said, he wished to ask the Judge Advocate General, Whether his attention has been directed to the recommendations of the Commissioners on Courts Martial and Military Punishments so far as they related to the provisions contained in the Mutiny Act and Articles of War, and whether it is the intention of the Government to introduce a Measure, during the present Session, to carry those recommendations into effect?

said, in reply, that the recommendations of the Courts Martial Commission were of two kinds; some that could be carried out by the Executive, and some that could only be carried out by legislation. Certain of the former had already been adopted, others of them were under consideration. As regarded the recommendations which required legislation, Bills were in preparation which, having regard to the state of Public Business, it would be impossible to think of introducing this year, but no doubt his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War would introduce them early next Session.

said, he wished to know whether there was any scale by which the salaries of the officers of the House of Lords were regulated?

, in reply, said, that the Estimate for the House of Lords was prepared by a Committee of the House of Lords and sent to the Treasury, and it was generally accepted by them without dispute. It was undoubtedly within the competence of the Committee of Supply to modify and even to reduce it; but a certain amount of respect was always paid to the Estimate, and it had not been their habit to scan it very closely. The salaries were now under the consideration of the House of Lords, and certain reductions would be made, some of which had been already determined upon.

said, that, what he wanted to know was whether the promised reductions were the result of some act of the House of Lords, or, whether they were mere verbal suggestions of the authorities of the day?

said, that the reductions were those ordered by the Com- mittee of the House of Lords, and they would be carried out.

said, he wished to ask when the salaries commenced of clerks of the House of Lords who were appointed at the beginning of the six months' holidays?

At the time of the appointment.

said, that the duties imposed upon the gentlemen to whom the hon. Member referred were of a very important character, and he thought they might well be allowed six months to acquire a competent knowledge of them in.

said, he wished to supplement the statement of his right hon. Friend (Mr. Ayrton) by observing that officers of the Houses of Parliament were required to work during the night as well as during the day, and, therefore, they ought to be regarded as persons living in the Arctic regions, having a day of six months and a night of six months.

said, he thought that the Secretary of the Treasury should give some explanation with regard to his statement that this House was not in the habit of disputing the Estimates for the offices of the House of Lords.

said, it was his duty to support the statement of the Secretary of the Treasury, because this question was one of a peculiar nature. It was not to be supposed that the Treasury would assume that control over the Estimates for the House of Lords that it was their duty to exercise over all other Estimates. Under the old usage the House of Lords were accustomed to regulate their own expenditure; but that House, in a spirit that did them great credit, had abandoned that privilege, and had consented that the expenditure should come under an annual Vote. Under these circumstances, it would not be becoming for the Treasury to assume that sort of command over that Estimate that they very properly exercised over ordinary Estimates.

said, he thought that the First Commissioner of Works ought to give some further explanation with regard to the refusal of the Lord Great Chamberlain to allow seats to be placed in the Central Hall. There was no pretension for calling the Houses of Parliament a Royal Palace, because no Royal personage had ever resided there in modern times. Under those circumstances he could not see by what right the Lord Great Chamberlain exercised any authority over any part of the Houses of Parliament.

said, he would call attention to the fact that the Civil Service Estimates had increased of late years from £6,000,000 or £7,000,000 to £10,000,000 sterling per annum.

said, in reply to the right hon. and gallant Member for Roscommon (Colonel French), he had to state that the building which the present erection had replaced had always been designated as "the Royal Palace of Westminster," and it had always had attached to it all the incidents of a Royal Palace. The office of the Lord Great Chamberlain was a very important one, and it had always been exercised in reference to this building. It was desirable that there should be some distinct officer like the Lord Great Chamberlain, to whom both the House of Lords and the House of Commons could look to regulate the occupation of the various apartments of the Palace which were not specifically devoted to the use of those Houses. It was not long since the House of Lords itself made some application to the Lord Great Chamberlain in relation to a Conference-room. With regard to the proposition of placing seats in the Central Hall, he must repeat the Lord Great Chamberlain had not thought it for the convenience of the two Houses that such a proposition should be assented to.

said, in reference to the item of £500 for salaries of the Division Clerks, he wished to draw attention to the fact that several discrepancies had occurred lately between the numbers reported by the Tellers of Divisions and the printed lists drawn up by the Division Clerks. In 49 Divisions there had been nine errors. The other evening, when the Tellers declared that the unusual circumstance of a tie had occurred, it appeared from the printed Division Lists, published the next morning, that the hon. Member for Boston (Mr. Collins) was in a majority of 1, and it was impossible now to ascertain which of the two alleged results was the accurate one.

said, he thought there could be no difficulty in ascertaining whether the printed Division Lists were accurate, because the names of the Members voting were given. He did not see under these circumstances that any reflection could rest upon the accuracy of the Division Clerks. He wished to allude to the salaries paid to the Referees of that House. When this Vote was before the House last year he made some observations on that subject. There were now two Referees instead of three, so that so far the expense of the Referees was reduced; but he had great doubts whether the system of having paid Referees was a good one, and should be continued. He was told, by those qualified to form an opinion, that the alteration which took place a few years ago, when Referees were appointed, was not a satisfactory one, and he thought the subject was one which ought to be reconsidered by the House.

said, he would submit that this was hardly a matter for discussion in Committee upon the Estimates. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Sclater-Booth) might take an opportunity of directing the attention of the House to it.

said, he was of opinion that no blame could be attached to any of the clerks who took the Divisions. It was certain that the name of every Member who passed the clerks was properly marked. In one instance, however, which had been referred to, the Member for Carlow (Mr. Kavanagh) remained in the House, and his name was accidentally omitted. His main object in rising was to protest against the ancient, but at present very unnecessary, disposition of the patronage of the House. Formerly it was necessary to vest patronage in the Judges, in order to secure proper and efficient persons to conduct the minor business of their Courts; and in like manner, up to the present moment, the Clerk of the Parliaments filled up all vacancies which occurred among the clerks in that House. There might have been a reason for this in former times; but, now that the education qualification had been so universally adopted, he saw no reason why the patronage should continue to be vested in that officer, and why the ap- pointments should not be thrown open, as the appointments in other Departments were, to public competition. He wished, however, to state that he had no complaint to make of the individual who at present enjoyed the patronage in question, and who was a favourite of every Member of that House.

said, he thought the error in the Division the other day ought to be satisfactorily accounted for, as he knew there had been other errors of a similar kind. In the case of a Bill which he introduced and took a Division upon in the present Session, the name of a Member was put down as having voted, although he was 200 miles from the House at the time. It could hardly be assumed that the gentlemen who counted at the doors fell into mistakes. On the whole, he was of opinion that something ought to be done to make the Returns of Divisions as accurate as possible.

said, he did not think the clerks were answerable for these mistakes. Members were themselves to blame for not seeing that their names were correctly marked as they passed the clerks.

said, he would suggest that the numbers might be accurately ascertained by having a self-acting register similar to the "tell-tales" used at Waterloo Bridge. He seized this opportunity of calling attention to the great waste of time caused by the present mode of taking Divisions. Surely some method could be devised for taking the Divisions much more quickly. Without going into matters of detail, he would suggest that the subject was well worthy of consideration by Her Majesty's Government in the course of the coming Recess.

said, that it was very refreshing to hear anticipations about the coming Recess, because they implied that, at all events, there would be a Recess. Although hon. Members were unable to abandon the idea that there would be a Recess, he thought few of them could realize the idea that it was approaching. He admitted that in some cases, particularly with regard to Motions for reporting Progress about midnight in a full House, the principal power of the Mover lay in the fact that each Division he took would occupy about 20 minutes. He quite agreed with what had been said by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Hunt); but it was doubtful whether the suggestion he threw out ought to be made by the Government or by the House itself. With regard to the remarks of his right hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon (Colonel French) respecting the patronage of the officers of that House, he did not think there was any cause to question or censure their conduct up to the present moment. The establishments of the House of Commons and the House of Lords must be regarded as outlying parts of the general body of the administrative service of the country. Therefore, it was not to them that we must look for administrative improvements. All we had a fair right to expect from them was that they should be ready to adopt changes which had been introduced and had received the stamp of public approbation in other Departments of the public service. He did not think they ought to adopt at the earliest possible moment every experimental change. At the proper moment, no doubt, the officers invested with this patronage would be prepared to follow the example of other Departments.

said, it was clear that if the Division Clerks were right the four gentlemen employed as Tellers were unable to count. He thought the errors were attributable to the clerks, although no doubt hon. Members themselves often caused them by passing by too rapidly. "Tell-tale" gates, he remarked, would give the numbers, and not the names of the Members voting.

said, he wished to draw attention to the existing arrangements respecting the exclusion of the public from the Lobby of the House. They rendered it very difficult for the friends of an hon. Member to communicate with him. Some alteration ought to be made, so that if a special message were sent to a Member it might reach him in a reasonable time. He also desired to suggest that it would be highly convenient if the name of the Member who was speaking were posted up in a conspicuous place in the dining-room.

said, he concurred in every word which had fallen from the hon. Member who had just spoken.

said, he hoped the alterations to be made after the close of the Session would result in increasing the accommodation in the dining-room. He thought some arrangement might be devised for informing Members when at dinner who was speaking, and the subject before the House.

said, that if the change suggested was made, hon. Members who happened to be in the Library ought to have the benefit of it as well as those who were in the dining-room.

said, discussion on the point would be taken more appropriately on the Vote for special works in connection with the Houses of Parliament.

said, he thought that great inconvenience resulted in the case of persons who came to see hon. Members on business, being told in the Central Hall that the hon. Member asked for was not in the House, when the fact might have been, as had happened to himself, that he had been there the whole night. There ought, in his opinion, to be some means of giving accurate information, as to whether hon. Members were in the House or not to those who came bon½ fide to see them on business.

said, if persons were not allowed near the door of the House, it would be very difficult for them to send a card in to a Member. He had heard it remarked, in reference to the present arrangement, that one of the first acts of the new Reformed Parliament was to turn their constituents further adrift.

said, he did not think the removal of strangers from the Central Hall worked satisfactorily. There was a great advantage in Members being as accessible to their friends as possible. It would be most convenient, therefore, in his opinion, to return to the old practice.

said, he concurred in the view taken by the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down. The metropolitan Members might like the existing arrangement; but it was very inconvenient to Members whose constituencies were at a distance.

said, he had had several complaints from his constituents on the subject. He thought that, if the present system was to be continued, some receptacle should be placed in the Central Hall, in which Members who were present in the House could place their cards.

said, it would be a great mistake to suppose that the existing arrangement had been carried out at the suggestion of the metropolitan Members. He had always understood that it had been suggested to the Sergeant-at-Arms by some representatives of northern counties. The metropolitan Members would, he believed, be in favour of returning to the old system.

said, he thought it was extremely desirable that constituents who lived at a distance should be afforded greater facilities for communicating with their Members than they were now afforded.

said, that the Treasury officially had nothing to do with the question. He would, however, take an early opportunity of communicating with Mr. Speaker on the subject, and laying before him what appeared to be the general views of the House with respect to it.

said, that he thought the sooner a Fourth Lord of the Treasury without salary were done away with the better. Such an officer, without pay, he looked upon as an anomaly. He should like, he might add, to see the salary of the First Lord of the Treasury increased, favourable though he was to economy. The present amount of the Prime Minister's salary—£5,000—was altogether too little.

said, he would suggest that it would be worth while to consider how far the expense of defraying the salaries of Inspectors should be continued as a charge on the public, and whether it would not be desirable that those Inspectors should be paid by the parties whose trades were more or less benefited by their action. The inspection of mines and factories cost some £35,000.

said, it was rather hard that coal-mine owners should be called upon to pay for an inspection which they did not want.

said, the inspection of prisons and constabulary was fairly charged upon the Exchequer; but the localities ought to pay for inspection under the Local Government Act, and the owners of fisheries should pay the expenses of Inspectors of Fisheries.

said, he desired some explanation from the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department as to the increase of £1,300 on account of the Home Office itself.

said, he wished to know what supervision was exercised over the travelling expenses of Inspectors?

said, the inspection of mines was not for the benefit of the owner, but of the workmen, to protect them from the danger which accompanied that employment. He did not think it was right, therefore, to throw the expense of inspection, upon the owners. But as to inspection in the case of fisheries, the Local Government Act, and burial grounds, a considerable sum might be raised by fees from the persons who profited from the inspection. The cost of inspecting prisons was extremely small—only £1,920—but that of the reformatories was very large in comparison, being £2,700, which he thought might be reduced.

