Sir, take this opportunity of making an inquiry of the noble Lord at the head of the Government, with reference to the statement which he made last night respecting the continuance of the suspension of arms. understood that there was to be a further continuance of the suspension of hostilities for one fortnight, dating from to-morrow. wish to know to what day now the Conference is adjourned; and also whether the suspension of hostilities for the space of one fortnight was connected with any conditions which might account for that particular duration of the armistice?

Sir, cannot at the present moment say why the suspension of hostilities was limited to that particular period. That particular dura- tion was not dependent an any conditions, but was the limit of suspension to which the Danish Government agreed. The other parties wished for a longer suspension, but only a fortnight's suspension was agreed to.

said, as secresy was so little observed by other parties to the Conference that the intelligence communicated to that House yesterday was known at Berlin was telegraphed back to this country before it was communicated to the House, he felt relieved from any obligations with respect to reticence. He wished therefore to ask the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether it is understood that no further extension of the armistice will be pressed upon Denmark by the British Government, in case the Conference should not come to a final agreement within the limits of the additional fortnight to which the duration of Conference is now extended?

I may be able to answer any question of fact, as, for instance, with respect to the extent of the armistice; but really am not able to give an answer as to what the Conference may do in cases which are yet to come.

said, he wished to ask the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, Whether he will undertake that none of the witnesses who may be examined before the Committee on Inspectors' Reports shall suffer any prejudice to their official position and prospects, so far as the Council Office is concerned, on account of any evidence which they may give before that Committee?

said, it was evident that in giving the undertaking which the noble Lord required, the Committee of Council were incurring the risk of being obliged to retain in a post of great importance an officer who, from his own statements and admissions, might have proved himself unworthy of the trust. At the same time he believed it had never been the practice of any department to allow one of its officers to suffer for evidence given by him with respect to the Acts of that department; and as, in the present case, it was important that in an inquiry affecting the character and honour of a department the evidence of an officer of that depart- ment should be given freely and without any fear of personal consequences, the Committee of Council did not consider that they would be right in withholding their consent to the undertaking required by the noble Lord. At the same time it should be clearly understood, that that concession was confined strictly within the limits indicated by the Question of the noble Lord.

I should be glad to know when the Committee is likely to sit, as understand the noble Lord (Lord Robert Cecil) and the Lord Advocate have been appointed assessors. It is well known that the right hon. and learned Lord Advocate is daily engaged in the Yelverton appeal case, and should like to know if the Committee is to await the settling of that appeal, or whether any arrangement has been made.

The Committee is summoned for Monday next, and then the necessary arrangements will be made.

said, he understood the right hon. Gentleman opposite, the Secretary of State for India, last evening to state, when the question relative to Lady Elgin's pension was before the House, that pensions granted out of the Indian revenue are not submitted to Parliament. He would now beg to ask if there is not a provision in the Act of 1858 under which all pensions and charges on the Indian revenue are to be laid before Parliament within fourteen days.

No doubt the pension would be laid before Parliament. What he stated was, that it was not necessary that it should be submitted for the Vote of Parliament.

said, he wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for War, Whether the promise made in the last Session of Parliament, that the quarters of the married soldiers at Aldershot should be separated, has been carried into effect?

replied, that the arrangements for the improved accommodation of the married soldiers in different camps had in some cases been carried out, and in other cases were in course of being carried out. The arrangements which had been in operation were that five or six families should be lodged in one hut. In some eases the quarters were separated by boarding, and in others only by canvas. Now, however, a sum of money had been taken in the Estimates for separating those quarters in a more permanent manner. It was intended that not more than four families should occupy one hut, and a chimney should be erected in the centre, so that each family might have a separate fireplace. The families would then be completely by themselves, and although he could not say that sufficient money had been taken to carry out all the arrangements in the present year, still he believed very great progress would be made towards that object.

rose to move—

"That in the opinion of this House it, is expedient that the duty of ascertaining the facts upon which legislation in respect to Private Bills is to proceed should be discharged by some tribunal external to this House."

He feared he had but little chance in the present state of public feeling upon the great and important national questions which occupied their attention, of successfully inviting the attention of the House to the comparatively humble subject which he desired to bring before them. If it had anything in it that could commend it to the attention of hon. Members it was the fact that it had reference to their personal comfort and the ease with which they might perform their Parliamentary duties. Pew of those who heard him but had personally suffered from the system of legislation on Private Bills as it existed. The Treasury Bench was, he believed, exempt from serving on Private Bill Committees, as, also, were those hon. Gentlemen who occupied an analogous position on that (the Opposition) side of the House. Gentlemen advanced in years were likewise free from the necessity of discharging the onerous duties to which he alluded. But with these exceptions every hon. Member had been forced at one time or another to take part in those duties. What he wished to point out was this, that a feeling against the existing system was generally prevalent, and that there was to be found a remedy for the evil which the House would easily be able to put into operation. He appealed to the experience of hon. Gentlemen themselves. That experience would afford him ample testimony to the inconvenience of having, in addition to the performance of their public duties, to occupy a great part of their time in discharging duties which more properly belonged to another tribunal. He hoped that hon. Gentlemen would not run away with the idea that when they sacrificed themselves in order to do the duties which fell upon them in consequence of the system they thereby earned any considerable title to the affection of their fellow countrymen. He was afraid the fact was quite the reverse; for the discontent; outside the House with the system was general. When he last brought forward the question he referred to a petition from; the Associated Chambers of Commerce, presented by the hon. Member for Bradford, in which the system of Private Bill legislation was denounced in the strongest terms. Since then the Associated Chambers had met again and expressed their opinion in terms so distinct that he would quote them to the House, and he would remind hon. Gentlemen that these Chambers of Commerce represented the classes principally interested in the successful and just performance of that particular duty. They represented the commercial classes, who chiefly came before the Committees of that House to ask protection for commercial undertakings or to resist alleged encroachments on their rights. The Associated Chambers of Commerce had passed a resolution, in which they stated that the present system of Private Bill Legislation was expensive and inefficient, and interfered with the course of public business; and they recommended that a superior court should be constituted, consisting of judges, with the requisite professional and engineering information. Not only was that resolution passed, but a debate took place, and he would refer to what fell from a gentleman representing the Hull Chamber of Commerce, in order to give to hon. Members an idea of the appreciation in which their labours on private committees were held. That gentleman (Mr. Norwood) said that he was concerned, as chairman of a proposed dock company, in a Bill which three years ago was a long time before a Committee of the House of Commons, con- sisting of five gentlemen, four of whom had no knowledge of commercial matters; and such was the ignorance displayed by them of the matter under consideration, that after being examined for a considerable period to show the necessity for the formation of a graving dock, he heard to his great mortification one Member of the Committee say to another, "What does he mean by a graving dock?" to which question the other replied, "I am sure do not know, but suppose it is something relating to ships." Considerable expense (Mr. Norwood added) was caused by the ignorance of Committees, who often took a great deal of evidence which had nothing to do with the matter before them, and it was owing to their want of knowledge on special subjects that they allowed themselves to be brow-beaten, as they sometimes were, by the Parliamentary agents and counsel. It was apparent, from the resolution passed at that meeting, and from the speeches by which it was supported, that the commercial classes were not very fond of this particular jurisdiction, which inflicted so much inconvenience on Members of that House. He knew that he should be told that the House of Commons was jealous of that jurisdiction, and that every considerable authority was against depriving the House of the power it had so long exercised. That was a mistake, however, for no authority could be found in support of the existing system. A Committee sat on the subject last year, and many competent witnesses were heard before it. He would not refer to their evidence, but simply mention the names of those who condemned the system. Among these witnesses were Mr. Rickards, the speaker's counsel. Lord Redesdale, Mr. Massey, Lord Grey, Mr. Adair, Mr. May, and Colonel Wilson Patten. He did not say that all agreed in the remedy which he proposed, but they all concurred in the opinion that the present system was bad, and according to their several characters, they expressed an opinion in stronger or milder terms, but they agreed that the present system did not give to the parties that justice for which they paid, and to which they had a right. The matter had at last come to a crisis, the machinery had broken down, and hon. Members felt the evil of the call made upon them. He need not remind the House how difficult it had been during the Session to carry on both the public and private business. Persons out of doors had noticed how often the deliberation of the House had been interrupted by what was called a "count out," and they attributed the circumstance to the indolence of hon. Members. If the public really knew the burdens which hon. Members had to bear, they would form a more charitable judgment. It was not merely the public business that had broken down, but the private business was coming to an equal dead lock. His hon. and gallant Friend the Member for North Lancashire (Colonel Wilson Patten) told him that his difficulty was increasing daily, and that he was afraid of passing before an open window lest he should be thrown out of it by indignant private Members lurking about. The position of the hon. Member was like that of a familiar of the Inquisition in olden times in respect to Moors and Jews; and private Members looked on the hon. and gallant Gentleman as a man who could take away their liberty and shut them up for three or four weeks. The useless labour imposed on the hon. Member for North Lancashire and the Committee of Selection to maintain an inefficient system would, he believed, have amply sufficed to discharge all the functions which the House had any occasion to perform in reference to Private Bills. He had stated that there was no authority who said that the present system was satisfactory but he was wrong, for there was in the blue-book, containing the evidence given last year, the testimony of a certain number of witnesses who asserted that the system was everything that was satisfactory. It was a curious phenomenon, for which he did not attempt to account, that this testimony was given entirely by Parliamentary agents and counsel. Perhaps a little light was thrown on this matter by the hon. and gallant Member for North Lancashire, who stated in his evidence that—

"The great defect of the present system is that there is no single individual who appears before the Committee who has not a direct pecuniary interest in prolonging the proceedings."

That possibly might, in some degree, account for the support given by the parties he had named to a system which every other authority most unflinchingly condemned. The House would naturally ask him what plan he had to suggest in place of the existing system. It was not, of course, for him to furnish information on that point in detail, and he needed only to point out principles on which a remedy might be based, leaving to others who had opportunity and official knowledge to fill up the details. He had gone through a good deal of the minutes of evidence taken before Private Bill Committees, with the view of ascertaining whether a portion of | their labours might not be transferred to some other tribunal. The issue presented; by every Private Bill was very simple On one side there was to be considered the injury done to private individuals, and, on the other hand, the advantage to the pub- he from the project contemplated. The balance had then to be struck in order to see which outweighed the other; but be fore that point was arrived at, there was an enormous amount of facts to be proved, and a great deal of time was wasted in ascertaining those preliminary facts. For instance, on a Water Bill, which had occupied a great deal of time this Session, and which desired to bring water to a population. It might drain certain lands, interfere with mills, or it might interfere with existing companies. There were three opponents to deal with—the old water companies, the people to be supplied, and those whose stream was injured. A great part of the labour of the Committee was devoted, however, to such questions us these:—The amount of population, the present supply of water, the exact nature of the scheme, the distance of the sources, the volume of the contemplated supply, the size and safety of the reservoirs, the area of the gathering ground, the height of the hills, the angle of the fall, the rainfall of the district, the chemical composition of the water, and the estimates of expenses. These were all simple facts. They were not matters of opinion. They could all be ascertained by an engineer going to the spot, and when once ascertained could admit of no doubt. If the opposing party chose to appoint an arbitrator, the two could decide whether the facts were true or not without any expense or labour on the part of the Members of the House, and without any danger of their decision being called in question, It was the same with railways. There were gradients, curves, distances, configuration of surface, the geological character of the ground, the estimate of the work. These were the items which now occupied the time of the Committee, and which might be easily disposed of by a scientific arbitration. In one Committee on a Water Works Bill, he remembered hours being consumed in inquiring into the safety of the reservoir. Was that a subject for the consideration of Members of the House? Was it not rather a subject that could be more fitly abandoned to an engineer? The same with regard to railways. He remembered a whole day being spent in an inquiry into the nature of the ground through which a tunnel was to pass. Surely that labour might have been spared to the Committee. Besides these questions of fact there were questions of opinion, The traffic between place and place, and the injury done to individuals. Those were points upon which scientific men could not judge, and which ought to be decided by a tribunal, such as a jury empanelled on the spot, or that recommended by the associated chambers of commerce, rather than by five Members of the House of Commons. The damage done by a railway after a Bill was passed was left to be decided by a jury, and by the same analogy, the injury done before the Bill passed, should be decided also by a similar tribunal. He had no wish that any Gentleman who took the same side as himself should assent to all the details of his Motion. All he wished was that private Members should unite with him in condemning the system as a whole, in pressing the matter on the attention of the Government, and intimating to them that they must undertake the duty of remedying it. The truth was that, unless private Members took the matter up, nothing would ever be done. It was not the interest of official Members to do anything—they were free from the burden. The argument constantly urged whenever an attempt was made to induce Members to abandon the system was, that the House of Commons was jealous of its prerogative, and would not part with it. He believed that such an argument was a libel on the House of Commons. The House of Commons would readily part with any jurisdiction which had ceased to be useful to the public whom they represented. Any pride or pleasure that might have been felt in this jurisdiction had long since passed away under the heavy pressure which it imposed on private Members. He knew that he should be opposed by Members of great authority in these matters. He saw his noble Friend the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Stanley) taking notes, and his noble Friend had had more to do with imposing this weight on private Members than any other man: Delirunt reges plectuntur Achivi. When his noble Friend went mad, private Members were victimized. His noble Friend was an enthusiast for that particular kind of work, but his enthusiasm was confined to his own breast, and the mass of Members would gladly see a jurisdiction, against which suitors murmured, and the expense of which was a reproach to English jurisprudence, transferred to a more efficient tribunal, leaving their own energies free to perform those most important and larger duties with which they were charged by their constituents. The noble Lord concluded with his Motion.

