said, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether Her Majesty's Government have under consideration the Report and Recommendations of the School Inquiry Committee; and, if so, whether he is prepared to inform the House what steps they intend to take thereupon?

said, in reply, that the Committee had collected a vast deal of information; but it was be voluminous, and some of it had come so recently into the hands of the Government, that he should not he correct in saying that the question was under the consideration of the Government. At the same time, the question was one of so great importance that any Government must deal with it at the earliest opportunity.

said, he would beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether it is with the sanction of the Government that the Tax Collectors of the South of London are issuing Notices that unless Assessed Taxes due on the 20th of March last are paid on or before the 20th of July, the person neglecting to pay will be disqualified from voting at the coming Election?

said, in reply, that the Government had given no sanction to the proceeding referred to by the hon. Member. His attention being called to the Question on the previous evening by the hon. Member for Greenwich, he caused inquiry to be set on foot, and if the hon. Member would repeat his Question on a subsequent evening, such information as he possessed would be afforded.

asked that the answer might be given to him privately, for the date mentioned in the Question was the 20th instant, and the House would not sit again until that day.

said, in consequence of a promise which had been made by the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury on Wednesday that if hon. Members having Notices to move in Supply would allow Supply to be then taken they would be afforded an opportunity of moving their Notices on the Report, he rose to call attention to a Return relative to Staff appointments ordered last year and presented in June, from which it appeared that the Royal Warrant (No. 106) restricting the holding a Staff appointment to five years had been frequently violated. He regretted the absence of the Secretary of State for War; but as the present was his last op- portunity, and as his Motion created much interest in military circles, he would, without mentioning names or entering into detail, very shortly occupy the attention of the House on the subject. It was an old saying—"Once on the Staff always on the Staff;" but it had appeared right to Her Majesty that this system should cease, and hence the Warrant to which he called attention. Staff appointments in the army were always regarded as the rewards of the military profession in the same sense that judicial appointments were recognized as the rewards of the Bar. But the Return which had been made to the House, and which no doubt all interested in that subject had read, showed that a very different course had been adopted, and that those appointments had gone in a "vicious circle" among a few favoured officers. A quarter master general, or a deputy assistant adjutant general, as the case might be, when his five years had expired, was, in distinct violation of the Warrant, shifted to a corresponding position in some other department. This naturally excited great discontent among military men—discontent which he (Sir Patrick O'Brien) had frequently heard expressed—as many officers had been continuously on the Staff for periods varying from ten to fifteen years. Now, it might be said that Staff training was essential, and that those who had served upon it were best fitted for new appointments. If so, let the Warrant be abolished; but he held that as long as Her Majesty's Warrant existed it was the duty of the military authorities to respect it. His observations had reference to what would be done in the future, and it was in that view he had made his statement.

said, that the hon. Baronet had very courteously, the other evening, not pressed his Notice, in consequence of which the Public Business had been very much convenienced and advanced. He was therefore sorry that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War was not present to give him the explanation he desired. But his disappointment had arisen from some little inadvertence of his own, not having put a Notice on the Paper that he intended to ask the Question on the Report of Supply. After the short and clear statement now made the hon. Baronet would have no difficulty in eliciting at an early opportunity from his right hon. Friend the information he desired.

proposed to insert the words ''by the Report of an Election Committee or by the report of a judge."

said, he objected to the clause altogether, on the ground that it proposed to impose a penalty upon persons who had been indemnified under a former Act.

said, that all they had in view was to prevent the employment by candidates of agents who were notorious bribers. He should therefore cordially support the clause and the Amendment.

said, he would beg to move the insertion of words making it a misdemeanour for any agent who had been adjudged guilty of bribery to hire himself as an agent or canvasser. Amendment proposed, in line 6, after the word "fifty-seven," to insert the words "any such canvasser or agent shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and."—(Mr. James Lowther.)

objected to the Amendment, on the ground that it would lead to the punishment of a man twice for a single offence. He would be imprisoned in the first instance, and then because he accepted a second office he would be imprisoned again, though be had committed no new offence.

said, he must contend that the man would have committed a second offence; he would have engaged himself under false pretences, because no candidate would willingly engage an agent who had been proved guilty of bribery.

said, that in his opinion the man who employed a corrupt agent stood in about the same relation to that corrupt agent as the receiver did to the thief. He thought, therefore, that the penalty of making such a man's election void was not commensurate with the offence. He therefore proposed to move to add the words at the end of the clause—"And he shall be incapable of being elected to and of sitting in the House of Commons during the three years next after such trial."

said, that it was quite possible a candidate might get into the hands of a corrupt agent without knowing it. In the case of a young man coming into Parliament for the first time this might easily occur. Would it not be too hard to brand such a man with the disgrace which the noble Lord's Amendment would inflict upon him?

said, the Amendment would only apply to a candidate who knowingly employed a corrupt agent.

said, he must, with great respect to the noble Viscount, say that the Amendment appeared to him to be nonsense. The word "trial" referred to the trial in the case of the corrupt agent who had been convicted of corruption within seven years previously to the Election which under the clause would be void. If the words proposed by the noble Viscount were added to the clause, the punishment of the candidate might commence long before he had committed the offence.

said, he thought the noble Lord had mistaken the object of the clause.

said, he did not think the Amendment applicable to the clause. In his opinion, making the Election void would a sufficient punishment.

said, that if at this period of the Session hon. Members persevered in moving Amendments the result would be that the Bill would be amended off the face of creation.

said, he felt that a person who knowingly employed an agent who had been convicted of corrupt practices ought to be subjected to this penalty at least.

said, he did not think it would be too great a punishment to inflict upon a man who prostituted the political rights of the country by bribery to disqualify him from sitting in the House of Commons for ever.

said, that he wished to ask the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther) whether he would bring up a clause on the Report embodying the views which he sought to carry into effect in the Amendment which had shortly before been negatived?

said, he intended to do so. Some hon. Members had, he believed, voted against his Amendment in ignorance of the real question at issue.

said, that the real question for the Committee to decide was whether they meant to pass the Bill before them this year or not. The Bill was one of great importance, and the Government, he thought, had very fairly done their duty in pushing it forward.

said, he hoped that the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government would postpone the prorogation, if necessary, in order to carry the Bill. The feeling of the House was evidently strongly in its favour.

said, that the fact that the feeling of the House was in favour was no argument against hon. Members exercising a discretion in dealing with it.

asked for some explanation of the clause. He did not object to all the penalties being placed upon those who had been found guilty; but he should object to penalties being placed upon persons who had not been tried, but had only been incidentally mentioned in a Report of a Commission; and who might have had no opportunity of being heard. He proposed to leave out the words "other than a candidate," in order to raise the question.

said, the clause was intended to include persons other than the Petitioner and respondent, but no doubt there was difficulty in what was pointed out, and to meet it he should propose to amend the clause so that the penalties should only be inflicted upon persons, other than candidates, who should have been found guilty of bribery in any proceeding at law.

said, he thought that what was intended was that the penalty of disqualification should follow a report of the Judge, and should not apply only to those who had been convicted upon a trial. When the inquiry had been conducted by a Judge, who would, of course, be aware of the penalty imposed by the clause, might it not be presumed that he had taken all the necessary steps for arriving at a knowledge of a man's guilt?

said, he hoped that the original words would be adhered to.

said, the difficulty was inflicting a penalty upon a person who might possibly not be present; but he thought that there would be no hardship in placing a penalty upon a person who had been reported guilty after he had had an opportunity of being heard. He would, therefore, propose that the clause should be amended by inserting the words, "in any proceeding in which, after notice of the charge, he has had an opportunity of being heard."

said, he wished to know what would be the position of an unfortunate candidate with regard to expenses, if the inquiry before the Judge was to be hung up while notice was being given to all the persons-implicated, as well as during the trial of all these collateral issues. Such a delay would cause a very ugly addition to the candidate's expenditure.

said, he hoped that words would be introduced to ensure parties accused a fair hearing.

said, that the worst delinquents could run away, and no notice could be given to them. They would thus escape the penalty.

Amendment withdrawn, and that of the SOLICITOR GENERAL agreed to.

said, he thought they had better in this Bill, and at this period of the Session, confine themselves to Parliamentary Elections. No doubt at some future period there must be an inquiry in reference to municipal Elections.

said, that his proposition was simply that a person convicted of bribery at a Parliamentary Election should be disqualified from voting at future municipal as well as Parliamentary Elections.

said, he feared that if they accepted the Amendment they would not be allowed to stop there, they would have to go further, and that would only be entering upon a sea of troubles, and they would run great risk of foundering in their legislation. He believed, however, that they would soon have to enter upon the question of bribery at municipal Elections.

said, that the clause proposed that in a certain event the returning officer should pay to the Member double the damages which he had sustained. This seemed to be placing a money value upon the position of a Member of Parliament, and he should move that instead of these words there should be others enacting that the returning officer should be liable to a penalty not exceeding £500.

said, that the clause as proposed was an exact copy of the 123rd clause of the 11th and 12th Vic, c. 98, which had been found in-applicable.

said, the clause would make the punishment for offences under the Bill different in Ireland and Scotland from that in England. It appeared to him that it was now time to consider whether they should extend this Bill to Ireland and Scotland.

said, he concurred in thinking that the clause required consideration.

said, that the clauses of the Acts proposed to be repealed were not penal clauses, but merely those which regulated the mode of trial of the Petitions. If he were mistaken on the point he would bring up a clause upon the Report which would settle the question.

said, the Bill would be valuable as an experiment, even if its provisions were not extended to Ireland and Scotland, although he did not mean to say that he had given up the idea of introducing a clause to extend, if possible, the provisions of the Bill to Ireland and Scotland.

said, he was one of those who had originally contended that they would be placed in a position of great difficulty with regard to this Bill if its provisions were not extended to Ireland and Scotland, but he thought that the question had assumed a new light in consequence of the announcement of Her Majesty's Government that the operation of the Bill was only to endure for a limited period; although he did not mean to say that if Her Majesty's Government could see their way to effect such an extension without loss of time it would not be desirable that the experiment might be equally and simultaneously tried in Ireland and Scotland, as well as in this country, or that it would be well to preserve the jurisdiction of this House in the case of Election Petitions from Ireland and Scotland, and to extinguish it as regarded this country. Under these circumstances he should not press the Government upon the point.

said, he must press upon the Government the importance of making the law upon the point apply to the three countries alike.

said, if he did not bring up a satisfactory clause upon the Report the right hon. Gentleman would have the opportunity of doing so himself.

proposed to amend the clause by inserting the words "as far as regards Elections and Petitions in respect of constituencies in England and Wales."

said, he wished to propose a new clause providing for the payment of additional Judges and remuneration of Judges appointed under this Act.

said, he would remind the House that a Commission had been appointed to inquire into the constitution of our Courts of Judicature. That Commission had been sitting for about a twelvemonth, and would shortly, it was believed, propose some very great changes. He trusted, therefore, that these new appointments would be made subject to any decision at which the House might arrive after seeing the Report. If the right hon. Gentleman would deal with that question, he would leave it in his hands; if not, he should propose a clause himself on bringing up the Report.

said, he trusted that the Government would assent to the following Amendment to the new clause:—Line 1, before "The," insert—

"No additional Judge shall be appointed under this Act until fourteen days after all the Elections Petitions presented to the Court of Common Pleas respecting the first Elections to the Parliament convened on the dissolution of the present Parliament shall be at issue."

