committee was moved for by the then Lord Advocate Murray, and the Resolution to which he now asked the assent of the House was, mutatis mutandis, couched in the very terms of the Lord Advocate's Motion. The Committee in their report stated as follows:—

"That it appears by the evidence given before the Committee in 1837, and also from the Reports of previous Committees, that the prices of Bibles and Testaments, of which Her Majesty's Printers have thus had the sole monopoly in Scotland, have been increased by that monopoly to a considerable amount, so as to interfere with the free distribution of the Scriptures, and that obstacles have been thrown in the way of devout persons obtaining such copies of the Sacred Volume as they wished to possess.

"That in the opinion of this Committee the Queen's Printers' patent in Scotland should not be renewed, and that the people of Scotland should have the advantage of the competition which the free introduction of Bibles and Testaments from the press of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and from Her Majesty's printers in England and Ireland, will afford."

The Scottish patent was accordingly abolished; but at the same time a Bible Board, consisting of both lay and clerical members, was established there to superintend the printing of the Bible, and all printers were required to give a security of £500 for the accuracy of their editions of the sacred text. The only remaining patent of this kind extended to England and Wales, and it would soon expire. These patents had been repeatedly condemned by the highest authorities. Lord Coke said emphatically that they were opposed to the laws and liberty of England; and by an Act of James I. they were expressly condemned. The scope of the English patent was so large that the patentees had not ventured to put the whole of it in force. It gave them the monopoly of printing editions whether with or without note or comment, but they had abandoned that right, and confined themselves to the authorized version alone, without notes. The free dissemination of the Scriptures was one of the plainest and most precious elements of religious liberty; and it was unnecessary to prove that com-petition was one of the best guarantees for cheapness and excellence. The Bible, it was true, was at present printed cheaply and well; but this was the result not of monopoly, but of freedom; for the abolition of the Scottish patent had had the effect of bringing down the prices in England, and had led to a wider diffusion of the sacred volume. In consequence of the abolition of the patent the price of the Bible in Scotland had been reduced by more than a half, while the number printed had been increased threefold. The following was an extract from the Report of the Scotch Bible Board in 1840, the year after the abolition of the patent:—

"Among the advantages arising from the abolition of a monopoly in printing, a prominent place must be given to the reduction of price in the various works that were formerly to be procured only from one patentee. The sum already saved to the public in this manner is very considerable, and as this saving becomes available chiefly to the middle and lower classes of society, is a matter of infinite importance, and to Bible societies, by which they are enabled to circulate the Scriptures to a greater extent among those who, though most needing them, would otherwise have been altogether deprived of their instruction and consolations, the money that is saved must be considered as having a value far beyond its nominal amount."

In November, 1840, the old prices were still maintained in England, but in February, 1841, the Queen's Printers in England published a catalogue, in which they brought down their prices by more than a half. This example was followed by the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and from that time dated a great increase in the circulation of the Scriptures. There were several causes for the Bible being cheaper than any other book. The first was the drawback of the paper duty; the second, the vast demand for the Scriptures; the third consisted in the fact that all the editions were sold off without leaving a single copy behind; and the fourth, that the types were kept standing. In 1804 the British and Foreign Bible Society computed that there were at that time about 4,000,000 copies of the Bible in existence in all the countries of the world; but in the half century which had since elapsed the Bible Society alone had caused to be circulated in England and abroad no fewer than 40,000,000 copies, or ten times the whole number sup- posed to exist in the world prior to 1804. That could not have been done without the reduction of price effected by the abolition of the patent in Scotland; as might he inferred from the fact that the number of Bibles and Testaments issued by the Bible Society in England was only 369,764 in the year 1838, whilst it was 727,830 in 1843, and 1,104,787 in 1846. He was sure that the Home Secretary was too much of a logician and economist to adduce the fruits of freedom in defence of monopoly, or to state that the fact of the cheapness of the Bible was a reason against the abolition of the only remaining monopoly that existed in England. But the right hon. Gentleman might plead that accuracy was promoted by restricting the printing of the Bible to a few hands. Accuracy, however, was not attained by that means, but was the result of the public vigilance and other causes. Serious errors had crept into the Scriptures under the existing monopoly. Thus it was stated before Mr. Hume's Committee that a Gentleman took the trouble to go over an Oxford edition of the Bible, and he found 12,000 errors in it, and he sent a statement of the fact to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who sent him a £10 note in his letter in reply to his communication. A mistake made by a former Queen's printer was the omission of the word "not" in one of the Ten Commandments, entirely reversing its meaning; and another was the introduction of a "not" in one of the promises of the New Testament, by which it was said that the righteous should not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. There were several things upon which they might confidently rely for the accuracy of the Sacred Text under the most perfect freedom of printing. In the first place was the interest of the printers, who would lose the outlay on a whole edition if it was proved to be inaccurate: secondly they could rely on the knowledge of booksellers, who knew whether a particular edition was accurate or not; thirdly, on the advantages possessed by the present patentees, and the two Universities, whose continued circulation of vast numbers of the Scriptures would be a guarantee that no inferior production was palmed on the public; fourthly, a guarantee for accuracy would be found in the vigilance exercised over every version of the Scriptures by every section of the Christian Church. Then there was the operation of the great religious societies, like the Bible Society, and the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Then there was also the vast number of Sunday Schools, not less than 30,000, in which the authorized version was used and its accuracy guarded. And, lastly, there was the jealousy for truth which existed in every private Christian in the land. These were the natural and best guarantees for the accuracy with which the Sacred Text would be printed in future; and having confidence in them he did not believe it was in the slightest degree necessary to establish in England any such clumsy expedient as the Bible Board in Scotland. It would be difficult to constitute a Board with perfect impartiality, and it must be impartial if it was to command general confidence. There were unauthorized versions of the Scriptures already published, such as the translation from the Latin Vulgate of the Roman Catholics, and that which was called the "improved version" of the Unitarians; and there were some in verse. He asked the House, lastly, to consider whether it had itself any right or prerogative to restrict the printing of the Holy Scriptures? Let it produce its own patent for the exercise of such an authority. He knew no sign-manual of any earthly potentate which could give validity to such an instrument. The Holy Scriptures were given in charge to no particular section of the Church, to no priest, to no prince, to no sanhedrim or senate, neither to Jew nor to Gentile, but liberally and impartially as the rains and dews of Heaven. They were made the universal patrimony of mankind. He appealed to the House, as they had given freedom to trade and industry and to the negro slave, removed every restriction from conscience, and maintained the liberty of the press, to bestow upon England the crowning blessing of a free and unlicensed Bible. The hon. Member concluded by moving for a Select Committee to inquire into the nature and extent of the Queen's Printers' Patent for England and Wales so far as relates to the right of printing the Holy Scriptures, and to report their opinion as to the propriety of any future grant of that Patent.

seconded the Motion.