said, he entirely admitted the general principle that wherever advantage was conferred upon property by inspection, the property should bear the costs of inspection. But, in the case of factories and mines, the owners did not call for inspection, and would willingly pay twice the cost of inspection to be relieved from it. All he could promise was, that the expenses of the Department in this matter should not be unduly swollen. As to the travelling expenses of Inspectors, if inquiry were made of those gentlemen, his hon. Friend (Mr. Fothergill) would find that there was certainly no want of vigilance on the part of the Treasury. An advantage was certainly conferred by inspection on the owners of salmon fisheries, and if his hon. Friend (Mr. M'Laren) would assist him with a plan for making a fair apportionment of the cost among them, he should be much obliged to him. It must not be forgotten, however, that the public also derived an advantage from this inspection in the increased number of fish that were now taken by ordinary fishermen outside the limits claimed by private persons. As to the Local Government Act, he was under an engagement with the House to charge the expenses of inspection under that Act on the localities which profited by the inspection. The whole subject, however, had been referred to a Commission, and he could not deal with the subject apart from the general question, upon which he expected from the Commission a very early Report. The increase of £1,300 in the expenses of the Home Office referred to by his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Sykes), was mainly caused by the salary of £1,000 paid to the Counsel for the Home Office. That was, in fact, a considerable economy. Mr. Thring, who had received a salary of £2,000 a year, had been nominally Counsel to the Home Office, and the Home Office had had the first claim to his services, though he was also employed in supervising the provisions of Bills for other Departments of the Government. By a new and economical arrangement Mr. Thring had now been transferred to a separate department, and supervised all the legislation of the Government; and, as it was impossible that the permanent "Under Secretary at the Home Office could do all the legal work that had to be transacted there, it had been found necessary to restore the office of Counsel. With respect to the reformatories, his hon. Friend (Mr. Hibbert) must be aware of the immense increase of late years in the number of reformatories and industrial schools. Considering the amount of correspondence and the work done, he believed the Department was conducted as economically as possible.

said, that one gentleman who appeared in the Votes under the title of Inspector of Mines, was not, in point of fact, an Inspector of Mines at all. Originally he had been an Inspector of Mines; but for a long time he had been constantly employed by the Government in other departments, though he still received his remuneration under the title of Inspector of Mines.

said, representing as he did a mineral district, he thought that instead of the system of mine inspection being restricted, it ought to be increased.

said, that as at present conducted the inspection of mines was a sham. It should be largely in- creased or be done away with altogether. He should rather trust to good management, and with that view he would throw more responsibility on the owners.

said, he was of opinion that the House ought to know the provisions of the Mines Regulation Bill before it was called on to vote salaries for Inspectors. The present system of factory inspection was expensive to owners as well as to the public. The owners had to pay money to surgeons; if they did not submit to this black mail it would be worse for them.

said, that by their own peculiar crotchets Members of that House would greatly increase the public expenditure. His hon. Friend who had just spoken (Mr. Muntz) proposed some time ago to have an army of Inspectors appointed, in order to prevent people from being poisoned. He (Mr. Rylands) deprecated any increase in the number of Inspectors. It was a great fallacy to suppose that the Government could prevent casualties arising from carelessness and other ordinary causes.

said, he thought the better principle would be to impose on owners of mines and factories the payment of the expenses necessary for the prevention of accidents. The owners of emigrant ships were obliged to pay for the inspection of those ships. He believed that the best mode of preventing accidents in mines and factories would be by the appointment of competent managers of works.

said, he was anxious that the Home Secretary should delay the Vote for Mine Inspectors until the Mines Regulation Bill had been brought forward. The whole system of Government inspection and interference was a mistake. In his opinion it had not saved a single life. If, however, there was to be inspection, he objected to the employment of gentleman Inspectors, who could do no good.

said, that if there were any probability that the amount of this Vote would be reduced by the passing of the Mines Regulation Bill that would be some reason for postponing the Vote until after the event, but such was not the case. While opposed to any large increase in this Vote, he could not agree with the hon. Member (Mr. Fothergill) that the inspection of mines had not had a beneficial effect, because coal- masters themselves admitted that the system of inspection had had the effect of removing some of the worst evils. He had before shown that had it not been for the adoption of that system the annual loss of life in mines would be 1,500 instead of 1,000.

said, that the sums paid to the inspecting surgeons represented not black mail, but a payment for necessary services performed.

said, he thought that as inspection was carried on for the sake of the public, it should pay the cost. The whole system of inspection was unsatisfactory.

said, he thought it would be a most preposterous idea to charge the cost of inspection against the factory owner, because it was not in any way for his benefit that it took place.

said, he was of opinion that the employers of labour were responsible for carrying on their business with safety to the persons employed, and that, therefore, they were benefited by inspection.

said, he considered that the inspection of factories was carried on in a most useful manner; but it would be unjust to make the manufacturers pay the cost.

said, he wished to hear some explanation of the "extra allowances" to officers in this Department.

said, he must point out the inconvenience arising from the present arrangements of the Foreign Office. The Parliamentary Under Secretary, who in this case happened to be a Member of that House, should be conversant with all matters going on in the Office, so as to be able to answer any question which might be put to him; but it appeared that many matters of importance were disposed of by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in concert with the permanent Under Secretary, of which the Parliamentary Under Secretary was not cognizant. The political representative of the Office in that House ought to be responsible for the expenditure; but the effect of the present arrangement was that the Permanent Under Secretary of State had more control than the hon. Gentleman who occupied a seat—and the tendency of permanent officers was generally in the direction of increased expenditure. In addition the present Permanent Under Secretary had been made a Member of the Privy Council, a quite unprecedented circumstance. Giving the Foreign Office full credit for the reduction of the expenditure for foreign service messengers from £23,700 to £18,000, he must complain that no details were given to show tow the reductions had been effected, and what were the numbers, the salaries, and the expenses of the messengers—particulars which were given by the Home Office; and haying a very confident opinion that the number and expenses of the Foreign Office messengers might be still further reduced without at all impairing the efficiency of the service, he would beg to move the reduction of the Vote by the sum of £2,000.

said, he concurred in the opinion that the cost of these messengers abroad was excessive; but, gratified with the reduction shown in this year's Estimates, he would be content with an assurance that further economy should be effected if it were possible.

said, he did not think the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) had made out his case for a reduction of the Vote.

said, he thought the existing arrangements respecting the Permanent and Parliamentary Under Secretaries had not been productive of inconvenience.

said, he wished for explanations in reference to the item for telegraphic expenses. He thought it might be reduced now that the telegraphs had been transferred to the Government.

said, he must call attention to the large pensions granted to persons who had rendered service to the Foreign Office. One gentleman had received £75,600, which was equivalent to £917 for every year from the date of his birth.

said, he could assure the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) that there had been a reduction in almost every item of the Foreign Office expenditure. The number of messengers had been reduced from 17 to 15, and it was intended eventually to reduce it to 12. The hon. Member had spoken of £18,000 being a very large sum for the salaries and expenses of messengers; but he did not appear to have remarked the fact that that very item had, in one year, been reduced by £4,000. Every messenger received a salary of £400 a year; and, when travelling, was allowed £1 a day for expenses, his railway fare, of course, being paid for him besides. When a messenger was about to go abroad, he was required to have his luggage weighed at the Foreign Office, so that he might not take a larger quantity at the public expense than was really necessary for the journey. The bills they sent in were most strictly checked. He hoped, therefore, his hon. Friend would see that the course which had been adopted obviated the necessity for the present Motion. Every possible step had been taken to bring the expenditure within proper limits. Even if the number of messengers were further reduced at once, those gentlemen were entitled to pensions and subsequent allowances, so that the saving effected would be very small indeed. As to the constitution of the Foreign Office, he might remark that Mr. Hammond, the Permanent Under Secretary, had a greater knowledge of the business of the Department than he himself could pretend to possess. It was, of course, absurd to suppose that a gentleman with so much knowledge had no power. He was very much disposed to agree with his hon. Friend with respect to a division of labour. The person representing the Department in that House was he who was most interested in the financial matters connected with it; and he was not at all prepared to say that it would not be an advantage to the public service, that all financial questions should first receive the revision of the Parliamentary Under Secretary before receiving the concurrence of the Secretary of State. As to the expenses of telegrams, it was impossible to say beforehand what they would be. He had some hope, he might add, that further reductions would be made, in addition to those which had already been carried into effect. There were only two clerks in the Department who received extra sums beyond their salaries. He hoped his hon. Friend (Mr. Rylands) would not deem it necessary to press his Motion to a Division.

said, he thought the country was much indebted to the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) for the reductions which had been made, and should he press his Amendment he should give it his support. He objected not so much to the amount of salary of these persons, as to the numerous and unnecessary journeys which they made.

said, that a portion of the pay of the military attachés was defrayed by the War Department, and the larger part by the Foreign Office; but, although these gentlemen corresponded with the Foreign Office, they were to be considered essentially officers of the War Department, who selected them for the appointment, subject to the approval of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

said, the salaries of the foreign service messengers appeared to be upwards of £750 a year. He had mot some of these messengers when travelling abroad, and he remembered particularly travelling from Naples to Marseilles with one, who was a most terrific swell. During the whole night he regaled them with accounts of his shooting, and he never received a shooting invitation from anybody less than a Duke.

said, he had also had experience of the foreign service messengers, and he must speak of them as very gentlemanly men. Considering what class of men they were, he thought them very badly paid.

pointed out the charge of £8,000 for incidental expenses, which he thought a large one, in a total expenditure of £47,000.

said, he thought the allowance of 10 messengers to 18 officials in the Privy Council Office excessive. In no other Department was there so large a staff in proportion. He wished also to know the reason for the increase in the veterinary department.

said, this increase was caused by the passing of the Bill of last year for preventing the importation of disease among cattle, and also for preventing the spread of disease at home. This duty entailed much labour, and required a proportionate staff. As to the messengers, it must be remembered that the Privy Council were constantly called upon to send messengers to other Departments, as well as to Her Majesty.

said, a large sum was spent for vaccination purposes, and he thought it was well spent; but there were people who were much opposed to it, and he asked whether it was necessary that other steps should be taken to extend vaccination?

said, he had reason to believe that the opposition to vaccination was nothing like so prevalent as it was. There was still some opposition, which arose partly from the propaganda of a particular school of medicine, and partly from a mistaken view, with which it was impossible not to sympathize, on the part of parents, that vaccination was a bad thing for their children. This feeling, however, was becoming less day by day.

said, he thought that those who benefited from public inspection in the veterinary department—namely, the owners of cattle—should pay the costs of inspection, and that the charge should not be thrown upon the public.

said, he thought the increase in the veterinary department was more than his right hon. Friend (Mr. W. E. Forster) had given an explanation of. It was a new sub-department of the Privy Council, instituted to carry out a single Act of Parliament, and it had a secretary, a chief clerk, a legal adviser, three inspectors, one first-class clerk, nine second-class clerks, and 22 other clerks, besides an office and store keeper, and others. The cost of the establishment was £8,000, being an increase since last year of £3,000. He could hardly conceive how this large expenditure was to be justified.

said, if the right hon. Gentleman was back to his former position in the Privy Council Office, he would soon see that there was no difficulty in the explanation. If the Department had only to stop the importation of foreign disease, the work would be comparatively easy; but the Act required a vast number of Returns to be made from all parts of the country, showing the state of pleuro-pneumonia and foot-and-mouth disease from week to week; these had to be tabulated, and it could easily be imagined that the making of these Returns gave rise to a large amount of correspondence. Before the department had been re-organized, it was not at all unusual for the clerks to be kept at work until seven o'clock in the morning. This, of course, could not be expected to go on, and, therefore, the staff had been increased.

said, he thought the department took rather too much trouble, and required more Returns than were absolutely necessary for the purpose.

said, he would suggest, in the matter of vaccination, that the distribution of a very few statistics on a small piece of paper, shewing the average number of cases of small-pox when vaccination was not enforced, and the number of cases since it had been made compulsory, would do much to dissipate the prejudice which was growing among the lower classes against vaccination.

said, he could confirm the hon. Member for Scarborough (Mr. Dent), as to the unnecessary multiplication of Returns required by the veterinary department, especially with regard to the foot-and-mouth disease; and it appeared that no use was made of them, for when he moved the other day for some tabulated Returns on that subject, it was found impossible to give them.

said, he would beg to repeat his request for an explanation of the large amount for incidental expenses; and he must also ask the reason of the increase of the Health Officer's salary from £1,500 to £2,000 a year.