His object was to prevent the public being put to a great expense, unless it had been satisfactorily proved that the assistance of new Judges was absolutely called for.

said, that the matter referred to by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock had been under the consideration of the Government, and there was at present a clear understanding with the Lord Chancellor that the services of the new Judges should be at the disposal of the country. If the right hon. Gentleman brought forward a clause, it should of course receive attentive consideration. As regarded the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) he could only say that he should give it the strongest opposition in his power, because it was in reality an attempt to upset the whole of what they had already done. It was, in fact, an announcement of the hon. and learned Member's opinion that no new Judges were wanted, although Her Majesty's Government had reason to believe, from the representations made to them, that the Judges had more to do than they could satisfactorily perform, and that it was only by the appointment of new Judges that the Bill could be carried into effect.

said, he would propose to strike out the words in Mr. Disraeli's clause providing that the Judges selected for the trial of Election Petitions should receive £500 a year in addition to their ordinary salary. He should be sorry if the Judges were not adequately remunerated for the services which they rendered to the country, but he could see no reason why this additional sum should be paid, more especially as the work of the existing Judges would be lightened by the assistance which the new Judges would render them when not engaged on the trial of Election Petitions.

said, he apprehended a good deal of canvassing among the Judges for this £500 a year.

said, it was desirable to induce the old Judges, if he might use that epithet, to give up their time to the performance of these duties, duties which, it must be remembered, they never expected at the time of their appointments to be called on to perform. The performance of those duties involved considerable inconvenience. The Judges employed in them would, for instance, be separated for some time from their families, and have to reside occasionally in small inns, which, to say the least of it, were not replete with the comforts and advantages to which they were accustomed. It was desirable, if it could be managed, that the new Judges should be engaged at first on the ordinary judicial duties, and that the trial of these Petitions should be carried on by those who had been for some time on the Bench. It was necessary to make the proposal as agreeable as possible, and as the clause had been carefully considered he trusted that it would be adopted in its entirety.

said, that the speech of the right hon. Gentleman was extremely kind towards the Judges. It was, of course, a good thing to make matters comfortable; but still, as a Judge once said to a friend who was condoling with him on his having been unexpectedly detained in a small country town from Saturday to Monday, "A man must be somewhere." He remembered that on one occasion Chief Justice Tindal, after having been received in an assize town by the sheriff with a coach and four horses and javelin men in plenty, was taken to the most miserable lodgings he had ever seen; his Lordship, however, simply said, "This is Cinderella, indeed !" Respecting the simple proposition, he did not think it was necessary to bribe the Judges to do the work, especially as they were going to inquire into charges of bribery. His own idea was that if any addition were made to the salaries of the Judges it should be general. The expense of going circuit would be more than those incurred by the Judges under this Act. This seems merely to be a payment to induce the Judges to adopt a new line of business.

said, he was of opinion that if they were to assent to the increase of pay to the Judges in question, they ought to extend that increase to all the Judges of the Superior Courts.

said, he must ask the Committee to bear in mind the difficulties under which the Bill had been brought in and pressed to its present position. The original objections of the Judges themselves, and the fact that those objections had never been in express terms withdrawn, should not be forgotten. These objections were those of gentlemen who had been appointed to do a certain work, and who had not accepted office on the understanding that this new work should be thrust upon them. Considering, then, that this work would be by far the most unpleasant the Judges, future as well as present, would have to do, he recommended the Committee to consider the question as men of the world, and make the Bill as little unpalatable as possible. Although the Judges themselves had been no parties to any such arrangement as that proposed, he was bound to remind the Committee that the Bill had hitherto been considered on the understanding that it should not be in the nature of an imposition on the Judges. And it would be admitted on all hands that the Judges would have a most onerous duty to discharge in laying down the course of procedure under the Act. All would remember how greatly the general admiration of Sir Cresswell Cresswell's conduct had been increased when it was remembered what immense trouble he had taken to regulate the procedure in the Divorce Court. There was no doubt that immense labour would be imposed on the Judges by the Bill; he therefore hoped the proposal of the Government would be acceded to.

said, he had heard with the greatest pleasure that the proposal under consideration had been made on the sole authority of the Government; it would have been extremely painful to him to think the Judges had been consulted on the subject and had entered into a compromise. He could not agree that the new duties imposed by the Bill would be the most disagreeable the Judge could undertake; it would be infinitely more disagreeable to him to try a man for his life. The question, however, was whether the passing of this provision would tend to elevate or derogate from the position of the Judges. It was true additional duties had been imposed on the Bench, but additional Judges would be appointed to share their work. He had never before heard the principle advocated that Judges should be offered additional payment to induce them to undertake work Parliament thought it right the Bench should discharge. If, then, it were resolved that the Judges should have this additional payment, he feared the result would be greatly to disparage the high estimation in which the Judges were held by the country. The Committee should be slow to create a precedent of this nature; for his part he would prefer voting £500 a year to each of the Judges unconditionally rather than accept the proposition made.

said, he thought the offer of £500 would make it impossible for the Judges to accept these new duties. The Judges' objection was not on account of the work, but for fear the new duty would destroy the dignity and authority of the Courts in other cases. As the objection of the Judges as stated in the letter of the Lord Chief Justice had not been withdrawn, this proposal of the additional £500 a year would seem like saying, "We will bribe you with £500 a year to withdraw your objection."

said, the House had taken the matter out of the hands of the Judges by deciding, notwithstanding the objections urged by the Lord Chief Justice, that the Judges were to do the duty. When additional duty was thrown on public servants, who were already fully occupied, it was customary to give them an addition to their salaries. To do that in this instance, could not be taken as a proposal, the acceptance of which would be derogatory to the dignity of the Judges.

said, his hon. Friend who had just sat down had founded his allegiance to the proposal before the House upon the doctrine that when additional duties were imposed on servants of the Crown additional remuneration should be given, and very generally was given. He was sorry to be obliged to differ entirely from his hon. Friend, both as to principle and as to fact. In the first place, he thought that if public servants were already fully occupied, additional duties ought not to be imposed upon them. That was the principle upon which the House had proceeded in appointing additional Judges. It would be very had policy to accept the principle contended for, because you could not have more than an average amount of service; and if you said, "We will give them more work and a higher salary," the result would generally be that the higher salary would be received, but the additional work would not be done. The homely rule of "a fair day's pay for a fair day's work" was the sound one. He was bound to say likewise that, as far as his experience went, it was not the rule of the public service, when new duties were imposed, to cap those new duties by new salaries. He did not hesitate to say that this was a principle you could apply; and in this case it would be irrelevant, because the difficulty had been met by an increase in the number of Judges. He must say that, whatever might happen with respect to this clause, no suspicion would be entertained within the walls of Parliament that the granting or the withholding of the proposed £500 a year would in any way influence the conduct of the Judges. But outside it might be supposed that the House of Commons had endeavoured to meet the objections of those learned personages by voting an addition of £500 to the salaries of the Judges who had to perform the duties prescribed by this Bill. He concurred with his right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Cardwell) that if the salaries of the Judges were thought to be insufficient, they ought to be considered generally, and a uniform increase ought to be made.

said, he would beg to remind the Committee that not only new duties but more arduous were to be imposed. As in this country position was in some degree estimated by amount of salary, this addition of £500 to the salaries of the Judges would, to some extent, elevate them in dignity.

said, he could not concur with the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken—that the position of Judges was to be elevated by £500 a year. If the Judges would not be fit to try those cases unless they got another £500 a year, he doubted very much that they would be fit to do so at all. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Oxford that if the Judges were underpaid, there ought to be an increase in their salaries for the discharge of their duties generally; but he considered that, as three new Judges were to be appointed, the work of the Judicial Bench would not be increased by this new jurisdiction.

proposed the following new clause:—

said, he wished to know who was to present these petitions. Was it to be the Government Whip?

said, the hon. Gentleman might undertake the duty himself.

said, he wished to express his acknowledgments to the Government for the great improvement which had been effected in the Bill.

proposed a new clause—

proposed, as an Amendment, an addition to prevent persons, Members of this House from practising.

said, the object of the clause was to preserve the status of the class known as Parliamentary agents, who may be neither barristers nor attorneys.

said, he had no great admiration for the Bill; but if it was to be tried, the experiment should he fairly made. It would be a singular example of mongrel legislation if they were to give this jurisdiction to the ordinary tribunals, and to allow audience to persons who were not now at liberty to practise there.

proposed to insert after the words "agents" the words "or counsel," in order to do an act of justice to the bar of Ireland.

said, the Irish bar were entitled either to some compensation—[Laughter]—he wished the House would hear the sentence out—for the loss of the business that would be taken away, or to be allowed to practise in the Court to which the jurisdiction was to be transferred.

said he thought it might tend to prevent inconvenience to omit the words "until the dissolution of next Parliament," and so fix the definite period of three years for the duration of the Bill. He moved an Amendment to that effect.

proposed to omit "three years" and insert "two years."

proposed, after Clause 53, to insert the following clause—

said, the Resolution to which the right hon. Baronet referred was passed in the 17th century; and at that time there was very good reason for passing such a Resolution, because the House of Lords had then the power and privilege of taxing themselves. Their interference with the rights of the House of Commons could not then be justified. But time which brought so many changes had brought a considerable change in the position of the House of Peers in regard to the great subject of taxation. The Members of that House were now taxed by the Votes of the House of Commons, and therefore he could not understand why a Peer of the Realm should not have a right of voting for Members of Parliament and taking part just as another individual in the general business of a free country like this, with the view of protecting his property and guarding his own interests. As to the doctrine laid down by the right hon. Baronet, it might be a version of the British Constitution to be found in De Lolme, or some other author; but in his (Mr. Disraeli's) judgment it was not a fair reading of the British Constitution. When the House of Commons, at the period of the Long Parliament, came to this Resolution the possession of power as regarded the respective branches of the Legislature was very different to what it was at that moment. It appeared that Peers of the Realm did now take an interest in elections of Members of that House. For example, at the commencement of the Session his attention had been called to the fact that a noble Friend of his—a Peer much respected on both sides of the House—had token the chair at a registration meeting in his own county; he was asked a Question on the subject, and he made some constitutional observations upon it. If it was a misdemeanour on the part of a Peer of the Realm to connect himself with the registration of his county, why was it not mentioned in this clause? This clause would not touch him as it only applied to interference in elections. The omission rather invalidated the position of the right hon. Gentleman. At the last Election for the University of Oxford, when the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire (Mr. Gladstone) was a candidate, more than one Peer of the Realm not only took a lively interest in those proceedings, but actually registered a vote. The distinguished Bishop of his (Mr. Disraeli's) diocese was a supporter then of the right hon. Gentleman, and, in the spirit of his constitutional rights and privileges, registered his vote for him. Another Spiritual Peer, the Bishop of Durham, had also the satisfaction to register his vote for the right hon. Gentleman on the same occasion, and a noble Earl, bearing an illustrious name—the descendant and representative of Lord Chancellor Cowper—also supported the right hon. Gentleman. Practically, Peers of the Realms did interfere in Elections and could register their votes. Within the last few days, he might say hours, he had read the advertisement of an election committee to support a candidate for the new constituency of the University of Edinburgh, and the chairman of that committee was the Duke of Argyll, who, he had no doubt, would make a most admirable chairman, and would direct and guide the operations of that committee with the utmost zeal tempered with discretion. He thought that all this showed that the Resolution which was first passed two centuries ago, and which was adapted to circumstances which had now changed, ought rather to be omitted from the Resolutions of the House than set up in a statutory form. Taking a great interest in the success of the Bill, he did not at that moment see that the adoption of this clause would be one of the most conciliatory courses they could take towards securing the concurrence of the Upper House. It would certainly not promote the passing of this Bill to inform the House of Lords that they had sent them up a clause which would inform the Lords Spiritual as well as Temporal, that their interference in the Elections of Members of that House should be considered as misdemeanour, and that they should be prosecuted accordingly. One would almost be led to suppose that the right hon. Baronet was animated by some vindictive feeling were it not that he had taken care to insert a proviso that the Bishops were not to be prosecuted at the Quarter Sessions. Whatever might be the view of the House of Commons as to the conduct of noble Lords interfering in the Elections for Members of that House, he would remind them that they had a right to be tried by their Peers, and that right still existed, independently of the House of Commons. If such a question had been brought forward at a younger period of the Session he thought it would probably have occupied three nights' debate. The practical point before the House was, were they interested in the success of this Bill, and if so, were they to send it up to the House of Peers with this clause? He thought the subject might reasonably be reserved for the consideration of the New Parliament.