Sir, I came down to the House prepared to agree to the Motion of the hon. Gentleman for a Committee to inquire into the expediency of continuing the system under which the Bible is at present printed in England, and therefore I was not prepared either to dis- cuss the question at any length, or to express a confident opinion on the subject, inasmuch as I wish to keep my mind open for the consideration of any evidence which may he taken by this Committee, and of any arguments that may be adduced in their report. Having heard the address of the hon. Gentleman, however, I cannot refrain from making a few remarks upon some of the points to which he has referred. He concluded his speech by an impassioned appeal to the House to sanction the free and unlicensed printing of the Bible, and to establish a system of religious liberty in that respect. Now, I cannot at all accede to the doctrine that any change of system which can be introduced would be attended with the important and wholesome effects anticipated by the hon. Gentleman, or that any great practical benefit would arise from such a change. It is true, as Lord Coke says, that the law of England condemns monopolies, and that the presumption is always against them. But in discussing this particular question there are certain difficulties which require the consideration of the House, In the first place, there are the difficulties which might stand in the way of entire freedom; and in the next place we have to consider whether, under the existing system, we do not practically enjoy the advantages of free competition. We must remember at starting that this monopoly is at present practically confined to the authorized version of the Holy Scripures and to the copy of the Prayer Book which is fixed by Act of Parliament, and of which there is an authentic original. There is nothing to prevent a person from printing the Hebrew version of the Old or the Greek of the New Testament; there is nothing to prevent a person from printing any new version of either of those portions of the Holy Scriptures. The monopoly, as at present exercised, is exclusively confined to the authorized version, and it does not even extend to the printing of the authorized version with notes. Now, in this country the publication of the statutes is restricted, and I believe it is a principle generally accepted that the authorized version of the Bible ought not to be printed without some public authentication. This principle has been acted upon here by means of the patent of the Queen's Printers and the privilege granted to the two Universities, while in Scotland it has been carried out through the medium of the Bible Board. That Board produces just as great an interference with the liberty of printing the Holy Scriptures as exists here, because in Scotland no person can publish them without the consent of the Bible Board, and if any serious errors are found in any of the sheets the whole edition is suppressed. In Ireland there is no printing of the Bible, although there is a patent to the Queen's Printer. I say, then, that the work of authentication is carried out in England by one system, in Scotland by another, the former costing nothing, while the latter requires an annual vote for its maintenance. Of course, if the House think the principle of authentication unnecessary they may throw open the printing of the authorized version, which will then be on the same footing as the text of Shakspeare and Milton, or any other work in the language. As to the right of free printing, although the authority of Lord Coke is quoted in support of that proposition, my hon. Friend will find in the second volume of Blackstone that the right of the Crown to control the printing of the authorized version of the Scriptures is distinctly laid down. That right has been affirmed by repeated judgments of courts of law and equity, and I believe there is no more doubt of its legality than there is of any other right which can be suggested. But then there is the question of cheapness. My hon. Friend has referred to the effect of abolishing monopoly in Scotland. I am not prepared to assent to or dissent from the statement he has made on this subject; all I can say is that, as I am informed, the cheapness of the Bible in England is not at all dependent on the competition which exists in Scotland, that the number of Bibles printed in Scotland is small, and that Scotland itself is to a great extent supplied with Bibles printed in England. Their cheapness is, indeed, extraordinary, and cannot, I conceive, be exceeded. I believe you can buy a Bible in sheets for 5d. or 6d., and bound for 9d., while a Testament costs considerably less. The price amounts to but little more than the cost of the paper and ink consumed in printing. That cheapness, as I am assured, is produced not by the competition of the Scotch printers, but by the very active rivalry which exists between the Queen's Printers and the two Universities. I have communicated with the Bible Society and some of the religious societies which circulate large numbers of the Holy Scriptures, and they assure me that they are perfectly satisfied both with the accu- racy and with the cheapness of the Bible as now produced by the presses of this country, and that they have no desire to see any change of system. The hon. Gentleman talks of one edition of the Bible in which 12,000 errors were pointed out. I am of course bound to accept that assertion, but I can only say that that statement differs very widely from information which I have received as to the accuracy at present existing. I was told by an officer of one of the great religious societies that, having been apprized of an edition of the Bible in which one word was printed with an error of one letter—I think "saw" was printed "say"— they required that a large part of an edition, consisting of 10,000 or 15,000 copies, should he cancelled. Now, everybody knows that in ordinary printing such an error would be thought wholly insignificant, and it is my belief that the accuracy required is almost unnecessarily strict, because it is carried beyond the point at which errors could lead to any practical inconvenience. Although, therefore, I am not at all prepared to defend monopoly where freedom of printing can be introduced, my information does not lead me to expect that if the patent of the Queen's Printers were allowed to expire, and the privileges of the two Universities abolished, the editions of the Bible would be either more accurate or less expensive than at present. At the same time, I am quite prepared to assent to the Motion for inquiry by a Select Committee, and to form no decided opinion until I receive the report of that Committee.

said, there was now no real restriction against printing the Bible in Scotland, and the only thing necessary to do was that the printer should give security to the Bible Board that the edition to be printed should be accurate. He should support the Motion.

said, he wished it to be distinctly understood that, as the patent would expire in January next, and as the Committee would not be able to report this Session, the patent ought not to be renewed until after the Committee had reported. No person could print the Bible without infringing the patent, for the words were, that "all and singular Bibles and New Testaments in the English tongue, or any other tongue, or any translation thereof, with or without notes," &c., should not be printed by persons other than the patentees; and, therefore, the statement of the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department was not quite accurate.

said, Bibles were printed by licence in Scotland, and were prohibited from being brought into England; and he wished to know whether this useless prohibition was to be kept up in future. It appeared only just that Bibles printed in Scotland should be allowed to be imported into England, while those printed in England were taken to Scotland.

said, the Committee could not report this Session, and it ought to be insisted on by the House that no new patent should be granted until the report was received.

seconded the Motion.

said, he rose to express a hope that the Government would not accede to the Motion for this return, because all the information which the hon. Gentleman desired was to be found in the library. With regard to the period since 1806, much fuller information than he sought was given in Thom's Almanack, of which there were two copies in the library, and, unless the hon. Member wanted the pages turned down for him, or the passages read out, he did not know what he could gain by this Motion. The oration of the hon. Mover was evidently directed to one object— that of putting himself forward as a fit and proper person to be silenced by an appointment to some office, and of this he had endeavoured to persuade the House in a "few observations," the utterance of which had occupied something more than three-quarters of an hour. Nothing could be more invidious than to print a return such as that moved for, stating that such a Minister came from this country and another from that—that this Minister was of one religion and that Minister of the other, and he hoped the Government would oppose the Motion. The hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. Foster) in the earlier part of the evening had thrown out several hints for shortening the Session, but how was it possible to do so if such discursive discussions were allowed to be carried on. The hon. Gentleman complained that it was of no use Irish gentlemen coming into that House; but the proper way for Irish Members to become useful was by making them- selves thoroughly masters of all that related to Irish interests, and always confining themselves strictly to the matter in hand.

said, the noble Lord had proved that he, as an Irishman, was perfectly satisfied to take an outside place on the Derby-dilly.

said, there were generally two motives in moving for returns of this sort. Either it was to obtain some information of which the House was not in possession—but that could not be the motive in this case, since there were already books of reference which gave all the information the hon. Gentleman desired in fuller detail and from an earlier date than he asked, so that it was just as easy to find out any of the facts which he wished embodied in a return as it was to turn up a word in Johnson's Dictionary; or the motive might be to bring before the House in an authentic form some information which was not before them authentically; but that description would scarcely apply to this case, since the House of Commons was not like a court of justice, which only took notice of the facts proved before it. If any hon. Gentleman in debate referred to the fact that such and such a statesman held a certain office at a certain time the House would receive the statement as correct, without requiring to have it proved by legal evidence. The two ordinary motives for granting returns did not, therefore, apply in the present case. To the wording also of the Motion he had several objections. The hon. Gentleman asked for a list of Ministers of the Crown; but it was not very clear what was meant by that. Did he intend, for instance, to include the Officers of the Household, or the Under Secretaries of State? It would be necessary, if the Motion were agreed to, that some more precise language should be used in it. Again, there was another point which had been lost sight of. The hon. Gentleman required Cabinet Ministers to be distinguished from others; but it was well known that the Cabinet was not recognized by the constitution of this country; the House of Commons had never recognized the existence of such a council in any of its authentic acts—it was merely a voluntary meeting of certain Ministers, and the archives of the country contained no means of distinguishing between a Cabinet Minister and any other. If these objections were removed, he was not aware of any others which he had to urge against the Motion, except the unnecessary labour which it would impose on the clerks of the public departments, and the expense thrown on the country of printing an unnecessary return. To listen to the hon. Gentleman's speech, it might be imagined that his object was to prove that his countrymen had not filled a distinguished place in the Parliamentary and official annals of this country, but he had always understood that the very contrary was the fact. Burke and Sheridan were two of the brightest ornaments of the House of Commons. Lord Wellesley and the Duke of Wellington were two of the most distinguished public servants this country had ever possessed. At one and the same time the Ministerial party and the Opposition party in that House were led by Irishmen—Lord Castlereagh and Mr. Ponsonby; and others, Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, Mr. Tierney, and Mr. Spring Rice had been prominent Cabinet Ministers. These names were sufficient to prove that Irishmen had distinguished themselves both in official and Parliamentary life. If it were the wish of the House that the return should be made, he would not oppose it, but he could not see that it would be of the slightest use.