, in reply, said, that a large sum was expended in the journeys of Inspectors, who were occasionally sent to the most distant parts of the country. A more intelligent and useful official than Mr. Simon, the secretary of the medical department, did not exist. The cause of the veterinary Returns from the country being so numerous was that, at first, it was impossible to judge what information would be useful; and the reason that the Returns relating to the foot-and-mouth disease were incomplete was, that some of the local authorities had refused to give the required information.

said, he thought that the Vice President should make some statement to allay the feeling, that the vaccine supplied by the public vaccinator could be used, only at great risk. He hoped he would explain that it was the best vaccine that could be obtained.

said, that the moment a Department was constituted it commenced to pay salaries, which were constantly increasing. Higher salaries were paid by the Government than were paid by private firms for a similar class of duties. In connection with the Privy Council there was a "legal adviser;" and though no salary was put down for that officer, he had very little doubt that a salary would be provided for him in the Estimates for next year. He should like to know what the law expenses of the several Departments of the State amounted to. He was sure the sum was an immense one.

said, that "incidental expenses" was an item which appeared in the Votes of every Department. He thought, however, that it was desirable to give some fuller explanation of the item, and he would give directions in accordance with that opinion when the Estimates for next year were being prepared. The item, which amounted to £7,528, covered a variety of minor expenses, and, among others, the cost of employing writers or copyists. In the veterinary department the incidental expenses were apparently reduced from £1,950, in 1869–70, to £715 in the present Estimates; but that arose from the fact that the cost of employment of temporary clerks had this year been taken from under that head and put under the general head of salaries. When the Estimates of the expenses of the Privy Council Department were first brought under his notice he was struck with the fact that out of 35 persons who composed the whole of the Privy Council staff, no fewer than 10 were messengers; but on inquiry of the present Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, who was formerly connected with the Privy Council, and whose regard to economy was well known, that gentlemen informed him those messengers were employed in conveying messages to sub-departments outside, and to the Sovereign, and that he did not think the number could be diminished. As Secretary to the Treasury, he had sanctioned the increase of the salary of the medical officer, Dr. Simon, from£1,500 to £2,000 a year; because he had ascertained that the gentleman in question had been obliged to give up private practice, in order to give his undivided attention to the duties of his office. The Vice President would not neglect to consider whether any reduction could be made; but he could assure the Committee that they had together gone fully into the matter, with the view of ascertaining how the work could be economically, and at the same time efficiently, performed. With regard to the veterinary department, the duty having been imposed upon the department by Act of Parliament, according to precedent they might have created a permanent establishment; but, instead of doing that, the Privy Council and the Treasury constituted a Committee, upon which his right hon. Friend (Mr. W. E. Forster) was good enough to serve, to inquire closely into the nature and amount of the work to be done, and then they took the precaution of saying that the establishment should not be a permanent one, and that they should be at liberty to reduce it at any time.

said, the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) seemed to think that the officials of the Government were much overpaid; but this opinion was not at all borne out by the facts; and if the hon. Member had a son whom he wished to start in life, he would hardly be likely to seek a career for him in the public service, especially the diplomatic. Judged by the standard of the medical profession, the medical officer of the Privy Council was not extravagantly remunerated. Doubtless, the honour of taking part in the government of the country was a consideration which was set off against the larger income sacrificed by abandoning private practice. Would anyone tell him that the hon. Gentleman opposite, the Under Secretary of State (Mr. Otway), was remunerated for devoting his great abilities to the service of the nation by the paltry stipend of £1,500 a year? A man of talent could make more in any other capacity. In the same sense the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury was not paid for his services by a salary of £2,000 a year, and he must be regarded as serving his country from a sense of public duty, and for the honour which that service brought.

said, that the duties imposed upon the Department were really of a very onerous and responsible character. It had not only to inquire into the nature of disease and to take measures for stopping it, but it had actually to stop it, and it had to undertake the responsibility of issuing Orders which might interfere very largely with trade. For the assistance required under such circumstances £1,000 a year was not a large sum to pay. To take a particular instance, during the prevalence of the foot-and-mouth disease the department had to consider from day to day how far it would interfere with the supply of food to the metropolis, and whether it should order such an amount of slaughter of animals imported as would, and at one time did, raise the price of food in London. The gentleman who was paid £1,000 a year, Dr. Williams, received that salary during the continuance of the cattle plague; and, when it pleased Parliament to impose these new duties on the department it was thought right that Dr. Williams should be replaced in his old position. The Inspectors not only looked after the importation of foreign disease, but also after what was going on throughout the country; and he should not be at all surprised if it was not found impossible to do the work with only two Inspectors. He believed that far more than the cost had been already saved by the impression produced upon pleuro-pneumonia; but if it were to break out again the Department must certainly require a sufficient staff to send officers about the country, to give advice and adopt such measures as might be neces- sary. It had pleased Parliament to impose upon the Department the duty of considering how far it could check cruelty in the carriage of animals and increase the supply of food by preventing the loss consequent on their unnecessary suffering. These things could not be done without expense, and the Orders which had been issued with reference to the carriage of animals would be a dead letter, unless persons were appointed to see that they were carried out. Something would have to be paid to a legal adviser; for, of course, it was necessary to have the assistance of one in the drawing up of important Orders, which had the force of Acts of Parliament.

said, he could understand how necessary it was that a man like Dr. Simon, who devoted his time and his talents to the service of his country, should be well paid; but Dr. Williams was a Doctor of Medicine who had not given up a practice, who had been secretary to a company now defunct, and who had no knowledge of veterinary science; and the remuneration paid to him did appear to be extravagant. They were told, that the maximum salary was £800, and that there was a personal allowance of £200; and that was surely nothing more nor less than a permanent advance of £200. The salary of the chief clerk, too, had been suddenly raised from £200 to £600. As to the Inspectors, Professor Simonds and Professor Brown, they were able and eminent men, and their services were undoubtedly very valuable to the country.

said, that the question as to the payment of a secretary did not depend upon his being a man in large practice, but upon whether he had done his work efficiently; he (Mr. D. Dalrymple) believed he had.

said, that £9,595 were spent in the veterinary department, and that did not include local Inspectors at all the ports. All this expense arose from the importation of foreign cattle; and, in his opinion, the importers should bear the expense. He, therefore, recommended that three lines should be inserted in the Customs and Inland Revenue Bill, imposing a tax of 1s. a head on every beast imported. This would pay the expense of inspection without raising the price of meat, and the tax could not be regarded as contrary to free trade principles, because the cost of inspection was a necessary charge upon importation.

said, he was glad that suggestion had come from the other side of the House; if it had come from his side it would have been met by a cry of "Protection!" He did, not, however, agree with the proposal.

said, he hoped the incidental expenses would be fully explained in next year's Estimates.

said, he thought the proposal of the hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. M'Laren) a very good one.

said, he believed the expenditure of £2,784 for quarantine to be entirely thrown away. It was either too much or too little. If the regulation was of any value it ought to be applied to a larger number of ports than at present.

said, that representing a constituency (Penryn and Falmouth) which took a great interest in the question, he felt bound to protest against any charge on the importation of foreign cattle into this country, which, as it would be a violation of free trade, would, he was sure, not receive the sanction of the Government.

said, he was in a position to support the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) in his opinion that the salaries of clerks in the Civil Service were too high as compared with the salaries obtained by clerks of similar capacity in commercial houses.

said, with regard to vaccination, he thought that the existing dissatisfaction was caused rather by the way in which vaccination was performed than by any disbelief in its effect. He believed that by the expenditure of a larger sum the difficulty might easily be removed. With regard to the fact of larger salaries being paid in public Departments than in private offices, it must be remembered that in private offices changes were made as opportunities of advancement occurred, but in public departments it was of the utmost importance that they should permanently retain the services of efficient officers, many of whom were content to receive less money than they could earn in private practice, simply on account of the honour which attached to them.

said, he hoped the Committee would not grudge the money laid out for the quarantine service, for it was well expended.

said, the foot-and-mouth disease was a serious matter to the owners of cattle, and the Government were bound to take all the means in their power to prevent its extension. £2,000 a year was not too much to pay to a chief medical officer of ability, and it was a salary with which many hon. Members would not be content.

said, that, besides the advantage to the country, all this discussion would have been avoided if the Government had adopted the suggestion made for the establishment of a foreign cattle market. The Vote was not too large for the services that were performed.

said, he had not found fault with Dr. Simon's salary, but only asked why it was increased, and he was satisfied with the explanation that had been given.

said, that the chief clerk had been a most efficient public officer during the cattle plague, and when that was got rid of he naturally returned to the Department with which he had been previously connected. The matter of quarantine did not come under his superintendence; but he would take care that inquiries were instituted, in accordance with the suggestions that had been made. But he wished to point out that if there was no quarantine service, the Mercantile Marine would be placed in an unfortunate position. With respect to the Under Secretary, he was one of the most efficient public servants. The permanent head of such an Office was more in the position of a managing partner than of a clerk, and for a salary of less than £800 or £1,000 the country could not expect to get the services of an acceptable man.

said, that was what was called the Board of Trade was really no Board. Formerly there was a Presi- dent, Vice President, and a large nominal Committee, but that Committee no longer existed, and the Office of Vice President had been abolished. Now they had a President, who was unable to attend to his duties, and a Secretary whose duty it was to carry out the instructions of his chief. Highly as he valued the services of the Secretary, he yet thought that the public service suffered from the absence of the responsible head of the Department. He (Mr. Bowring) had assisted in the formation of the Library of the Board of Trade, which included a very valuable collection of works on political economy; and a librarian was appointed at a salary of £600. A year or two ago, when the Board of Trade removed from their old offices to Whitehall Gardens, the library was placed in a shed at the back of the Privy Council Office—a position in which it was not safe—and it still remained there, where it was of little use. He hoped to receive an assurance that this state of things would be remedied. Last year it was said that the appointment of a corresponding clerk in the railway department at £400 a year was only temporary, but now it appeared to be permanent. He hoped that the gentleman who held it might be put upon the ordinary staff of the Office without injury to the other gentlemen who were already there. Some explanation ought to be given on this point. He congratulated the Government upon the fact that they had abolished the office of dustman.

said, that the Inspectors of Limejuice were henceforth to be buried among the "miscellaneous items." He strongly objected to this, and therefore moved that the Vote be reduced by the sum of £1,280.

said, he thought the change that had been made in the constitution of the Board of Trade had worked extremely well. The weak point in its organization was the low salary of the President, which, he would suggest should be increased. It was an extremely unfair thing that a man of Cabinet rank should hold that position with a salary of only £2,000 a year. He believed that practical difficulties had arisen from the salary being too small, and that men whom it would have been very desirable to have in the Office had declined it on that account.

said, he would briefly point out that the incidental expenses in the Vote had been reduced by £900, and the cost attending the inspection of limejuice had been reduced by £200 or £300. There were now no special salaries for this work, which was done by officers who held other appointments. As to the library, that would remain where it was now until it should be removed to the new offices, which were now building. The corresponding clerk appointed by the late Government had been found to be an exceedingly valuable officer, and had therefore been retained temporarily. He might add that, since the Estimates had been prepared, reductions in the Department to the amount of upwards of £2,000 had been effected, and the reductions would have been greater but for the fact that there were no less than eight Bills now before Parliament which threw additional duties upon the Board of Trade.

, in rising to move—

"That the continued want of employment among those who live by waged labour in many of the great Towns of the Kingdom calls for the special consideration of this House, with a view to the means that may best be devised for the remedy of the same without delay,"

after referring to two Petitions on the subject which he had received for presentation, said, on that midsummer eve, when the weather was comparatively genial, when the town was full, and there were various alternatives of temporary occupation that helped men to forget the long interval of involuntary idleness, with all its attendant privation, through which they had passed, the House was free from that direct pressure of importunity and alarm which at an earlier period of the Session might have been said to interfere with their dispassionate judgment in the matter. But great classes of the community, both ratepayers and working men, had suffered bitterly last winter and the winter preceding, and all the inquiries he had been able to make confirmed him in the opinion that there were no new openings for trade in the winter that was approaching sufficient to give any guarantee against the recurrence of like misery. He also feared that the Poor Law Returns did not indicate that great improvement which would, if the logic of such statistics were admitted, discharge this House from the responsibility which many felt regarding the next six months. He was not going to discuss the administration of the Poor Law, and he asked the House to consider the question of the want of employment wholly apart from the question of poor rates and pauperism. What the House had to provide for and deal with was not that class which, being from various circumstances broken down, came upon the rates for relief, but those who were able to work, who wished for work, and who had not work to do. Three or four months had been spent by Parliament in securing the means of living to Irish tenants, and a million of money was to be devoted to this purpose by the State. Again, New Zealand had become discontented and alienated, and sooner than suffer that sore to canker, substantial help had been given by the State in order to promote emigration and afford employment in that Colony. Government had in their possession proofs which they probably were wise not to produce, and which he was not about to call for, of the extent to which, in the case of New Zealand, alienation had gone; and they knew too well the degree in which the feelings of the people of Ireland had become estranged before measures of concession were resolved on. Surely, if Ireland and New Zealand, being on the brink of disaffection, had been so generously dealt with, it was not unreasonable to ask the House to consider what could be done, though not in the way of lavish, grants, to improve the condition of classes of our countrymen who were certainly as peaceable and as little importunate as these. There was conclusive evidence to prove that unexampled poverty had prevailed for the last three years in the great towns of the kingdom; that that poverty, though at present alleviated, was likely to recur; that it was aggravated every day by the mere natural increment of population; and, as had been well said by a rev. friend of his—

"This distress did not arise from any mere oscillation of trade; but was one of those great changes in the progress of surplus population with which, sooner or later, Parliament would be obliged to deal."