said, he entirely concurred with the noble Lord in the description he had given of the labours hon. Members of that House had to perform during the Session in connection with private legislation. No doubt, the duties of representatives of the people of this country, both in reference to public and private business, must be heavy and laborious. The business of law-making in a country like this could not be done without labour or without great sacrifices. Law-making must be founded on deliberate and anxious inquiries—and private Bill legislation was a form of law-making. It was, in fact, the making of exceptional laws for cases which were not provided for by the general law of the country. If the general law of the country could be reduced to such a form that everybody could do those things now requiring special legal sanction under certain conditions laid down beforehand, there would be no need for Private Bill legislation; but until that could be done, Parliament was obliged to pass exceptional laws for particular cases, and he was one of those who believed that these exceptional powers ought to be given only by Parliament. They were matters of judgment, discretion, and expediency; and it was for Parliament to consider, after an investigation of its own, whether the facts made out justified it in rejecting or passing the proposals made to it. The noble Lord had hardly fairly described the qualities of Members of that House for deciding matters brought before them in Committees; nor did he think there was so much dissatisfaction amongst the public with the manner in which Parliament had performed this duty. Improvements, undoubtedly, might be made in the mode of bringing business before the Committees, and also in the mode in which the business was conducted; but there was not that general dissatisfaction with the Parliamentary tribunal which the noble Lord had described. Though the noble Lord had said that many of the witnesses condemned these Parliamentary tribunals, he had not informed the House what was the finding of the Select Committee who heard those witnesses on one side and the other. [Lord ROBERT CECIL: The Report was only carried by a majority of one.] There was a small majority, but he thought it was carried by more than one vote. The Chairman did not vote. The opinion of the Committee was this:—

"That having regard to the character of the questions which arise on the consideration of contested Private Bills, your Committee is disposed to concur with the view entertained by the majority of the witnesses, that no court of inquiry could be constituted for the purpose of investigating such questions which, on the whole, would be so satisfactory to the public as Committees composed of the Members of the Houses of Parliament."

The noble Lord named many eminent gentlemen who had given evidence condemnatory of the present system; but nearly every one of those gentlemen proposed to form his new tribunal in some way or other out of the old ingredients. The Members were to be Members of Parliament or Peers. Take the case of Lord Redesdale, to whom the noble Lord had referred. He would have had a Committee composed of two Commoners and one Peer, and they were to sit before the commencement of the Session of Parliament and to eliminate from the measures proposed to be laid before Parliament such as in their judgment ought not to be passed, allowing the rest to be carried in the ordinary way. Then take the case of the hon. Member for Ipswich. His proposition was to leave the Committees as they were with the exception that he would appoint a paid Chairman—a plan which he thought would ensure the duties being performed under an increased sense of responsibility. The other hon. Gentlemen named by the noble Lord, all of them, contemplated the ultimate decision coming to Parliament. They all agreed that whatever external tribunal there might be there must be an appeal to Parliament. Then, if there was an appeal to the House of Commons, what would the House do? Would the whole House entertain it? No; they would hand the question to a Select Committee, and the interested parties would have to be heard by counsel. [Lord ROBERT CECIL: No, no.] Was it probable that in those great struggles, in which the main question was whether old companies should retain possession of a district or new companies should be admitted to compete with them, any Judge would endeavour to stop persons from proceeding further who had a right of appeal to the House of Commons? On the contrary, he would gay at once, "this is a question for Parliament to decide, involving, as it does, points of expediency and discretion." That being so, the battle would after all, in all great questions, be fought within the walls of that House; and all that would be effected by establishing such external tribunals as were proposed was, that one stage more would be added to the conflicts which took place—one more source of expense. There had, he might add, been something like an attempt to provide for Private Bill legislation by means of such preliminary inquiries before external tribunals. A Committee, which sat in 1853, and of which his right hon. Friend the Member for Oxfordshire (Mr. Henley) was Chairman, made a report in which were set forth the failures which had attended the attempts made to control the action of Parliament by preliminary inquiry. The first who tried was Mr. Huskisson, and he failed; next came Lord Dalhousie; and in 1844 the Government of Sir Robert Peel proposed a scheme to determine what plan should be adopted in reference to the subject; but Parliament refused to be controlled by those preliminary inquiries. He did not, he might add, quite understand the plan of the noble Lord. His Resolution was—

"That in the opinion of this House it is expedient that the duty of ascertaining the facts upon which legislation in respect of Private Bills is to proceed should be discharged by some tribunal external to the House."

Did the noble Lord propose that the facts and the evidence were to be taken before one court, and that the decision upon those facts and that evidence was to be pronounced by another? Were the facts to be ascertained by some judicial body, and then the preamble of the Bill to be settled by a Committee of the House of Commons? The difficulty in such a case would be to define beforehand what a Committee would consider to be material in guiding its decision. If the facts which it was necessary to prove before the Committee could be settled beforehand, it would be quite possible, no doubt, to ascertain them by any process which it might be deemed right to adopt. Even then the Committee could not be precluded from examining further into those facts, because the inquiry before the Committee on a private Bill had no definite character. It was in the nature of an inquisition with the view to satisfying Members of Parliament whether it was expedient that certain powers should be given to the parties who applied for them, so that the facts to be ascertained could not be defined beforehand without great difficulty. If it were proposed that the Committee should meet first in order to consider what facts should be inquired into elsewhere, he did not think much time or labour would by such a plan be saved, or much expense or delay to the parties themselves avoided. The Committee would first assemble to decide what facts were material to the issue; a court would then set about the investigation of those facts; and then the Committee would have to meet a second time, to sift them as reported by the court, and see whether they establish the preamble. Let him take, by way of illustration of his argument, a proposition for the formation of a tunnel in Oxford Street, from the Marble Arch to Tottenham Court Rood. What facts could in that case be ascertained for investigation by an external tribunal, with a view to their being laid before the Committee? The Committee, in exercising its inquisitorial power, would gradually understand the whole bearing of the question, and those facts would come out which appeared to be material for guiding them in their decision. The principle for which the noble Lord contended was, no doubt, acted upon to some extent at present, for instance, by the 150th Standing Order it was laid down that, in cases of amalgamation, certain things should be proved to the satisfaction of the Board of Trade; whether, for instance, the respective parties paid up a certain part of the capital ordered to be raised by means of shares and so forth. The Committee, supplied with those facts, took them as matters proved, and to that extent their labours were of course diminished. He was quite willing moreover to admit that, if it could be done, the lessening of those labours farther was an object which it would as far as possible be desirable to accomplish. Those, however, who had carefully considered the question, could hardly, he thought, see their way to the expediency of taking the jurisdiction over private business out of the hands of the House of Commons so clearly as the Chambers of Commerce to which the noble Lord referred seemed to do. It must be borne in mind that the proposals which came before the House in the shape of Private Bills changed with the times, and that they ought not, therefore, to be dealt with by a fixed body, apt to be guided by precedents; and to lay too much stress on consistency and uniformity. They ought rather to be judged of by the representatives of the people at the moment, and if the contrary course had been pursued, it was possible we might not have had a railway at all; or, at any rate, the railways would have been long delayed, for lawyers would naturally proceed upon the principles which he had just mentioned, and great obstacles would thus be thrown in the way of progress and improvement. Such a tribunal might have been astounded at the proposal to make the railway from Liverpool to Manchester. Lawyer-like they would have looked to consistency, and felt bound by precedent. He believed there was no body in the country fit to deal with these fluctuating and changeable questions like a representative body; and therefore he, for one, would not give his consent to the Resolution, if in the least it went to take away the jurisdiction of Parliament in these matters. Lawyers could tell the legal effect of certain facts, when facts were proved before them. A law being in existence, judicial bodies might apply the law to the facts; but he denied that judicial bodies were the proper parties to say what the policy of the country should be. It was not a question of administration but of legislation; and he thought it behoved the House not lightly to agree to any proposition which seemed like parting with its jurisdiction over the private legislation of the kingdom.

said, that after the satisfactory and conclusive statement of his right hon. Friend he should not have trespassed on the attention of the House were it not for the peculiar course which had been taken by the noble Lore below him in recommending his Resolution to the House. He regretted that the noble Lord had not contented himself with pointing out the defects of the present system of Private Bill legislation without seeking to cast so much odium not only on Committees of the House, but also on individuals composing those Committees. He had scarcely ever heard, for instance, so unjust and uncalled for an attack as the noble Lord had made on his noble Friend the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Stanley). Did the noble Lord, he would ask, know the circumstances under which his noble Friend took upon himself the laborious duty of presiding over the Committee to which his observations pointed? His noble Friend bad, at the end of last Session, come to him and stated that he was afraid he could not again undertake that duty, and it was only at his particular and earnest request that he consented to go through the labour which it imposed during the present Session. Yet the return which his noble Friend got was that the noble Lord sought to throw upon him the odium of the present system. [Lord ROBERT CECIL: should be the very last person to do anything of the kind.] He was sorry if he had misunderstood the noble Lord, but he had, at all events, thrown odium on the Committees of that House, and had quoted statements made by somebody—nobody knew whom—as to what he had heard pass in conversation in a particular Committee between two of its Members. Now, if there was anything for which the Committees of the House on Private Bills were distinguished, it was for their impartiality and the painstaking manner in which they devoted themselves to the investigation of the cases which came before them. Although the commercial community complained of the way in which the business was conducted, it was the great railway bodies who, when another system was tried some years ago, brought back the present course of procedure by declaring their want of confidence in any tribunal except one constituted in Parliament. He had expressed an opinion before a Select Committee that certain facts might be ascertained elsewhere; but when he consulted with men of experience, such as the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn, the hon. Member for Ipswich, and other Chairmen of Committees, he found that they were of opinion that the investigation could not be divided between Parliament and an external tribunal. The experiment of having a preliminary inquiry had already been tried without success, for it only doubled the expense without giving any satisfaction; and after two years' experience of it he felt compelled to move its abandonment. Perhaps some mode might yet be devised of holding a preliminary investigation; but unless the House had some practical scheme in view, it would be dangerous for it to pass a general Resolution leading the public to expect something which all their experience hitherto had proved impracticable. If his noble Friend really wished to have the matter taken up, he should move for another Committee, and place himself at the head of it. His noble Friend had alluded jocularly to the animadversions which were passed by hon. Members on the Committee of Selection; but he was bound to acknowledge seriously the great and valuable assistance they had derived from Members in conducting the private business of the country. He hoped the noble Lord would not press his Motion,