said, he thought the pith of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (the First Minister of the Crown) was contained in the last sentence. He should be very glad to persuade his right hon. Friend that there was no advan- tage in proposing a clause of this kind to give a rigid form to that which had not been hitherto the statute law of the country. But if it were deemed right to raise the question, it could not well be raised upon this Bill. He entirely concurred in the conclusion at which the right hon. Gentleman opposite had arrived, but he must make a protest on behalf of the Re-solution of this House. The right hon. Gentleman did not give sufficient weight to the fact that they were responsible for it. It had been remarked by Earl Russell—when Leader of that House—that although the Resolution of the House was not law, and was not susceptible of a rigid and uniform application, yet, on the whole, it operated to check and restrain within narrow bounds the interference of Peers in elections, which, if not so restrained, might grow to a great inconvenience. That was sufficient to justify as a practical measure the Resolution of the House of Commons, but he hoped his right hon. Friend would not press his proposal. The right hon. Gentleman had stated that the Peers of the Realm in this country, at the time when this Resolution was first passed, possessed a power of separately taxing themselves, but it required the whole weight of the right hon. Gentleman's authority for him to believe such a statement.

said, that the Resolution had hitherto been enforced by Election Committees, as the law of the House, though not the law of the land. By the law of the land Peers could interfere as well as any other individuals. The practice of that House had always been to vindicate their privileges by striking out the votes of Peers at an election, but that power they had parted with by placing their jurisdiction in the hands of an independent tribunal, which would have no power to strike out such votes. He might observe with reference to the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (the First Lord of the Treasury) that Peers had always exercised the right of voting at and taking part in the elections for the Universities. Had the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Gateshead (Sir William Hutt) proposed a clause forbidding Peers taking part in elections—without subjecting them to punishment as being guilty of a misdemeanour—it would have been carried.

said, if it should be the wish of the House to pass a Resolution of this kind in a future Parliament they would have the same power to enforce it which they had always had. The privileges of the House were part of the law of the land, and had been always recognised as such; and if it were part of that law that Peers should not vote at elections, it would be the duty of the Judges to disallow such votes. But the real object and purpose of the Resolution was not to strike off this or that vote, but to prevent unconstitutional interference on the part of Members of one House with the independence of the other House. Should the clause be omitted, however, there was nothing in the Bill which would prevent that House from vindicating its privileges in such a case. If they attempted to turn this interference into a crime, they would be doing a different thing from what had ever been done by a Resolution of the House, or intended to be done. He thought, therefore, that the Committee would do well to adhere to the existing state of things, and not to assent to the clause now under consideration.

said, that these votes had invariably been rejected by Revising Barristers.

said, he believed that the Revising Barristers had always expunged the names of Peers from the lists of voters.

supported the clause.

said, he would suggest that the right hon. Gentleman (Sir William Hutt) should bring up the clause in a different form to meet the objection that had been made. He believed the only way to prevent the interference of Peers in elections was to enact that all elections compassed by the unconstitutional interference of Peers should be declared void. If the right hon. Gentleman would bring up a clause to that effect it would find a good deal of support in the Committee. He was rather surprised to hear it asserted that Peers might interfere in elections, and propose and vote for candidates, for if that were so it would go far to demonstrate that there was no necessity for the House of Lords.

said, he apprehended that Peers had not a right to vote for Members of Parliament. It was so stated by Lord Camden, and it was not a subject on which doubt should be entertained.

said, he thought that the punishment attached by this measure to acts of bribery would be far too heavy for the offence to which the hon. Gentleman's clause referred.

opposed the clause.

said, that though not going to the full extent of the clause, he thought that something clear and definite should be laid down with reference to such expenses.

asked when the Bill would be again proceeded with?

said, he proposed to place it on the Paper for To-morrow, but would be able more definitely to inform hon. Members on the subject later in the evening.

said, that in rising to move that the House should adjourn to Monday, he would take the opportunity of calling the attention of the House to the very able and lucid Report which had been presented to it by the Committee on Greenwich Hospital, though it was certainly not his intention to criticize one of the cleverest and most interesting documents which had ever been laid before Parliament. The fact of such a Report having appeared was a justification for inquiring fully into the origin of Greenwich Hospital, and how the intentions of the founders had been carried out. What was the stale of things prior to 1865, when the Greenwich Hospital Act was passed, and what was the state of things at the present moment? In passing he might remark that the very fact of a Committee having recently reported on the Act was a sufficient proof that that Act had not worked in a beneficial manner. In considering this matter, it was necessary to bear in mind that the word "Hospital" originally meant a shelter and refuge for the destitute, and not merely a receptable for persons suffering from disease. Now, the Act of 1696, under which Greenwich Hospital was founded, said—

"Whereas, the Seamen of this Kingdom have for a long Time distinguished themselves throughout the World by their Industry and Skilfulness in their Employments, and by their Courage and Constancy manifested in Engagements for the Defence and Honour of their Native Country; and for an Encouragement to continue this their ancient Reputation and to invite greater Numbers of His Majesty's Subjects to betake themselves to the Sea, it is fit and reasonable that some competent Provision should be made, that Seamen who by Age, Wounds, or other Accidents shall become disabled for future Service at Sea, and shall not be in a condition to maintain themselves comfortably, may not fall under Hardships and Miseries, may be supported at the public Charge, and that the Children of such disabled Seamen, and also the Widows and Children of such Seamen as shall happen to be slain, killed, or drowned in Sea Service, may in some reasonable Manner be provided for and educated. And also the Widows of such Seamen, Watermen, Fishermen, Lightermen, Bargemen, Keelmen, and Sea-faring Men, who shall be slain, killed, or drowned in the Sea Service, and the Children of such Seamen, Watermen, Fishermen, Lightermen, Bargemen, Keelmen, or Sea-faring Men so slain, killed, or drowned, and not of Ability to maintain or provide comfortably for themselves, shall be received into the said Hospital, and there be provided for."—[7 &c 8 Will 3, c. 21.]

Such, then, was the spirit of the founders. Not only was the Hospital intended for sailors of the Royal Navy, but the Act distinctly said that it was designed for merchant seamen and for their widows and orphans. The principle on which the institution was founded had, however, been departed from, and great injury had been thereby inflicted upon the seamen of this country. Anyone, indeed, who read the inscriptions on the building would see that it was intended originally to be an asylum, a refuge, and a home for aged and worn-out seamen. Now, what were the regulalations affecting the Hospital prior to 1859. It appeared from the very able Report made by the Royal Commissioners in 1859 that—

"In the year 1814 there were 2,710 pensioners in the institution. In 1849 the authorized number of in-pensioners being 2,642, there were but three vacancies in the Hospital. At that time the, admissions into Greenwich Hospital were regulated by the following Admiralty Memorandum of the 1st of January, 1852:—'1st. Out-pensioners for life, having served ten years and upwards, and who, on account of age or infirmity, are unable to work. 2d. Out-pensioners for life, with less than ten years' service, who are rendered totally incapable, by reason of wounds, hurts, injuries, or sickness received in and by the service, of assisting in any way to support themselves, reference being had to their age. Men who are not pensioners:—1st. No man shall be considered eligible for admission with less than ten years' service, with a good character. 2d. Unless he has been maimed or disabled by wounds in the service.'"

The Commissioners, in the admission to Greenwich of naval pensioners, recommended—

"That no man be deemed eligible for such admission who does not fall under one of the following descriptions:—Description (A). Seamen and marines, whether in the Royal Navy or the merchant service, who from wounds received in fight, or from bodily injury by accident while engaged in the service of the Crown, or from ill-health contracted in the service of the Crown, and not from want of proper care on their part, are in need of the medical or surgical treatment provided by the Hospital. Description (B). Seamen and marines entitled to an out-pension of not less than £9, who, through age, imbecility, or disease, have become incapable of maintaining themselves, and proper objects for the medical and surgical assistance provided by the Hospital. Description (C). Seamen and marines, of good character, by age unfit for further service at sea, who shall have served in the Royal Navy, at sea or abroad, between the ages of eighteen and forty-eight for twenty-one years; two years in the Naval Reserve to count as one year at sea or abroad, and one year of war service to serve as one and a half years of ordinary service."

Such was the recommendation of the Royal Commission of 1859. It would, no doubt, be hardly believed that at the time that Commission was appointed the members of the Establishment numbered only 452, beginning with the Governor and Lieutenant Governor, and ending with the warehouseman. The expense of the establishment was £57,000 a year, and the number of pensioners 1,600. It was proposed by the Commission that there should be 2,300 pensioners, that there should be 173 persons on the establishment, and that the salary and allowances should be only £31,000 per annum. But what was the state of the case now? While there was an establishment of 173 persons the number of pensioners at the present moment was only 410, each of whom cost the country no less than £120 a year. In twenty-eight years the officers' quarters had had £46,000 expended on them. Therefore, instead of an improvement having been effected, things had actually become much worse than they were under the old system. The object of the Bill of 1865 was on a former occasion clearly stated by his hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers) who said—

"Greenwich Hospital was intended, so far as the building was concerned, to be for the future an asylum for infirm, helpless, and wounded seamen, and that seamen were not necessarily entitled to be received as inmates merely because they were in receipt of pensions, and because they were unfit for longer service at sea."—[3 Hansard, clxxix. 1011.]

But the principle laid down by the founders had been entirely overlooked. It was clear from the Memorandum of the Duke of Somerset that by the Act of 1865 it was proposed to conduct the Hospital on a principle it never had been founded on and never would have been founded on. That Memorandum stated—

"In former years the out-pensions were supplemental to the relief afforded by the Hospital; in later times the out-pensions constituted the chief source of relief, to which the Hospital is a supplement."

In 1865 the men were driven out of the Hospital, each of them getting £36 10s. a year. He believed that 900 of them left, and that within fifteen months no fewer than 400 of that number were dead. That was not to be wondered at, because, in point of fact, the men had been driven from their homes. The only object was to get rid of them. One of the regulations then made was this—

"Pensioners can only return with the loss of their pensions, and not in good health; they must be aged or infirm, or under medical treatment. Unless residing at a naval port they must go to Somerset House to be surveyed, married men being only allowed 2s. a week for their wives."

Some of the medical evidence as to the difficulty of obtaining admission to the Hospital was very instructive. He should refer to only two or three passages. Sir David Deas, Medical Inspector of Haslar, stated—

"Two or three years ago we were constantly applying to have men admitted into Greenwich Hospital, but we met with so many rebuffs and refusals that we ceased to make them, and the result is that the men themselves have almost forgotten that there is such a place as Greenwich Hospital in existence, and it is only when the medical officers, seeing that a man must be sent to his parish, take action themselves, and make representations to the Admiralty, that they occasionally, but very rarely indeed, succeed in getting them in."

In the evidence of Dr. James Salmon, Deputy Inspector General of the Infirmary, Woolwich, these passages occurred—

"You are of opinion that it would be of great advantage to the service and to the men if they had the power of coming in here if they chose?—Yes, I think it would be a very great advantage to the men and also to the service. I think that the service is maligned by these men, and, as I consider, justly, because these men present in their external appearance the marks of disease, and they go about saying,' I have served my country for so many years; I have lost my health in the service of my country, and they give me a miserable 6d. a day, or they give me a gratuity and have done with me.' I know that they do that.