He took a recent opportunity of consulting the Registrar General, who said there was no reason to expect in the next decennial period that there would be any falling off in the increase of our population, which was now going on at the rate of 1,000 a day. The pressure occasioned by this increase was concentrated in the larger towns of the United Kingdom, whose aggregate population had risen enormously in recent years. He held in his hand a table verified during the present week by the signature of the Registrar General, from which it appeared that in the last 19 years the population of the 20 largest towns—counting the metropolis as but one—had risen from 5,225,000 to 7,216,000; so that at a very moderate computation the increase in these great centres of population would be found by the Census of next year to amount to considerably more than 2,000,000. But the total increase in the realm in the same period would appear to be about 3,500,000. There was, therefore, little reason to doubt that when they had the figures of the 15 or 20 next largest cities, it would be found that the whole of the additional population of the kingdom was concentrated in the towns. Formerly, this was not the case; but, of late years, Ireland and some agricultural counties in England, as well as many of the smaller country towns, had steadily decreased in population. He would not discuss the causes which had led to this important change in our vital statistics. The successive alterations made in the law of chargeability had, he believed, a great deal to do with it. Modifications in our system of trade had, in some places, a great deal more. All he desired was that note should be taken of the fact as one that was essential. If the large towns had become the places where great fortunes were to be made, they were also the places where great masses of poverty were accumulated. Now, this was the question to which he had to ask the serious attention of the House. He hoped that question would not be evaded by the attempt to raise any false issue as to the general causes of increasing poverty. He had heard it sometimes said that if there were no trades unions, the people would be all employed, well off, and contented. He had never spoken a sentence, or written a line in favour of resort to strikes, which had frequently, he believed, done much harm. But the man must be profoundly ignorant of the actual condition of things around him who believed that they were to be accounted for mainly, or to any important extent, by misdirected combinations among workmen. Their total number in the United Kingdom had been estimated at upwards of 5,000,000; while the minority enrolled in trades unions of all kinds did not exceed 800,000; and of these it was notorious that a large proportion had not for many years been engaged in any contention with their employers. Take Birmingham, for example, which was said to be the place where unionism was weakest, and where, accordingly, he might be told that employment was good. He rejoiced to believe that, comparatively speaking, it was so. But what was the testimony he had received within the present week, from two of the most intelligent and reliable persons in that town? They were both well known to his hon. Friend (Mr. Dixon), who was their representative; and he would attest the value of any statements made by them. The clerk to the guardians, replying to a letter of inquiry from one whom he could have no other desire than impartially and correctly to inform, wrote—

"There is a considerable number of persons unemployed, who will not apply to the guardians: for the most part artizans. Many would emigrate if aided, themselves paying a small sum perhead.

The editor of an influential journal corroborates this view—

"The gun trade, he says, is very bad, and is not likely to grow better. Of 4,000 engaged in this trade more than half, are unemployed, and will remain so till they can be drafted off into other callings. These are not paupers, and if they take parish relief, they only do so under severe pressure. Many would emigrate if aided, supplying part of the means themselves. I receive daily inquiries from workmen about emigration agencies, rates of passage, &c. The same observation applies to the districts round, and to the Black Country. Any information about the Colonies or the United States is eagerly caught at. There is no town in which unionism is so weak as in Birmingham."

Neither was it just to ascribe the prevailing want of work to the evils caused by drinking or betting, which latter he had reason to fear was an increasing habit, and one much to be deplored. But it was well known that gambling was most indulged in where work was plenty and wages high; and, as for intoxication, he would endorse unreservedly the thoughtful and just expression in a letter he had received that morning from the rev. Mr. Temple, incumbent of Upper Kennington, in which, after lamenting the want of profitable labour which existed even now, and the prospect of its grievous aggravation in the later months of the year, said—

"I cannot attribute all distress as arising from excessive drinking, as is sometimes done, because I believe distress occasioned by want of work, depresses the mind and leads to the habit of lulling trouble by drink; and this does not prevail only among the labouring classes, but in a more refined manner is to be found in the higher ranks of society."

But to whatever extent misery was caused by evil habits, where was the class among them without sin entitled to cast the first stone, when the casting of that stone meant a sentence of death? He held in his hand a mass of correspondence from clergymen, employers, and physicians of all shades of opinion, and all spoke of the deep distress prevailing throughout the metropolis last winter. Dr. Lee, All Saints, Lambeth, said—

"A very considerable number would be only too thankful to emigrate from this parish could they see their way to do so. I have never known such misery among the lower classes as they endured last winter; and it amazes me that statesmen do not insist upon a Government scheme of emigration to the Colonies."

MR. Owen, St. Jude's, Chelsea, said—

"One-third of all trades are out of work, except the mendicant trade, which flourishes most when it is notorious that there is least work to be had. The well-known want of employment is an indirect endorsement of fraud. Whether failing commerce or surplus population be the cause, emigration meets both difficulties. There is no other remedial proposal so easy, so cheap, so otherwise desirable, as an extensive organization to send men to where there is land on which to live by their labour. If Government would make an emigration loan advance, to be repaid after given periods, thousands would avail themselves of the boon, who soon will be a costly and dangerous burthen on local rates or public charity."

The Rev. T. Nolan, of Regent Square, wrote—

"Out of a population of 11,000 there are 1,300 families depending on waged labour, the half of whom have not regular work. The poverty of this part of London is coming in like an armed man. Desultory efforts no longer yield even a temporary mitigation. Government must grapple with the evil. The question is not of alms but of productive work, the want of which among skilled labourers is not so great as among unskilled. But a third of these have been without work last winter for three or four months. Of the shoemakers the greater part had only occasional employment during the winter. Five hundred are day labourers, of whom a third are unemployed three or four months. Tradesmen complain of want of business, ratepayers are greatly burdened, and general depression prevails."

A partner in one of the largest building firms in the metropolis, who was one of the best educated, and most intelligent men he was acquainted with, told him the other day that their wages-book showed payments last year and this of more than a thousand guineas a week less than they had been three or four years ago; that he saw no prospect whatever of trade reviving, and that he could have to-morrow hundreds of men if he wanted them, able and willing to work, both artizans and labourers. The gentleman in question did not happen to agree with him (Mr. Torrens) in all his views of emigration; and he made his opponents, whoever they might be, a present of the admission. On the other hand, he must add that his friend had frankly said to him—"I know that we are no worse off than other large houses, and that if asked they all would say very much the same." This was in Bloomsbury. In another district, one that seemed among the most favoured in many respects—he meant the pleasant and healthful region lying between Highgate and the more densely-peopled portion of the town—another employer, Mr. Wiltshire, wrote to him thus—

"During the last winter I know from my own knowledge that many industrious artizans and labourers were driven to the stoneyard in order to provide food for their families. In several instances I recognized men who had worked for me in the building trade, who begged me to give them work to relieve them from the degradation of taking parish money. A man who had worked for me as a foreman bricklayer, came and implored me to give him labour of any sort, so as to take him from where he was working for 1s. 6d. a day. But my building work has been stopped for months, and it will be a long time before any builder in Islington can recommence operations, In Holloway alone, which is about a fourth of the parish, there are about 1,600 houses unfinished or empty. Though the population of the parish is increased in the last 10 years from 153,000 to 240,000 many of the small shopkeepers are reduced to the greatest poverty, and hardly able to pay the heavy rates imposed on them, and in hundreds of instances the vestry is obliged to excuse them. In February and March last year we gave out-door relief to 35,000, and in the same months this year to 59,000 poor."

MR. Timewell, who has also been largely engaged in building, and who takes an active part in local affairs, corroborates this despondent view, illustrating the downward progress of the district in economic condition by the striking fact that whereas the amount of property assessed for the relief of the poor has about doubled between 1856 and 1870, the amount given in out-door relief had been augmented five-fold. Dr. Ballard, referring to the Reports made by him as Medical Officer of Health, observes—

"I have pointed out the enormous increase of sickness which seeks relief from public sources, arising out of the distress of the labouring classes from lack of work, and altogether disproportionate to our increase of population. In 1805 I recorded 29,098 cases of sickness; in 1867, 34,692; and in 1868, 41,077. Last winter the destitution from lack of work, came very prominently before me when relapsing fever broke out among the labouring class. Nearly all were in a state of semi-starvation, which was most painful to witness; and I visited every family. The complaint of the; men was that they could get no work, of the women, who kept stalls, that they had no customers. The want of food and firing in the bitter weather obviously led to the extension of the disease, to repeated relapses, and to a prolonged debility after convalescence. Our public sickness still continues very high for the season; the cost of food is rising, and unless some anticipatory measures be adopted, I look forward to next winter with dread."

He assured him (Mr. Torrens) that in many other suburban districts a similar state of things was to be found, and that from experience and observation he was confident no change for the better was at hand. It would be no answer to say that, although all this might be true of the metropolis with its 3,000,000 of people, Leeds was busy and the vale of Cleveland was bright with the glow of iron furnaces. The prosperity of one district was of no avail to cure the per- manent wretchedness of another. He warned the House against being misled by averages on such a subject as this. There could be no question of averages between the rich and the poor, between the healthy and the sick, or between the wretched and the happy. It was an absurdity to tell a suffering man that he could not be very ill because his neighbours were enjoying good health. It was no reason against help when a house was on fire to say that there was not a sign of smoke from the opposite chimney. They might do well to take averages of exports and imports, of rates and taxes, of railways and telegraphs; but it was cruel and stupid nonsense to talk of average health, hunger, or despair. It was the duty of the House to disregard all arguments founded upon such sham calculations, and to do their best to prevent any class of the community becoming destitute, and, therefore, desperate. He did not ask the Government to provide work for a single man, or to do anything which could in any way be regarded as bordering on Socialism; but he asked them to deal with the working and the lower middle classes of this country in the same way as they had dealt with the people of New Zealand and of Ireland. A relieving officer in Bethnal Green wrote to him that they were inundated with surplus labour from the agricultural districts. The changes in the law that had been made of late years had rendered the great towns the drainage for the unemployed of the provinces, who were becoming a source of danger and demoralization. An East-end incumbent, the Rev. Mr. Caparn, says—

"From my own knowledge, and from information obtained from reliable sources, I believe more than half my people are unemployed, or not following their old employments. Many who were earning 50s. to 60s. per week, as well as less skilled labourers, are glad to unload barges or obtain any casual employment, and the number that are able to obtain work do not earn sufficient to support their families—the majority barely exist, and of some it is a puzzle to know how they keep body and soul together. I do not think there are many in my parish who have been immediately connected with strikes, though some, no doubt, have injured themselves in that way. For the last four years my people have suffered terribly, and notwithstanding the indiscriminate charity which has been given, and which has done much harm, the distress is rather increasing than diminishing."

Mr. Caparn would rejoice in any remedy; but though he has assisted in emigration, he fears it alone mil not do. He ends by asking—

"Are there not vast quantities of waste land in Great Britain that might be made to produce food for our increasing population?"

He would add one more testimony, but it was that of a man whom he was sure the Prime Minister would not undervalue. The Rev. Dr. Miller, of Greenwich, wrote—

"My strong conviction, which has for some time been deepening, is that this question—'How to deal with the unemployed?' will, ere long, be the most urgent social question of the day. That very many are willing to emigrate if aided, not as paupers, is certain. I fear the want of employment will continue. Scarcity, and a hard winter, would probably bring the matter to a grave point."

So much for the metropolis. Now, as to the other towns, Mr. Russell, the able conductor of one of the Liverpool journals, said—

"This is a city of refuge, or colossal workhouse, for all, many miles round, and for thousands from Ireland; anything which would deplete the labour market elsewhere would greatly reduce the distress in this town. Casual labour ought to be organized here in order to avert suffering in bad times, which comes suddenly, and often lasts too long. Emigration would lessen the supply of cheap casual labour, which brokers like to have dangling about, of course. It is more popular with working men than with them."

MR. Samuelson, brother of the hon. Member for Banbury, said—

"During a great part of the year there is a very large amount of superfluous labour in the cotton and general produce markets. Only when favourable winds bring in a fleet of vessels is there full employment. One large cotton broking firm employs 50 regular hands as porters and weight takers, and 90 casually. Eleven months out of 12, they have no difficulty in engaging these hands at an hour's notice. Their warehouseman tells me that at 2 o'clock on most days he could go on 'Change and engage 500 hands in a very short time. Some ascribe the superfluity of labour to what they call high wages, which tempt men, they say, to flock into town during a flush of work; and which being soon spent the men are unable to leave. I think what is wanted is a higher rate of wages to compensate for casual employment, and a well-managed trades union to regulate labour and counteract the influence of public-housekeeping warehousemen. A respectable man will, at any time, prefer 21s. a week with regular work, to the vicissitudes of a dock porter's life with 4s. a day. The facility with which extra hands are obtained, owing to the rapid influx of men when there is a flush of work, is not only the cause of frequent distress, but is indicative of a widespread superabundance of labour elsewhere."

The Mayor of Southampton endorsed the following statement:—

"The Poor Law Returns give an average of men out of employment. But by far the larger number of persons would not have been in receipt of relief, and consequently I have no means of ascertaining their number. The Poor Law statistics would not give you a tenth part of the numbers out of employment."