said, he felt bound to state that he did not understand his noble Friend to speak of him (Lord Stanley) in any other spirit than that of good humour, and he also wished to discuss the question in the same spirit. The House was indebted to his noble Friend for bringing forward the subject. He was the last person to deny that the manner in which the Private Bill legislation was conducted was capable of various amendments in detail. Faultfinding was easy; but the real question was, however, not whether the existing arrangements were perfect, but whether any other system could be substituted which would work better. As to the general dissatisfaction with which it was alleged the decisions of Committees were regarded, he could not admit it. It must be remembered that several rival interests were represented before a Committee, and it stood to reason that some of them must be defeated. Those parties whose hopes were disappointed not unnaturally left the Committee not particularly well pleased. What they had to consider was whether it was possible to transfer the decision of these cases from Parliament to any other tribunal. It was suggested that they might have a Board or Commission, which would be paid for its labours, would sit regularly, and would possess the advantage of greater experience and greater dispatch. But the next point was whether this Commission was to give judgment with or without an appeal. If there was to be an appeal, it must be to the House or to a Committee, and in either event he did not see what would be gained. In every case, involving important pecuniary interests, the Bill would be fought to the last, and thus the result would be, if it were sent to a Committee, that an additional step would be added to the trial, with a corresponding increase of expense to the parties concerned. If, on the other hand, the decision rested with the House at large, he feared the consequence would be a mere scramble for Parliamentary influence. Or, lastly, if there was to be no appeal, they must consider the amount of absolute irresponsible power which would be placed in the hands of three or four permanent officials. Railway business to the amount of £30,000,000 or £40,000,000 annually came before Parliament. It was no answer to say that the Judges dealt with pecuniary interests quite as important. He admitted that; but a trial before one of the ordinary courts bore no resemblance to the trial of a Private Bill before a Parliamentary Committee. The Judge had a simple and definite issue before him. He had to decide whether, say, a property belonged to A or B, or whether the law had or had not been violated by certain persons. He had no arbitrary power or discretion. He had only to ascertain what the law was, and to apply it to the particular matter before him. But in the case of a Private Bill there was no fixed law. The issue was whether this or that company should make a line, but there was no right in the matter. It was merely a question whether it would be more for the public advantage that the one or the other should get authority to construct the line. It was impossible to deal with matters of that kind in a way which would not leave a large and arbitrary discretion in the hands of those with whom the decision rested, and on that ground the ultimate judgment could not safely be intrusted to any body apart from the House. It had been proposed, however, that the facts ascertained in the preliminary inquiry should be embodied in a report, or summary of evidence, which should be laid before the Committee, and upon which counsel should be allowed to argue, before the Committee came to a decision. Without absolutely condemning that plan, he would point out some difficulties which attended it. Whatever might be gained by the more methodical course of procedure in taking evidence, it was inevitable that the evidence would be exceedingly voluminous. Even omitting details which were unimportant, if not irrelevant, it would often happen that the testimony would fill a folio volume of several hundred pages; and there was no security that the Committee would master that printed statement as completely as they would learn the features of the case from listening to the witnesses day after day. He did not deny that that plan would save some time to the Committee, but when they took into account the length of the inquiry before the Commission, in addition to the trial before the Committee, they would see that the whole affair would last a great deal longer than now. It was to be remembered, too, that defeated parties would probably be dissatisfied with having decisions given against them by an unseen and unknown tribunal. There would not be the same conviction in their minds that their cases bad been fairly gone into, as there was when they saw the witnesses examined in their presence and observed the Committees carefully watching the evidence. Such were the difficulties which appeared to him to stand in the way of the proposition now before the House. The principal objections to the existing mode of transacting private business were three in number—the allegation of the uncertainty of decisions, the expense to the parties, and the labour imposed upon the Members of that House. His belief was that since the House had adopted the practice of limiting the number of chairmen, and thus throwing the main responsibility into fewer hands, the instances of contradictory decisions, so much complained of formerly, had, if not ceased to occur, been greatly diminished in number. The fact was, that even if all Private Bills were tried by some independent tribunal they never could have that uniformity of decisions which prevailed in courts of law; because, in dealing with Private Bills, there was no fixed law to administer, and the question of what was best for the public interests was necessarily a very vague and general one, upon which men of equal competence might come to different judgments in different cases. He was afraid, again, that they never would get rid altogether of unnecessary expense to the parties whatever mode of procedure might be adopted; but he thought that the promoters and opponents of Private Bills were themselves principally in fault. Other litigants proceeded at their own charges, but when Railway Companies fought one another upstairs, the shareholders paid the expenses, and the directors enjoyed the pleasure and excitement of the contest. He did not know why railway shareholders did not, as a general rule, exercise much control over their boards; but such was undoubtedly the case, and as long as one set of men spent the money and another found it, so long they could not expect economical administration. He believed, in the last place, that the labour imposed upon the Members of that House fell hard in some instances; but the evil lay not so much in the amount of the work as in the inequality with which it seemed to be divided. He had made some rough calculations on that subject—though he was afraid he could not vouch for their strict accuracy—from which it appeared that assuming from the total number of members 150 might be deducted as disabled by age, or exempted by station, and distributing the duty among 500 hon. Gentlemen, the average amount of labour devolving upon each did not come to more than eight days in the course of a year. Considering the magnitude of the interests involved, it could not, he submitted, be fairly said that that amount was excessive. At the same time he thought that some relief might be given in that respect. For example, he had never been able to understand why in ordinary cases there should be separate hearings before Committees of the two Houses of Parliament. When some time ago a joint Committee was appointed to consider the London Railway Bills, he was himself afraid that the experiment might not succeed, but the plan worked very well, and he had no doubt that in 99 cases out of every 100—for he presumed that each House would preserve the right of dealing separately with cases requiring special attention—one Committee might do the work for both Houses. That course would lessen the work to a considerable extent. Then he thought that the number of five members on Private Bill Committees was unnecessarily large. Last year he proposed to reduce it to three, and he was still inclined to hold that opinion. The objection urged against it was that in the event of any one of the three being disabled by illness, the whole of the responsibility would rest upon the Chairman. If the House were of opinion that that objection was of so much weight as to overrule the advantage of diminishing the number to three, then it might be reduced from five to four, the only disadvantage of which would be that in doubtful cases it would be necessary to give the Chairman a double vote. He had calculated in a rough way that the effect of these alterations would be to reduce the amount of labour imposed upon members by one-third. Such were the practical suggestions be had to offer, and he hoped they would be taken into consideration with any other amendments that might be proposed; but, meanwhile, ho trusted the House would not proceed upon the unusual and unsatisfactory plan of passing a general Resolution, which condemned the existing system without substituting anything else in its place.

said, he concurred with a good deal of what had been said by the President of the Board of Trade, and by the noble Lord who had just sat down, upon this question. The Committees of the House of Commons with regard to private business, had assumed more and more the character of prophets than of judges. The facts were daily lessening, and the matter became one of speculation more than of judgment. He had reason to believe that if the House directed their rules to be more rigidly enforced, half of the burdens thrown upon Members would quickly disappear. It appeared from a return, that the sum lodged with the accountant general as deposits for railway schemes that year, amounted to £6,300,000. That was to be multiplied by 12½, to represent the capital involved in the decision of the Committees; so that nearly the sum of £80,000,000 was brought under the adjudication of Parliament. The first thing he would ask the House to consider was, how far the existing rules and regulations had been attended to. If their rules were not only not enforced, but were allowed to be set at defiance, he should feel little interest in any plan which might be proposed. They should first try what the enforcement of their rules would do before they rushed into a totally different and new system of proceeding. He dared to say the Committees did not give satisfaction to all parties, but he should be glad if in some respects they gave less satisfaction. If the present system should be found so bad as to be wholly incapable of enabling them to transact the business which came before them, then he would say reform it altogether. He thought the Chairmen of Committees, of whom he was one, might do something by coming to an understanding with each other on the subject of Standing Orders. At present, there seemed to be a considerable variation of opinion as to the degree in which the Standing Orders should be carried into effect.

said, he could not support the Resolution ns it stood, as he was not prepared to give up the practice of taking vivâ voce evidence by the first tribunal before whom a case might come. The proceedings of the Committees, however, might be shortened in many ways; for instance, when a Bill originated in the House of Lords, a Committee took the evidence in full. When the Bill reached the House of Commons, why should they re-hear the whole of that evidence instead of accepting the printed evidence from the House of Lords, just as the two Houses recognized each others' blue-books on political subjects? When a Bill had come from the other House, he thought a Committee of three, instead of five, was sufficient to deal with it; and that, unless in the case of a special application, no evidence further than what had been heard before the Lords should be given. As to a tribunal external to the House, he thought, however carefully its inquiries might be conducted, its decisions would not be treated with very much respect by the House. Indeed, the scheme which was recommended by his noble Friend had been tried, and had completely failed. He remembered the case of an inquiry in the country on which a friend of his sat for six weeks, and then when the Bill came before the House the whole matter was gone into again before a Committee. The same was the case with reference to the inquiries under Lord Dalhousie and the Board of Trade, although they were so elaborate and so careful that nearly every recommendation which they made had, though rejected at the time, since been accepted by Committees of that House. He regretted that his noble Friend (Lord Stanley) should have so completely sacrificed himself to the conduct of private business that he was unable to sit upon public Committees, or to give the full advantage of his assistance in the proceedings of the House. The duty of serving upon Committees ought to be more equally distributed among the Members, and it would be well if no one would consent to do more than his share of it.

said, that he had the greatest respect for the Committees of that House, the Members of which discharged a most onerous and ungrateful duty with great ability and the greatest integrity; but he did not think that full justice had been done to the evils of the existing system. The first objection was that a great amount of valuable labour was diverted from the public Committees and public business of the House to the performance of judicial functions, and judicial functions of by no means a high order. The second objection was that the Gentlemen who sat upon those Committees were in somewhat the same position as juries would be if they were called upon to administer the law without judges to assist them. They were gentlemen of ability and integrity, but they were in the hands of practised counsel, by whom they were addressed in artful and able speeches, and they had to perform many of the duties of a judge at Nisi prius without the training and practice which gave authority and facility to the decision of such judges. The proceedings before such a tribunal must necessarily be greatly prolonged, and such a prolongation caused enormous expense and -led to a denial of justice to many persons, who had to put up with injuries of which they could not afford to complain. Nor must they look, as in ordinary cases, to the litigants to agitate for redress, because, although they did not say so, there was no doubt that the great railway companies regarded the enormous expense of these Parliamentary contests with complacency, as they looked upon it as a security for their maintenance of what they had got from the Legislature. Since the Committee system first came into operation, the theory upon which the Legislature dealt with joint-stock companies had greatly changed, and much time and labour would be saved if Committees, accommodating their practice to that change of principle, were to confine their inquiries, in the case of railway companies at all events, to those parts of the Bill which authorized companies to do something which they could not do without the authority of the Legislature. Then, although decisions were continually being given upon points which were of the greatest consequence to the public, no rule, no law was created. Although a judicial decision was of value to the litigants, it was of still greater use to the rest of the community, who steered their course by it, and were thus enabled to avoid litigation. Such a result was not, however, attained by the Committees of that House. One Committee did not know what another had done or was doing. No record was kept, although a point might have arisen twenty times before, it was treated as a case of first impression; and the same question was often decided by different Committees in diametrically opposite ways. The result was that no one knew when he was sure to maintain his right, and no one could tell that he might not overthrow it. This afforded a great encouragement to experiments, and was a great source of anxiety to those who were interested in established undertakings. If a judicial and permanent element were introduced into the Committees, their judgments would be reported and gathered together, and would form precedents which would guide future decisions. A hundred years ago it was thought that the mercantile law could not be reduced to rule, but Lord Mansfield took the matter in hand and accomplished it. At the present moment railway companies did not know on what terms they held their property. They did not know whether competition was a proper ground of opposition; so that there were some hundreds of millions sterling embarked in railway property, and no one knew on what security. Not only had the House no practical control in the matter, but it really knew less about railway business than about any other kind of business; and after twenty years' experience of the inconvenience and insecurity arising from this, we left things just where we had found them. He did not pretend to any great practical knowledge on the subject, but it struck him that there were several modes by which an improvement could be effected. He believed it would he an improvement if a single person took the evidence now taken by Committees, and reported it to the House, leaving it for parties to move for a Committee if a Committee was desired. Again, he imagined it would be a great improvement to have joint Committees of the two Houses, even if the evidence was still to be taken by Committees. He thought it would he an improvement if hon. Members consented to act as special jurors, and to be presided over by a judge, so that they would act like special jurors in a case at nisi prius. Then, he could imagine that there might be a Committee appointed to act in these cases as the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council acted in appeal cases for the latter body. He believed there was no tribunal whose decisions gave more satisfaction than did those of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. He felt bound to express his opinion that Committees of the House of Commons, as then constituted, were not a satisfactory tribunal, and that some change was required in respect of their private legislation.

thought the decisions of Committees on Private Bills, although sometimes erroneous, were on the whole very satisfactory, and were much respected by the public. If an error was committed one Session, it could be remedied the next. No tribunal that he could imagine would pronounce decisions that would be equally satisfactory to the public Turning to the Motion of the noble Lord, he did not see how, as was suggested, it; would tend to save expense. True, the evidence as to the estimates connected with Private Bills might be taken by a Commission appointed by Government, or by, the House of Commons; but evidence of that kind was open to dispute, and would frequently be required to be given again before the Committee at a great addition to the expense. It was the great expense of these inquiries that the country objected to. The fees which parties who came before the Committees were obliged to pay had been beyond all measure extravagant. j, Something had already been done in the way of reducing those expenses, and he hoped that still more would be effected in that direction, for by that means much of the dissatisfaction entertained against Private Bill legislation would be removed.

said, his right hon. Friend the Member for Calne (Mr. Lowe) had placed the matter in so clear a light, and he concurred so fully in his right hon. Friend's observations, that he should not have thought it necessary to address the House, only that the great weight of authority seemed to be, not only against the proposition of the noble Lord the Member for Stamford, but also against any essential change in the present system, He concurred in thinking that the country was not so satisfied with the existing system, as some hon. Members seemed to suppose. A Select Committee was composed of Gentlemen some of whom might have a great knowledge of the subject to be considered, and others of whom might not have any knowledge of it at all. It was, therefore, an uncertain tribunal, and its decisions must be unsatisfactory, and lead to constant appeals to that House. He agreed with the President of the Board of Trade, that in a community like that of England, where opinions and interests were continually changing, it would be unwise to intrust to a fixed tribunal the powers adminis- tered by Parliamentary Committees; but it seemed to him that some one ought to be connected with a Committee who should give it a judicial character, and that it should be guided by some one of experience in the matter before it, as well as skilled in judicial investigation. It frequently happened that a great mass of evidence was taken by a Committee which had no bearing on the question. Counsel, Parliamentary agents, and solicitors had no interest in shortening the proceedings; and if the Chairman had not the moral courage to stop them, it often happened that they protracted the proceedings very unnecessarily. The suggestion of his right hon. Friend, therefore, was one of a practical character; and though it had been made before, was one worthy of consideration as likely to be of considerable advantage. The suggestion of the hon. Member for Leominster, that evidence should be taken once instead of twice, was one of which he approved; and if the Lords would consent to accept the evidence taken before a Committee of the House of Commons, and the House of Commons would adopt a corresponding rule, the proceedings would be shortened and a saving of expense effected. It should be borne in mind that the parties upon whom the expenses of proceedings before Parliamentary Committees ultimately fell were often not the litigants. There was a large class interested in litigation before the Committees, whose views consequently were not identical with those of the shareholders. Attention should, therefore, be directed as much as possible to the reduction of expenses. These would never be lessened unless the House took the matter in hand; and great credit, therefore, was due to the noble Lord for directing attention to a matter which was more thought of out of doors than hon. Members might be disposed to believe.