"Do you think that it would give pleasure to the men throughout the service if it were known, and would it be an inducement to good conduct in some sense if it were known that they had that privilege; would it render the service, in your opinion, more popular with the men?—To a certain extent I think it must be so: from what I have observed of the men they look upon this place as their home by right; that is a sentiment which is very deeply ingrained in the naval mind."

Dr. Armstrong, R.N., was asked—

"What is your opinion as regards increasing the inducement to become out-pensioners as compared with widening the area of admission into the Hospital?"

His reply was—

"I would prefer to widen the area of admission of men into the Hospital, because I think it would be more beneficial to them and more beneficial to the public service."

In the examination of Dr. Beith there were these passages—

"Would it be of advantage to the service itself (I mean, in the opinion of the men) if they had increased facilities for admission into this place, and if invalids were really attended to here more largely than they are now?—I think it would be a great advantage to the service, and would give satisfaction to the men in general."

He now came to the recommendations of the Committee, some of which were admirable, though the Committee did not seem to have grappled with the fact that this magnificent institution was founded for the objects to which he had referred. In that summary of recommendations the Committee, referring to the outline of the revision, which they recommended, made this statement—

"In the foregoing outline of the revision we propose in the Hospital establishment we have endeavoured to keep in view the following leading principles:—1. To make Greenwich Hospital that which from its general character we believe it ought to be—a self-contained institution under the Board of Admiralty. 2. To relax as far as may be expedient and practicable the present terms of admission for invalid inmates. 3. To reduce, as far as may be consistent with efficient management, the cost of the Hospital establishment. 4. To secure, while making this reduction, the means of a thorough check and supervision of the Hospital accounts and expenditure, by means of both local and independent audit. 5. While making the Hospital, as formerly, a self-contained institution, to avoid a return either to the old system of double government, or to vesting again in the same individuals the management of the northern estates and the conduct of the Greenwich establishment. Guided by these principles, our leading recommendations are, as regards the inmates—1. To admit all seamen, being of good character, who are discharged from the naval hospitals as no longer capable of service, in consequence of hurts received or diseases contracted in the service rendering them incapable of earning a livelihood and requiring medical treatment, without reference to the possession of a pension or to length of service. 2. That the present payment of £15 per head for every man by which the number of inmates of Greenwich Hospital falls short of 1,400 be henceforth discontinued. 3. That the regulations by which an out-pensioner becoming an inmate of the Hospital is deprived altogether of his out-pension be relaxed. 4. That the warming and ventilation of Queen Mary's and Queen Anne's Quarters be improved, and these Quarters rendered fit for the accommodation of invalid inmates. 5. That the present number of inmates be increased to 1,200 men by such gradual increase as the Admiralty may find that the funds of the Hospital may admit. 6. That admission should be given to men of the Royal Naval Reserve on certain conditions. As regards the Hospital establishment—1. To abolish the Greenwich salaried establishment at the Admiralty. 2. To change the title of the head Executive authority of the Hospital to Deputy Governor. 3. To diminish the Executive staff of the Hospital by one lieutenant, remaining lieutenant to be styled Lieutenant and Adjutant."

He did not think that the recommendations of the Committee went to the extent that the evidence would have warranted. By the Act of William and Mary widows and orphans were to be provided for within the walls of the Hospital, and some years ago a Commission suggested that £70,000 should be laid out on a building for the reception of widows, and £30,000 a year on their maintenance; but nothing of that kind had been done. No reason existed for the neglect. At this moment there was an available surplus of £24,000 a year, but if these funds were insufficient, Parliament would readily vote £50,000 a year for the purpose of giving effect to the principle on which Greenwich Hospital was founded. In the Estimates, £1,000 he observed was all that was set down to be given in gratuities, and those solely to the widows of seamen and marines, on active service, who might be killed in action, by a fall from aloft, or by drowning. Under the present regulations, widows of out- pensioners received the balance of the quarter in which their husbands died; and widows of in-pensioners received only the balance due on the death of their husbands—rarely more than 2s. The Duke of Somerset had recommended that £5,000 a year should be given to widows. It appeared that some fifty seamen's widows who lived around Greenwich were in the greatest distress and that one, the widow Boyles, died a short time ago in the streets of that town from starvation. He now came to the schools. It had been stated that there were difficulties in the way of carrying on a school for girls at Greenwich; but be could not see why with such ample space at their command those difficulties might not be overcome. The Committee stated on this point that they thought the end in view might be more simply and economically obtained by placing girls in existing institutions which, by an arrangement with the managers, might be made available for that purpose; and they recommended that a sum not exceeding £4,000 per annum be applied to the maintenance and education, and in the training for domestic service, of 200 orphan daughters of sailors and marines. Now, this plan would involve the taking of those girls from their families and scattering them over the country, while schools for twice the number might be provided at Greenwich. He now came to the important question of our relations towards merchant seamen in respect of Greenwich Hospital. From the foundation of that institution down to a recent year every seaman had been made to subscribe 6d. a month towards it—the Greenwich 6d. it was called—and no less than £2,600,000 was contributed towards its funds by the merchant seamen who got nothing at all from it. He asked that the principle of the Act of Parliament, under which the pay of our seamen had been mulcted to the extent of £2,600,000, should be carried out, and that a portion of the Hospital should be given to them. That question had been discussed before; the year before last it created great interest in the country; and he was happy to say that the Earl of Derby and the present Secretary of State for War had fully appreciated the importance of that subject and shown themselves keenly sensible of the position of our merchant seamen. Yet, in spite of all that, not a merchant seaman had been admitted within the walls of the Hospital. He would suggest that they should offer those seamen not a part of the Hospital which it was known they could not accept, but that part of it which was nearest the Dreadnought—namely, Queen Anne's Quarters. He understood that in Queen Anne's Quarters there was accommodation for a large number of merchant seamen, and there they could be under perfectly separate management from the rest of the establishment. We boasted of our Naval Reserve of 12,000 seamen, and well we might; but how were we to recruit the navy without our merchant seamen? Therefore, to overlook the claim of those men was wholly unjustifiable. It had been supposed that the occupants of the Hospital were drunken men, dissatisfied men, and that it was no object of ambition with them to enter the institution. Wishing to know how far that impression was well-founded, he had obtained some statistics respecting one point—namely, drunkenness. In 1866 there were only twenty-one cases of drunkenness in the whole year; and in 1867 only nineteen. The men were exceedingly happy there; and although they had been tempted and even bribed to leave the Hospital, he believed they would all come back again if they saw there was a facility for doing so. It was all very well to say they might go through certain forms; but they did not understand those forms, or choose to incur the expense they involved. Greenwich Hospital was an institution of which every Englishman ought to feel proud as he passed it on the river; and to convert it into a mere hospital for the infirm, and exclude from it the merchant seaman—who, he might almost say, had maintained it—was certainly not carrying out the principle on which it was founded. Speaking on that subject, the present Secretary of State for War had well said—

"You are turning into a mere hospital that magnificent establishment which has always been regarded by the sailors who have served their country long and well as a refuge for their old age."

Without trespassing further on the attention of the House at that hour of the evening, and that advanced period of the Session, he would conclude by quoting the eloquent words of a man who strongly sympathized, as it was to be hoped the House would do, with the objects forwhich that great institution was established. Lord Macaulay's words were these—

"The gentle Queen sleeps among her illustrious kindred. The affection with which her husband cherished her memory was soon attested by monument, the most noble that had ever been erected to any Sovereign. No scheme had been so much her own, none had been so dear to her heart, as that of converting the palace of Greenwich into a retreat for seamen. Few of those who now gaze on the noblest of European institutions are aware that it is a memorial of the virtues of good Queen Mary, of the love and sorrow of William, and of the great victory of La Hogue."

said, he thought it was much to be regretted that the hon. Member for Honiton had brought forward a question of so much interest and importance at a period of the Session when it was utterly impossible that any practical result should follow or that the question could receive the attention which it deserved. In the administration of the funds of Greenwich Hospital there was an essential element of injustice. Those who had contributed to its maintenance for a century and a quarter, and who had been instrumental in creating its vast revenues—namely, the merchant seamen of this country—did not now participate, and never had fully and fairly participated, in its advantages. From 100 to 200 aged seamen in his own borough (Sunderland) who had been subjected by an operation of law to an enforced subscription to that institution, without ever having derived a fraction of benefit from it, were now left in a state of pauperism and supported by the rates. To a greater or less degree it was so in every other mercantile community throughout the country. While the just claims of our mercantile marine were thus entirely ignored, though the funds would amply suffice to meet them, the resources of the institution had been wasted and mismanaged, and no inconsiderable portion of them spent in pensions to officers of the navy, contrary to the conditions on which the Hospital was founded, and to the spirit of the legislation under which it had grown. In 1859 £120,000 was paid for annuities for retiring officers. The management of Greenwich Hospital stood pre-eminent for improvidence and injustice. It was said that the seamen of the mercantile marine, if they entered the Royal Navy, would obtain access to the benefits of the institution, but the injustice of the case was this—that whereas those benefits were open to anybody who entered the Royal Navy, although he remained there only a day, whether he had contributed to the funds of the Hospital or not, on the other hand, the merchant seamen, who had long been compelled to contribute towards those funds, was not permitted to enjoy those advantages. As long as that state of things continued unredressed, the sense; of injustice must exist among our mercantile marine.