Next Session the House must be prepared to have this question of the unemployed more fully discussed. It was becoming every day of more and more importance. Wild dreams were being indulged in, and desperate expedients were being mooted with the view of meeting the difficulty. As he ventured the other day to tell a noble Lord, who was better acquainted, perhaps, than any man of his order with the true condition of the people—"You who have good estates to lose or keep, had need to look to it betimes: the devil is looking over the wall;" and his noble Friend replied—"I know it, and have often said so." He had been asked upon what ground he could advise Parliament to levy a tax for the benefit of a particular class, but he did not ask for a single shilling. The tax was already levied; he asked only that it should be adjusted. If there were a large number of people out of employment, and if they did not find their way to the workhouse, they must live upon the wages of others; and it was so. The poor would not see their neighbours dying from starvation without helping them; and besides this, the poor rates were levied most unjustly. He knew of two proprietors, who drew from £30,000 to £40,000 a year from house property in Finsbury, and were not assessed a shilling to the local rates. As absentees they did not see the poverty of the district, and were therefore not prompted to charity. The remedy for this would not be found in any adjustment of local burdens. He recently met a distinguished friend often consulted by the Government upon the subject of commercial legislation, who asked him why, instead of requiring State interference in reference to surplus labour by means of emigration, they did not ask for the means of opening new markets to labour by negotiating the reciprocal abatement of Customs' duties, which stood in the way of greater intercourse with other countries. But the truth was that they who proposed State aid to emigration had been the most constant advocates of the free trade alternative, on which his friend Sir Louis Mallet in preference relied. All through last autumn and winter they had not failed to press upon the attention of the Government the policy of equalizing the duties on wines, which would not only cause a great expansion of trade with the Peninsular States, but with our own Colonies of Australia and South Africa. The Ministers of Spain and Portugal had long been urging the admission of their wines on the same terms as those of France, and only the other day he (Mr. Torrens) had introduced a deputation of Cape and Australian merchants to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for the purpose of pressing upon him the expediency of the change, and the right hon. Gentleman had told them that the question had been considered, and that the thing could not be done. This was not the time to discuss the grounds of that determination; but if the alternative of new markets was closed against them, they had all the more right and reason to ask that some other should be sought, and, if possible, found. He thought that it ought to be impressed upon the Government that they were wrong in leaving the outflow of labour undirected. The Report of the Emigration Commissioners showed that out of 167,000 British-born subjects who left this country last year, no fewer than 133,000 proceeded to the United States. It was, he believed, a great error not to endeavour to prevent this. He was as hearty a friend of America as any man in that House, and could look back with satisfaction to the services he had rendered in preserving amity between the two countries; but he loved his own country best, and had little sympathy or respect for

"The steady patriot of the world alone,

The friend of every country but his own."

If they desired to hold the Empire together, they ought, while they had spare hands and the Colonies had spare lands, to marry the land to the labour and the labour to the land. Canada was able and willing to receive between 20,000 and 30,000 men, and yet they allowed people to remain here weltering in their misery. He, for one, would not advocate what was called "sending" men out of the country, because he did not think that was their business at all; but their duty was to strike down the toll-bars between this country and every other part of Her Majesty's dominions. Above £1,000,000 was annually voted in subsidies nominally for the postal service, but practically for the provision of floating hotels for the great comfort and expedition of first and. second-class travellers. Those subsidies were professedly granted for postal reasons; but they had the inevitable effect of combining great luxury with great speed for those persons who were able to travel at high pressure and at great expense. Why, then, should not the working classes have their fair share of the advantages of improved transit? In every Railway Bill a provision was inserted that there should be third-class carriages, and why should they not have, in like manner, third-class ships? Doing this would naught impoverish capital, while it would make labour rich indeed. He would plant in the heart of every working man a fresh root of hope, of self-help, of loyalty. He would enfranchise him with something better than any mere political privilege—the sense that when he woke in the morning of life, and found the sky dark and the air chill, and work scanty around him, he might, by thrift and care, in a short time gather enough to purchase for himself, under the provisions of a great and merciful law, the right to pass the limit of his parish, of his town, or even of this old kingdom, and go forth to seek wealth and fortune, health and content, in whatever region and whatever zone there were lands untilled within the allegiance of the Queen. It would be possible, without any appreciable increase of national burdens, to enable many thousand families to emigrate, who, for want of material aid, were now unable to do so. Each adult should pay £3, and each child over 12 years of age 30s. For this they should obtain a family passage warrant to Quebec, Victoria, or Natal, as the case might be. The difference in each case might be made up in the following manner:—one portion should be defrayed from the Imperial Exchequer, one from the revenue of the Colony, and one out of a fund to be created by way of colonial loan guaranteed by the Home Government. The portions would not always be the same; but, taking all things into account, he thought the advantages and capabilities of contribution might fairly be considered equal. No plan, of course, could be wholly free from objection which attempted to deal with a problem so complicated, and one the elements of which were in several respects so diverse. But, at least, that which he desired to recommend might afford a way of escape from perilous uncertainty as to the means of livelihood to great numbers of industrious and respectable persons at present existing in daily deepening fear of absolute want. It would, on the other hand, supply Canada and Australia with the hands they more than ever need on terms much easier than, as far as he knew, had ever been heretofore suggested. He would have the Imperial Executive authorized to give the option to any Colony whose circumstances rendered it suitable for emigration from this country; and he would in every case give the colonial agent resident here a veto in the selection of passengers by these "third-class trains across the ocean." Each Colony would be left to judge for itself from year to year what addition to its population it could helpfully assimilate and absorb, and there would be no great difficulty in adapting the supply to the varying demand under this elastic system. The working men had given abundant evidence that they were ready to pinch themselves in order to accumulate £3 a head, and thereby prove they were not paupers. If this boon were refused them, who would convince them that they were duly represented in that House? Many of the Colonies would be willing to contribute an equal sum for each approved emigrant; and they of their abundance ought to contribute the remainder. The adoption of such a scheme would tend more than anything else to knit together the different portions of the Empire. He would not then discuss the policy pursued by his noble Friend at the head of the Colonial Department of withdrawing their troops from the Colonies; but surely if they withdrew force they ought to plant affection. Those who went to the Colonies would become customers for our manufactures, on which the tariff of the United States imposed a duty of from 30 to 70 per cent. It might, perhaps, be urged that the magnitude of our exports was an answer to his complaints; but he would remind the House that history recorded instances of great wealth existing side by side with great misery and want. By the mercy of Providence they were singularly happy in having many untried regions where they might most advantageously employ both capital and labour, and he was convinced that by a wise, judicious, and kind application of our laws and financial arrangements, they might facilitate the outflow of capital and labour to the extended sphere of British dominion, and, at the same time, confer unmitigated blessings upon this country.

, in seconding the Motion, said, he hoped the House might be induced to take immediate action in the matter, The hon. Gentleman who had brought forward the Motion had successfully combated the objections that had been raised against Government aid to emigration. The hon. Gentleman had said that the Poor Law statistics did not represent more than a tenth part of the misery and destitution prevailing in the country. He would himself briefly refer to the last annual Report of the Poor Law Board, which had within the last few days been placed in the hands of hon. Members. He found that the number of persons in the receipt of relief during the past year amounted to 1,032,000—a larger number than in any year of which we had a record, with the exception of the years 1849 and 1863. Now, the cause of the increase of pauperism in 1849 was that the policy of free trade had just been introduced; but that its good effects had not yet begun to be experienced; while 1863 was the worst year of the Lancashire cotton famine, which was admitted to be a national disaster. It was easy, therefore, to account for the increased amount of distress which prevailed in those two years, while he had heard no valid reason assigned for the pauperism of the last few years. The increase was, under these circumstances, he could not help thinking, a most alarming circumstance. On the 1st of Jannary in the present year he found that the number of paupers was 36,000 in excess of that of last year, and that at the end of the month of February the excess was 74,000. He would also observe, because he believed the present House of Commons was an economic House, that one cause of the increase of distress was to be discovered in the fact that thousands of persons had been turned out of employment in our public establishments. From the Returns to which he had already ad- verted it would be seen that in Greenwich, Woolwich, Deptford, and those other parts of Kent where their great dockyards were situated, the increase of the expenditure in the relief of distress for the last year had been 22 per cent, while in no other single district throughout the country had it been more than 8 per cent. In addition, he found that the money which had been expended last year in relieving the poor in England was in a larger ratio per head than in any year since 1835, except 1848. Those circumstances were, he thought, sufficient to justify those who brought forward and supported the present Motion. To such a Motion he had heard no objections except that although the state of destitution in the country was very bad it was not worse than it had been before, and that there was, therefore, no need of immediate action. That, however, was an argument which he could not help regarding as being very unworthy of that House, and which he hoped would not find favour with a Reformed Parliament. It was also said, not so much within as outside the walls of the House, with some plausibility, by gentlemen connected with the great manufacturing interests—"No doubt there is a great want of employment; but trade will improve, and we shall soon want every man in the country. Do not, therefore, adopt any scheme giving facilities to enable them to go to other countries." To such an argument there were, however two objections. He should, in the first place wish to know when the promised increase of employment was to occur. He had heard in the course of recent discussions in that House that the trade of the country was tolerably prosperous; but with 1,100,000 paupers, to whom must be added the hundreds of thousands hovering outside the circle of Poor Law relief, it must be an unparalleled increase of trade which would give employment to the whole mass of our poor. He would also wish to point out that if they could keep men until they wanted them—if, likewise, the longer they were kept the better they would be, there might be no objection to the adoption of that course. But they all knew that in the case of men who had lost their employment, and who had to fight the battle of life from day to day, the probability was that they would sink into a hopeless state of dependence, and would become so deteriorated that if after a time they were able to obtain work, they would be almost incapacitated from accepting it. He thought he might add that it was clear from the way in which the House had listened to the observations of the last speaker, they would be only too glad to adopt any means of relieving the prevailing distress which was not open to strong objection. One of the means suggested was their employment in the reclamation of waste lands; but he, for one, must frankly admit that he could never discover how work of that description was to be provided. Even in Ireland he found, from careful inquiry, that the waste lands which could be reclaimed with any reasonable prospect of remunerating those who might be engaged in the task were very small indeed. There was also another scheme which had been put forward, and that was the introduction of some change into our commercial policy; but when that subject had been brought before the House the Government had refused—he did not say without reason—to accede to any investigation with that object. Those two projects might therefore be dismissed, and then came the proposal for the adoption of some satisfactory system of assistance to emigration. Now, he wished it to be distinctly understood that he did not wish to see any man forced to leave his country. But it was, nevertheless, in his opinion, desirable that a man who could not find occupation at home should be able to go where he could find the means of employment, and where he might become an advantage to the community which he joined, instead of a burden to that which he left. It might be said that the plan suggested was Socialistic. But for the last 250 years we had had a Poor Law the very origin of which—the Act 43 Elizabeth—was the rankest socialism possible, because under it overseers were to find work for persons unable to get it. The principle contained in this Act had been put into practice, yet Socialism and Communism had not been found among us. He trusted that the House would not be influenced by these hard names. Those who would benefit by Socialism would be the very lowest class, who had nothing to lose and hoped to better themselves in the scramble. But the proposal of his hon. Friend (Mr. W. M. Torrens) was that those who were destitute, not from any fault of their own, should be afforded facilities for emigration to seek work in a country some thousands of miles off, where they would certainly gain nothing from the adoption of Socialism here. A residence in Canada had convinced him that it offered opportunities of employment such as did not exist in England. It was said that emigration to Canada would only swell the population of the United States, and that the emigration from Canada was greater than the emigration to that country. No doubt, during the time of the Civil War enormous bounties in the States tempted immigrants from Canada, and great difficulty was experienced in preventing English soldiers from deserting, because, even if they did not get the bounty, there was such a want of agricultural labour that they were sure of profitable employment. But since the war ceased, the heavy taxation, which was the result of the enormous War Debt, had put a stop to immigration from Canada. An indirect advantage arising from the adoption of the Motion would be the check it would give to indiscriminate charity, which was a great evil. If it were known that the Government had taken up this question of destitution, persons would hesitate before they gave any money in the streets. Parliament had spent months in discussing Irish grievances, and a Bill would probably soon become law which violated the first principles of political economy. The House were asked, to sanction this Bill because they were told that there was a keen competition for land in Ireland, and that unless a man there found employment in the cultivation of the land he had no means of subsistence. Now, the competition of labour in England was not less keen than the competition for land in Ireland; and he doubted whether, within a short distance of this House, there was not more distress than in the whole length and breadth of Ireland. He did not ask the House to violate the principles of political economy or of free trade, but to place employment within the reach of persons unable to gain employment at home; and to send those persons to the Colonies instead of paying an annual sum for their maintenance here, and helping them in a state of semi-starvation and compulsory idleness. An eminent political economist had said that one of the great evils engendered by a high state of civilization was the local scarcity of employment. The difficulty was further enhanced when these local scarcities became general. They flattered themselves that they were increasing in wealth; but all this time the heart of the country was being eaten out by the cancer of pauperism. He confessed, that the plan suggested by his hon. Friend (Mr. W. M. Torrens) was dimly shadowed forth; but he earnestly asked the House and the Government to consider and support it, for the present condition of affairs was, to a highly civilized nation like theirs, at once a danger and a disgrace.