said, the Motion had called forth many interesting speeches from Gentlemen well qualified to pronounce opinions on the subject, but the noble Lord would see that it could not be expected to do more. His proposal to have one tribunal to take evidence, and another to decide upon it, was one which the House would never adopt. The noble Lord (Lord R. Cecil) was in error in assuming that the House and the Government had not grappled earnestly with this Question. There was no subject which had commanded more attention from the painstaking and practical Members than that of Private Bill legis- lation; and the fact that the grievances still continued showed how difficult it was to provide a remedy for them. Everybody admitted the evil, but it was the very magnitude of die grievance which led to its, continuance. From many of the proposals made that evening he felt compelled to differ. He did not believe, for instance, that hon. Members would feel themselves satisfactorily placed under the guidance of a judge by whom their attention; was to be directed to special issue. The training of the, judicial mind would infallibly lead the Judge to discard many of the innumerable issues which always; presented themselves in the investigations, of Private Bills, and thereby a great deal of matter would be excluded which yet might well deserve, consideration Members moreover, coming, as, they did from various classes of., society, would better appreciate the force of those issues than a single judicial mind could be expected to do. Again, he felt considerable doubts as to the propriety, in a constitutional point of view, of joint Committees of both Houses of Parliament. The subject had a right to petition both Houses of Parliament; and suppose a petition setting forth important facts, were presented to either. House after a Bill had undergone investigation by the joint Committee, the House surely could not ignore that petition. That very eveni9ng, in the case of the Dublin Improvement Bill, an instance had been afford of the importance of a second hearing in another place, where the omissions, neglect, or misrepresentations of parties at the first hearing might be supplied or corrected. No doubt, investigation by the second tribunal was attended with expense, but that was as secondary consideration compared with security of individual interests. It was impossible that was a secondary consideration compared with security of individual interests. It was impossible that the noble Lord himself could more ardently desire improvement in legislation of this nature than he did. In fact, he had introduced a Bill relating to one branch of the subject, piers and harbours, and presided over the Committee that the Bill was referred to. He then learnt form most respectable witness, that the view he had taken was erroneous, that the view he had taken was erroneous, and that the Parliamentary tribunal was by no means so unsatisfactory to the public as was supposed; those gentlemen declared their preference for the independent and impartial decisions of Committee, attended though these might sometimes be with expense and delay, to the arbitrary caprice of a public department, the officials of which were apt to run in a groove and to decide everything accordingly. He had come to the conclusion, as regarded a very large proportion of the business brought before Parliament, that it would be difficult to find any other tribunal which could deal with it as satisfactorily. There were, however, a vast number of applications which might be submitted to some tribunal out of doors? and he believed the extension of the system of provisional orders, being purely permissive, might be attended with useful results, preserving always the right of ultimate appeal to Parliament. The-working-of the Piers and Harbours Bill threw is some light; upon the matter. In the first year there, were nine applications for: provisional orders; seven were granted and; passed by Parliament without opposition: last year there were fifteen applications and in only three cases were granted, and there was one appeal to Parliament. That year there were twenty-seven applications, and in only three cases were objections taken and referred to a Committee. Without going into the question of the constitution of the-Committee, his strong feeling was that these subjects must be kept within the walls of Parliament, as regarded final legislation, but that the provisional order system might be extended, with a, sanitary effect.

said, the real question at issue in most of these Private; Bills, especially with regard to railways, was the question of competition between great companies; and if that could be settled, he believed: there would be no difficulty in acceding almost unanimously to the views which- the noble Lord- had so admirably expounded. The reason why the great companies were so unanimous infavour of the existing tribunal was because, owing to the expenditure and the great uncertainty of an appeal to Parliament, struggling enterprises were kept out of the field. The present system gave a virtual monopoly to the great companies, and seriously damaged the prospects of new local undertakings. Out of some£3,000,000 spent on new lines in the district with? which he was connected, he believed he was not exaggerating when he said that; an expenditure of £l,500,000 was due to the fact that-all these schemes had to pass, through Parliament. Money could rarely be raised for a local project in the district itself, and then it was necessary to apply for aid to contractors, engineers, and solicitors, who had no identity of interest with the district;, who assumed the management of the line with reference only to their own interests, and who repaid themselves at the rate of 50 per cent for the risks they incurred. The great railway companies found out that they had no chance of getting their claims so well attended to as by the Committees of Parliament, and they acted on that knowledge. That was the only reason why that class of business was retained in the House, with such public results ns the noble Lord had described, and with the private results upon the personal convenience of Members which mast be familiar to all. It should be remembered that there would be as much finality in the decisions of any other tribunal to which those questions might be referred as there was in those of Select Committees. Those Committees did not really legislate — they simply reported their opinion to the House; and this would be the case with any-other tribunal to which these matters were referred. The Report of the Committee of last Session noticed the various schemes which had been brought forward in reference to that class of business, and said that as it was not proposed by any one of the schemes to absolutely exclude parties from going before a Committee, in most cases they would avail themselves of the privilege, and thus the institution of a preliminary tribunal would only add to the length of the proceedings. That really was the ground for the House not parting with that class of business; and surely they should not be deterred from doing so, in consequence of the difficult questions involved, for the questions before Railway Committees were really much more simple than those brought before other Committees. In fact Railway Bills were much less complicated than Gas or Inclosure Bills. The increasing power of the great railway companies deserved the attention of that House. In 1853 competition was first allowed as a ground of objection to a new scheme; and then only at the discretion of the Committees. In 1863, when the question of competition was discussed by the Committee upon the various projects for the improvement of the present system, he carried a vote in the Committee that, so far as competition had been allowed as a ground of objection to new projects, it ought not to have been allowed, and that it should not be so in future; but that Resolution, though it formed the basis of about one half of the Report, was actually rescinded by the Committee—a step altogether without precedent, and due entirely to the overwhelming power and influence of the great companies in the Committees of the House. If they could exercise such influences in the Committees appointed to consider the subject of Private Bill legislation, much more might it be expected that such influence would be felt in the Private Bill Committees. The trade and general commerce of the country were involved in the question to an extent that was not exceeded by any single matter that engaged the attention of Parliament. The power of the great railway companies was also shown in regard to the Bill now before the House, and brought in by the President of the Board of Trade, for affording facilities for constructing railways. The Bill provided that where all the parties in a district having an interest in a new railway consented to its construction they could apply to the Board of Trade, and need not incur the expense of going before a Committee. The great companies, however, combined as one man, and insisted that they must have a voice in the new project. The Bill had therefore been altered to meet their views, and as it now stood it provided that if any railway or canal company intimated to the Board of Trade that they were not satisfied with the project, then the whole machinery of the Bill was set aside, and the parties applying for the Act were referred to a Committee upstairs, where they would have to cope with the inexhaustible resources of a great company. He trusted that, whatever the result of the present Motion might be, the noble Lord (Lord Robert Cecil) would not abandon the subject, but would continue to give it the patriotic, earnest, and enlightened attention he had already bestowed upon it. The noble Lord would find additional reason to be satisfied that he was devoting his influence and ability to a subject which would well repay his attention.

said, that although he did not go so far as the noble Lord, yet he could not think that Committees of the House were satisfactory tribunals to deal with these matters, except, indeed, so far as the honesty and integrity of purpose which they brought to bear upon the subject. It would be supposed that almost the first requisite of a tribunal to consider a railway Bill was great local knowledge, yet the Members of a Committee invariably came from different parts of the country, and thus could not bare the requisite local knowledge. It had been said, in reference to the enormous sums spent before Committees, that the directors spent the shareholders' money recklessly; but on- behalf of himself and his brother directors he must say that the expenditure was forced upon them, and chiefly by counsel overloading the inquiries with: unnecessary evidence. Directors had a clear; interest in saving money, because what they spent was partly their own. It had been said that the great companies were in favour of the present system; but he certainly had never heard his colleagues express such an opinion, or that they waned to keep small companies out of the field. It was true that they were obliged to fight a great number of Bills, and often had eventually to buy the interest of the new companies, but that was not an economical mode of acquiring a line. Unfortunately the facilities for obtaining freeholds were now so great that, with the aid of a discount house and a contractor, any project; no matter how absurd, could be set afloat without diffienlty. And then it was competent for a company to go before a Committee, and after fighting for a time, if their scheme was rejected they might go before a new Committee the next year with the same counsel and the same engineer, and then they would probably get a Bill without adducing any new evidence That showed that the present system was not very perfect. He had listened; with great pleasure to the speech of the right him. Gentleman the Member for Calne, and agreed with him in thinking that there was a great want at present, because there was nothing to guide the Chairman of a Committee to a decision; there was no system of railway law to which he might look for direction in any difficulty. If the noble Lord should carry the question to a division he could not support him, but he thanked the noble Lord, for the very able manlier in which he had brought the subject before the House.

said, he should have great pleasure in voting for the Resolution of the noble Lord. In a matter of this nature he would not have ventured to intrude his opinions on the, House, but having read with much attention the Reports of the Select Committee's of 1858 and 1863, and the best portion of the evidence, he collected than, the highest authorities, in, that House and out of it were unanimous in expressing a strong sense of the evils of the present system. Considerable changes had been made in consequence of the Report of the first Committee, and the question was whether the time was not now come for going still further. It was stated by some of the authorities to whom he had alluded, that the evils of the; present system were inseparable from the nature of the tribunals; that their decisions were fluctuating, uncertain, and frequently inconsistent, and did not command public confidence; It was also said that the Committees disliked the work allotted to them; and no one could blame them-if they did. They knew that their constituents had no interest in that work; if they had there was no labour they would not willingly undergo. As it was, they would prefer to devote their time to social and imperial questions, or to the study of international law which now more that ever invited the attention of the country. They saw that the strength and talent of the House was eliminated before an appeal was made to their ranks. Those engaged in office were exempt, and likewise those engaged in the profession of the law. The orators of that House, to whose utterances they all lent an attentive ear, on whose effusions they ever dwelt with so much pleasure, were rarely, if ever, found to ply the laboring our in the Committee-rooms upstairs. The duties of the Committees were of a more humble and unaspiring nature—

"The applause of listening senates to command Their lot forbade."

Thus, they found themselves committed to a contest beyond their strength, from which not much of credit or reputation; was to be gained. It was the advice of a celebrated critic of antiquity to the poets never to take up a subject above their resources, and to consider well beforehand what burden their shoulders were abel to bear—"

"Sumite materiam vestris, qui scribitis, æquam,

Viribus; et versate, diu, quid ferre recusant,

Quid valeant humeri."

And the same, rule applied to orators, as an orator is said to be next akin to a poet. If he were asked what system was to be established, in lieu of that now to be displaced, he, would refer to the suggestion which had been made of a railway tribunal composed, of men either in Parliament out of it; and he would not attach too much, weight to the objection against parting with any of their jurisdiction. In other; matters, such as those submitted to the Inclousure Commissioners, they had parted with a good deal already, and he thought they might part with more of that description without the slightest diminution of their hereditary splendour. He hoped he had said nothing in any degree disparaging or undervaluing the labours those who in the chief Committees set all this machinery in motion with so much ability and self-devotion. He had experience from them nothing but consideration and kindness, and it was only because he had studied their opinions as embodied in the Reports with the deepest attention, and was influenced by their high authority, that he had ventured to say what he had, adopting their suggestions and treading in their steps, though, perhaps, going a little further than some of them. Seeing, then, that this confinement of Members in committee-rooms was unnecessary and useless, and might better be dispensed with; seeing that they had abolished the slave trade, and that Factory Acts had been passed with the approbation of every friend of humanity and his country, he would cordially vote for the Resolution, as containing within it the element and the germ of the emancipation of Members of Parliament.

said, he thought it would be useless to press his Motion in the then state of the House, and therefore he proposed to withdraw it.

Sir, I rise to move,

"That the increasing trade and commerce of India, and the consequent increasing demand for a portable circulating medium, require that a gold currency should be established in that empire."