in reply, said, he should take no notice of the observations made upon him by the noble Lord opposite, but if he spoke of him in the same tone a second time he should probably reply by expressions which the noble Lord would not like to have applied to him. He had not been able to find in any book or work the information he required; but it was not denied that since the Emancipation Act was passed no Roman Catholic, he believed, had been appointed a member of the Cabinet. The Home Secretary had said nothing upon that point. He (Mr. Scully) wanted the return to show whether it was true that no Roman Catholic had been so appointed. He should not, however, trouble the House to divide upon the present Motion, but should renew the subject on future occasions.

said, he rose to more for leave to introduce a Bill to amend certain laws and statutes relating to the admission of barristers and solicitors to practise in Ireland. The Bill merely contained two clauses, and its objects were twofold, one of them being to repeal a statute of Henry VIII., which rendered it necessary for students going to the bar in Ireland to attend a certain number of terms in one of the Inns of Court in England. Some of the most eminent lawyers in Ireland were in favour of that repeal. Another object of the Bill was to enable the benchers of King's Inn, Dublin, to admit students to the Irish bar on the same terms as students were admitted to the English bar. For the last twenty years the benchers in England had admitted students to the bar in three years, whether they were graduates or not; but in Ireland a student could not be called to the bar in less than five years after his name had been entered in the books unless he was a graduate of a university. The hon. and learned Gentleman concluded by moving for leave to bring in the Bill,

seconded the Motion.

said, he thought the House ought to understand well what was the object which the hon. and learned Gentleman aimed at. He had a very great objection to the last part of the measure. By an Act of Parliament, which he thought was a wise one, it was enacted that gentlemen who had obtained a degree in a university might be admitted to the Irish bar three years after they had been entered as law students at King's Inn; and that those who had not graduated should not be admitted until at the expiration of five years from their entrance. That provision had a beneficial effect in inducing men of education to join the profession, and the effect of granting the concession sought by this Bill would of necessity be to increase largely the ranks of the profession in Ireland. He had not heard that any scarcity of barristers existed, on the contrary, he had been under the impression that the profession was very fully stocked already. Education in former days was of the very highest order. Fortescue, who wrote on the praises of the laws of England, expressed in two lines the reason why our forefathers thought a good education was useful. He said it was "that they may have a greater regard for their character than those who are bred in another way." Notwithstanding the opinions which had been referred to, he did not believe that the change would be desirable, and in any event it would be time enough to make it when complaints had arisen in consequence of the present system. This change had not been asked for at the other side of the Channel—the Motion was not made at the desire of the benchers or of the profession —it emanated from a gentleman who was a member of the bar in this country, and had his time very fully occupied, and he, as a bencher of the Irish bar, objected to any such alteration. The other part of the Bill related to a regulation of the time of Henry VIII., when it was thought that every gentleman going to practise at the bar in Ireland should, for certain reasons, serve half of his terms in England and half in Ireland. That, probably, was in order that people in Ireland might be acquainted with people in England, and that as the same law prevailed in each country, the students might study in the best school of law. No complaint had been made of that law. It had the sanction of antiquity, and he believed that it was attended with beneficial results. He saw no advantage in changing old laws unless they were proved to be attended with inconvenience; and he confessed that in this case he was satisfied with the old system. The Irish students when they came over enjoyed themselves very much, and he trusted that they would long continue to come to England and distinguish themselves as they had always done on the press, at the bar, and in after years in Parliament itself. In any case he believed it was hopeless, with the discussion which such a measure would require, to introduce it at this period of the Session, and he therefore trusted the hon. and learned Member would see the propriety of postponing his measure till next February, when they could consider it much more advantageously in the cooler weather.

said, he could not but express his astonishment at hearing the right hon. and learned Gentleman state that no dissatisfaction existed in the minds, or had been expressed by the Irish law students with regard to the points which this Bill proposed to remedy. He knew, on the contrary, that they felt strongly the injustice of being compelled to come to England, and regarded it as an insult to the education which they received in Ireland. If they really came to study the law of this country the thing would be intelligible; but every reasoning Gentleman would regard the paying of fees and the eating of three dinners each terra as a mere matter of form. A state of things so unprofitable would be removed by the Bill of his hon. and learned Friend. The English Inns of court did not require a university degree as a necessary qualification for the profession of the bar.

said, that the same distinction which the hon. and learned Gentleman complained of as existing in Ireland existed in England, for a person who had a degree from a University was called to the Bar in England after three years, whilst those who had no degree had to spend five years before they could be called. He thought there was no injustice in that, because a degree from a university was a guarantee that a gentleman had received a good general education. He also conceived it to be beneficial that Irish students should come to England for the purpose of finishing their studies. He therefore opposed the introduction of the Bill.

said, be should agree to the introduction of the Bill, but he could not promise it support in its future stages. He thought it would be right to consult the benchers of Ireland before promising his support to the measure.

in moving for leave to bring in a Bill to extend the powers of the Conservators of the River Thames, said the object was one which would be approved by the House—namely to assist in the purification of the River Thames. He was afraid however, it would be of a very limited extent. The Conservators had represented to him that certain of their powers were deficient with respect to preventing the conveyance of impurities into the river, and he proposed to bring in a short Bill to supply the defect.

Bill to extend the Powers of the Conservators of the River Thames, ordered to be brought in by Sir GEORGE LEWIS and Mr. CLIVE.