Sir, I have to thank my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. W. M. Torrens) for the courtesy with which he allowed Government business to come on at the Two o'clock Sitting, and deferred his Motion until this evening. I wish to draw particular attention to the terms of his Motion, because its tendency is very different from the particular scheme to which he addressed himself in his speech. I must ask the indulgence of the House if I travel over a certain extent of ground, because it will not do to let it go forth uncontradicted that the state of affairs in this country is such as it has been described. Do not let hon. Members be led astray by isolated facts and the descriptions given of particular places. The hon. Member referred to the metropolis, Southampton, part of Birmingham, and Liverpool; but did he deal with any great industry, such as the cotton trade or the iron trade, or any of the industries that are reviving again, and calling for labour even from the metropolis? It would be disastrous that the country should think it is in a worse situation than it really is. It is exceedingly dangerous to feel an overweening confidence; but there is danger, too, in the opposite direction. If a belief that the state of things is worse than it is leads us to seek remedies we ought to avoid, it is our bounden duty to remove the erroneous impression. I demur to the facts of the hon. and learned Member, and I deny the inferences which he has drawn from them; and I maintain that the remedy he proposes would be ineffectual for its object, even if it were possible for the House to adopt it. Why has he put the Motion on the Paper in the form he has done? Why does he speak of "devising the best means," without naming the particular scheme he advocates? It could not have been, I am sure, from any wish to evade the decision given from the Chair that the subject of State-aided emigration could not be renewed in this House this Session. What inference, then, are we to draw from the form of his Motion? It implies that if emigration is not a sufficient remedy for the want of employment, other means ought to be found by the Government for relieving the working class. Do he and the noble Lord opposite (Lord George Hamilton) pledge themselves to this plain inference which is clearly contained in the Motion? Suppose the emigration scheme breaks down, as it clearly will, are we to proceed to devise further remedies? What will the working classes think of the Motion? Is my hon. and learned Friend prepared to tell the working classes that it is the duty of Parliament by other means to find employment for them? Seldom has a Notice been put upon the Paper calculated to raise so false and dangerous an impression. My hon. Friend has taken upon himself a great responsibility, and, in assuming it, it was his duty to have laid a stronger case before the House. Is it sufficient to quote private letters when other authorities are at his command? I could quote a number of private letters to show that employment is reviving at almost all the centres of industry. But I should, indeed, not venture to rely exclusively on private letters in such a case. I shall show from numerous sources that work is reviving in the country. The hon. Member has told us of four places only where employment is very scarce. The statistics of pauperism bear upon this question to a very great degree, but the hon. and learned Member is quite right in not resting his case upon them. I quite admit that there might be a decrease of pauperism and yet an increase of suffering among the working classes. But the statistics prove that there is a great decrease of the depression which has existed for so many years. But the noble Lord took a different course: he quoted the last Report of the Poor Law Board; but if he had read the whole he would not have quoted what he did without first stating certain modifying facts. The noble Lord stated that there were 1,100,000 paupers in the country; and he wished to know what sort of a revival in trade there must be before we could find work for them. The noble Lord assumed that all this million of paupers were capable of work.

What I said was, that there was 1,000,000 of paupers and some 100,000 on the mere outside of pauperism.

Yes; but the noble Lord argued as if we expected that the revival of trade would absorb them all. But of that 1,000,000 paupers, how many did the House think were capable of work—able bodied in the real sense of the word? I dislike vague generalities. It is stated in the Report how many are sick, how many are aged, how many are widows, and that 350,000 of them are children. It is not fair to talk of that 1,000,000 as if that number represented men who are out of work, whom the revival of trade would absorb. The hon. and learned Member (Mr. W. M. Torrens) would find it rather difficult to show that there was so large an increase in the number of paupers that a revival of trade would not easily absorb those who are capable of work, and the revival of trade is, in fact, absorbing them fast at the present moment. A Return issued by the Poor Law Board a day or two ago shows that a large proportion of them have been already absorbed. Why take Returns for the 1st of January when we have Returns up to the fifth week of April? The January Returns show a great excess of paupers over the preceding year, but that was owing to the hardest winter we have had for a long time. Now we are not 1 per cent above last year; the Returns show we have reduced the excess until there are only 6,000 more paupers than there were at the same date last year. The difference between the fourth week of January, 1868, and the fifth week of April in the same year, was 66,000; in 1869 the difference was 49,000, and in 1870 the difference is 117,000; so that we have already run off 117,000 from the great excess. Pauperism is going down, not up. If we except the metropolis and the south-eastern district, there would be a decrease on the pauperism of last year. The noble Lord quoted Poor Law statistics because he thought they strengthened his case; and, therefore, I feel it my duty to call attention to this point in order to show the real facts. Well, Sir, I scarcely know at this late hour what course I ought to take. I have before me a bundle of Papers containing a mass of evidence which, I think, will be of interest not only to the House, but also to the working classes, on whose behalf the Government is as anxious to legislate wisely as my hon. and learned Friend and hon. Gentlemen opposite can possibly be. I have not thought it sufficient to converse with, or correspond with, a few private friends. I have endeavoured to exhaust every source from which reliable information on this subject was likely to be obtained. I have asked the Factory Inspectors to report. I have asked the Poor Law Inspectors to put themselves in connection with everyone who could give them information. I have myself communicated with Members of the House who represent large towns, and have requested them to consult every authority whom they could possibly command, and I have watched every indication of the state of trade. I will not speak of the schedules of the Income Tax Returns, which, though they are not conclusive on the point, are to some extent indications. But I may allude to the Revenue Returns, which, show that the working classes are consuming more sugar, more tea, more beer, more spirits, and more tobacco. Those classes are depositing more in the savings-banks and contributing more to the Imperial Exchequer; and I say here, on my responsibility, that in the most searching inquiry which I have instituted, I have found there is scarcely a single symptom on which we can rely that does not point to reviving prosperity throughout the length and breadth of the land. All the facts to which I have referred leave not a doubt of this—that the distress is not greater than it was a year ago, that it is not greater than it was two years ago, and that it is decreasing. The noble Lord has referred to the East-end of London. No doubt, the distress there is somewhat greater than it was a year ago, but not greater than it was two years ago; on the contrary, it is diminishing. No doubt, there is great misery in parts of the metropolis, and there is local misery elsewhere. The question, then, is—are we to legislate for a particular district; are we to go back from the great principle we have always acted upon of leaving the labour market free, of letting labour take care of itself? I contend that we ought not to do so unless a very strong case is made out. Sir, if the House will accompany me for a few moments into some details, it will learn what I have gathered from the Reports to which I have adverted. Mr. Cane, one of the Poor Law Inspectors, reports that in almost every part of Lancashire there is a considerable diminution of pauperism. In Yorkshire there is not so great a relief from the depression; but Mr. Cane, referring to Preston, Stockport, Liverpool, Manchester, Wigan, and the other towns of Lancashire, writes—

"I have visited many Unions and attended a very considerable number of Guardians' meetings during the last months. In all the places I have been assured that work is now plentiful for those who chose to labour. There is at this time much agitation among the workpeople employed in factories and collieries, the object of which is to obtain that rise in wages which it is thought the improvement in trade enables them to demand. Manufacturers and others display a marked desire to retain the services of the operatives whom they employ, and I have observed an anxiety to draw to their mills workpeople from distant places, where it was supposed work was less abundant. In one instance, at least, I have known that the proprietors of a large cotton-mill have directed attention to the condition of the poor of the East-end of London as a source from which to obtain, the 'hands' they could not engage elsewhere… I hope and believe that the marked improvement which has taken place in the condition of the working classes will be further increased and permanently sustained."

Parenthetically, I may ask my hon. and learned Friend the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. W. M. Torrens), why he speaks of transferring labour from England to Canada, and not of transferring it from the East-end of London to other parts of the country? In Stockport there has been a decrease from 2,500 paupers in May, 1869, to 1,500 in May, 1870, the decrease being thus 1,000. In Blackburn the decrease has been from 5,200 to 3,300, being a decrease of 1,900. In Liverpool the decrease has been from 11,900 to 10,700, being a decrease of 1,200; and in Preston it has been from 6,000 to 3,000 since October, 1867. Well, but I was not satisfied to take the Reports of the Poor Law Inspectors only. I applied to the Factory Inspectors, and with reference to the cotton trade, I have this Report from Mr. Ewing—

"I can answer with confidence that there is a decided revival in the staple trade of this district and neighbourhood, and the improvement is very considerable when compared with the actual state of things at this time last year. We have evidence of this revival more particularly in the starting again of a number of the mills which had remained closed for a long time, and in the investment of fresh capital in new machinery and other ways. It is also seen in the increase of machinery being gradually brought again into operation in factories which had only been partially worked since the Cotton Famine. The workpeople, too, are again earning better wages, and but comparatively few of them need now remain unemployed."

On this subject, I may add that a large employer of trade in Liverpool says—

"There is no scarcity of workpeople, but generally in the cotton trade they are almost fully employed."

A market report in the Manchester Courier of the 14th instant contains this statement—

"Yesterday the Bolton Cotton Operatives' Spinners' Association forwarded another circular to their employers, asking the advance of 5 per cent on present prices, which was taken from them in November last. The circular sets forth that when the reduction was made a pledge was given that as soon as trade would guarantee its restoration the masters would be happy to give it back. The operatives' view of the question is that trade has so far improved, and its prospects are such as unmistakably to impress their minds with the belief that the time has arrived when that pledge should be fulfilled. In confirmation of that opinion they quote statements from Burns's Monthly Colonial Circular for May, in which it is stated that the long period of depression is drawing to a close, and that most encouraging reports are being received from the foreign markets, and that a large increase has taken place in the supply of the raw material from the United States. The daily increasing value in mills and mill property is also adduced as an indication of increasing prosperity. The operatives conclude by saying that the dangerous points are passed, and, although profits are not all that can be desired, still they consider that they are labouring under a reduction of 5 per cent below the minimum rate of wages, and that they have established a just claim to an advance equal to the amount of the last reduction. The circular states that the operatives will wait upon the masters for an advance at their (the masters') convenience."

I should also mention to the House that there are other indications all pointing to the same fact, that the cotton trade is reviving, and that production has considerably increased during the last few weeks. Then, with regard to the silk manufacture, another of the great industries of the country, how are the facts? Writing about the silk trade of Macclesfield, Mr. Steen, the Factory Inspector, states—

"There are a great many buildings, which were formerly factories, and still contain machinery unemployed, and these, to a stranger, would lead to a belief that the trade was bad. This is not so; if hands could be obtained in sufficient numbers to fill them, many of them would be now at work. This difficulty is daily becoming less, and it has been ascertained that there are 700 and more cottage houses occupied this year which were empty last year, and these mainly occupied by silk operatives. The rate of wages has increased from 16 to 20 per cent within the last two or three years. At present the manufacturers are full of orders and the trade is very brisk; the weavers are fully employed, and many more could be also fully employed. The manufacturers complain greatly of the scarcity of labour."

Mr. Henley, Poor Law Inspector, reports of trade in Coventry, which town he visited. He attended a meeting of the Directors of the Poor. He says—

"It happened to be an annual occasion for calling the roll of all the men in the workhouse, and investigating each case."

Mr. Henley reports of those in the workhouse—

"They appeared as a class unusually aged and infirm. There was nothing approaching an able-bodied man…. The out-relief cases afforded no intimation of any want of employment."

In continuation the Report states—

"Mr. Henley questioned the directors then present, all of whom were engaged in business. They informed him, unanimously, that there was work for all who were able and willing to do it, at good wages; that in any trade many persons were employed during a time of great prosperity who could not be called workmen, and that these were put out at the first pressure."

No doubt as a consequence of the pressure of 1866 a number of second-class workers were thrown out, and a portion of them have since reached an ago which forbids them any longer to look for first-class wages. And this is a point to; which I wish particularly to direct the attention of the House. It is notorious that in the metropolis many old men were employed during a period of prosperity who would not have been employed in slacker times; but surely my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Finsbury would not propose to send to Canada men too old for work in this country. There is not an absence of demand here for first-class labour. The second and third-class workers are those who have been thrown out by the depression here. Is this the class who are to be assisted to emigrate? And, again, I should like to know, does the hon. and learned Gentleman think that in Canada those who have emigrated will be able to take up occupations in which they have been engaged in this country, but in which want of employment has ensued and thrown them out of work? The hon. and learned Member speaks of the gun trade in Birmingham, and he talks of sending the workmen in that trade to Canada. But are they to be employed in Canada in the same trade? [Mr. W. M. TORRENS made a gesture of dissent.] The hon. and learned Member says, "No." Then they must take to some other trades, and why could they not do the same thing at home? Would persons in their position be better fitted for new employment in the Colonies than in England? Is the versatility to come in a colonial climate only? Will these men learn among strangers that which they cannot be taught at home? I hope that the hon. and learned Member does not think that obstacles would be interposed in this country to the migration of labourers from one town to another. It has been a question of grave deliberation for us how the surplus labour in one part of the country is to be transferred to other parts where it is required. The hon. and learned Member referred to Coventry in the course of his speech. Now Mr. Henley, speaking of Coventry, says he was informed by Mr. Harris, clerk to the guardians—

"That there are now more houses in the course of erection than there have been at any time for the last 10 years, and he fully believes that Coventry is emerging from the cloud of depression which has overshadowed the whole city for the last few years."

These are encouraging facts, and facts which ought to be known. Again, in Brentford and the surrounding country there was great depression amongst masons and in the building trade last winter. This has now passed off entirely. The Chairman of the Uxbridge Union writes—

"The brickmakers are now fully employed. No class or number of persons of the wage-earning class, who are able, capable, and inclined to work, are unable to obtain employment."

The slight increase—172—in the pau- perism of the Brentford Union in the first week of June, as against the same week last year, is due to the drought. Then, as regards the linen and flax-spinning trade of the North of Ireland, to which the hon. and learned Member did not in any way refer, although the labourers in that trade contribute equally to the taxes of the country with those in any other trade in the United Kingdom, Mr. Philip Johnston, manufacturer, of Belfast, says—

"Flax-spinners have had trying times, and many of them sustained heavy losses during the past year, but since January they have had a good supply of flax at comparatively moderate prices, and this, coupled with an improved demand for linen yarns, has bettered their condition, and at the present time more life is observable in this branch than for a considerable time past. [After speaking of the drawbacks to the trade]—We seem now gradually recovering from the effects of these combined circumstances, and have the appearance of fairer and brighter prospects. This applies, so far as my experience and observation go, to the entire North of Ireland, in every branch of the linen and flax-spinning trade."