In India, and Eastern countries, silver is almost fee sole instrument of exchange, even for the largest transactions. This fact has important bearings upon our trade, which, with the East, differs from that with other countries. In the case of India, oar exports are insufficient to pay for our imports, and the consequent is that we have to pay the balance in specie. The extent of toe exports of specie to India, from the commencement of the present century, will be shown by Return moved for by my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen (Colonel Sykes); from which it will be seen that the balance of imports of specie, after deducting exports, into the provinces of Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, from 1801 to 1851, a period of fifty-one years, was £110, 662, 000, and from 1852 to 1863, a period of twelve years, it was £123,691,000. The average import for fifty-one years appears to have been about £2,000,000 per annum; but for the last twelve years it has increased to £10,000,000 per annum. Last year (1863), however, the import amounted to £19,367,000. Now, in order to obtain specie for the payment of our Indian imports, it is necessary that we should export our manufactures to countries producing specie. There would be little inconvenience in this operation, but the specie required by India is silver, while the chief production of the precious metals is gold. A double operation, therefore, becomes necessary, first to exchange our manufactures for gold, and then to exchange the gold for silver. But besides the ordinary demand for specie, to pay the balance of our imports from the East, a variety of circumstances have concurred to create an extraordinary demand for silver within the last fifteen years. About £50,000,000 have been invested in Indian railways. There has been the expense of the mutiny in India, a Persian war, two Chinese wars, an increased importation of a variety of Indian products, and this year an extraordinary importation of cotton, amounting probably from £30,000,000 to £40,000,000. In addition to the demand for silver from the East, there has been also a drain of silver to supply those countries which have demonatized gold. The discovery of gold in California in 1848, and subsequently in Australia, produced a great panic in the commercial world. Bank directors and writers, who were supposed to know more about such questions than any one else, predicted a serious decline in the value of gold, and a rise in price of all commodities. In 1850, Holland took the alarm, and demonatized her gold currency. Belgium followed her example. Russia, Spain, and Portugal prohibited the export of silver. In 1852, the East India Company, which previously to that time received gold mohurs at the treasury for fifteen rupees each, declined to receive any payments except in silver. The effect of this demonatizing of gold was, on the one hand, to create a great demand for silver, to replace the gold circulation; and, on the other hand, to increase the alarm occasioned by the influx of gold, by swelling the volume of gold which was rolling in from California and Australia. The natural supply of silver is limited; the demand for it has been exceptionally large. M. Chevalier estimates that the export of silver to the Levant and the East in l857 was £20,145,921, being more than double the yield of all the silver mines which supply the Western world. The exports to India alone, in the last twelve teats, amounted td £98,476,766, besides probably £30,000,000 to £40,000,006 to China. The exports of silver are still increasing: last year, to India alone, the export was equal to the whole production of the silver mines. It is surprising, under all the circumstances, that the advance in the price of silver in this country has been so small, for while it Ms advanced in India 10 to 12 per cent, it has only advanced here 1 to 4 per cent, and less disturbance has been hitherto created by this extraordinary state of things than might have been expected. This inordinate Eastern demand for silver, could not have been met without occasioning a great advance in price had it not fortunately happened that we have been able to obtain from1 France immense supplies of silver in exchange for gold. M. Chevalier says, the excess of exports over imports of silver from France, from 1852 to 1858, amounted to £45,080,000; and since then the exports have been in a like proportion. Until the gold discoveries, France had only a nominal circulation of gold, a small paper circulation, but an immense accumulation of silver coin. Her increasing trade and wealth had rendered her cumbrous silver currency inconvenient for large transactions, and she willingly availed herself of the profitable opportunity of an Eastern demand, to get rid of it in exchange for gold. By these means the demand for silver has been met with comparative ease; but this source of supply, however, cannot long continue unexhausted, and the produce of all the silver mines in the world being inadequate to meet the continued demand, some remedy is absolutely necessary to prevent the great commercial disturbance which must inevitably take place if a remedy be not applied. India has petitioned for a gold currency. A forcible memorial from the native Bombay Association to the Governor General sets forth—

"That from time immemorial, until some years ago, India possessed a gold currency. That the superior convenience of this circulating medium is well understood by the natives of this country. That the transport of a bulky and cumbrous silver currency entails-constant and useless expense upon the country, and its consequent sluggish circulation is a serious impediment to trade. That India is not yet pre- pared for a paper currency, which does hot circulate in the interior."

The great amount of the trade of India —the probable increase from the development of its resources by the opening out of roads, has made it necessary to adopt a more portable and convenient currency to facilitate its large transactions. In ten years the commerce of Bombay has increased 250 per cent. In 1863 the imports and exports amounted at Bombay to £59,000,000; Calcutta, £34,000,000; Madras, £13,000,000; total, £106,000;000. A Government paper currency has been introduced with a view to facilitate commerce; but its circulation is small, and confined to the Presidency towns, while the great want1 is in the country. It will take a long time to establish a paper currency in a country like India, if it be possible ever to circulate it beyond the large towns. I confess, however, I should regret to see a Government paper issue successful. No profit can compensate for the danger of its introduction in a country where ignorance and religious excitement are the characteristics of the people, and where whole districts are continually disturbed by fanatical appeals to their superstitions. The mutiny, which was the result of these causes, cost about £100,000,000 before it was subdued. How greatly would our embarrassment have been increased, if in addition to the anxieties of that period, a demand, influenced by a panic, had arisen for the immediate conversion of the Government notes into silver. The indiscretion of officials might produce such a result at any moment. Only the other day we saw how the religious bigotry of the people was excited from one end of India to the other, in consequence of an attempt being made at Calcutta, for sanatory purposes, to induce the people to bury their dead instead of partially burning and then throwing them into the river. The fanatical cry was immediately raised, that the Government wished to destroy their religion. Of course the only object was to preserve the public health, and the Government finding that its object was misconstrued, wisely1 withdrew the order; but the incident showed the fanatical temper of the people. It appears to me, then, that the safest and best course is to adopt a gold, instead of the attempt to introduce a paper currency. Why should not India, which is equally prepared for it, adopt a gold currency as well as France? The world is not likely to be so inundated with gold, that its value will be more affected than that of silver. No doubt a general impression prevailed on the discovery of gold in California and Australia, that a serious decline in its value would take place, founded on the effects produced on prices by the influx of the precious metals on the discovery of America. This feeling was confirmed by the opinions of one of the most distinguished writers on these subjects in Europe, M, Chevalier, whose able work, On the Probable Fall in the Value of Gold, has been translated by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Mr. Cobden). Baron Humboldt, however, appears to have taken the largest views of this question. He wisely observed, in reference to the difference between the influx of silver on the discovery of America, and the recent gold discoveries, that "a small quantity of rain would flood a rivulet, which would have scarcely a perceptible effect on a mighty river." And this seems to be a correct analogy between the barbarous state of Spain— with little trade or enterprize — the "rivulet," into which the vast supplies of silver were poured on the discovery of America,— and the present world, "the mighty river," teeming with activity, industry, and enterprize, the results of the growth of civilization and the advance of science and invention. The effects of the influx of gold have not so far realized the anticipations of those who believed that it would raise the price of commodities. Notwithstanding that, since 1848, a larger amount of gold has been produced than America produced from the first voyage of Columbus to tie discovery of the mines of California in 1848, a period of 356 years, there is no evidence that the prices of commodities have been affected by this enormous influx of gold. Some commodities have no doubt risen, but the increase in price is in no way attributable to the influx of gold. The advance in cotton is the result, not of the influx of gold, but of the American war—of wine, the disease of the vine—of silk, the destruction of the silkworm, and so of other commodities. But let us take the price of wheat which Adam Smith adopts as the barometer of prices—

"The influx of silver on the discovery of America," he says, "caused a continuous decline in the price of wheat, until at the end of fifty years it required three ounces of silver to buy the same quantity of wheat which was previously bought with one ounce."

What have been the effects of the gold discoveries on the price of wheat in England? I find that the average price of wheat in 1847, the year before the discovery of gold in California, was 69s. 9d. per quarter; and now, in spite of the influx of gold since that period, the price instead of rising has fallen from 69s. to 39s. per quarter. An ounce of gold will, at the present moment buy 75 per cent more wheat than in 1847, the year before the discovery of gold; in fact, the price of wheat, taking the quality; into account, is as low now as at any period within the last half-century. Not only have writers been deceived as to the effects of the influx of gold on the price of commodities, but also in their expectations of vast accumulations of the precious metals in the national banks, such as they expected would render money almost valueless. There was, indeed, a great accumulation of bullion at the Bank of England at one period. In 1852, she held upwards of £20,000,000, the largest amount she ever held; but, within the last two months, her bullion was reduced below £13,000,000; and instead of money becoming almost valueless, she was obliged to raise the rate of discount to 9 per cent to keep her treasure from running away. In 1852, the bank of France held £24,000,000 of bullion; within the last two months, however, it was reduced below £10,000,000, and the rate of discount was raised to 8 per cent to prevent the efflux of her treasure. Sufficient allowance appears not to have been made by writers for the effect of the influx of gold in stimulating the production of commodities. If the production of commodities increase in proportion to the production of gold, their relative value will remain the same. Let us suppose all the commodities of the world, at the time of the gold discoveries, to be represented by the figures 100, and the precious metals then necessary to circulate the commodities to be also 100. An influx of the precious metals to double the amount, say to 200, without any increase in the quantity of commodities, would have the effect of doubling their price; but if commodities were also increased to 200, the relative value of gold and commodities would remain the same. There can be no doubt that the first effect of the gold discoveries was to create a disturbance in the relative value of gold and commodities. Half-a-million of men ceased to be producers, and were suddenly converted into wealthy consumers of commodities; prices rose; the abundance of money gave a stimulus, to increased production, until an equilibrium was restored between gold and commodities. There is; every reason, to believe that the production of commodities has kept pace with that of the preciou metals. We see an enormous increase of trade all the world over. Our own trade has increased nearly threefold since the gold discoveries, which could, not have taken place except by the increase of commodities. It is not improbable the production of gold has, reached its maximum; for while, on the one hand, fresh, discoveries are constantly made; on, the, other hand, the produce of California and Australia is reported to have fallen, off. By a Return, moved for by the hon. Member for Perth.(Mr. Kinnaird), it appears, that the exports from Victoria, for the last five years show a constant decline, namely:—

	Oz	VALUE.
1858	2,555,263	£10,220,000
1859	2,280,525
1860	2,128,466
1861	1,978,864
1862	1,662,448	£6,642,624

As the alluvial deposits become exhausted, recourse must be had to the working of the quartz rocks; gold mining then becomes a, manufacture, and comes into competition with other industries, and will not be continued unless it be equally profitable. Of the mines which may be abandoned, because at present unprofitable, many may remain as a reserve for future generations, when population becomes more dense, labour cheaper, and capital more abundant; in the same way that mines in this country, which were abandoned by the Romans as unprofitable, are now being scientifically worked, and are yielding large profits. Whatever falling off, however, there may be in the production of gold, we have at present experienced no diminution of the supply. The war in America having led to an irredeemable circulation of paper, a large amount of the gold previously circulating in that country has been exported, and this is sufficient to account for any diminution in the production of gold not being yet felt in Europe. The results of the influx of the precious metals, consequent upon the discoveries in ' California and Australia, have not then realized the expectations of those supposed to be best informed on these question. There have been no sufficient grounds for the alarm which led to the demonatization of gold. It is shown that the price of gold, as compared with commodities, has not declined, and that even the rise in the price of silver has not been occasioned by the influx of, gold, but by the enormous exceptional demand for it from the East. These facts are important in Considering the policy of adopting such a gold currency in India as will circulate from hand to hand, which it cannot be said that country has yet enjoyed; for although previously to 1852 the gold mohur was received at the Treasury at the fixed value of fifteen rupees (or fifteen times its weight in silver), being Intrinsically worth more than fifteen rupees in silver, none were paid in, so that the law was in effect a dead letter. In 1852, in consequence of the apprehension of a great decline in the value of gold from the discoveries of California and Australia, gold mohurs began to be paid into the Treasury at fifteen rupees: the Directors of the East India Company, however, then prohibited the receipt of gold at the Treasury, and silver became the sole legal tender. Had this prohibition not taken place, it is not improbably that India, like France, would by this time have had, in addition to its silver, a large gold circulation. Now, assuming that a gold coinage for India has become a necessity, is it desirable to coin in mohurs, to circulate English sovereigns, or to have an entirely new coinage? It has been suggested that sovereigns should he allowed to circulate in India; if, however, they are to circulate at the market price of silver, it will be equivalent to saying they shall not circulate at all, since all experience teaches us, that gold coins will not be voluntarily accepted by the public, if they be only allowed to circulate at a fluctuating value. In such cases they only circulate with money changers. Another suggestion is, that sovereigns shall be received at the Treasury for the value of ten rupees. Now, as the intrinsic value of a sovereign is ten and a half rupees, a plan like this would be; as great a joke as the Queen issuing a proclamation that spade-ace guineas would be received at tie English Treasury for twenty shillings. No doubt a continuous enormous demand for silver, and a short supply; may so raise its price in India; that a sovereign may temporarily pass for only twenty shillings; but what is wanted is, a permanent gold currency, a gold coin which will circulate from hand to hand, and be received for taxes and all other payments as in England and France. No such coin will thus circulate, unless it represent a definite and fixed value, the Queen's stamp being the certificate that it contains a fixed quantity of pure gold. Hitherto the proportion between gold and silver coins has been fixed at one to fifteen, but as gold is initrinsically more valuable than fifteen times its weight in silver, gold coins bear a premium, and only circulate with money changers. To provide a coin which shall circulate from hand to hand, a change in the relative proportions of gold and silver will be necessary. The most convenient coins for India would probably be gold pieces of five and ten rupees each. But if these gold coins were issued in unlimited quantity, there would arise the difficulty of a double standard. Without advocating a double standard, it is a fact worthy of note, that a double standard has existed in France for sixty years, and it has not been shown that any inconvenience has arisen from it. We all know that the argument against a double standard is, that as the price of gold and silver constantly fluctuates, debtors having the option to pay in either, would always pay their depts in the cheaper metal. If it be advisable to adopt a gold currency in India, it is worthy consideration whether it be possible to obviate this by a gold coinage made subsidiary to silver, taking the standard for instance of France, of a gold piece equal in value of fifteen and a half times its weight of silver, and so to limit the issue as always to preserve its value. I am aware that this is a novel suggestion, but it is acknowledged that even an irredeemable paper currency, if limited in quantity, will maintain an equal value to that which it represents; and why should this not hold good in a gold circulation, issued as subsidiary to silver? I remember having a conversation with the late M. Horace Say in 1851, on the subject of paper issues, arising out of the suspension of specie payments by the Bank of France at the Revolution of 1848. At that time there was a run upon the Bank for the purpose of hoarding, which would soon have exhausted its treasure: the Bank, therefore with the concurrence of the Government, suspended cash payments, and its notes became inconvertible. The first effect of this suspension of payments was, that its notes fell to a discount of 1 to 2 per cent, but this continued only for two or three days, for such was the skill exhibited in the management of the Bank in limiting its issues, that the notes were ever after wards of equal value, and sometimes even more valuable than specie. In Germany, some twenty years ago, the Prussian Government issued a limited quantity of notes, which were receivable for taxes, but which were found so much more convenient for carrying about than rix-thalers, that they bore a small premium, which I constantly preferred to give rather than be encumbered with silver. If such be the effect produced by the limitation of a paper circulation, why should not the limitation of a gold circulation be equally effective in preserving its value? It may be objected that the coins so issued would be melted, but having always a higher value than gold, because of their value as money, it would not be the interest of any one to melt coin in preference to cheaper gold. The existing large demand for silver from the East is exceptional, but may yet last for several years. I have reason to believe the Secretary of State for India is alive to the importance of the question; but let me urge upon the right hon. Gentleman, that prompt measures be taken by the Government to meet evils which, if neglected, may by and bye have a serious effect on the financial interests both of England and India.