said he rose for the purpose of bringing under the consideration of the House the petition of Sir W. Russell, asking that the Select Committee on Contracts should not investigate the matters connected with the contract for the conveyance of mails between Dovor and Calais, made by the late Government, until the Dovor election petition had been disposed of. Sir W. Russell was a candidate at the last election, and had petitioned against the return for the borough of Dovor. In the petition which he (Mr. Bouverie) had presented the day before from that Gentleman, it was stated that Sir W. Russell was advised that the inquiry into the Dovor contract by the Select Committee would be prejudicial to the inquiry on the same subject which would have to be made by the Election Committee. It therefore prayed the House that it would instruct its Committee not to inquire into that portion of the matter referred to them till the election petition had been investigated. He would briefly state the grounds why he thought they ought in justice to comply with Sir W. Russell's application. He regretted that two very distinct subjects had been referred to the same Committee. They had referred to the Select Committee the general inquiry into the policy and character of the contracts which of recent years had been entered into by the Treasury and Post Office for the conveyance of mails and telegraphic messages, and also the investigation of the circumstances connected with the two contracts of the late Government, known as the Galway and Dovor contracts. He apprehended that the first portion of the inquiry might very properly be refer-red to the Select Committee as a fit subject for its investigation, but that the two matters, which touched the privileges of the House and the character of some of its Members, could hardly be properly conducted by the same Committee. It was to be regretted that when personal charges were in question, they should be referred to a Committee, a large proportion of the Members of which were more or less parties to the accusation brought against a certain portion of that House. He looked at the composition of that Committee, and while he saw hon. Gentlemen on it of the highest distinction, and whose character stood high in the estimation of their brother members, he saw other hon. Gentlemen upon it who, however high might be their general character—and he was not there to challenge it—were yet more or less implicated in the accusations which had been freely made. He thought the proper course was to place upon committees of this nature independent Members, along with one or two hon. Gentlemen who would undertake the laborious though somewhat odious duty of eliciting the accusations; but he found that, upon the Committee relating to contracts there were no less than four members of the Government whose proceedings had been broadly attacked, two of them being members of the department the conduct of which was particularly called in question. There were also upon the Committee a number of hon. Gentlemen who had occupied official positions, and, whether justly or unjustly, there was in the public mind a distrust as to the feeling which men who had been in office, or who were in office, might entertain with regard to accusations against public departments. He believed that, from the constitution of that Committee, its investigation with regard to the personal and incriminating charges which were preferred could not be so satisfactory as the inquiry of a Committee which directed its attention to particular cases. If the result of such an investigation was to acquit parties charged with political corruption, he did not think that decision would be regarded as the impartial verdict of disinterested men. ("Oh, oh !") He merely said that that was the necessary consequence of the constitution of the Committee. He had intended to submit the question of the Galway Packet contract specially to the notice of the House, but he had been forestalled by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who had proposed the appointment of a general Committee. He regretted the constitution of that Committee, and, as he had stated, he believed that its decision would not be so satisfactory to the public as the decision of a Committee appointed on a different principle. He hoped, however, that the explanations afforded to that Committee would be full and satisfactory, and that the parties whose conduct was impugned would be able to relieve themselves from the imputations made against them. In the case of the Dovor contract, however, the House had another tribunal ready to their hands,—the Election Committee appointed to try the Petition of Sir W. Russell. That petition alleged distinctly that undue influence had been exercised by the Ministers of the Crown for the purpose of securing the return of the gentleman who defeated him. That was a material allegation which would of course be tried by the Committee on the Dovor Election Petition; but the same issue would substantially be tried by the Select Committee on Contracts, if it entered upon the Dovor case. Now, he asked the House to consider what were the allegations repecting the Dovor contract. A certain person of the name of Churchward, who had for some years had a contract for the conveyance of the mails between Dovor and Calais and Dovor and Ostend, applied in 1857 for additional remuneration for the services he performed. A distinct refusal was given to the application. Mr. Churchward renewed his application in the begining of the present year, and set forth particular services which he alleged he had performed without remuneration, and for which he claimed remuneration. The claim was allowed both by the Admiralty and by the Treasury, and when he was requested to name the compensation to which he considered himself entitled for these extra services he requested to have his contract for the conveyance of the mails, which would have terminated in four years, extended until 1870, with large additional remuneration for services to be performed. He (Mr. Bouverie) was merely stating the primâ facie case, to which an explanation, and he trusted a perfectly satisfactory explanation, might be given. ["Oh !"] He could assure hon. Gentleman that the task which he was performing was not a pleasant one. He quite understood that men of character were often obliged to submit to have charges made against them which they did not deserve; but in justice to those Gentlemen themselves those charges when made ought to be inquired into. He begged the attention of the House to the dates, which in this case were material. On the 14th of February, Mr. Churchward wrote to the Lords of the Admiralty to ask for an extension of the Government contract from 1863 till 1870, with an additional allowance of £2,500, while in 1857 he put the extra services at £1,500. On the 23rd of February the Admiralty transmitted the application to the Treasury, re- commending that the offer should be accepted. On the 3rd of March the letter was referred by the Treasury to the Postmaster General, and on the 10th of March the Postmaster General wrote to the Treasury alleging strong reasons why the application should not be acceded to. There was then a long pause; but on the 15th of April the letter of the Postmaster General having been written on the 10th of March, a Treasury minute was issued sanctioning the contract. Now, he asked the House to note what public events had occurred between the 10th of March and the 15th of April. On the 31st of March a division of great importance took place in that House, upon which the Government were defeated, and on the 4th of April a dissolution of Parliament was announced. On the 12th of April certain charges were made in that House respecting the Lords of the Admiralty, and it appeared that Sir H. Leeke, who was then a candidate for a seat in Parliament, had gone down to Dovor to seek the suffrages of the burgesses of that borough. On the 15th of April the Treasury minute sanctioning an extension of the contract was signed, and on the 26th of April the contract itself was signed by the Admiralty. On the 30th of April the polling took place at Dovor. It might be asked what had the polling at Dovor, the dissolution of Parliament, and the discussions which had taken place about the seat for Dovor to do with Mr. Churchward and his contract. That was a question which he thought might fairly form the subject of investigation before an Election Committee, for there were strong suspicions that these proceedings had not been unconnected with political corruption. Mr. Churchward was a gentleman who was not unknown to fame or to the House. He was, from his position, an extensive employer of labour at Dovor, and could command from 100 to 120 votes in that constituency. Mr. Churchward was a gentleman who in 1852 happened to have a commanding influence in the borough of Plymouth, and he was referred to in the report of an Election Committee presented to that House. That Committee reported, that

"It was proved that George Knapman was bribed by the said Charles John Mare, Esq., the sitting Member, and by Joseph George Churchward, by a promise to use their influence to obtain him a situation in the Excise. That Robert Shears was bribed by the said Joseph George Churchward by a promise of a situation in the Customs for his son-in-law; and that William King was bribed by the said Joseph George Churchward by a promise of employment."

Mr. Churchward then went with a tainted character to the hon. Gentlemen who represented those departments; and while he was disposed to hope and believe that there was no ground for the accusations of political corruption in this matter, which were freely launched against them, still there was unanswerable ground for charging them with the greatest incaution and indiscretion in having at a political crisis, and with a contest pending at Dovor, given a reversionary contract that could not come into operation till four years after the termination of the existing contract, to a man whose reputation had been blasted by the report of a Committee of that House as a most notorious briber. That was the issue which the Election Committee would have to try; and he asked the House, whether they were prepared to say that it was convenient that the inquiries should be conducted at the same time by the two committees—the one being a Select Committee, constituted as he had named, and whose decisions would be regarded with distrust; the other being an Election Committee, composed as such tribunals were with every assistance which the presence of lawyers and which the forms of the House could give for eliciting the truth and arriving at a correct conclusion. The members of an Election Committee were sworn to make a just deliverance; they were few in number, responsible, and regular in their attendance from day to day; not varying in number, so that there was no probability of a chance majority deciding one way to-day and another to-morrow. Counsel on both sides appeared before them, who by their keen encounter of wits, and above all, by their examination and cross-examination of witnesses who made their statements upon oath, would probe the matter to the bottom. Could there be any doubt as to which of these two tribunals would he the best instrument for getting at the truth? He presumed that hon. Gentlemen opposite wished to have the truth brought out, and therefore it was perfectly incontrovertible that the question should be tried by the Election Committee in preference to the Select Committee. Sir W. Russell said his case would be materially damaged by having these witnesses, some of whom were of tainted character, brought before a Select Committee and put through a preliminary examination, not upon oath. But suppose a Select Committee came to a conclusion before the Election Committee, would not the Election Committee in that case really he a committee of appeal, not trying the issue submitted to them, but whether the Select Committee had decided rightly or wrongly? Surely, then, nobody who desired to have the truth fully sifted, and to avoid a conflict of jurisdiction between different Committees, could hesitate to prefer an investigation before an Election Committee. He had feebly endeavoured to urge Sir W. Russell's interests in that matter. He begged to say he had done so totally irrespective of the party to which Sir W. Russell belonged; and if any other petitioner to that House could satisfy him that he had a fair claim to a similar Resolution he would do his best, regardless of party considerations, to have justice done to him. His past conduct in respect to Election Committees ought to convince hon. Gentlemen that he was influenced solely by a regard for what was just. In conclusion, he trusted that for the interests of the public, for the character of the House, and, above all, for the sake of hon. Gentlemen who were accused, there would be the fullest investigation into these suspicious circumstances.