I feel that in reading all these quotations I am not following the good example of the hon. and learned Gentleman, who only referred to three or four places; but in dealing with a subject of so much importance, I feel bound to lay before the House the most ample information upon the subject that I could obtain. I am informed—

"The lace trade in Nottingham is still active…… There is a still further improvement to report in the shipping branch of the hosiery trade, more orders having been placed, chiefly for the United States, and, generally speaking, manufacturers are better employed in this department than for some time past."

The coal trade also, as one may expect in the event of a general revival of trade, is in a flourishing condition. Then one word as to a trade in relation to which a stronger case may be made out against the hon. and learned Member than in any other—I mean the iron trade—

"I learn from Middlesbrough that the Cleveland iron trade is exceedingly animated. The demand for pig iron is almost unprecedented, makers on all sides being unable to meet their engagements and to deliver the iron as fast as it is wanted. From Newport, that the ironworks have been in full employ during the week. From Sheffield, that our heavy trades continue well employed. There is a good demand for all descriptions of steel, both for home and foreign markets. The railway branches are still well employed, as are also the mills. From Wolverhampton, that the iron trade is, on the whole, steadier this week. From Barnsley, that the iron trade is now in a healthy state and there is a good business being done in plates and rails, as well as in other qualities of manufactured iron."

An hon. Member of this House has handed me a letter from Mr. Woodall, Burslem, stating that—

"The iron trade has greatly improved, and may even be called flourishing. Orders for such goods as rails are in excess of the power of production."

Mr. Longe's Report on "Staffordshire Coal and Iron District," states of the South Wales coal and iron district, and of the South Wales copper and tin district "that the trade is steadily reviving; and that new furnaces are being daily erected at Dudley." Mr. Longe has received the following letters from the clerk of the Merthyr Tydvil Union, and of Cardiff Union:—

"There are no labourers out of work who choose to work. We have had no applications from able-bodied men during last winter. There has been no decline during the past year in the demand for labour; but, on the contrary, an improvement. Work has been more plentiful, the state of the iron and coal trades being more brisk."

Thus, after all that has been said about what the foreign producer can do, it is to this market that the foreign buyers bring their large orders. The recovery of the iron trade has been stated to be perfectly unheard of, and I cannot refrain from reading the following extracts from a newspaper on the subject:—

"Improvement of Trade in the Black Country.—One of the best proofs of the permanent character of the improvement which has recently been experienced in the iron trade in this district is the fact that several new furnaces are about to be erected. To-day (Friday) Messrs. Rose, of the Albert Works, Moxley, will begin a new furnace, which is to be furnished with all the modern appliances for economizing fuel and augmenting neat, which is, in fact, to be similar to the furnaces which have been worked with such satisfactory results in the Middlesbrough district. The South Staffordshire ironmasters have been slow to adopt the new furnaces, and to this many persons versed in such matters attribute the present backward position of the trade in this district. Messrs. Rose intend in a few weeks to erect a second furnace on the same principle in another part of their premises, and we hear that in a short time a number of new furnaces will be set to work in various parts of the Black Country.

"Improved Prospects of the Iron Trade.—After the long period of dejection and distress through which our commerce has passed, it is very gratifying to read reports such as those from the iron districts, which are now gladdening the hearts of business men. From Cleveland correspondents write that every department of the iron trade is as busy as possible. Stocks of the raw material are exhausted; the orders already booked extend into next year, and more will not be taken except at enhanced prices. The mills and puddling furnaces are working to the full extent of their power to supply the demand for rails, and the foundries are busy with heavy castings. From Wales we get equally favourable accounts. Russia, the United States, India, and the Colonies are pressing upon the market, and severely taxing the resources of manufacturers. Great works which once gave employment to large populations, but which have long been closed, are being re-opened, and are now once more full of bustle and activity. From the Lanarkshire, as well as from the Birmingham and Wolverhampton districts, favourable accounts are also received; and, on the whole, it may be said that the iron industry of the country—which in its export branch alone has before now exceeded the declared value of £15,000,000 sterling—had never brighter prospects before it. After all that has been said of what the foreign producer could do, it is found that it is to this market that the foreign buyer comes with his large orders. The Americans at this very moment, notwithstanding their protective tariff, are ordering largely, and will take enormous quantities off our hands this year. One hope we may venture to express; we trust that the improved circumstances of trade will be allowed to benefit both employers and men; that capital will not be waylaid on its enter-prizing and beneficent march, and deprived by ill-usage of all encouragement to devise large measures for the good of the community. The great trades of the kingdom are just now putting forth their resources, after a long interval of compulsory stagnation; they can absorb the surplus labour of the country, if they are only allowed fair play. In fact, Middlesbrough alone has lately been taking off more of the unemployed population of London weekly than our charitable emigration societies have sent out to the Colonies. It would be more than a calamity, it would be a scandal, if this improvement were arrested by untimely and unreasonable demands."

I am informed from the Merthyr Tydvil district of Wales that there are no labourers out of work, and that no applications are being made for relief by able-bodied men. Then as regards the Potteries—also an important branch of industry—an hon. Member told me the other day that the condition of this trade might be briefly summed up thus—the American pottery trade is somewhat flat, the home trade is good, and the fancy trade is magnificent. Again, the iron ship-building trade is reviving, and shipbuilders are now paying their men 7s. a day. There is one piece of evidence to which I should like to call attention, and that is from a source connected with the Trades Unions, who are likely to know better than anyone the conditions of the trades with which they are connected. By the courtesy of Mr. Applegarth, the secretary of the Amalgamated Carpenters' and Joiners' Union, I am enabled to lay the following statistics before the House: —In February, out of a total of 9,477 men in that Union, there were 970 unemployed; whereas in June, out of a total of 9,800, there were only 192 unemployed. And let me remind the House that it is in the building trade that there has been more depression, as far as I can ascertain, than in any other trade. The hon. Member for Finsbury said that I italicized the words "the building trade." But it was my duty to find out the main causes of the depression in the metropolitan districts; and, to my inquiries upon that subject, I received one invariable answer—namely, that it was owing to the depression in the building trade, which includes not only masons and bricklayers, but carpenters, joiners, plumbers, painters, glaziers, and a variety of other trades. And here I may point out that it is not in the eastern districts of London so much as in the suburban districts that the distress has prevailed. In the latter districts there is but little demand for the labour of children, and, consequently, we find that the children there form a large proportion of those receiving relief. But is this the description of distress that is likely to be remedied by the proposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman? On the contrary, it would be more difficult to deal with it in the Colonies than in this country. That there is local congestion of labour is certain; but are we, therefore, to pass a Resolution to the effect that it is the duty of the Government to provide employment for the population, because local and temporary distress happens to prevail in certain limited districts? I have stated that the shipbuilding trade was reviving very much to the advantage of Liverpool, but I have tested the amount of pauperism there by other means, placed myself in communication with the gentleman who is at the head of the Central Relief Department there, a voluntary association for relieving destitution; and he has sent me statistics showing that the applications for charity, as well as those made for poor relief, have been considerably reduced for some time past. I have now reviewed a number of trades, and have alluded to many parts of England. I have put evidence, collected from various sources, before the notice of the House, and I now ask, is the evidence which I have adduced to prove the revival of trade supported by other facts? If distress were so wide-spread as the hon. and learned Member appears to imagine, should we not find that the great articles of consumption were less consumed than usual. I have inquired into this branch of the subject; and I find that the average annual consumption of sugar in the United Kingdom for the three pre-panic years 1863–4–5 was 37½ pounds per head; in the panic year 1866 it was 41 pounds per head; and in the three post-panic years 1867–8–9 it was 42½ pounds per head: tea, 3 pounds 1 ounce per head in the three pre-panic years, and in the three post-panic years 3 pounds 10 ounces: malt, 1½ bushels per head in the three pre-panic years, and 1·6 in the three later years: the consumption of spirits has risen from ·67 to ·71 per head: beer from ·72 to ·81: and tobacco from 1·29 to 1·35. In the three months ending with March, 1868, there were retained for home consumption 22,094,000 bushels of malt, and during the three months ending March, 1870, 23,376,000 bushels. For the same periods the British spirits retained for home consumption amounted to 5,055,000 gallons, as against 5,128,000 gallons in the three months ending March, 1869, and 5,509,000 gallons for the three months ending March, 1870. And let us turn from consumption to production. What have the labouring classes produced? For the four months ending April, 1868, our exports were £56,000,000; and during the same period in 1870 they were £63,000,000. Trade this year is upwards of £7,000,000 better than in 1868, and £4,500,000 better than in 1869. The cotton export trade shows that 949,000,000 yards of cotton piece goods were exported in the year ending 1868, 897,000,000 yards in 1869, and 1,003,000,000 yards in 1870: in the woollen export trade 67,000,000 yards were exported in the year 1868, 85,000,000 yards in 1869, and 86,500,000 yards in 1870: in the linen trade 66,000,000 yards of linen piece goods were exported in 1868, 73,000,000 yards in 1869, and 76,000,000 yards in 1870. In machinery, in which France and Belgium are said to rival us, we find that our trade has risen from £1,157,000 to £1,533,000. The shipping Returns show the same magnificent results. The total business of the country is represented by the totals at the Clearing House: in 1867–8 the total clearances on the 4th of each month, the day of clearing inland acceptances, amounted to £147,000,000; for the year 1868–9 they amounted to £162,000,000; and for the last year £168,500,000. Hence the year ending with April, 1870, exceeded 1868 by £21,500,000, and 1869 by £6,500,000. The Post Office Savings Banks show that during the five months ending with May last the deposits amounted to £2,618,328, whilst in 1868 in the same months they were only £1,972,000, an increase of 25 per cent. That does not look as if the working men generally were in a depressed condition. As regards the Revenue, I have been supplied by the Treasury with figures, which conclusively show the elasticity of the Revenue, and that we have exceeded the estimated returns. The Customs were estimated to produce, in the past quarter, £4,750,000; they have produced at the rate of £4,900,000; Excise was estimated at £4,950,000. It has produced at the rate of £5,500,000. The whole Revenue expected on the quarter was £15,645,000; but it has produced at the rate of £16,171,000. And now, Sir, I venture to ask the House whether they think that I have proved my case? Possibly some will say certain portions of the country are not reached by this prosperity. Still it exists, and I rejoice with all my heart and soul that it has come about without our having had recourse to artificial measures, which would have been an infraction of the principles we have always held. My hon. Friend, however, asks us to abandon the principles which have produced this result, and to have recourse to measures which have been seldom recommended to this House. My hon. Friend, I fear, will scarcely have been convinced by any of the evidence which I have produced. In this matter he is hopelessly colour-blind, and he sees only the rose-colour wash of official optimism in those streaks of light which are the genuine reflection of the bright rays of reviving prosperity and hope. And now, Sir, let me direct the attention of the House to the plan of the hon. Member and to the arguments which he has used; and I must call the notice of the House to one or two of those arguments which I heard him use with the greatest regret. I refer to the £1,000,000 which he says is to be given to the people of Ireland, to the purchase of the telegraphs, and to the arrangement by which he says we improve the first-class accommodation to travellers by certain steamers. Now, even if we had made these concessions to one class, it would be no reason for making concessions to others; for to do so would be to establish the principle of "pull baker, pull devil" upon the public purse. If the hon. Member thought we were spending one shilling simply to improve the accommodation of first and second-class passengers across the Channel, then it was his duty to have risen in his place and opposed the grant. What the hon. Member had said on that subject is absurd; but he has clients out of doors, though I deny that he represent the working man. His arguments will be repeated out-of-doors, and will be ticketed with his authority. And, again, why did we purchase the telegraphs? For the sake of the merchant? To enable rich people to telegraph at the expense of the poor? No Sir, we purchased the telegraphs for the general good of the country, and in the full belief that they would prove a profitable investment for the country. If we had proceeded on any other ground we should certainly have committed a great mistake. And my hon. Friend opposite asks us to correct one error, as he calls it, by another. He tells us we should not depart from principles of political economy, and then recommends us to adopt a semi-communistic plan. And let me ask, how is the hon. Member going to carry it out? He says voluntary emigration tends to the United States, and yet he wants us, by transgressing principles of political economy, to turn the stream to Canada. The hon. and learned Member asserted that the natural flow of emigration was to the United States. But how are the Government to prevent that? I remember the proposition made by Mr. Jenkins, the secretary of one of the emigration societies, at the deputation which waited upon the Prime Minister, at which my hon. and learned Friend was present. In a pamphlet he published Mr. Jenkins carried out his opinions to their logical conclusion, and said that every person who passed over the border of Canada to the United States should be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by imprisonment. It is clear that emigrants cannot be retained in Canada after they arrive there, and if they cannot be prevented from crossing the border, one of my hon. Friend's arrangements falls to the ground. And, again, I ask, who will go? There are a great many people willing to go, and I can mention several large classes who would gladly avail themselves of these third-class tickets. First of all, there is the class who are going now at their own expense. Every one of them would, of course, avail themselves of this new facility. The next class who would avail themselves of the opportunity consists of those who now go out with the assistance of voluntary contributions. My hon. and learned Friend said it was very hard that the great landowners and rich people should have to pay for sending them away; but under the proposed scheme the expense would be really borne by the working classes who stayed in this country, who formed the great bulk of taxpayers, and by the Exchequer generally. Who else would go? Does my hon. and learned Friend think that no one except the people of Southampton, Liverpool, and certain other towns particularly suffering at the present moment would avail themselves of these cheap assisted passages? Why, it is just as possible that our best workmen will go as our worst workmen. There is just as much, or even more, inducement for the good workmen to go as for the bad workmen, and other countries do not want our worst but our best artizans. Besides, I deny entirely that over-population is the only thing which leads to pauperism. You have pauperism in under-peopled countries as well as in over-peopled countries. For instance, there is pauperism in America. [Lord GEORGE HAMILTON: Where?] In the State of Massachusetts and in many other places. Pauperism is a growing evil in Massachusetts, and has reached a very high point in New York. Indeed, as regards the United States, they have no very great wish to receive those who have obtained State aid to enable them to emigrate, and if the hon. and learned Member's scheme were adopted of giving people third-class passages to Canada, the United States would probably object to it. I may also allude to the case of Victoria and other Australian provinces, where there is considerable pauperism, although those Colonies are under-peo- pled. And here I can lay my finger upon one of the fallacies which underlie the whole argument of my hon. and learned Friend. The revival of one branch of trade, or the opening up of a new country or invention, would at once absorb more labour than we could hope to assist to emigrate by the means he has suggested. And when are we to arrive at the maximum of population which my hon. Friend thinks we may reach? We go on increasing at the rate of 300,000 in a year, and the question is—"When shall we reach the maximum?" Of course that depends on the customers we shall obtain for our goods, on the industry of our population, and on the competition we may meet with elsewhere. Is my hon. and learned Friend afraid that competition is going to extrude us from the markets of the world? At all events, such a process is not going on at the present moment. There was a time when it was thought that strikes were ruining our trade, and that Belgium and France were stepping into our shoes as far as the competition in manufactures was concerned. But the countries which it was imagined were going to take the bread out of the mouths of our people have been much more seriously affected by strikes than ourselves. In regard to the relations between labour and capital, it appears to me that we in England have fared much the same as in the case of other troublesome questions. We have settled them first in this country peacefully, and painfully perhaps, but still without any disturbance of public order, which were afterwards settled in other countries not so peaceably, nor always without bloodshed. I have now attempted to deal as well as I can with the Motion of my hon. and learned Friend, and while dissenting from all his facts and all his conclusions, I still say there is one part of his Motion which contains a truth. He says that the "continued" want of employment demands special consideration in this House. Now, I object to the word "continued;" but I do not object to the general statement that the want of employment demands the special consideration of the House, though not with a view to dangerous and novel legislation. I am not one of those who think that the schedules of Income Tax can be regarded exactly as gauging the pro- sperity of the country, neither do I believe that cheap labour is such a blessing, though it is, no doubt, an element of national prosperity. With regard to natural and voluntary emigration, I am as warmly in favour of it as any man. Let the good wishes of the country follow in the wake of every emigrant ship. Let them light on better and happier times. Let the hungry be filled with good things. But I see no reason why we should depart from the traditions we have always followed in this House. It may be that in the competition of nations English industry is handicapped to a certain extent, and that English workmen are hindered in the race of life, by the burden of the hundred millions sterling levied in Imperial and local taxation. Stand by us then, while with all our heart and soul we try to reduce this taxation and to resist onslaughts on the public purse, by whatever class, large or small, they are made. It may be that the English workman is also handicapped in consequence of our shortcomings as regards education. Stand by us, then, while sweeping every obstacle before us we carry a comprehensive educational reform to a triumphant end. It may be, that the Poor Laws have superseded in the minds of a portion of our labouring classes the idea of the duty of individual forethought, the sense of domestic obligation, and the recognition of the just claims of kind. Stand by us, then, while we resist with our whole strength every effort to expand the operation of these laws, which we, on the contrary, are most anxious to narrow and contract. In the whole of our legislation and Parliamentary proceedings let us, in the words of my hon. Friend, show our special consideration for the want of employment of the working classes by always keeping the highest interests of the working class in our hearts and minds; not by abstract Resolutions, or by walking round the Lobby on an occasion such as this, but in the framing of all our laws, and let us not, I implore you, assent to vague proposals like that brought forward by my hon. and learned Friend, which can never be fulfilled, which can only encourage delusive hopes, and which are contrary to the course of legislation which in this country we have always pursued. For my part I stake my faith on surer ground. I have the most profound be- belief in the unfailing energy, the irrepressible elasticy, and the spontaneous efforts of an industrious, high-spirited, and self-reliant people.