said, as the Chairman of the Committee to which the hon. Member for Honiton (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had referred, he could not but feel gratified at the complimentary terms in which his hon. Friend had spoken of their Report. Whatever the merits or demerits of that Report might be, all he could say was that it was intended that the inquiry should be of the most searching character, and he felt bound to take this, the first, public opportunity presented to him to acknowledge the valuable assistance he received from the other Members of the Committee. As no two men appeared to think alike either in regard to the past or the future of the Hospital, he did not expect that the recommendations of the Committee would command universal assent. But the Committee, as the Report abundantly showed, entered upon their investigation with no predilections in favour of profuse expenditure or useless sinecures. Their desire throughout was to ascertain how they could combine the strictest economy with the fullest efficiency on the part of the establishment of the Hospital. He hoped his hon. Friend (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) would not think him discourteous if he did not follow him to-night through his elaborate history of the birth of the Hospital and first intentions of its founder. The object now was to deal with the future of the Hospital, and upon this subject two broad views might be said to be entertained by different parties. The first was that of his hon. Friend, who would go back to the early days of the Hospital and carry out to the very letter the charter of William and Mary, and would by so doing establish a state of things unsuited to the present time. The second was the view taken last year by the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers), who would offer to the present inmates inducements somewhat similar to those which produced a clearance in 1865, and the ultimate operation of which would be to close the Hospital altogether. The Report of the Committee took a middle course between these two extremes. No doubt it might be considered a retrograde course in some respects, but the Committee had no wish to re-establish the exact state of things which existed before 1865, or anything approaching to it. He thought the Hospital ought to be a self-contained institution under the Admiralty, but he had no wish to revert to the old system of the double government or to see re-established there sinecure offices with nominal duties attached to them. And although the Committee recommended to a considerable extent the re-filling of the Hospital they by no means desired to see the sailors of the Royal Navy compelled nolentes volentes to become in-pensioners, to be separated from their wives and families, and to adopt a life which many of the former inmates had indisputably complained of as being one which isolated them from the outside world, and forced them into almost monastic seclusion. His hon. Friend had certainly suggested a remedy for the monastic grievance, for he wanted to see the in-pensioners accompanied by their wives and families, and he argued in favour of a fair provision for the maintenance of their widows. There was something very attractive, no doubt, in the idea of thus parcelling out the Hospital into a number of domestic interiors, but there were limits to the funds of the Hospital. All would agree that the object should be to provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number. The idea of the hon. Member could only be realized by a large augmentation of the funds of the Hospital, which Parliament would not sanction, or else by a great diminution, if not the entire suppression, of those 5,000 out-pensioners who now in a great measure realized outside the Hospital his hon. Friend's ideas of the state of things that ought to exist within it, for they lived among their wives and families, and thus proclaimed in various parts of the country the glories of the naval service and the benefits of Greenwich Hospital. His hon. Friend asserted that widows at present derived no direct benefit from the funds of the Hospital. He would admit that his hon. Friend was justified in stating that widows were in the original charter of the institution, and he should like to see some further provision made for them; but if they were to receive pensions, or if the pensions of the in-pensioners were to be continued to their widows after death, either the number of pensioners must be diminished or else some further grants must be made out of the public purse. At present the widow of every seaman of the Royal Navy killed or drowned in the service received the gratuity of a year's pay out of the funds of the Hospital. In time of peace, of course, the number was not very great; but this payment would require a large fund in the event of a naval war. Another benefit to the widows was that the large staff of hospital nurses was almost entirely recruited from the class of pensioner's widows, and very excellent nurses they were. The widows also had a prior claim to the benefits of the school for the education of their children. Then the hon. Member for Sunderland had resuscitated the old story of the claim that the merchant seamen were supposed to possess to share in the benefits of the Hospital on account of the payment of the "Merchant Seamen's Sixpences." The original intention of the founders of the institution appeared to be to establish a hospital in the first place for seamen of the Royal Navy, and, secondly, for seamen of the merchant service who might be maimed or wounded while serving in the Royal Navy, but not for the large body of merchant seamen who had never served the Crown in any capacity. That payment of 6d., so far as he could make out, was an equivalent levied upon the whole body of merchant seamen for the protection afforded to British commerce by the British Navy, for whose benefit the Hospital was established. No doubt, in the early history of the Hospital, merchant seamen who under the Registration Act of the time registered themselves as willing to serve, and who were killed, maimed, or wounded in action against either an enemy, a pirate, or a rebel were admitted to the benefits of the Hospital. The seamen of the Royal Naval Reserve of the present day exactly answered the description of those who were registered under the Registration Act of 100 years ago, and they would reap all the benefit of the Hospital enjoyed by the merchant seamen of that day, without contributing to the maintenance of its revenue as they did. His hon. Friend had referred to the question of the Dread-nought hospital ship. That matter was very fully discussed, as the House would recollect, last year, and the case was briefly this—The Admiralty allotted a Quarter of the Hospital, called Queen Mary's Quarter to the Dreadnought, while, on the other hand, the Dreadnought authorities asked for Queen Anne's Quarter as being the most suitable. Well, the Admiralty then had Queen Mary's and Queen Anne's Quarters inspected, not only by medical officers of the navy but by independent medical authorities, who all reported in favour of Queen Mary's Quarter. The Dreadnought authorities, being still dissatisfied, the Admiralty then referred the question to a Committee, which contained an evenly-balanced number of representatives of the Admiralty and the Dreadnought, with the medical officers of that ship. The majority of the Committee decided that neither Quarter would be fit for hospital purposes without considerable alteration, but that the one offered by the Admiralty was, for many reasons, more fit than the other. The Admiralty were, therefore, open to no reproach on this head. As to the future of the Hospital, the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Childers) suggested last Session that terms should be offered to the present inmates to leave, that the infirm should be transferred to the naval port hospitals, and that the establishment should be finally closed. This appeared at first sight a simple solution of the question, and in the early part of their inquiry the Committee sought for evidence in support of it, but they ultimately decided both against its practicability and its desirability. The large majority of the inmates being infirm old men who had rejected the terms of leaving offered in 1865, it was unlikely that any great number of them would accept another such offer, in which case the whole scheme would fall to the ground. On the most sanguine view 200 or 250 inmates would be left. Now, the accommodation of Haslar Hospital was only sufficient for the requirements of the service and for emergencies such as might be expected in a large harbour like Portsmouth, with a dockyard and the Channel squadron in close proximity to it. He had visited Haslar Hospital last summer, in company with his noble Friend the Secretary to the Admiralty, and the conclusion was forced on them that it was out of the question that the men could be sent to Haslar. At Plymouth fifty or sixty men might, perhaps, be taken in, but the authorities were strongly of opinion that Greenwich pensioners accustomed to liberty and the absence of restraint could not dwell under the same roof as sailors subject to the strictness of naval discipline, and that a separate building would be necessary. Now this would probably involve a sepa- rate establishment and separate staff, and two or three small establishments of this kind at the naval port hospitals would be little less costly than one great establishment. There was, moreover, the absolute necessity, whatever became of the present inmates of Greenwich Hospital, of the whole building being under the immediate control of the Government, for if a naval war broke out, not only would the naval port hospitals be soon filled to overflowing, but there would be in-pensioners enough to re-people the whole range now vacant at Greenwich. If, however, different portions of the building were given over to the Dreadnought, to a local hospital, and to other objects, their reclamation would be very difficult. Admitting, therefore, that the present state of things was unsatisfactory, the number of in-pensioners having till recently been rapidly decreasing, while the cost of the establishment was undiminished, the Committee considered whether, avoiding the abandonment of hospitals, the area of admission could be so widened as wisely to extend its benefits, and, while utilizing the present establishment, diminish the cost per head of each man. Now, while under the old system the object was to drive everybody into the Hospital, the Act of 1865 appeared to them to go too far in the opposite direction, the present regulations for in-pensioners excluding, as it seemed to them unfairly, numbers who were fit to enjoy those benefits. Without detailing the evidence on this point he might mention that whereas in 1866 1,468 men were invalided from the port hospitals as incapable of further service, a large proportion of them being incapable of maintaining themselves in any way, only seven of them found their way to Greenwich, though 618 of them received pensions and were therefore eligible. This showed that the in-pension system was heavily weighted, and the fact that 850 received no pensions proved the strict administration by the Pension Board of the pension regulations. He feared that a very large proportion of the men thus discharged without pensions ended their days, to the scandal of the service, in Union houses. The Committee desired to remedy this by a relaxation of the in-pension regulations, so as to admit every man of good character, irrespective of length of service, who was discharged from the naval port hospitals as incapable of further service and of maintaining himself. With regard to the contribution for the education of seamen's daughters, 200, for whom it was proposed to provide from the Hospital revenues, was precisely the number of girls educated in the school, which was given up in 1841, but which the hon. Member for Honiton (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) desired to resuscitate. He thought the House would agree that the furnishing out of the funds of the Hospital, annual grants for excellent educational institutions al-ready in existence—the Orphan School at, Devonport and other institutions of that character—the Admiralty having the right to nominate a certain number of scholars, would be a better plan than repeating the experiment of a girls' school in so questionable a locality as Greenwich—an experiment which had failed once and might do so again. He did not think the interests of the Hospital would suffer from no precipitate action having been taken, for the carrying out of the Committee's recommendations would require time, and some of them, indeed, legislation. It was the intention of the Admiralty to consider those recommendations during the Recess with a view to the production early next Session of a measure dealing with the whole subject. It would be a source of great satisfaction to the Committee if their labours resulted in leaving a mark on the future history of the Hospital, and, while promoting judicious economy in the administration of its revenues, in advancing also the welfare of those for whom this noble institution was originally founded.

said, that the hon. Member for Honiton (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) deserved the thanks both of the naval service and the country for having brought forward this question. He was one of those who greatly regretted what he might call the destruction of that noble naval institution, Greenwich Hospital. The office of Governor had been a great naval dignity which Admirals who had served in all parts of the world might look forward to as a great reward. Then the Hospital itself was regarded by the sailors as a post of honour. They considered it an honour to wear its uniform and to be members of the institution. It was very; like what the Invalides in France was. But we had now got rid of it, and the same thing would be done, he supposed, by-and-by with Chelsea Hospital, which occupied towards the army much the same position as Greenwich Hospital towards the navy. We should do a great injury to the military service if we lost Chelsea Hospital, and he thought we had done great mischief to the navy by getting rid of Greenwich Hospital instead of retaining it as a refuge for our destitute old seamen. It was said that the men did not like the Hospital. But the fact was the place was made uncomfortable to them. When the whole police of the Hospital was in the hands of the men they used to take charge of it with pride; but when new regulations were introduced and the metropolitan police were brought into the place the sailors looked upon it as a degradation to be under them. [Mr. LOCKE: Like the Temple.] He thought it a great disgrace to the Benchers to have allowed the police to come in there. If a sailor had had a little too much grog he was met by a policeman and taken to the station-house, but under the old system he would fall into the hands of his comrades, who would take care of him and nothing more was said about it. Then, the sailor liked to smoke, but smoking in the wards was prohibited, and no smoking room was provided. That might appear a little thing to hon. Gentlemen, but it was a great thing to the sailor. Again, there was nothing a sailor hated more than to be turned into a soldier. He did not like to be subjected to the strict discipline of the soldier. All these things made the Hospital distasteful to him, and then a small inducement was offered to the men to go away, which a great many of them did. But he was quite sure, if their habits and comforts had been duly considered, they would never have gone away. If the place had been properly managed, there would always have been more candidates for admission than could be accommodated there. If Greenwich Hospital were made pleasant to the sailor, he had no doubt that it would be a real assistance to the navy, by rendering the naval service more popular that it was. He trusted that Her Majesty's Government would never reconcile themselves to the notion of making Greenwich Hospital a mere receptacle for the sick. It was intended by the founder to be an asylum for meritorious seamen who had served their country, and had been wounded in the service. He did not think that the men of the merchant service ought to be altogether excluded, but that one portion of the Hospital ought to be appropriated to those that were qualified. He must say, however, that the man-of-war's man did not like to be mixed up with the merchant seamen, and unless restrictions were placed on the admission of that element into the Hospital it would never be very popular in the navy. Merchant seamen ought to be admitted when they had performed some valorous action or other distinguished service. It was not desirable that there should he too many places for officers of the navy kept up at the Hospital. Those places must to a great extent be sinecures, and the great grievance of the Hospital from time immemorial was that the money which should have been devoted to the comfort of the men had been given in payment to sinecurists. They all remembered the famous speech of Erskine when he denounced the system. It would be desirable, however, to keep up a few honorary offices, such as that of Governor, to which Admirals who had served their country might look forward; and the Hospital would be all the more popular if there were at the head of it naval men whom the old sailors would respect. In conclusion, he would express a hope that what had been done a short time ago to revolutionize the Hospital would not be deemed irrevocable, and that the false step which had been then taken would, if possible, be retraced.

said, the House had not yet been told whether the recommendations of the Admiralty Committee had received the sanction of the Board. As far as the general tenor of those recommendations went, he was prepared at the proper time to give them a general support, because they were framed in a liberal and kindly spirit towards the infirm and aged seaman. But many parts of those recommendations would require careful consideration, and among other important matters very large questions of a financial character would present themselves. One point which he had before brought under the notice of the House he would venture to recall to their attention now. There were in the North of England a certain number of the survivors of those men who formerly paid 6d.from their wages towards Greenwich Hospital. They had no legal claim upon the revenues; but as an act of grace, seeing that the Hospital funds were very flourishing, he hoped that their case would be considered, and that a small sum would be applied to their relief, many of them being in distressed circumstances.