said, he considered the subject one of very considerable importance and interest both to England and India; for it involved this question—how England was to pay for the annual debt she incurred to India for the sugar, cotton, tea, coffee, indigo, and other commodities she received from that country? The imports received from India had been from year to year increasing from £10,672,862 in 1854, to £34,133,551 in 1861, and to £48,434,517 in 1863, while the exports from England had been only increasing from £9,620,710 in 1854, to £15,346,426 in 1862, consequently the balance of dept was increasing in the same proportion. To meet that balance of dept England sent silver of India. Since 1801, by a Return on the table of the House, it appeared that the silver bullion sent to India amounted to £234,000,0000, increasing small quantities of gold. The question arose whether, owing to the annually increasing demand of silver bullion for India, the production of silver from the mines went on with a proportionate increase to the demand. Recently the prospect had become so unsatisfactory, that the Chamber of Commerce at Bombay had addressed a memorial to the Governor General, Sir John Lawrence, on the subject. That memorial stated that within the last ten years the trade to Bombay had been trebled, and last year the aggregate export and import of the three Presidencies amounted to £106,000,000. The total product of silver from the mines was only £10,000,000 per annum, while India took from us on an average silver to the amount of £11,500,000 of silver. The result was an increase in the price of silver. England must therefore either buy less of the products of India or pay in some other way than silver. There could be no doubt that the Natives of India would receive gold money. His right hon. Friend (Sir Charles wood) possessed in the museum that belonged to the East India company a collection of all the coins of India—the finest in Europe. It comprised specimens of coins from the time of Alexander's successors in Bactrea and the Punjab down to the present day. During a period of 2,100 years there is proof that gold monies had been in circulation among the people of India. There was no doubt, therefore, about the fact that his right hon. Friend had nothing to do but try to induce the people of India to accept his gold in the same form in which they had accepted it in former times. When he himself went to India he received his pay in gold rupees of about the size of spangles. The Madras army was then paid in gold currency called Pagodas or Hoons. There could be no questions, therefore, about the readiness of the people to accept a gold currency if given them under conditions to which he would presently refer. So lately as the time of Moolraj, gold rupees were coined at Mool- tan, and he (Colonel Sykes) possessed a specimen. But there was evidence that the people of India were quite satisfied to receive the gold coins of Europe, provide they were pure. On the Malabar Coast and in the Province of Canara and the Nielgherries gold coins of the Roman Emperors were frequently turned up. In 1851 at a village ten miles eastward from Cananore, on the slope of a hill, while persons were searching for gold dust, hundreds, indeed thousands, of Roman gold coins were found, ranging from the reign of Angustus Caesar down to that of Antonius Pius. General Cullen, the Resident in Travancore, was good enough at his (Colonel Sykes) request, to present speciments to the museum of the India company, where they now are. Why had these coins been sent there? The Romans, when they wanted to get the products of the Malabar coast, had nothing but gold to pay for them, for they had no acceptable manufactures to offer in exchange. So, again, the Venetians, when they traded with India, took with the figure of the Virgin Mary upon it; and that coin, under the name of the Pootlee or figured coin, still existed in India, and as treated entirely as a commodity at its market value. He next came to the conditions on which a coinage could be circulated among the people of India. The gold coins to which he had referred were all of pure gold. There never had been a standard of value in India; and when we talked of such a standard among ourselves we used a conventional term which was often a mockery. Why, formerly, when our gold coin was exported to spain in the Peninsular War to pay our army, people in England had to give 28s. for a gold guinea if they wanted one! There could be no such thing as a permanent standard of value. Supply and demand regulate the exchangeable value of all commodities, and gold and silver are only commodities. The gold mohur was nominallay worth fifteen rupees; and if the Government agreed to receive their taxes in gold mohurs they might get only fourteen rupees for each of them in the market; or, on the other hand, if mohurs were scarce, the Government might make a profit on them. The Government took its land tax in rupees, irrespectively of whether sixty pice or less could be got for each rupee. That would entirely depend on the market value of copper. What we wished to impress on the Secretary of States of India was that if he would introduce a gold coin of five or ten rupees, and have it of pure gold, of a certain weight, the people would take it. But then, again, the Government must take it at its market value, not at a convential price. At Madras since the years 1847–8 they had never coined a gold coin at the Mint; at Bombay since 1836 they had never coined a gold coin; in Bengal there had been very triffing additions made to the gold monies. It was objected to pure gold coin that it wore away rapidly. He had in his hand a note from a gentleman who had charge of the whole of the coins in the British Museum, and who was a great numismatist. The writer had thoroughly studied this subject, and he said—

"I have been thinking over the question of a gold currency for India, and have looked at the various regulations as given in Prinsep's Tables, vol li. p. 69, do., and also at the earliest gold coins we have bore, being these of Sardes and probably of Crœsus, or some other Indian king. I cannot from the former come to his conclusion, that because the introduction of a gold currency in India has not hitherto met with the success it seems to deserve, or because some mistakes appear to have been made in the manner of its introduction, that, therefore, such a step is impracticable; and from the latter, I should be included to argue strongly in favour of the durability of gold, if the coins should be struck thick, and considerably rounded, like the ancient Sandian money, and not fiat, like the present sovereign. The question of wear and tear is rather one for the chymist; but certainly these Sardian coins have lasted wonderfully since the sixth century B.C., and it is obvious that a surface considerably rounded in naturally much less liable to abrasion than our flat modern money. These Sardian coins are very nearly pure gold—that is, there is no intentional alloy—and I believe that if not required to be flat, like the sovereign, the proportion of alloy now used would not be required. It has been argued that if you introduced a pure gold currency into India the Natives would melt the coins down to make ornaments, and that you must insert a larger alloy than we do here, on the same principle tat you have added a considerable quantity of alloy to your rupees to render them less fit for subsequent native adaptation. I confess I should be inclined to leave a question of this sort to time and to the gradual operation of the good sense of the people.

The writer continues—

"I imagine that any gold coinage struck for general acceptance in India must be quite pure, or at least as free from alloy as was the Greek gold, and that you could not expect the Natives to accept a gold coinage which was alloyed at all in the manner or degree that your present rupees are."

That was the opinion of a gentleman whose extensive knowledge and experience rendered his authority well worthy the consideration of his right hon. Friend. He would tell his right hon. Friend that his sovereign would never circulate and be accepted as a currency in India in its alloyed state. If the Government would introduce a pure gold coin to ten rupees, which would be received back at its market price by the Treasury, he would succeed, but not otherwise.

said, the question which his hon. Friend the Member for Stockport had brought before the Hose was very interesting and important and, from the attention which he had himself always paid to subjects of this nature, he felt a peculiar interest in it. When they came to discuss it in detail it would be found to be, perhaps, suited to the consideration rather of a scientific meeting that of the House of commons. There were, however, some general views on the subject which might be stated. He could not agree with his hon. Friend n his criticism on the paper currency of India. Two or three years ago the Government undertook to establish a Government paper circulation in India, in lieu of the partial circulation of private banks, which existed to the amount of about £3,000,000. Although the arrangements made in India for that purpose were so faulty that delay had occurred in extending the operation of the system, yet the present issue of paper amounted to about £5,000,000 in the Presidency towns. It was also not a little remarkable, that when there was great pressure at Bombay on account of the scarcity of coin, people were bringing in rupees in order to obtain paper in exchange. Measures had been taken to develop the system, and to establish centres of issue in the great centres of commerce in India, where a paper circulation would furnish a useful, safe, and convenient mode of conducting business. It was well known that bills of exchange were transmitted to a large extent from one part of India to another, and the Hindoos were remarkable clever in these commercial transactions; therefore, he saw no reason why they should not avail themselves in considerable degree of the facilities afforded by a paper circulation. He agreed with his hon. Friend, that the form of currency which existed in this country was the best. A gold standard coin of a certain fineness and weight, with subsidiary silver and copper coins, and a paper circulation of a limited amount on securities, and the remainder based on gold or silver in the banks. Whatever might be our own opinions, however, as to the best form of a currency, there could be no doubt that it was a very difficult thing to attempt a change in that respect and to bring such a system into effect in a laud where transactions were small, where there was little demand for gold, more for silver, and much more still for copper. Except under the pressure of a few months of last autumn, they had always been able to meet the demand for silver circulation, but they had been hardly able to meet the demand for copper. Looking to the greater value of gold coins, therefore, he had no doubt that gold would be circulated to some, but not to a very large extent, His hon. Friend had fallen into one or two inaccuracies, having probably been misled by the petition on the subject from Bombay. In times past silver was the only standard and the only legal tender in India, with the exception of a single gold coin in Bengal. When the currency was reformed some years ago a gold rupee, or, as it was called, mohur, was coined, which was equal to fifteen silver rupees. The mohur was not a legal tender, but it was received by the Government treasuries as the equivalent to fifteen silver rupees. It had been stated that this change was a dead letter, and that was in the main true. The people of India were not very partial to the gold mohur; they preferred pure gold, and no great amount of the coinage of gold was circulated in the country. That was the state of affairs up to 1853. At that time, and indeed until within the last year or two, there was an impression among philosophers and well informed persons that the discoveries of gold in California and Australia would tend to depreciate very considerably the value of that metal. The people of India were disposed to share this view, and began paying in the gold mohurs to the Treasury. The Government took alarm, and declined any longer to receive the gold coins at the treasury. His own opinion was that the alarm was unnecessary, for the ultimate loss to which the Indian Government could have been subjected would have been comparatively trifling. The amount of gold in circulation was not sufficiently large to affect the state of matters in the same way as it did in France when a change took place in its value. His hon. Friend said that the rule for receiving gold at the public treasuries had been a dead letter, and then added, that but for the prohibition of Lord Dalhousie, the same effect, would have been produced in India as had been produced in France of changing the currency from silver to gold. Surely it must be obvious that no such effect could have been produced by repealing a regulation which was a dead letter. The change in France arose without any alteration of the law from a change in the relative value of gold and silver. Both were legal tenders in France, a dept might equally be discharged by coins containing an ounce of gold, or by coins containing 15½ oz. of silver. Before the recent discoveries of gold, an oz. of gold was worth nearly 15¾ oz. of silver, and of course on man gave what was worth nearly 15¾ oz. when 15½ oz. would answer his purpose. After the discoveries of gold, an oz. of gold was worth only about 15½ oz. of silver and of course, everybody was glad to pay in gold what was worth only 15½ oz. of silver, when if the paid in silver, he must have given 15½ oz. Under the system of a double standard, and with the change of relative value of the to metals, this change took place in France; but the value of gold has never fallen so low as to reach its relative legal value to silver in India. The production of gold had now fallen off, and large discoveries of silver, and greater cheapness of producing it from the discoveries of new mines of quicksilver are anticipated; and if it should so happen that the relative value of gold and silver was restored to its former proportion all that had taken place in France would be reversed, and the currency of silver be again restored. It was good instance of the evils of a double standard. The next question was, whether a gold standard should be substituted for a silver standard in India. There would be many advantages in having a gold standard; and the sovereign circulating there as well as in this county and Australia, but he was not prepared at present to undertake the responsibility which would be involved in substituting a gold for the present silver circulation in India, for such a change could not be carried into effect without a great disturbance of trade. Until the people were more accustomed to gold it would be a serious measure, and might be dangerous to remodel the whole circulation of India in the manner proposed; for a belief might be induced among the Natives that in arbitrarily altering the standard from silver to gold, the Government meant to take some advantage of them and that their whole properly would be put in jeopardy. He was not prepared to incur this risk, and then came the question, what steps could be taken to produce the desired effect of gra- dually introducing gold into circulation in India, and accustoming the people to its use. All through India the general request was, that the English sovereign should be received in the Government Treasuries as equivalent to 10 rupees. He admitted that the establishment of the sovereign in England, Australia, and India would be a great convenience, in commercial transactions, but the difficulty was how to do it. In the public accounts of India the rupee was taken, no doubt, as the tenth part of a sovereign, because for certain purposes it was convenient to reckon the rupee as equivalent to 2s.; but, in point of fact, that was not its real value, for a sovereign was worth more in the market than 10 rupees. The standard in India being silver the value of the sovereign there should be measured by silver, but he regretted to say that he had not been able to ascertain with any degree of accuracy what the value of gold in the Indian market was, although it ought to be as readily obtainable as the market value of silver in this country. The extent to which sovereigns could be substituted for silver coins in India, so as to obviate the necessity now imposed upon mercantile men of carrying great quantities of silver about with them, would depend upon the amount of sacrifice involved in receiving a sovereign as equivalent to 10 rupees. He found that during the last two years the sovereign had varied in value at Calcutta from 10 rupees and 1 anna, that is, about 1½d. to 10 rupees, and 4 annas, and a-half, that is, about 6¾. If that might be accepted as a real indication of the value of the sovereign, the sacrifice would not be great, and therefore he was disposed to try the experiment of receiving a sovereign in the Government Treasuries as equal to 10 rupees. No doubt this would give it a certain amount of circulation, because any person taking a sovereign up country, if he could not sell it in the market for what it was worth, would, at all events, be able to dispose of it by paying in into a Government Treasury. Still he did not present to say that this concession would have any great effect, because the intrinsic value of a sovereign was more than 10 rupees, but, as it would meet the wishes of the people, and would go some way towards introducing gold, he had no objection to such a measure. At the same time, he did not whish to be understood as giving any positive assurance on the subject, for he must first ascertain the opinion of the Indian Government itself. The memorial to Which the hon. Member for Stockport had referred was at present under the consideration of the Indian Government, who would doubtless announce what they thought practicable and prudent after receiving reports from different parts of India, and taking the opinion of the intelligent merchants; and meanwhile he did not think it would be right to give any positive directions from here. In point of fact, he did not wish at this moment to express any decided opinion as to what should be done, and he believed no good could be derived from attempting to come to a decision here until the views of the Indian Government were ascertained. He hoped, under these circumstances, that the hon. Member for Stockport would not press his Motion to a division.