said, he could state for himself as a party very much concerned in that question, and also, he was sure, for the Gentlemen who sat around him; that their only wish in this matter was precisely the same as that expressed by the right hon. Gentleman opposite; namely, that the case should be fully and fairly discussed, and the truth in every possible way sought out and brought to light. If it was of importance to the House, as it undoubtedly was, that the truth in regard to that question should be ascertained, it was of much more importance, he ventured to say, though hon. Gentlemen might perhaps not think so, that an opportunity should be given to the accused to clear themselves from the charges brought against them now on more than one occasion, charges which they utterly repudiated, for which, when they came to be investigated, there would be seen to be not a particle of foundation; but which were repeated one night after another by hon. Gentlemen, in a form that had hitherto prevented them from being fairly discussed. Hon. Gentlemen had obtained a Committee, which it was understood was to have fully and fairly inquired into that matter, and for the judgment of which the late Government had reserved their defence. But now, at the very time when that Committee had actually commenced their labours and the case was about to be examined, the right hon. Gentleman interposed, and asked that the investigation should be postponed until an Election Committee had reported, which would probably not sit that year. Meanwhile, the right hon. Gentleman, and those who sat around him, come forward night after night, launching accusations at the head of the late Government, and taunting them in every way with not answering them. And for what reason was that request made? If the Committee on the Mail and Telegraph Contracts, which was now carrying on its inquiry, were, indeed, to supersede the Election Committee, or if the evidence taken before it would prevent Sir W. Russell in any way from substantiating the charges he had made, the contrast drawn by the right hon. Gentleman between the two tribunals might be fair enough. But how was the inquiry before the Select Committee to prevent the petitioner from bringing forward any evidence he possessed? He would not do Sir W. Russell the injustice to suppose that his petition contained only fishing allegations, put forward on mere grounds of suspicion, but would give him credit for believing that he had some evidence to support his serious charges against the late Government. How, then, could he be precluded by the Select Committee from making use of that evidence before the Election Committee? On the other hand, it was quite possible that something might be elicited before the Select Committee of which Sir W. Russell was not in possession, and of which he might avail himself, there by prejudicing the rights of the sitting Members, if there was any truth in these allegations. And if the present application had come from the side of the sitting Members, and they had prayed that the case might not be examined into till they had had their case heard, one might have understood on what grounds it was based. But, supposing Sir W. Russell's only object to be to get at the truth, why he would have two engines for his purpose—first, the Select Committee, and next the Election Committee. A Select Committee might, perhaps, not be quite so good as an Election Committee for such an inquiry; but, at all events, it would not prevent him from afterwards adducing his evidence. In one way, perhaps, he might be injured. The Select Committee would inquire into the general subject, and when particular contracts were examined, it would turn out, on more light being thrown on the usual practice of Governments in granting them, that things which appeared suspicious on the first blush were not really so much so as they seemed. That Committee, containing hon. Gentlemen like himself interested in these proceedings, would by examination and cross-examination, bring out more stages of those transactions than could possibly appear upon the printed papers. Sir W. Russell would have it in his power to take advantage of any evidence that might be thus obtained, and he certainly could not be prejudiced by the investigation of the Select Committee. The right hon. Gentleman objected to the composition of the Select Committee, because it comprised several Members of the late Government. Now, that Committee was expressly appointed to enter into the general subject of contracts, and the moment it was appointed the right hon. Gentleman himself, the noble Lord the Member for Forfarshire, and others, rose after he (Sir Stafford Northcote) had spoken, and could not therefore reply to them, and particularly emphasized the Galway and Dovor contracts. [Mr. E. P. BOUVERIE: I abstained from mentioning Dovor altogether.] He thought he was correct in stating that the right hon. Gentleman expressly emphasized the Galway contract, and that the hon. Member for Richmond (Mr. Rich) alluded particularly to the Dovor contract. The right hon. Gentleman had again referred to the Galway contract, and had said that the Select Committee recently appointed was not a proper tribunal to try the Galway contract any more than the Dovor contract. But, as everybody knew that both the Galway and Dovor contracts were to be investigated by the Select Committee, the right hon. Gentleman ought to have objected to the composition of that body at the time it was nominated, and not after it had commenced its labours. As the right hon. Gentleman had again brought forward the same charges relative to the Dovor contract which were formerly advanced by the hon. Member for Richmond, he hoped he might be permitted, as he was the person who happened to be mainly interested in the matter, to address a few observations to the House upon the subject. In the first place, he took upon himself a large share of the responsibility. Packet contracts were dealt with by two departments—by the Admiralty as the advising and ministerial department, and by the Treasury as the deciding department. The final decision rested with the Treasury. In the case of the Dovor contract the judgment of the Admiralty was formed and expressed before there was any question of a dissolution of Parliament. It was with the Treasury that the delay occurred, and in the Treasury, he did not shrink from saying, the responsibility mainly rested upon himself. He was the superior officer there under the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and although in the decision as to the Dovor contract of course he deferred to his right hon. Friend, yet he had the principal investigation of the matter, and the opinion which he formed upon it, and which he communicated to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was that which mainly influenced the granting of the contract. He thought, therefore, he might crave the indulgence of the House while he stated how the case really stood, and he confidently believed that a simple statement of the facts would remove much of the suspicion which, in the minds of certain parties, attached to the transaction. The Dovor contract was originally granted to Mr. Churchward in 1853 by the Government of the Earl of Aberdeen, and he need hardly remind the House that the year 1853 was subsequent to 1852, when those charges were made against Mr. Churchward to which the right hon. Gentleman had referred. He could only say, for his own part, that he had never heard anything of the connection of Mr. Churchward with Plymouth, nor of the accusations which had been brought against him by an Election Committee. But let that pass. It was sufficient to state that the Dovor contract was granted by the Government of the Earl of Aberdeen in 1853 to Mr. Churchward, after an open competition, in which Mr. Churchward undertook the service at a much lower rate than that offered by the other competitors one of whom was the South Eastern Railway Company, or than that at which the same work had previously been performed. The arrangement was that Mr. Churchward should receive a subsidy of £15,500 a year on condition of his performing certain postal services, and in addition a certain number of special services; but for any services beyond those special services he was to be paid at a rate which was to be afterwards ascertained. There was also a clause in the contract which bound him to carry on the Indian mails whenever they arrived. Such was the bargain made in 1853. In 1855, when the Government of the Earl of Aberdeen was still in office, when the right hon. Baronet the Member for Carlisle (Sir James Graham) was at the head of the Admiralty, when Mr. Bernal Osborne, the late Member for Dovor, was Secretary to the Admiralty, when the present Chancellor of the Exchequer filled the same office which he now occupied, and when the Vice-President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Wilson) was Secretary to the Treasury, Mr. Churchward applied for an extension of his contract, which had then been in operation for little more than a year only. Five years were immediately added by the Government to a contract which had still three years to run. The ground for that extension was that Mr. Churchward had, in 1853, made a bargain very favourable to the country, and had suffered from the loss of one of his vessels. Certainly that was not a strong ground for extending the contract, but it was thought sufficient by the Government of the day. Mr. Churchward, after he had taken the contract with the English Government, took another with the French Government. Subsequently to the extension in 1855, the special services that he was called upon to perform became much more numerous than they had previously been, and many cases occurred in which he had to present bills for work done over and above the conditions of his contract. In 1857, the Indian mails were doubled in number, and a system was adopted of accelerating them through France, so that in almost every instance he was obliged to send a special boat, at a considerable expense to himself, for the purpose of bringing them to England. The Australian mails were also added to his contract, and in short, a large amount of postal service was cast upon him, for which, although by a strict construction of the letter of his contract it might be classed under the head of the service which he was bound to perform without remuneration, he was in equity entitled to be paid. So matters stood when, in the first month of the pre- sent year, Mr. Churchward presented another hill to the Admiralty, which called attention to the whole subject, and necessitated a final settlement. The Admiralty referred the matter to the Treasury, stating their opinion that it was a fair claim, which ought to be paid. On reference to the Postmaster General, he also agreed that it ought to be paid. The Admiralty then requested the opinion of the Treasury, whether it should be done by a mileage rate or by a commuted payment; they referred to the Postmaster General, but he declined to give any opinion on that point. In February the Treasury urged the Admiralty to try to make an arrangement with Mr. Churchward. The Admiralty thereupon called upon Mr. Churchward to state what he wanted, and then it was that Mr. Churchward made the proposal to which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock had referred, He proposed that the extra payment should be at the rate of £2,500 a year for all the services he performed up to a certain number, and he submitted a calculation which showed that if the commutation which he proposed were adopted, the Government would he gainers to the extent of £100 per annum. At the same time he made an application for an extension of his contract, which had to run till 1863, just as he had done in 1853, when it had to run till 1859. The ground upon which he asked for that extension was, that he found, on looking over his affairs, that he had sustained very heavy losses, which put him in a worse position than he had occupied in 1853, when his claim to an extension was admitted by the Government of the Earl of Aberdeen. The late Admiralty took the same view as the Admiralty of 1853, and recommended that his contract should be extended in compensation for his losses. That was the main ground. The matter was then sent to the Treasury, and was referred by the Treasury to the Postmaster General, who raised certain objections to an extension of the contract, saying that although he thought Mr. Churchward ought to be paid for his extra services, he did not believe that the plan of paying for them by a fixed sum would be convenient, inasmuch as the services required to be performed might vary in number. That was the last letter which appeared in the papers presented to the House. It was necessary at this point to explain that, for the purpose of dealing with matters of this kind, the Treasury was divided into departments. Those departments were under the charge of clerks, whose special duty it was to write reports upon the business coming before them, which reports were submitted to the Assistant Secretary, who in turn communicated his views to the Financial Secretary. The matters then became the subject of internal discussion among the diferent Members of the Treasury itself. That was the case in the present instance. The interval which the right hon. Gentleman had pointed out between the 10th of March and the 15th of April was filled up by discussions among the officers of the Treasury themselves, and the various minutes, reports, and other documents which then passed between the different departments of the Treasury would be laid before the Select Committee. He might, however, state generally what the nature of them was. The report of the Postmaster General against an extension of the contract went to the clerk of the department to which it belonged. That functionary was doubtful as to the proposed commutation, but his opinion was decidedly against an extension. The matter was then referred to the Assistant Secretary, who wrote a memorandum upon it, in which he expressed an opinion contrary to the view of the Postmaster General. His argument was that in the case of a contractor who was doing a service well it would not be wise for the period his contract had to run to impose upon him conditions which might render him dissatisfied with his position. It was possible that at the end of three or four years they might have a more favourable opening; but on the other hand they had the certainty that he would perform the service for the remainder of the existing term on unfavourable terms. The matter then came to him (Sir S. Northcote) in that shape. He was of opinion that, having regard to the losses which Mr. Churchward was alleged to have experienced, they afforded no sufficient ground for extending the contract. He had to consider, however, whether it was worth while to allow a contractor to become dissatisfied before the conclusion of his contract, and perhaps on that account to perform it in an inferior manner, upon the chance of getting the service better done by inviting competition at the expiration of the term. That point had frequently been under the consideration of different Governments, and there were instances in which the Treasury against the recommendation of the Post Office had extended the contract on those very grounds. One case he would mention was that of the Pacific service, the contract for which was extended a considerable number of years before it had expired, although the service was carried on not in British territory at all, and was not productive of revenue to the amount of the subsidy. He was free to say, however, that, although he thought there was great force in the argument he had mentioned, he was not entirely satisfied by it, and he therefore drew up a minute, addressed to the Assistant Secretary, in which he said he felt considerable doubt as to the extension of a contract of this kind with so long a term to elapse before it would expire, though from the circumstances in which Mr. Churchward was placed he was entitled to liberal consideration; and he suggested that the Assistant Secretary should communicate with Mr. Churchward as to the increase of his subsidy during the four years which his contract had to run, and endeavour to make a satisfactory arrangement in this way, without renewing the contract. Mr. Hamilton accordingly saw Mr. Churchward, who afterwards wrote strongly urging that no such addition would meet his case, for that his whole arrangements turned upon the extension of the contract; that the English service alone was unremunerative, but that be had in addition the French service until 1870, and had taken the English contract at a low sum in the expectation of making the two work together and pay; that he was anxious to introduce improvements, but was unable to do so, because the French Government would not treat with him on account of the shortness of the term of his English contract, not feeling sure that he could carry out the things which he undertook to perform. After this he (Sir Stafford Northcote) saw Mr. Churchward in the presence of Mr. Hamilton and the clerk in whose department these matters were. The subject was fully discussed, and Mr. Churchward explained that the services which he was performing for the two countries were intimately connected, and that he was then engaged in negotiations with the French Government by which he expected to accelerate the French mail by some four hours, reducing the time from fifteen to ten or eleven hours, changing it also from a night to a day service, and altering the ports of departure. He (Sir Stafford Northcote) pointed out the objections of the Postmaster General, that "any extension of the duration of this contract would be objectionable, as it might probably fetter the Post Office in its negotiations with foreign countries, and increase the difficulty already experienced in improving the continental postal arrangements, through apprehensions of the South Eastern Railway Company that, by a change in the hours of sailing or in the French port of arrival and despatch, the traffic by this Company's own boats may be seriously injured." The most important point which the Postmaster General brought forward was that the South Eastern Railway would be jealous of this arrangement. But the apprehensions of the railway company were founded on the change not in the English service—with which when the contract expired there would be a power of dealing—but in the French contract, which there was no power to upset until 1870. It struck him, therefore, that there was very little in that objection. The Postmaster General also suggested that the Ostend mail service might be changed from a night to a day service. Mr. Churchward said he desired that very much, because a day service would be much more profitable than a night service; and he added that he was in communication with the Belgian Government, and that his prospect of making arrangements with them depended upon the conclusion of arrangements with the British Government. He (Sir Stafford Northcote) would not then go into the subject fully, but the conclusion to which he came, on a patient consideration of the whole facts, was that the contract ought to be extended. It was in these discussions and this correspondence that a considerable portion of the time to which the right hon. Gentleman referred was spent; for he need hardly say that there was a great deal to do in the Treasury, and other matters intervened which occupied time. As to the Postmaster General's remarks on the subject of a fixed payment, he admitted that there were certain things in these papers which primâ facie appeared somewhat suspicious, and that there was one blot in the proceedings respecting the renewal of the contract. After the discussion to which he had alluded he came to the conclusion that the contract should be extended on two conditions, first that Mr. Churchward should bind himself not to enter into arrangements with any foreign Government unless with the consent of the Treasury, inasmuch as it was found that these arrangements overlapped, as it were, the contract with the English Government, and gave Mr. Churchward a great advantage over them; and secondly, in order to meet the objections of the Postmaster General, that instead of having an absolute fixed addition to his subsidy of £2,500 a year he should have a maximum of £2,500 a year, subject to a diminution if the special service should fall off. A minute of the Treasury was thereupon drawn out. He (Sir Stafford Northcote) was sorry to say, however, that having left town in the interval, and the clerk whose business it was to give effect to this decision having also gone out of town, the matter fell into the hands of a junior clerk, and the result was that the contract had been executed without those two conditions. He never found it out until these papers were printed; but he understood now that Mr. Churchward fully acknowledged his obligation with respect to the first of these points. As to the second, the Select Committee would no doubt inquire into it, and Mr. Churchward would be called on to embody this condition also in a subsequent contract. He had now explained the share which he had taken in this business, and he could solemnly and conscientiously assure the House that the negotiations were conducted by him and the decision was arrived at solely upon public grounds. He had given the history of the transaction and of the arguments which weighed with him. He did not deny that he knew an election was pending at Dovor, and that Mr. Churchward was a person of some importance there. He knew, also, that Mr. Churchward was a gentleman who was attached to the Conservative party, having formerly, he believed, been connected with The Morning Herald. He would frankly own that these considerations did so far affect his conduct that they made him doubt for a moment or two whether it was desirable to conclude negotiations thus begun while the election was pending. For the moment he put the papers aside, but then he thought to himself, "How can I, without acting as a coward, put aside papers which have come before me regularly upon any such grounds?" He considered the matter therefore entirely in a public point of view, and acted entirely with an eye to the public interests. As far as he and those of his colleagues who sat upon the Packet Committee were concerned, their wish had been to challenge the fullest inquiry, and if it seemed to the House that the postponement of the investigation by that Committee until it had been inquired into by the Election Committee was most likely to conduce to the discovery of the facts they were quite ready to accede to such an arrangement, for their only wish was to clear their characters, and to elicit the truth of the charges which had been made against them.