said, that being responsible for the legislation of 1865 with regard to Greenwich Hospital, he felt sure that his hon. Friends who had spoken in favour of restoring the monastic institu- tion of Greenwich would stand almost alone in that opinion. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) said that the result of discharging the men from the Hospital was that 400 of them died in about eighteen months. Now, fortunately, the official statement was before the House, and from this it appeared that the number discharged in October, 1865, was 977, and the number of those living sixteen months afterwards, in January or February, 1867, was 905. The death of seventy-two out of 977 was, considering the age of the men; a very low average. The hon. Gentleman, in stating that 400 had died, instead of seventy-two, had taken the figures out of a public newspaper. He had seen the statement there himself, but there was not the slightest foundation for it. His hon. Friend (Mr. Du Cane) in the able Report which he had presented, expressed his approval of the general features of the Act, and spoke of the abuses which existed before it was passed. But he made some proposals tending in his (Mr. Childers') opinion to the very evils the Act had removed; and this at a considerable cost to the country. He was not prepared merely to carry out charitable objects, but to adopt measures which would destroy the sound financial basis on which the Greenwich funds were placed. It was, for instance, proposed to increase the number of admissions to the Hospital from 400 to 1,200, to reduce the charge for pensions very considerably, to increase the number of children in the schools from 800 to 1,000, and to carry out further improvements. These charges, however, would entail very considerable expenses. The increase of admissions from 400 men to 1,200 would cost £40,000 a year, which, along with the other alterations, would entail a total expenditure of £172,000. The gross income of the Hospital was £155,000, so that in time of peace, when there ought to be a considerable surplus, there would be a deficiency of £17,000 a year, assuming that £15 a head was still paid to the Consolidated Fund under the Act. The proposal of the late Government to keep a surplus of £10,000 a year in order to put the finances in the condition they were in before 1865 was characterized as extravagant, and it was said that £5,000 a year would be sufficient; but, looking at the large proportion of terminable mineral income, and considering that the building was not insured, as was originally intended, it would be most unwise to have a surplus of less than £10,000 a year. In this case the old saying was quite appropriate, "You can't eat your cake and have it." We must in these matters be prudent; we must not indulge in the pleasure of granting all that every one asks; endless demands might be made, and it was the duty of those who held the purse-strings not to yield. The plan his hon. Friend proposed showed where it was hoped to get the money from; he proposed to bring into the Hospital fund the out-pensions of everyone taken into the Hospital, and thus, and by giving up the £15 a head contribution, to get from the Chancellor of the Exchequer no less a sum than £20,000 a year. His hon. Friend had not got it yet, and he doubted whether, with such a deficit as we had now, and with a falling Revenue, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would spare £20,000 a year to carry out these proposals. There were many good points in the Report. It was distinctly proved that the establishment was too great, and he must say that the Government were a little responsible for not previously themselves watching matters which did not require a Royal Commission. For instance, the late Government had appointed a certain number of medical officers for 600 men, but, for reasons which were not clear, the late First Lord of the Admiralty unnecessarily appointed another medical officer, although the number of men was only 400. The proposals made as to the better management of the school were sound. Two tendencies had been pulling against each other, and nobody had had the courage to say which should prevail; but the proposal made did so. As to the appointment of a Controller, he would say the expenditure in connection with the control of the revenue was unnecessarily large, and economy could be effected. It was, however, doubtful whether we should always have a Civil Lord of the Admiralty who would be competent to do what the hon. Gentleman had undertaken, for Civil Lords were generally appointed, not with reference to the management of estates, but with reference to their fitness for the civil duties in connection with the dockyards and the navy; and it was not often we had a Civil Lord who possessed the knowledge and the aptitude of his hon. Friend. He therefore doubted the wisdom of making the Civil Lord a sort of superior estate manager. He deprecated also the lax and uncertain rules laid down with respect to admission into the Hospital, a matter about which regulations ought to be distinct and intelligible, seeing that vagueness would infallibly end in the abuses of former days, and the filling of the Hospital with men who had no right to be there. Laxity in admission was opposed to the policy of the Act, which was that sailors were better off in the bosoms of their families than collected together in the Hospital, and the only cases for admission should be circumstances of utter helplessness and having no friends; indeed, the very fact that in 1865, for £30 or £40 a year, men who had cost £100 a year preferred returning to their families, justified the policy of the Government. He should be sorry now to see any act taken of a retrogressive character, and he much feared the effect of the proposals would be a considerable retrogression. With respect to the merchant service the case was plain; as a matter of right they had no claim on the Hospital. The 6d. paid before 1833 by sailors, whether in the merchant or the Queen's service, was a tax imposed to maintain Greenwich for the purposes of the navy; when it was repealed, in 1834, it was expressly stated by those who moved the repeal that the merchant seamen had no right whatever to any advantages in consideration of it; and it would be absurd now, when they did not pay, that they should be supposed to obtain a right. He had expressed the obligations due to his hon. Friend and the Committee for their able Report; he had pointed out the dangerous proposals that were made in a financial point of view, admitting their excellence from a charitable point of view; and he hoped that when the plan came before the House next year they would insist upon a scheme of management showing a fair balance of income over expenditure.

said, he wished to correct the statement that old pensioners when once they had left the Hospital could not return to it. They could return at any time; they had nothing to do but to go to Somerset House and relinquish their pensions and they would be received at once. As to their not being received unless they were "infirm and helpless," if they were that when first admitted, when they returned some years afterwards they were not likely to have become sound again. It had been his duty during the last two years to investigate the claims of these poor fellows, and a very painful duty it was.

said, he hoped the Government would take into their favourable consideration the claims of the seamen of the merchant service, and offer them a wing of the Hospital which could be put into an efficient state of repair at a moderate cost. This would be but just, and he hoped the Government would consent to the arrangement, instead of banding them over to a charitable society.

said, he rose to call attention to the case of the Customs Extra Clerks. These gentlemen had no complaint to make against the chiefs of their Department nor against the Treasury. Their complaint had reference solely to the system or law which was in force, and which inflicted great injustice and hardship upon them. When there had been an unusual pressure of work in the Customs Department it had been the practice to engage a number of Extra Clerks, but as the additional work had invariably increased, instead of diminishing, these clerks were, of course, permanently engaged. Notwithstanding this, they were not attached to any particular class, and received no regular promotion. He could not conceive that any person acquainted with the internal details of the Customs administration could entertain any doubt as to the importance of having those details carried out by a class of men educated and trained to expertness in the duties devolving upon them, in preference to raw and untried labourers. There was, however, an entire want of acknowledgment of the services rendered by them. They could not at any time receive promotion or be draughted on to what was called the establishment. Some fifteen years ago, it appeared, the Treasury published a Minute to the effect that all persons then engaged in the service of the Crown, and who had been so engaged at an age above twenty-five years, should thenceforward have no promotion in the public service, nor be draughted to the regular establishment of the Customs or any of the departments subject to the administration of the Treasury. They were deprived of all the advantages enjoyed by those who belonged to the permanent establishment. This Minute sinned against the elementary principles of justice in legislation, and it was impossible to discover any principle on which it could have been framed. The number of persons thus employed was thirty-eight, of whom twenty had entered the service previously to the promulgation of the Minute. The Treasury Minute appeared to overlook the fact that many of these clerks had been twenty years in the service at the time it was issued, and it was the cause of those that he chiefly advocated on the present occasion. Their salaries amounted for the first five years to only 30s. a week, for the next five years to only 35s. a week? and for the remaining period of their service to only 40s. a week. Anyone would conclude that the Minute was based on the supposition that these gentlemen were the journeymen of their occupation, instead of being, as they were, men eminently fitted to discharge all the duties of the Department. They were liable to be draughted from one branch to another at the discretion of any of the heads of their office, and to be called upon temporarily to fill any situation that might fall vacant, and thus it happened that one so appointed was called upon to discharge, and was expected to be able to discharge, the duties of an office, the regular holder of which would receive a salary of from £500 to 700 a year. If they were absent from sickness, no allowance was made to them on this score, although those who were regularly on the staff were allowed to be absent from this cause for a period of six months without deduction from their incomes. They were entitled to no superannuation allowance; but were expected out of the 40s. a week they received, to provide for themselves a fund which should keep them from the workhouse in old age; and though receiving only the remuneration of ordinary workmen, they were obliged to keep up the same appearance and pass the same examinations as gentlemen placed on the establishment. He could not believe that the Government, if they were aware of the circumstances of the case, would allow gentlemen thus employed to work for so wretched a stipend, and to be deprived of the common advantages which belonged to all persons in the service of the Crown. If they were not wanted for the works of the Department they ought to be dismissed; if they were wanted, the dignity of the public service required that they should be properly remunerated. From a printed circular which had been sent to him, as well as to other hon. Members, he learned that they were appointed by the Lords of the Treasury on the recommendation of a Member of that House, that they were permanently and not temporarily employed, that most of them were married men with families, and entirely dependent upon their salary for their support. If retrenchment was to be the order of the day, it was scarcely fair that it should be applied to a score or so of miserably paid Extra Clerks. He trusted that the case he had endeavoured to explain would receive the favourable attention of the Government, and that he should receive an assurance to that effect from the right hon. Gentleman opposite, though the forms of the House precluded him from making the Motion which stood on the Paper in his name—

"That the Customs Extra Clerks be either amalgamated with the establishment or established as a separate class, and placed upon a footing with the establishment with regard to pay, prospects of promotion, and sick leave."

said, the Government were placed in this difficulty—that the hon. Gentleman was asking them to depart from the conditions and terms under which these Extra Clerks entered the public service. It might be very true that those clerks did a very good day's work for very moderate pay, but if they were tired of the conditions under which they served the public, and chose to vacate their situations, their places could, no doubt, readily be filled, not perhaps by persons with the designation of Extra Clerks, but by persons who, while discharging analogous duties, and engaged in a similar manner by the day or week, would not be on the establishment, and would not enjoy those privileges and advantages which persons who were on the regular establishment did enjoy. The appointment of the Extra Clerks was one of the many attempts which had been made from time to time to limit the unwieldy character of the establishment in the Customs and in other Departments of the State. Any one who had listened to the statement which had been made a few nights ago by his hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers) could not failed to have perceived not only how important but how difficult it was to check the tendency which all our public establishments had to become overgrown. It was true that the Extra Clerks were few in number and many of them advanced in years, but it would be impossible to depart from the terms under which they were engaged and to put them on the establish- ment. No injustice had been done to them, however. For several years no clerk had been appointed to the establishment of the Customs, and it was the hope and intention of the Government, by limiting the number of the establishment clerks, to limit the charge on the public in regard to promotion and superannuation, and to confine the higher positions of the Customs to those specially engaged for the higher class of work, while the lower class of work should be done by persons who could be easily engaged at a lower scale of pay, without having claims for promotion and superannuation. He was extremely sorry to have to make any statement which might be unsatisfactory to those gentlemen whose case the hon. Member had so ably advocated; but their case had over and over again been considered by the Treasury and the Commissioners of Customs, and although their pay was small it was not so small that their places could not be filled up at the same rate should they choose to withdraw from the public service. They had been engaged under certain conditions of temporary employment and pay; and though their employment had gone on from year to year, they had a regular definite increase of pay, although it was only small. But the whole question of the Custom House establishment in London was under the consideration of the Government, and any special ground of grievance which the Extra Clerks might have would be sure to receive fair and attentive consideration. He could not undertake to say, however, that those clerks would be placed on the establishment, and thus made a permanent charge on the public. There was no wish on the part of the Government to press hardly on any individual, or on any class, and if the hon. Gentleman would bring forward any special case of hardship in which an extra clerk had been disappointed in his legitimate expectations, or in which his services had been so considerable as to be out of proportion to the salary he received, such a case would be fairly considered. But he must express a hope that the Government would be supported in its endeavours generally to improve the classification and divide the duties of a great Department such as the Customs, without at the same time allowing the expenditure connected with it continually to grow upon the country.