said, that the right hon. Baronet had not attempted to answer the question of his hon. Friend the Member for Stockport, but perhaps he had misunderstood the effect of the Motion. He had argued as if the proposal was to substitute a good for the existing silver circulation in India. What the Motion before the House really meant was that, in as much as the silver circulation was deficient, it should be augmented by the establishment of a gold circulation, in order that the increasing requirements of trade and commerce might be fairly met. But the right hon. Barenst had assumed that there was no gold coin but the British sovereign to supplement the Indian coinage. He (Mr. Watkin) thought that the use of the gold did not depend so much on the relative values of god and silver as on the size of the coin which would be introduced. Hon. Members who travelled in France knew the great convenience afforded by the introduction of a little gold coin, worth five frances, instead of the old silver five-franc pieces. If the right hon. Baronet would address himself to the question, whether he could not coin a gold piece representing a two-shilling piece, he might, without any destruction to trade, being in a useful coin into the British dominions in India.

said, the hon. Member, in advocating the proposal that silver coin-age should be supplemented by a gold one, was really aiming at establishing a double standard. No doubt it would be desirable to supplement the gold coinage by a silver one, but it would be difficult to do that without creating a double standard. He understood that the Natives of India would not take a sovereign because it contained alloy, and if that were so, they would not be likely to take a gold token, which the gold rupee would be in the absence of double standard, unless it were of pure gold. Perhaps the only possible mode of doing it would be by the introduction of the sovereign in some such manner as that suggested by the right hon. Gentleman, and by its superior portability and other advantages it might possibly be brought into use.

said, he would withdraw his Motion.

said, that in putting the Question of which he had given Notice relative to Education in Scotland, he wished to give his right hon. Friend the Vice President of the Committee of Council an opportunity of explaining to the House and the country the course which it was the intention of the Government to adopt with reference to a matter which had created the greatest interest in Scotland—theappointment of a Royal Commission to inquire into the subject of education in that country. A large body of the Members for Scotland had recently waited on the Lord President of Council, and strongly impressed upon him the anxious desire of the people of Scotland that Her Majesty's Government should issue a Royal Commission to inquire into the state of education in Scotland, not simply in reference to the narrow question of the into Scotland of the Revised Code, but to the subject of education at large, with a view of establishing a basis for restoring and extending the old national system of education in Scotland, and rendering it more efficient. They, at the same time, thought that if any such inquiry should be determined upon, it would only be just and right that the operation of the Revised Code should in the meantime be suspended in Scotland. That Code was adopted after an inquiry relating to England, without any reference whatever to Scotland; and, in many respects, it was not in accordance with the habits of the people. From the reception given to the deputation by the Lord President, they had strong reason to hope that the Government would give a favourable consideration to their application; and he now requested his right hon. Friend to inform the House of the conclusion at which the Government have arrived in the matter. If it be, as he had some reason to expect it would be, in favour of granting their application, he could assure him, on the part of all the gentlemen him, on the part of all the gentlemen who waited upon the Lord President on that occasion, that such an announcement would be received with great satisfaction.

said, in answer to the questions which have been put by my hon. Friend, I beg to inform him that Her Majesty's Government have decided upon issuing a Commission, one of the principal objects of which is, as my hon. Friend has stated, to consider whether it is not possible to erect a national system on the foundation of the old parochial system in Scotland, as amended by the School-masters Act of 1861. In considering the question, whether the Revised Code should be applied to Scotland in the interim until the Commissioners had presented their Report, there certainly did seem to be valid objections to such a course. The Revised Code came into operation on the 31st of March in the present year, and up to this time it has been applied to very few schools. It could hardly be justifiable to insist upon the immediate application of that Code to Scotland, seeing that the inquires of the Commissioners may result in the recommendation of a system of national education in Scotland for the working classes, which will differ not only from the Revised Code, but also from the system which was in operation before the Revised Code was adopted. For these reasons, Her Majesty's Government have consented to suspend the operation of the Revised Code until the Report of the Commissioners shall have been presented, on the understanding, however, that that Report shall be made within twelve months of the issue of the Commission. This suspension, however, will have reference only to the elementary schools, and not to the normal schools. With respect to the normal schools, to which the Minute of March last applies, there does not appear to be any reason why the same course should not be adopted with regard to them which is adopted with regard to the same class of schools in England.

said, he rose to move for copies of a communication made to the Admiralty by Sir W. Snow Harris on the organization of the proposed School of Naval Architecture. It was most important that the House should have every possible information on that subject. He objected to the Vote for the institution on the ground of its being placed at Kensington, and one of the principal reasons given for having it there was, that it afforded an opportunity of having a staff of professors; but it appeared that there was no such staff, and to provide them would render a large outlay necessary. Then they were told that they were suitable apartments available at Kensington, whereas the school was held in a ramshackle kind of shed. It was impossible to tell what the expense of the institution might be, and he wished to know whether the scheme for the institution had been submitted to the Treasury, and if it had investigated whether the system was likely to answer, and its probable cost?

said, he was sorry his hon. Friend so pertinaciously opposed the school of naval architecture, which had been generally called for by the public. The Government itself shared in that opinion, and the school in question had been projected by the Government in deference to the policy of the country, and because they themselves thought it would be productive of considerable advantage. A site for the school had been selected at South Kensington simply because it presented itself at the time, and because it presented itself at the time, and because the Admiralty were of opinion that it would be advisable on the score of economy to establish it there; but he did not mean to say that it should, therefore, be permanently fixed in that quarter. A very eligible site might pos- Sibyl hereafter be found at Greenwich, but he merely mentioned that to show tat the Admiralty had arrived at no positive conclusion as to where the institution should at a future time be located. He objected to the Motion of his hon. Friend because— while admitting freely the high scientific qualifications of Sir W. Snow Harris— he thought it would be introducing a novel system to print at the public expense a document containing simply the views of a private individual, however eminent, who was not a recognized authority on the subject treated of. If Sir W. Snow Harris's pamphlet were published, there was no reason why the opinions of the noble Lord the Member for Huntingdon, who had taken great pains to make himself acquainted with the subject of naval construction, and of other distinguished persons should not be published also.

said, he would take that occasion to call attention to the unsatisfactory mode in which the business of the House was being conducted, as if the voting away of the public money was only a matter of secondary importance. Night after night hon. Member had to remain until between eleven and twelve o'clock before the Government go into Committee of Supply, and then millions of money were voted away ultimately at hours when many Members had been obliged to leave the House. There were no less that twenty-two Motions on the paper to-night, on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply.

said, he regretted as much on his hon. Friend could do that such impediments should be cast in the way of the discussion of the Estimates, but the Government had no power to prevent it. It was quite natural that hon. Members should desire to call the attention of the House to subjects in which they felt an interest; but, considering the advanced period of the Session, and the great number of votes which remained to be taken, he trusted that they would exercise a little more forbearance as to putting down Motions on going into Supply.

said, he would suggest that Friday night should be given up to general discussions, and that for the remainder of the Session the House should go into Committee of Supply on Mondays and Thursdays without the interpositions of any other questions.

Sir, I trust that the Committee will be disposed to concur, without any objection, in the recommendation which Her Majesty has been graciously pleased to make. Sir Rowland Hill is a man of great genius, of great sagacity, of great perseverance and industry, and he has rendered important service to this country, and I may say to other countries also. He formed the opinion, in which I concur, that the Post Office was more properly a department for the performance of service that for the mere collection of revenue; and with a boldness which staggered a great number of persons who had not looked at the matter form the same point of view, he recommended a very large reduction in the rate of postage with the confidence that it would in the end bring up the revenue to the same amount to which it had previously stood, and would in the meantime confer great benefit upon the community. Grave doubts were entertained, many people thought that he was too sanguine in his calculations, and that, although the number of letter might increase, the increase would not be sufficient to make the revenue recover the great shock which the introduction of the penny postage would inflict upon it. Those anticipations have been falsified, and the calculations of Sir Rowland Hill have turned out to be correct. Sir Rowland Hill had for nearly a quarter of a century performed, with some slight interval, the arduous duties which have devolved upon him in connection with the scheme, and he is now at a time of life when his health must have suffered to his office. The Treasury have on that ground given him permission to retire, and have done that which I am sure this House will not think too much—they have given him his fully salary for life. He is now, I believe, in the seventieth year of his age, and his health has been shattered by the labours which he has had to perform. Under these circumstances, Her Majesty thought that this House would be of opinion that the great services which he has performed would recommend him for a grant which should enable him to make those Arrangements for his family which the short period during which he may probably enjoy his pension would not otherwise permit him to make. His labours have produced more beneficial results that may strike persons at first sight. It is quite clear that the facilities which the penny postage has given to all the transactions of commerce and to all communication connected with business must have been infinitely advantageous to the industry, and, by that means, to the revenue—not to the revenue of the Post Office, but to that revenue which arises out of the general prosperity of the country. In that view Sir Rowland Hill has performed great service to the country; but there is another view in which he has produced still more startling results—namely, in the amount of happiness and comfort which his plan has conferred upon millions of the poorer classes of the community. When the rate of postage was as high as it was before that plan was introduced, communication between the members of a poor family who were scattered about the country was difficult and expensive. How could a poor labouring man pay 1s. or 6d. for a letter? Communication between the members of such families was more difficult than the communication between England and Australia is now. The cultivation of the affection, which frequent intercommunication assists, raises men in their own estimation and in the standing which they occupy in society. It improves their morals, and develops all those qualities which tend to make useful members of the community. Therefore, I say that Sir Rowland Hill, independently of the benefits which his plan has conferred upon the general interests and prosperity of the country, has the merit of having conferred a great benefit upon the labouring and poorer classes of the people, which would of itself entitle him to any mark of approbation and reward which the House may be disposed to confer upon him. In the year 1838, before the penny postage was introduced, the number of letters transmitted through the Post Office was 76,000,000; in 1863, the number was 642,000,000. That is a measure of the extent to which that plan has assisted the industry and contributed to the comfort and happiness of the community. There are many matters connected with the plan which are independent of the mere reduction of the amount paid for the postage of letter. Among other, there is the facility which his arrangements have given for the transmission of money in small sums from one part of the country to another. The amount of the Money Orders taken out in 1838 was £313,000; in 1863 it was £16,494,000. What an immense advantage to the community at large must have resulted from the facility for the safe transmission of so large an amount of small sums which it would other wise have been very difficult and in some cases expensive to transmit! Then, there is the book post. It is greatly conducive to the interests of literature, and the arrangements have been most extensively taken advantage of. The gross revenue of the Post office has increased very considerably, but of course the increase of facilities has led to the multiplication of establishments and officers, and has therefore largely increased the outgoings. In 1838 the gross receipts were £2,346,000; in 1863 they were £3,870,000; showing that Sir Rowland Hill was perfectly right in anticipating that at no distant period the receipts of the Post office would recover from the diminution which the first introduction of his plan naturally produced. In point of fact, everybody is so well acquainted with the merits of Sir Rowland Hill's plan and the good effects which it has produced, that I shall content myself, without further observations, with moving the Resolution of which I have given notice. The noble Viscount concluded by moving that a sum not exceeding £20,000 should be granted to Her Majesty as a provision for Sir Rowland Hill.

said, that no one more highly estimated the great services of Sir Rowland Hill than he did; but it ought to be remembered that he was not the only person who was concerned in carrying out the change in the postal system. The late Mr. Wallace, almost night after night, urged the subject upon the attention of that House, and did more to introduce the plan to the country than Sir Rowland Hill. No doubt great services ought to be rewarded; but years ago there had been a large subscription raised for Sir Rowland Hill, and he thought that and the pension were a sufficient recompense for his services, especially as the Post Office had yielded a very large revenue, whereas at present he did not think it paid its expenses.