said, he wished to revert to the real question before the House, which was the Petition of Sir William Russell. There were two modes of action which this House adopted—one based on its judicial capacity, and the other on its character as the grand inquest of the nation. Now, the Petitioner asked that they should view this matter in their judicial capacity, and he thought the House would do wrong not to grant its prayer. Sir William Russell, being the claimant of a seat in that House, declared that he had been advised by counsel that his case would materially suffer if the subject of the mail contract were first investigated by the Select Committee. He (Mr. Cowper) thought the Petitioner was to be considered the best judge of his own case, and should in justice be allowed to conduct it as he was advised. The accusation made against the late Government, that they had used the influence of the Crown to corruptly sway the election, was a very grave allegation, which he thought ought to be treated judicially. He knew the history of the steam contracts from the beginning, and although there might have been many charges of neglect and want of caution with regard to them, the Dovor and Galway contracts were the first in which an allegation had been made against any department of a Government that it had entered into such an agreement with the view of influencing the return of Members to that House. The question involved was one, therefore, which ought to be treated judicially, and with the utmost seriousness, inasmuch as the honour and integrity of the House were implicated in its solution. The hon. Gentleman who had just spoken had made a statement which he was glad to hear, but then he could not help thinking that it would be more satisfactory if that statement were made before an Election Committee. He was sincerely desirous that hon. Gentlemen opposite should be able to come out of the transaction with credit, and he hoped they would not deem it their duty to oppose the Motion before the House.