asked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether he would give Instructions to the Commission he proposed to appoint with reference to Land Tenure to inquire into and report on the best means, whether by Government aid or otherwise, of encouraging and assisting the creation of an independent proprietary of small freehold estates in Ireland? He was unwilling at so late a period of the Session to enter at any great length into the subject of which he had given Notice, but he would briefly refer to some statements some time since made by the noble Earl (the Earl of Mayo), and upon which he (the noble Earl) seemed to rely in support of his assurance to the House of the advancing prosperity of Ireland. He would refer to two or three broad facts which would be sufficient to sustain his views, and he would support those facts from figures taken from the noble Earl's own statement, or from the Return lately moved for by him (Mr. O'Beirne), and now on the table of the House. The noble Earl, he believed, was simply in error in the assurance he gave of the immense and daily increasing advance of Ireland in wealth and prosperity, as a very few examples would show. Taking for instance the state of the Savings Banks deposits, in 1847, certainly a year not very famed for its happy recollections, but still a remarkable year in Ireland's history, the deposits amounted to the sum of £2,410,000, while in the year 1866, twenty-one years afterwards, they only reached £1,540,500. Well, what said the emigration Returns? In 1850 there were 80,000 emigrants, in 1863 there were 117,000, and the average of the four years up to 1867 was over; 100,000 in each year. If they turned to the state of the population they found that at the Union the people numbered over 5,000,000. The population steadily increased up to 1846, until within the period of forty-five years it had reached 8,287,848. But when they looked at the Census of 1865 they found that plague and famine had fearfully done their sad work, and the population had fallen to 5,641,000; and he deeply regretted to add that it continued to decrease, the last Return showing that in 1867 it had fallen to 5,557,000. Now, it did seem to him strange that with three such striking facts before him the noble Earl could find any ground for his statement that prosperity was making such advances throughout Ireland. Suppose they looked to neighbouring nations as a test. They saw in Germany an increase, during a less period, of 90 per cent; in Russia 90 per cent; in Austria 80 per cent; in France 50 per cent; and in England 120 per cent. Would it be contended that decrease in population was to be accepted in Ireland as a proof of improvement? If so, they should be informed upon what principle of argument so singular a doctrine could be sustained. He next came to the subject of the condition and relief of the poor, and he found that in 1856, twelve years since, the sum expended in the relief of that class was £576,300. The amount decreased in 1857 and 1858, but in 1861 it began to increase; in 1862 it was £578,789; in 1863, £605,981; in 1864, £596,465; and in 1866, £611,891. Now, in connection with this branch of the question, this very remarkable fact appeared—that the population in 1857 amounted to 6,047,492, while in 1866 it had fallen to 5,582,625; so that a smaller population in 1866 required a much larger outlay to relieve them than the population in 1857 required, and certainly, so far as he (Mr. O'Beirne) could read such figures, there was no evidence of advancement to be found in them. But although he differed so widely from the noble Earl in his conclusions, he was not unwilling to admit the fact—and there was some hope of the future to be found in it—that the country was not losing ground. What he complained of was that remarks which had the effect of producing erroneous impressions upon the minds of hon. Members should be made. He (Mr. O'Beirne) for his part contended, and he believed it was beyond doubt, that Ireland had not kept pace with England, Scotland, and Wales; and, therefore, there must be something wrong—some reason for her backward state. That reason he desired to discover, and, so far as his humble efforts would admit, to apply a remedy. But before he came to the remedy which he advocated, he would allude to the valuation of the surface of land under crops, and used as a productive medium. The noble Earl had told the House that in 1841, the date of the first valuation, there were 13,461,000 acres productive, which were valued at £13,215,000. He also stated that in 1856 the acreage had increased to 15,000,000, or nearly 2,000,000 in excess of 1841. But the noble Earl stopped there; he did not inform the House what the valuation of this 15,000,000 acres in 1856 amounted to. That figure could, however, be found in his (Mr. O'Beirne's) late Return, and, singular to say, it did not exceed £12,989,000, and in that sum should be included the value of some £26,000,000 of railway property which did not exist in 1841, and which could not amount to much less than £500,000 a year. This was, he submitted, rather a startling result; 2,000,000 acres in 1856 in excess of; those in 1841; and yet with the addition of the railway property, valued at up-wards of £200,000 a year, less than the 13,461,000 acres in 1841. Did this show a great advance in prosperity in agriculture or commerce? He would not go further into the figures he had prepared, as he thought the House would agree with him in considering that the picture drawn by the noble Earl of the immense advances which had been for the last twenty years made in Ireland was not borne out by the real facts. But that the condition of the land tenure and relations between landlord and tenant were eminently unsatisfactory had been admitted by the noble Earl, and indeed he had himself proposed and promised to issue a Commission to inquire into the whole question. As that point of the subject was that to which his Motion pointed most directly, he must say that he rejoiced at the prospect of that inquiry, and for his part he should accept it at the hands of the Government most willingly. He had no reason to doubt that the Commission would be well and efficiently composed, and that its inquiries would be large, searching, and satisfactory. The result would, in that case, he felt assured, produce results to all of a very useful and beneficial character. It was so many years since the last Commission, under the able presidency of the Earl of Devon, took its evidence and made its valuable Report, that its recommendations and findings could scarcely now be considered as very applicable, so large had been the change in the interim. Therefore, it did seem that the time was come when much valuable information might be obtained by a new and well-conducted inquiry. Then the subject of ejectments was one which required attention and inquiry, and well-considered legislation as the result of that inquiry. The right hon. Member for Calne (Mr. Lowe) had stated, on a previous occasion, that he had never yet heard a well-authenticated case of injustice and cruelty on the part of landlord to his tenant, and that in point of fact the complaints so often made and repeated in that House were, if not fictitious, little more than imaginary. Now, besides the indignant language of the late Master of the Rolls, in giving judgment on a case before him, the Return recently moved for by Lord Belmore showed that for the last ten years the average of ejectments was 6,000 a year, giving a total of at least 30,000 persons turned on the roadside annually. These facts showed the absolute necessity of dealing with this important question. He would not trouble the House by making these extracts from the voluminous authorities to whom he could refer in support of the particular system of small freehold proprietors, which he so earnestly advocated. But he would refer to one circumstance which was on the Records of the House, and upon which he thought he might rely in support of his position. It was this—that some years since Sir Matthew Barrington, a member—and a most distinguished member—of the legal profession in Ireland, being impressed with the unsatisfactory state of the tenure of land in that country, associated himself with Lord Devon and several other influential persons, amongst whom was the late Sir Robert Peel, and they introduced a Bill in that House giving authority for the promotion of a private company to carry the principle of establishing small proprietors into operation, believing, as it appeared from their evidence before the Committee to which that Bill was referred, that such a measure was eminently calculated to elevate and improve the people, and to foster loyalty and a closer union with Great Britain. The Chairman of that Committee was the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Lancashire (Mr. Gladstone), and he was requested by the Committee to make a special Report to the House in the following words:—

"That on account of the important consideration of public policy which this Bill appeared to involve, they have directed him to move the House that the Bill be re-committed to the Whole House and be printed, with the evidence upon it, for the use of Members."

The Bill was re-committed and passed through that House and the other House unanimously, and on the 31st of August, 1848, it became law. He would read what the Preamble of that Bill said, and hon. Members would bear in mind that it was now upon the statute book of the kingdom as the expression of the united opinion of the Legislature and the Crown.

"Whereas, the formation and the establishment of a permanent body of independent yeomen, consisting of resident proprietors, holding farms in fee simple, containing respectively not less than thirty acres, would materially improve the social condition of Ireland by promoting the better cultivation of land, the reclamation of waste lands, and by personally interesting a large proportion of the population in the preservation of peace and order; and whereas there are many persons in Ireland possessing a limited amount of capital which they would gladly employ in the purchase of land if facilities were given for the transfer of estates or portions thereof, be it enacted," &c.

Now, that Preamble, both in spirit and in language, expressed his full meaning. He did not desire to add anything more. That was the entire of his case. He believed it was admitted by many that the measure would largely facilitate the transfer of land, and tend to unite the people in feelings and in sympathy with this country. He would not quote any further; he would merely allude to the opinions of some intelligent and practical men who had lately published their views on the subject, and to whom he was indebted for much information. Amongst them he would mention Mr. Butler, a gentleman living in Tipperary, who lately examined this question himself, and found the plan working admirably in our possessions, the Channel Islands; Mr. Hutton also, a gentleman who had written a very able pamphlet on the subject, giving an excellent description of the Prussian system; Mr. Fisher, and many others. The unqualified conclusion of those gentlemen was that the introduction of such a class of owners into the country would be of the greatest possible importance in every respect—socially, politically, and in an agricultural sense. Last year the noble Earl the Chief Secretary for Ireland, in opposing a Motion which he (Mr. O'Beirne) made of a different character, but on the same subject, took several objections to the principle. The first was that under the Landed Estates Court means at present existed for purchasing small estates where there was any desire to do so. He had since then carefully examined the Landed Estates Court Advertiser, and had made sufficient inquiries. The result justified him in stating that the noble Earl was entirely misinformed, and that no such facilities in fact existed. Another of the noble Earl's objections was that this principle did not succeed in European countries where it existed. To this he could only reply that he had sought for information from the registries of countries where this principle was in large operation, and that he was assured it acted most beneficially. In fact, the result of the information he had gathered justified him in differing altogether from the noble Earl in the opinions he had expressed. But all he asked was a careful and honest inquiry. He asked that Instructions might be given to the Commission to examine this large and, in his estimate, this most important question. He had no wish to thrust it down the throat of Parliament. He merely demanded a fair hearing for a principle advocated—warmly supported, he would say—by so many able, intelligent, and practical men—men who had applied their minds earnestly to the tenure of land in Ireland, and whose opinions on that subject were entitled to respect and consideration. The noble Earl might be right in his view, and he might be entirely and completely wrong. He accepted the issue—he invited the inquiry. If there were no merit in the principle let it be so decided, and then let it be cast aside, and the House no longer troubled with the consideration of it. But if the proposal were found to justify the views of those who advocated it—if the Commission should come to the conclusion that it would be a useful measure, and was likely to work out the beneficial effects ascribed to it, he asked for an assurance that then it would be promptly accepted and taken up, that the Government would aid in carrying it out, that the Irish people might at length hope to see a remedy within their reach which, without outraging any of the known principles of political economy, would confer upon them a great and lasting benefit.

said, the hon. Gentleman had entered upon a very large question, and had brought forward matters which required much more extensive discussion than could be given to them that night. He had not been aware from the Notice on the Paper that the hon. Gentleman meant to do more than ask a Question. Had he known that it was intended to impugn the statements he made on a former occasion, he would have been fully prepared to vindicate them. The facts and figures he had then stated had been before the country for a considerable time; and on no one substantial point had they been disputed. He had given no glowing or exaggerated description of Ireland; but he had shown what, if the hon. Gentleman had resided as much in the country as he had done be would have known—that the country had been steadily improving for the last thirty years. He was not prepared to say that at many times during that period there had not been causes which tended to create much uneasiness and alarm, and that still in many respects the state of things was not satisfactory. But what he proved was this, that for a certain number of years there had been a steady, gradual, and wholesome improvement in the state of every industry and of every class, all indicative of a really healthy condition; and he believed the more the subject was studied the more that improvement; would become manifest. He did not say that any miracles had been wrought—he did not believe that; or that there was not enormous room for great improvement for the future. The Poor Law Commissioners in their last Report said that the rags of the people had disappeared; that they were healthy and well dressed, and that when coming from church on Sunday they looked clean and comfortable. They also said that the character of the houses had improved—that the dwellings were more healthy than those of the labourers in this country. The dreadful epidemic diseases that so frequently ravaged Ireland twenty years ago had entirely disappeared, while the general health of the people had greatly improved. They did not require statistics; everybody who lived in the country was aware of the fact that the condition of the poorer classes of Ireland had been for a considerable time gradually improving; and he believed that the improvement would continue. With regard to the particular question of the hon. Gentleman, he had to state that the Instructions to that Commission would be identical with those given to the Devon Commission—namely, to inquire into the whole system of tenure in Ireland; and therefore they would be at liberty to inquire into the vexed question whether small or large holdings were the most suitable for the wants of the people; and he had every reason to believe that the Commission he proposed to appoint would devote considerable attention to the point. He did not personally anticipate that any peculiarly satisfactory results would be obtained from creating a large class of small landholders; but still the subject was a fair one for further inquiry. He believed that the notion that very small holdings contributed to the prosperity of a country had been long exploded, and that it was now felt that if a man was to hold land at all he ought to be in the position of a farmer holding a sufficient quantity of land to sustain himself and his family. He thought that the proper policy for Parliament to pursue with reference to the question was to remove all obstructions to the purchase of land by small capitalists who might desire to invest their money in such property, but not to undertake any special legislation like that asked for by the hon. Member. He believed that the difficulties that now existed in Ireland in the way of small capitalists investing in land had been greatly exaggerated, and that by combining together, and by other means, purchasers could obtain small quantities of land at a reasonable rate. The Incumbered Estates Court were bound to sell the land to the best advantage; and if small capitalists could give a good price for small lots, they would easily become its purchasers. He must, however, admit that the working of the Incumbered Estates Courts had not been entirely successful, as it had enabled some persons to buy up the estates at low prices for the purpose of re-selling them. At the same time he felt that these were all subjects for inquiry, and he thought that the result of the Report of the Commission he proposed to appoint would be to remove a great deal of misapprehension from the public mind upon this subject.