, on behalf of the large mercantile community of Liverpool, said, that he desired to express his satisfaction at the proposal of the noble Lord at the head of the Government. His constituents would have wished the Government to go even further for at a public meeting at Liverpool, at which the mayor presided, the opinion was expressed that the proposed grant of £20,000 was inadequate.

said, that the people of Manchester felt the greatest respect for Sir Rowland Hill, and believed that he had conferred a benefit not only on them, but on the world. He was surprised at the objection s raised by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Lambeth. He was glad that the noble Lord the Prime Minister had come forward with a more liberal proposition than had originally been made by the Government. He was sure that if he had gone round the Exchange of Manchester he could have raised more for a tribute to Sir Rowland Hill's family than the pension originally proposed by the Government.

said that, representing a large constituency, he fully believed that the whole mercantile interests of the country would most heartily concur in the proposition of the noble Viscount in proposing a liberal grant. The hon. Member for Lambeth had stated that Mr. Wallace had proposed a similar scheme many years before it was propounded by Sir Rowland Hill. [Mr. W. WILLIAMS: Not before.] The pamphlet of Sir Rewland Hill was one of the most consummate pieces of inductive reasoning he ever read, and it produced an effect which it was impossible for the Government of the day to resist. The measure was an exceedingly bold one. It proposed to reduce the postage from a shilling, and in some cases a larger amount, to a penny. That was thought most extravagant; yet it was proved by Sir Rowland Hill that the public revenue would be recouped by the increase of the correspondence that would ensue. And that had been doe by the most extraordinary success that attended the measure. He believed the advantages of the scheme were altogether inestimable; and it extended not to England alone, but to the whole civilized world. Therefore, with the greatest pleasure, he supported the Motion for conferring that handsome grant on the family of a distinguished man.

said, it was hardly necessary that further testimony should be given of the estimation in which Sir Rowland Hill's services were held; but representatives of large commercial communities Having expressed their opinions, he thought it was hardly proper that the City of London should be silent. He, therefore, on the part of the City of London, begged to express his hearty concurrence in all that had been said in favour of the vote. He hoped that the principle which Sir Rowland Hill applied to internal postage would be extended to commerce with the world, and that, before long, an ocean penny postage would be established.

said that, as the representative of a small constituency, he wished to express his hearty concurrence in all that had fallen from the other side to the House with regard to the vote. The hon. Member for Lambeth had expressed an opinion that Sir Rowland Hill had been amply remunerated by his salary during past years and its continuance in the shape of a retiring allowance during his life and the life of Lady Hill; but by usage Sir Rowland Hill would have been entitle to tow thirds of his salary as a retiring allowance for his services if they had been of an ordinary character. Allusion had also been made by the hon. Member to the public subscription for Sir Rowland Hill. In a great commercial country a gentleman often realized an enormous fortune for some happy thought and invention. Why, then, should not Sir Rowland Hill, who had conferred immense benefit, not only on this country, but on the whole civilized world, receive a moderate remuneration for his scheme? He trusted that Sir Rowland Hill would not only receive the sum proposed by the noble viscount, but that the example would be followed by the whole civilized world.

remarked that the hon. Member for Lambeth had mention that another gentleman had advocated the scheme cheap postage. It might be so; but the difference between Sir Rowland Hill and that gentleman was, that the one had succeeded in making hi suggestion a reality, while the other had not. It reminded him of the old story of Cobbett, who said, "I prophesied that, but never told anybody." The whole country would be grateful to the noble Viscount at the head of Her Majesty's Government for the proposition before the Committee.

said, he fully concurred in the proposition before the Committee, but he would venture to suggest that vast as were the advantages of the penny postage system, it had its disadvantages also, for it enable puffing tradesmen to cover gentlemen's tables with their circulars. Perhaps those individuals would be less prodigal with their penny stamps if they knew that, as a rule, their circulars were almost invariably consigned unread to the waste-paper basket.

said, he should be sorry if the feeling of the metropolis on this subject were supposed to be represented by the hon. Member for Lambeth. He was quite sure there was not a man in the metropolis who would not approve of the Vote. As to the subscription to Sir Rowland Hill, he was fully entitled to it. He thought it a gracious way of acknowledging the dept of gratitude they were all under to Sir Rowland Hill for the suggestion that he made, and for the ability with which he carried it into effect.

said, having been Chancellor of the exchequer at the time Sir Rowland Hill introduced his scheme, he wished to hear his testimony to the value of the services of that eminent public servant. The difficulties were great and at the time there was a strong feeling against it in many quarters, but Sir Rowland Hill, by his calm good sense, intelligence, and good humour, encountered and overcame them all.

said, he had the honour of being private Secretary of the right hon. Baronet who had just addressed the House, at the time the scheme was brought forward; and he wished to state that his right hon. Friend, in the panegyric he had just bestowed on Sir Rowland Hill, had for gotten his own share in developing the plan. He hoped the House would not lose sight of the patronage which Sir Rowland Hill had received from his official superior.

said, he wished to ask the noble Viscount at the head of the Government how it happened that Sir Rowland Hill always held a subordinate office, and was never made Postmaster General, an office which was reserved for Dukes and Earls? As Postmaster General he would have received £5,000 a year. In any other country in Europe, a man like Sir Rowland Hill would have been rewarded with such an appointment, and not been left in a subordinate post.

There si one very good reason why it would not have been an advantage to Sir Rowland Hill to have made him Postmaster General, it is, that he would not have received any increase of salary while he held the office, but would have to go out with a change of Government. The hon. Member for Lambeth doubted whether the Post Office paid its expenses. In answer to that, I beg to state that the net revenue for last year, after paying expenses, was £1,790,000.

said, it was a very remarkable thing that the practice should have sprung up of appointing Peers only to the office of Postmaster General, which was strictly of a commercial and mechanical character. The practice seemed to have grown up without any express warrant in the middle of last century, and he believed it to be a remnant of the old days of corruption in the department.

said, the noble Lord had forgotten to deduct form his estimate of Post Office revenues the sum of £1,000,000 for packet services. That would reduce the net revenue to £790, 000. At the same time, he regarded the present pro-position as one of the most creditable acts of the present Government.

said, he wished to ask for some explanation of the increase which had taken place under the head the Board of Trade since 1859. A new office of Secretary of Marine Department, at a salary rising to £1,500 a year, had been created, and a new class of clerks called assistants to secretaries. It was not impossible that these new titles might have been introduced in order to get rid of some persons under the pretence that the offices to which they belonged had been abolished. Some information would likewise be acceptable as to the Meteorological Department. He wished to know what was the whole expense of the Meteorological Department. The weather returns were quite fallaeious, and it was a pity that they should be issued in their pre scutform, thereby deceiving the public.

said, that the Vote for the Board of Trade contained a greater increase than any other estimate. No less that four new places were created in the department, involving a very considerable expenditure. With respect to the appointment of temporary clerks, he would be bound to say, that if a permanent selection of proper men were made, a great step would be accomplished both in point of economy and efficiency.

said, the increase had arisen from various causes, and especially from changes made in the organization of the office, with a view to render it more efficient. It was true that some new places had been created, but some old places had been abolished. One principal cause of the increase of expenditure had been the increased amount of business which the Board had had to perform. There had been a considerable transfer of new business from the Admiralty in reference to harbours, and an increased establishment was therefore necessary. The whole increase was £3,363 over 1863–4; but this increase was absolutely necessary from the causes he had mentioned. As to the meteorological predictions, nobody, of course, pretended that Admiral Fitzroy had always foretold the weather, but no great storm had occurred which he had not foretold. The science of meteorology was at present experimental, and this was perfectly well understood by the House and the country. The experience gamed by Admiral Fitzroy had been most useful, but sufficient time had not elapsed to enable the House to decide whether the establishment was of such a character as entitle it to be permanently supported by a vote of the House.

said, he had been a witness to the dreadful accident which had occurred the other day on the South Western Railway. Two carriages were mixed up together, and three persons were entangled in the ruins. One was dead, and two were almost dead. They died before the eyes of the bystanders, who were unable to give them the least assistance. In the days of the road every coach or carriage used to carry a small tool-box in case of accident. If there had been ropes, hammers, and hatchets, by which the wreck might have been cleared away, two or three lives would have been saved. Could not the Inspectors of Railways of the Board of Trade insist upon some such apparatus being carried by every train assistance being rendered in the event of an accident.

said, he wished to ask for some explanation respecting the superannuations of the registrar and librarian of the Board of Trade.

said, the office of registrar had been abolished by the recommendation of the Treasury. The office of librarian was now discharged by a subordinate, at a reduced salary. In respect to the observations of the hon. and gallant Member for Limerick (Colonel Dickson), in reference to the late railway accident, he had to observe that the power of the inspectors was small as regarded the general management of railways. All the inspectors could do in regard to the inspectors could do in regard to the late accident was to hold an inquiry. That inquiry was being held, and he was bound to say that the railway authorities furnished every facility for the most thorough investigation. That accident might no doubt be the means be the means of adopting some such precautionary measures as the hon. and gallant Member suggested.

said, that Mr. Edgar Bowring, who filled the office of registrar and librarian, at a salary of £800 a year, had been superannuated at the age of thirty-eight on £426 per annum. Another gentleman had been appointed librarian at £456 a year. He should oppose the Vote unless some explanation could be given.

said, it was thought an improvement in the organization that the secretary should control the establishment—a duty which had formerly been discharged by the registrar. The office of registrar was, therefore, no longer required, and it was abolished, his duty of librarian being given to an officer of inferior salary.

said, he should move to report Progress, and he was resolved to divide the Committee upon the Motion. He had been in the House until two o'clock on the previous day, and he had been there also from twelve o'clock on the previous day until the present hour (twelve o'clock).

said he was sorry that the constant attendance of the hon. Member was such an impediment to public business. He hoped the hon. Member would allow a fair chance of having the Estimates discussed.

said, if this Vote were passed the Government would consent to Progress being reported.

said, that the duties of the Paymaster General were performed by deputy, and he wished to know if any change were contemplated by the Government in reference to that department of the army?

said, he could hold out no hope of any change in the constitution of the Pay Office. An alteration would only entail expense, without affording any advantage upon the present system which was a good one.

said, he wished to quote the following passage from a congratulatory address of the East India and China Association, to show the appreciation in which his services were held:—

"We beg leave to offer to your Lordship our cordial congratulations on the distinguished success which has crowned your exertions as Her Majesty's High Commissioner and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of Pekin, by the conclusion of a treaty which, when fully in operation, will secure to Her Majesty's subjects a commercial intercourse of the greatest importance with that vast empire. Tour Lordship's similarly successful negotiations with Japan, and the prospect; of the early opening of her commerce to British and European enterprise, no less demand oar acknowledgments and our congratulations. Trusting that your Lordship may speedily witness and long enjoy the satisfaction of contemplating the complete success of your labours in that increase of our national prosperity which they are so eminently calculated to promote, we have the honour to be, with the highest consideration and respect, your Lordship's most obedient servants."

The Earl of Elgin, in his reply, thus explained the objects to which his diplomacy had been directed, and the manner in which advantage might be derived from its success:—

"The treaties recently concluded with China and Japan have in a great measure removed the obstacles to intercourse between those countries and the world, without which the jealousy, exclusiveness, and apprehensions of their despotic Governments had created. To the attainment of this end the efforts of diplomacy have been directed with some success; but its action extends no further; it rests with our merchants and manufacturers to complete the work by turning these; new facilities to account, and establishing mutually beneficial relations between England and those countries, inhabited as they are by populations numerous, industrious, and commercially disposed.… For my own part, I have only to say that it is my sincere desire to continue to co-operate with you in the noble work of extending the blessings of commerce and Christian civilization to those remote and interesting regions of the earth."

wished to know how the Consolidated Fund was affected by the Resolution. If he understood the Resolution, it seemed that there was a euro of.£4,000 a year which we claimed against the Greek Government, and which was now to be handed over to the King of the Greeks as a present.

said, the hon. Baronet need be under no apprehension that the Consolidated Fund would suffer. It was a mere question of foregoing a portion of a claim upon the Greek Government. The protecting Powers had agreed to forego each the payment of £4,000 a year from Greece, and the Resolution would but relieve Greece from remitting that amount annually to this country.

said, he would remind the House that the Greek Government had undertaken to pay pensions to certain civil servants of Great Britain. He thought it was a strange proceeding to abandon a debt due from Greece, while at the same time we were leaving our public servants to the mercy of the Greek Government.