said, the right hon. Gentleman who had just spoken had called upon the House to treat the question under consideration judicially and seriously, while the right hon. Gentleman who had made the Motion had declared himself to be a lover of justice, and had then proceeded to attack the composition of the tribunal before whom all the parties concerned were to appear—namely, the Select Committee which had been appointed to inquire into the subject of Government contracts. Nay, more, the right hon. Gentleman who was so ardent a lover of justice had gone on to state that, if by that Committee the late Government should be acquitted of all corrupt motives in dealing with those transactions, a similar verdict would not be pronounced by the public at large. The right hon. Gentleman, indeed, seemed to forget what had been done in the House so recently, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the conscientious discharge of his duty, refused to change the composition of the Committee on Contracts, although he had been called upon to do so by several hon. Members who objected to it on other grounds than those which the right hon. Gentleman has advanced. The right hon. Gentleman, notwithstanding all that had taken place in connection with the appointment of that Committee, did not hesitate to stand up in that House and to pronounce the Committee to be most unfortunately constituted for the investigation of the subject to which his Motion related. But how, let him ask, could the assumptions on which the argument of the right hon. Gentleman proceeded be justified? How could the trial which would take place before the Election Committee be prejudiced by the fact that the truth had been previously elicited? The Committee on Contracts had been appointed by the House to inquire into the question whether that political corruption existed by the very mention of which the right hon. Gentleman seemed to be so much distressed. The conduct of the late Government in making those contracts had been impeached. They challenged inquiry, and because, forsooth, the right hon. Gentleman was apprehensive that justice would not be done, he made an appeal to the House on behalf of the Petitioner whose cause he advocated that the investigation, which it had been deliberately decided should be entered into, should be postponed. And what was the ground upon which the appeal was based? Upon the fact that the Peti- tioner alleged that injury would otherwise be done to him, and that his counsel concurred in that opinion. Was that, he would ask, a sufficient reason for putting off indefinitely an investigation which some hon. Gentlemen but a few nights ago appeared to think ought to be so promptly proceeded with, that not a moment's delay in its prosecution ought to be allowed to occur? The right hon. Gentleman had in effect cast another imputation upon those who already stood accused, inasmuch as the tendency of his speech had been to prove that the Members of that House who were nominated to sit on the Committee on Contracts were incompetent to elicit the truth, and that in order to attain that object the whole matter must be referred to a tribunal before which evidence would be taken upon oath. He should submit to the House, however, that the late Government had a right to demand that the charges which were made against them should be without delay inquired into by that Committee, in whose honour every hon. Member ought to be prepared to repose the most implicit confidence. Indeed, the whole of the present proceeding was an attack on the privileges and independence of that House, and as such the House would be prepared to deal with it.

remarked that the House was placed in a very inconvenient position in relation to the question at issue. It would seem that two Committees were likely to take cognizance of the matter under consideration, and the House was nevertheless engaged in discussing that very matter itself. The right hon. Gentleman, indeed, who had introduced the subject had dealt with it as fully and as enthusiastically as if he stood in the position of a counsel submitting his case to a jury, and that course was taken, it would appear, under the pretence of doing justice. The right hon. Gentleman had gone into a large amount of criminatory matter to prove that Sir W. Russell would be prejudiced if the prayer of his petition were not granted, and yet he had really failed to show in what respect Sir W. Russell would be injured if the House should not agree to the Motion. The House, however, was asked to accede to that Motion on the grounds of justice. It was asserted that the late Government were accused of acts which were, to say the least of them, not very decent, and that the charge demanded investigation. Now, everybody concurred in that opinion; but then the right hon. Gentleman must not endeavour to induce the House to believe that the issue in the matter lay between Sir W. Russell and somebody else who had been returned for Dovor, and that hon. Gentlemen whose names were implicated in these transactions should not be allowed to defend themselves. Was that, he should like to know, the view of doing justice which the right hon. Gentleman entertained? Was it right that when all the circumstances of the case might come out collaterally upon oath, and when the characters of hon. Members might be whispered, or rather sworn away, they should have no opportunity of presenting themselves before the tribunal before which such proceedings took place? There was not, in his opinion, even the semblance of justice in such a proposal. Indeed, it would appear, when the fact that the Election Committee was not likely to sit for some time was taken into consideration, as if it were sought to shut out from the possibility of refuting the accusations which were brought against them those hon. Gentlemen whose conduct had been assailed. He could therefore see no justice in the course which the right hon. Gentleman opposite wished the House to sanction.