said, it would be in the memory of the House that, shortly after the General Election, amongst the first steps taken by the Irish Secretary of the then Government (Mr. Chichester Fortescue) was the introduction of a Bill dealing with the question of landlord and tenant in Ireland, proposing to give some approach to secure tenure to the people. That Bill was energetically opposed by the party with whom the noble Earl acts in this House, and by none more energetically than by the noble Earl himself. [The Earl of MAYO: I only opposed one clause in the Bill.] The noble Earl not only objected to one particular clause, but he opposed the second reading in a very long and most energetic speech, and if he (Sir John Gray) rightly remembered he described it to the House as a confiscation Bill designed to spoliate the property of the landlords, and the noble Earl succeeded in his opposition, and prevented the Bill from being read the second time. Then when the noble Earl himself came into Office, he brought in a Bill which was heralded by his friends as the perfection of legislative wisdom. But he never proceeded with that Bill, and let the question drop, though he pledged himself to the House that he and his party were fully informed upon the subject, and quite capable of settling it without further delay. Now, however, at the expiration of the Parliament, he and his party tell us they must have more delay, they must have another Commission, and must have more knowledge before they can deal with this great question. They were to have another Land Commission issued, based on the model of the Devon Commission, which was issued four-and-twenty years ago, and which ended in nothing. They were now to have another based on a precisely similar model, which would, no doubt, terminate in the same way. The noble Earl spoke of the advisability of inquiry into the extent of and on which a peasant-farmer might live, and said that would constitute a feature of the promised Commission. The Irish people wanted no such inquiry—they could determine that for themselves. Each man could best ascertain how much or how little land suited his requirements. The Adjustment they wanted was an adjustment as to tenure, and not as to extent of the holding. The tenant-farmers ask you not for inquiry, but for security. They want secure tenure—they want a firm foothold in the land they occupy and till—they want that neither political malice, nor religious rancour, nor personal caprice shall have the power to thrust them, their wives and children, out on the road-side; and to do this no inquiry is needed, and no delay should be countenanced or encouraged. He (Sir John Gray) then protested altogether against this Commission—it was a delusion, and would end in postponement and disappointment.

desired to say a word or two upon the question of the adjournment. He had no objection to attending the House on a Saturday for the purpose of advancing Bills which had already been progressed with, and the passing of which was necessary, but he thought it undesirable that a "jaded House," to use the Prime Minister's own words, should be called upon to discuss new Business on a Saturday in the middle of July. He referred to the Inland Revenue Bill, the provisions of which would excite a good deal of discussion. The right hon. Gentleman, he felt certain, did not intend to take the House by surprise, and he would not, therefore, he trusted, proceed with any new measure which would give rise to discussion.

feared that, owing to the shortness of the Notice, there would not be so large an attendance as there otherwise would have been to discuss the new clauses of the Corrupt Practices Bill, several of which were very important.

said, he always endeavoured to arrange the Business in accordance with the convenience of Members. There were certain measures the passing of which it was necessary to secure. There would be, he supposed, little if any doubt as to the propriety of proceeding with the Appropriation Bill. With regard to the Corrupt Practices Bill, he had certainly notified to hon. Members the possibility of its being proceeded with on Saturday, but he had stated that the matter would be definitely settled that evening. They had made considerable progress with the Bill that day having got through all the original clauses, the postponed clauses, and a great many of the new clauses; and but for the constitutional discussion which had arisen they would probably have succeeded in passing it through Committee. The remaining clauses would probably be dealt with in about an hour to-morrow so that the Bill might be read a third time on Monday. The Inland Revenue Bill was, he believed, a good one and ought to pass, but if it was likely to give rise to serious discussion he certainly should not think of pressing it on a Saturday morning. If there were any other measures which could be advanced a stage, and on which no discussion was expected, they would of course also be put down.

said, he had heard that considerable objection was entertained on the part of several Members to going forward with the Indian Bills to-morrow. He mentioned this matter in order that the Government might not be unprepared for objection.

said, he would be glad if hon. Gentlemen who objected to any of these measures would communicate with him, so that those Bills likely to lead to discussions might not be put on the Paper only to be withdrawn after hon. Members had taken the trouble to come down to the House.

said, he hoped that the Appropriation Bill, about which a good deal might be said, would be placed on the Paper after the Corrupt Practices Bill.

said, he would withdraw his Motion for the adjournment of the House.

said, that nothing could be more objectionable than giving the Board the power of taxing the country.

said, the Amendment would deprive the Board of a power it possessed already. The clause did not design so much to invest the Board with new power as to give it the means of enforcing the power it was already in-trusted with. If the guardians failed to appoint any necessary officer the Board could apply for a mandamus to compel them to do so. That might be argued, and a return made that the guardians could not find a proper person, and the thing might go on for a year or two, so that practically the law could not be carried out. Last Session a power similar to that sought to be conferred by the clause was given to the Board within the metropolis, and therefore the Board was only asking for that power in the provinces which it already possessed in London. He could not understand why a chaplain should be the only officer who should be expected to perform his duties without security that his salary would be paid.

said, that at Leicester the duties of chaplain were duly performed by voluntary officers; and the question was whether in such a case the Board should have the power of appointing an officer who must be paid?

said, the Board had the power already, although they had been compelled to resort to it in only one instance, in which the guardians refused to appoint a chaplain; and even the language of the proposed Amendment would leave the Board judges of the necessity just as much as they were now.

said, these remarks seemed to show that it was unnecessary that the clause should apply to chaplains at all, although there might be strong arguments for passing it as regarded other officers, such as schoolmaster, schoolmistress, medical officers, and nurses. The office of chaplain was of a different nature, and it would have been well to have raised the question separately. On the Report he should propose to define the offices to which the clause applied.

said, so far from there being no difficulty with regard to the appointment of chaplains, it happened there was at present a London case before the Board. A chaplain was absolutely necessary, and but for the power already possessed by the Board in London the case could not be dealt with.

said, he did not see why the discretion sought should not be vested in the Commissioners, and why they should be under the necessity of applying for a mandamus.

said, he wondered that gentlemen could be got to undertake the duties of guardians if all the discretionary power was to be exercised by the Board.

said, there was a workhouse in Ireland in which, though there was only one Protestant pauper inmate, a Protestant chaplain attended, and was paid a salary.

said, he did not require the example of Ireland. After the description given of that country by a distinguished Member of the House of Commons, and after what they had heard of it that night from an Irish Gentleman, he had no desire to see England assimilated to Ireland. He remembered to have heard a Chief Secretary for Ireland state that the power of appointing chaplains was given to the Irish Poor Law Commissioners because it was necessary, owing to the circumstances of the country, that they should have a veto in the matter. It required the power of the Government to cope with that of the Roman Catholic hierarchy in Ireland; and there had been instances in which vacancies had been created in chaplaincies against the will of the Government, owing to the opposition of that hierarchy.

said, he thought the Secretary to the Poor Law Board ought to give the Committee some information as to whether the question of the appointment of chaplains was really involved in this clause.

said, it was agreed that the appointment of paid nurses was desirable in country workhouses. He thought, also, that where the great majority of the inmates of a workhouse were of one religious persuasion, a chaplain of that persuasion ought to be appointed to attend them and be paid for the discharge of that duty. There was a Liverpool workhouse in which, he believed, the great majority were Roman Catholics, and a Roman Catholic chaplain was paid £300 a year for attending that institution. If the majority of the inmates of a workhouse were members of the Established Church, and the guardians should refuse to appoint a chaplain for them, he believed it would be the feeling of the House that the Poor Law Board ought to have the right to interfere, in order that the inmates might be provided with the consolations which the visit of a clergyman of the Established Church would afford them.

asked whether red tapeism was to step in where religious consolation was afforded by voluntary efforts?

In such a case the Poor Law Board would not for a moment think of interfering.

said, that propositions to alter our Poor Law arrangements proceeded year after year from the permanent staff of the Poor Law Board.

said, that in an omnibus Bill like the one now before the Committee, one found it difficult to discover in which of the clauses the important principle of the measure was really contained.

then proposed at the end of the clause to add these words—"Provided always, That nothing herein contained shall relate to the appointment of chaplains."

stated that he had by mistake given his vote in the last division in the opposite way to that which he intended, and he was proceeding to explain how the mistake occurred, when—

interposing, informed him that the rule of the House was that if an hon. Member went into a Lobby his vote was counted with that Lobby. The hon. Member might set himself right by stating that he had made a mistake, but beyond that the House could not enter into the consideration of the matter.

said, he would divide the Committee against the clause, which contained a principle against which the country was now in arms—namely, a great increase of the rates. The House had of late years been too ready in increasing the rates. When a question of increasing the general taxation was raised the House took alarm, but when the local rates were concerned the case was quite different. When hon. Gentlemen went to the elections he believed they would be asked whether they had voted for or against clauses in Bills largely increasing the rates.

said, that the country objected to giving the Central Board power over the rates, because the rate-payers had not the opportunity locally of being heard on the subject. He should oppose the clause.

said, that the grand principle of improvement in Poor Law administration was not to strengthen the power of the guardians but of the Poor Law Board. The guardians frequently refused to perform their obvious local duties, to the injury of the sick, the poor, and the lunatics, and to the oppression of the medical profession, which performed the most important duties to these suffering and unprotected persons. In all these matters the central authority was more to be depended upon than the local Boards. He preferred the Amendment of his hon. Friend (Mr. P. A. Taylor), but, as the Committee had negatived it, he should give his strong support to the clause.

said, that, as he did not wish to see a national poor rate, he should vote against this clause, because local administration was the only ground on which a national rate could be resisted. Every step they were taking in setting up and strengthening a central administration was breaking down the local rate. What had occurred this Session? There had been Motion after Motion to bring different species of property into assessment which now paid nothing, and how much longer would the House be able to resist these Motions if the pressure of local burdens went on every day increasing? This clause authorized medical men to correspond with the Poor Law Board in London, but not through the guardians. A wholly independent management would thus be set up. After a very short time he believed the new system would break down, and then the poor would be worse cared for by the central authority in London than by the local Board of Guardians.

said, he should support the clause on the ground of economy, because there was no economy like employing properly-qualified and properly-paid persons. The system of employing pauper nurses and pauper assistants had let to great abuses and great peculation.