contended that those members of the late Government who felt that their conduct was impeached might present themselves before the Election Committee, and thus have an adequate opportunity afforded them of clearing their characters upon oath. The real objection to the Election Committee, however, which was felt by those Gentlemen, and those by whom they were supported, was that they would not form part of the tribunal to try themselves. The Secretary to the Treasury said part of the case of the late Government would be one of recrimination. [Sir STAFFORD NORTHCOTE dissented.] He (Mr. Collier) contended that if it was the object of hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition side to satisfy the public in this matter, they would not do themselves justice by opposing the Motion before the House.

said, he for one felt the force of the appeal made to the House that they should treat this matter in a spirit of impartiality, and strictly refuse to look at it from a party point of view. Endeavouring to approach the question in that spirit, he did not doubt his right hon. Friend (Mr Bouverie) had made this Motion with no other aim in his mind than the advance- ment of public justice. He thought, however, the speech of his right hon. Friend was not calculated to present his Motion altogether in that light of impartiality, because he undoubtedly founded his Motion on the allegation of the Petitioner that he would suffer in his interests, as a party asking the seat for Dovor, if this matter underwent a prior investigation before the Select Committee. But he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) put it to the recollection of the House whether his right hon. Friend did not likewise in great part found his Motion on the doctrine that the Select Committee which the House had appointed to investigate those packet and telegraph contracts was a Committee competent indeed to investigate the general questions of policy and prudence submitted to it, but not worthy of the confidence of the House or the public with reference to the particular cases of Dovor and Galway. He (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) confessed—and the Government shared that feeling—that he was most unwilling to take any step which should by the remotest implication appear to indicate a participation on the part of the Government in that want of confidence in the Select Committee, whether for the one purpose or the other. That Committee was not appointed for the purpose of conducting certain cases of criminatory accusation against any Government in particular. It was not to try the case of Dovor or Galway in any other spirit than that in which it would be its duty to examine every other case of contract that might come before it. It appeared to him that each of those inquiries, whether before an Election Committee or a Select Committee, had its own advantages. Undoubtedly, an inquiry before an Election Committee would be better for some purposes, and an inquiry before a Select Committee, with its larger and more comprehensive aspect, would be better for other purposes; but it was only a question which inquiry should be prior. Endeavouring to look fairly at the case, he received the allegation of the Petitioner that he would be prejudiced if this matter were first tried before the Select Committee, but he thought it would have better suited the convenience of the House if that allegation had been somewhat more explicit. But, treating that as a bonâ fide allegation, he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) asked what course the House ought now to take? The Chairman of the Select Committee was, absent at that moment from his place in the House, and they had no means of ascertaining whether the Committee had been regularly made cognizant of this petition, and whether they were prepared to give an opinion upon it. The question was, should the House undertake—with that allegation of contingent damage before them which had not been developed in explanation, and into which they could not there institute any scrutiny—on that ground to step in and limit the inquiry of the Select Committee which they themselves had appointed? The other alternative seemed to be a simple one. He did not think the House was bound to treat this petition with disrespect, and if it was competent to him to make such a Motion, he should be disposed to propose that the Petition of Sir William Russell be referred to the Select Committee itself. That Committee would then be in a condition to examine if they pleased, and with closed doors if they pleased, the persons who had made or had advised Sir William Russell to make the allegations contained in his petition. They would also be fair judges of the question whether that investigation prior to the sitting of the Election Committee would be likely to prejudice the interests of Sir William Russell. Judging between those two alternatives, he confessed he thought it would be the safer and more prudent course that they should allow the Select Committee itself to form its opinion on that subject; and if it were competent to him he would, therefore, move that the Petition of Sir W. Russell be referred to the Select Committee on Packet and Telegraphic Contracts.

said, that in the absence of the Chairman he, as a member of the Committee, wished to explain that they had the agent of the petitioner before them, when he made the same statements as were laid down in the petition. There were, however, no particulars of any inconvenience likely to arise laid before them. The Chairman informed the agent that it was the opinion of the Committee that if the case were referred to them they would not alter the ordinary course of proceeding unless they had instructions from the House, but that they would not go on till an opportunity had been given of presenting their petition to the House. He (Sir Francis Baring) had no authority to state the opinion of the Committee; but he believed the general impression of the Members was that no statement of inconveniences likely to ensue having been made, the proceedings of the Committee ought not to be impeded, especially as there was no prospect of the Dovor election committee being proceeded with this year.

said, he thought that after the statement of the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Francis Baring) the Chancellor of the Exchequer would hardly expect the House to support the suggestion he had made for referring the petition to the Select Committee. He should himself— though he had great doubts as to the expediency of such a course—have agreed to the suggestion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and left the Select Committee to decide the question, But there could then be no reason for taking that course, seeing the conclusion at which the Select Committee had arrived. He gave full credit to the right hon. Gentleman who introduced this business for all the impartiality of feeling which he had evinced. He held a deservedly high position in the opinion of the House, for he had on many occasions performed the difficult and arduous duties of Chairman of Committees; but he might be allowed to express the hope that he would not be Chairman of the Committee that was to investigate this matter. He thought the Members of the late Government had some claim on the consideration of the House in present circumstances. As there was really no prospect of the proceedings at the Dovor election being examined before a Committee this Session, it would not be fair to deprive the Members of the late Government of the opportunity that presented itself of promoting an investigation into all the circumstances of this case. His own anxiety was, he confessed, much alleviated by the full and manly statement which his hon. Friend (Sir Stafford Northcote), without asking it, had had an opportunity of making. That statement must have carried conviction to the mind of every Member in that House. So interesting was it from the candid and ingenuous spirit that pervaded it, and so characteristic of the nature of his hon. Friend, that it must have been felt to be a complete answer to the charges brought forward by the right hon. Member for Kilmarnock. He thought, with reference to the exact case before the House, that it was of importance to maintain the authority of the Select Committee in the important labours they were pursuing. By so doing they would be taking a course that would elicit truth, and that would do no injury to the interests of Sir William Russell. It was, no doubt, possible for a clever counsel to give an opinion that it would be of advantage to his client that the investigation before the Select Committee should not be pursued; but he should be surprised, and the character of that House would he changed, if they fell into so easy a trap, and allowed the authority of the Committee to be interfered with at the adroit suggestion of an anonymous counsel.

said, he considered that the functions of the two Committees would lie in different directions, and that they were not connected the one with the other. There was no ground for interfering with the Committee on contracts, because the Election Committee would be likely to inquire into one or two of the cases which the other Committee had to take into consideration. His right hon. Friend (Mr. Gladstone) had suggested that the Petition of Sir William Russell should be referred to the Committee on Contracts, as it was thought that Committee would judiciously use its discretion in the matter, but since that proposition was made the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Portsmouth (Sir Francis Baring) had informed the House that the Committee had already taken the question into consideration; that they had, in fact, taken the step which it was the intention of his right hon. Friend's Amendment to enable them to take. In these circumstances, his right hon. Friend would probably be of opinion that the Amendment was not now called for, and that the sense of the House should be taken on the main question, as to whether there should be any interference with the inquiry of the Contract Committee.

said, he did not think that the case had been met by the assertion that the inconvenience to Sir W. Russell had not been stated. If this issue were tried by the Select Committee it must also be tried by the Election Committee. Assume for the sake of argument that the Select Committee came to ore decision and the Election Committee to another, in what a position would it place the House of Commons? For these reasons he should put the House to the trouble of a division.