said, the right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had made statements which, from his experience, he would show to be entirely false.

The hon. Member means to say erroneous.

begged to apologize for using a word which was not Parliamentary. He had been but a short time in the House, and was therefore not well versed in Parliamentary terms; but if there was any Parliamentary term stronger than the word "erroneous," he would beg leave to use it with reference to some of the statements of the right hon. Gentleman, as well as of others which had been made some time ago by the hon. Member for Manchester (Sir Thomas Bazley). That hon. Gentleman had informed the House that the cotton trade was improving, and that there was every prospect of its continuing to improve. He had a great respect for the experience of the hon. Baronet in days gone by; but it should be remembered that he was not now in the trade. The fact was, however, that the cotton trade in the month of May last, when the hon. Baronet spoke, was in a much worse state than it had been in the previous months of November and December. He defied any cotton manufacturer in the House to rise in his place and contradict that statement. But when the hon. Member for Manchester made the speech to which he referred he was cheered by the Prime Minister, and it was scarcely any wonder that under those circumstances the Bolton operatives who read of those things in the newspapers should ask for an increase of 5 per cent on their wages. He would venture to say that if ever a man had been returned by the working men it was himself, and he could tell the House that they were not at all in favour of a policy which refused inquiry into the operation of the French Treaty, and which imposed a duty on Lancashire manufactured goods imported into India, in direct opposition to the principles of free trade. They by no means approved that Radical political economy which cast all principle to the winds whenever it pleased Gentlemen opposite, but which allowed them to starve.

said, he hoped, with the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Poor Law Board, that the tide of distress was receding, and that prosperity was soon likely to return. He would point out that in 1866 there was a great scarcity of labour throughout the country, and that it was in consequence of that circumstance that the work done on the Continent had been brought into greater competition with our own. In the district where he resided he was bound to say distress did not exist. In 1853 the labourers in his district were earning 2s. a day; they were now earning 3s. During the holidays he had gone into calculations as to the number of persons to be employed on works in the neighbourhood of the town he represented (Darlington), and he was startled to find that they would require from 3,000 to 4,000 persons; or, with their wives and children, 12,000 persons. The effect, besides, of natural emigration was not to be overlooked. His hon. Friends the Members for North Durham and South Northumberland would bear him out in his statement that several hundreds of pitmen had lately gone to the United States. There was another point which was eloquently alluded to by his right hon. Friend. If this country remained at peace they would be able to reduce our war establishment; the arts of peace would flourish; reduced taxation would flow back into the pockets of the people; labour would be more and more employed. He was satisfied that no appeal need be made for extraneous support of emigration.

said, he agreed with the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Poor Law Board that trade was reviving. In South Wales there had been a great advance in wages. His own firm paid this year between £30,000 and £40,000 more in wages than they did last year. He believed this improvement would last. They were only prevented from opening new works by the scarcity of labour.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. W. M. Torrens) upon the outrage he has committed upon the President of the Poor Law Board. As in the case of most outrages upon the imagination, and not upon the person, the President of the Poor Law Board relented towards the close of his speech; but at the commencement he re- buked the hon. Member for Finsbury with much gravity for venturing to bring forward a subject which, he says, is calculated to raise dangerous expectations among the working classes. He almost accused the hon. Member of Communistic tendencies; and why? Because it is one of the cardinal points of political economy—the great maxim of Free Trade, as the right hon. Gentleman understands it, that the State should do nothing in support of labour. The right hon. Gentleman, while availing himself of the resources at his disposal, worked himself into an ecstacy in contemplating the streaks of light which appear in the commercial horizon, and which he tells us are the precursors of a revival of industry. I rejoice to hear that the right hon. Gentleman is able to promise his supporters on the other side of the House some relief from the not very agreeable position of having to support a commercial system, which is characterized by such periods as that through which, everybody admits the trade and industry of the country have lately passed. The right hon. Gentleman strove to reconcile himself and the House to a condition of the commercial interest which is marked by periodical depression, and which depression, according to his own account, increases pauperism. He tell us that system has at Coventry forced the second class of labour out of employment; and he congratulates himself upon the symptoms of revival just commenced, after a prolonged period, of the general depression, and falls foul of an hon. Member who ventures to call our attention to the necessity for adopting some measures with a view to the mitigation of this tendency to depression which, as yet, avowedly exists. At this advanced period of the evening I do not wish to go into details; but I hold in my hand some particulars with reference to several of the trades of Birmingham, and what do these amount to? I find, in the first place, that the trade in military arms has never recovered from the depressing influence of the competition which the Government carry on through the manufactory at Enfield; that the trade in fowling-pieces is rapidly diminishing through the action of foreign competition; that parts of guns and parts of pistols are sent here from the Continent, and that the depression in this trade is such that men who formerly earned from 20s. to 30s. a week do not now earn above 10s. a week. Go to another department of trade. Take the button trade. I find that that which is one of the most ancient trades in Birmingham is suffering in every branch, except in that of pearl buttons. Again, in the steel goods trade wages are from 30 to 40 per cent less than they were some years since; and the communication from which I cite these facts, and which was made to me only this morning, adds that almost all the reductions of late years have fallen upon wages—and everybody knows how compressible they are as compared with profits; and, if we look at the falling prices, and allow for improved processes of manufacture, we shall be quite safe in saying that wages in these trades have fallen during the last 12 years not less than 20 per cent. I have before me at this moment the prices of articles of a miscellaneous character manufactured at the brass foundries, and I observe that they have been reduced between 25 and 50 per cent during the last six years. Thus I might go on through almost the whole category of trades at Birmingham, and the result would show that there is a depression in wages averaging about 20 per cent not marked only during the last three years of avowed and admitted depression, but extending gradually throughout the whole of the labouring classes of that town. I say, therefore, that it is idle for the right hon. Gentleman to get up in his place in this House and congratulate us upon a partial revival of industry, when the complaint is this—that large numbers of the labouring classes find it to their interest to emigrate to the United States, there to pursue the industries for which they cannot obtain employment at home. I am unwilling to detain the House at any length; but there is one remark called for by an allusion of the right hon. Gentleman to Coventry. The right hon. Gentleman congratulated the House upon the circumstance that there was rather more building going on in the city of Coventry than, I think he said, in the course of the last 10 years. This is not surprising. The right hon. Gentleman has an advantage in the darkness of the period with which he contrasts the present; for I remember that in the year 1863 there were not less than 1,500 houses unoccupied in Coventry and its adjoining districts; and I put it to the House whether there was likely to be much building in a city the trade of which was so completely ruined seven years ago that there were 1,500 houses without tenants in that city and the districts of which it was the commercial centre? We cannot blame the right hon. Gentleman for fostering the best hopes he can, in those who are admittedly suffering from the depression of trade; but I must deprecate the tone in which the right hon. Gentleman at first treated the Motion now before the House. Is it, or is it not, the duty of the House of Commons to consider the interests of the labouring classes? Is it the sole duty of the Legislature to leave them to take care of themselves under the action of free trade economics? If that be the case, then, I ask, is it surprising that the labouring classes should, view with some jealousy the active means, which are adopted to promote the interests of property? Is it unnatural that they should begin to look with jealousy at the facilities which are given for the transport of first-class passengers across the Atlantic, whilst all facilities for their own transit thither at a cheaper rate are refused them? I believe it would be a mistake to attribute the purchase of the telegraphs only to a desire on the part of the Government to afford accommodation to the rich. There are, no doubt, other reasons for the purchase; but it is an additional instance of the Government having undertaken a commercial speculation; and when they enter into commercial speculations they must not be surprised at jealousy being excited amongst the labouring classes in the employ of their competitors, so long as they adhere with such rigid exactitude to the maxim which they seem to have adopted, that it is not the duty of the Legislature or of the State to do anything that may promote the interests of labour. Let the House also bear in mind that there is a determination on the part of the Government to maintain the Treaty with France, which is but a type of other and cognate treaties, by which protective duties are maintained against the industry of this country, whilst the British Government binds itself under no circumstances to impose any countervailing duties for the protection of the industry of this country. Sir, these are facts which, I think, ought to inspire the Go- vernment of this country with, rather less confidence in enunciating the doctrine which has become such a favourite with, modern political economists—that it would be a departure from sound policy if the Government of this country did anything to sustain the industry and the labour of Englishmen.

said, that the people of the metropolis regarded with deep interest the subject to which the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. W. M. Torrens) had called the attention of the House. Interesting as had been the speech of the President of the Poor Law Board, it was not satisfactory, as it evaded the principal points brought before the House by the hon. Member for Finsbury, who had referred to the fact of large masses of the people—tens or hundreds of thousands—being out of employment, and on the point of starvation within the last three or four months. In the face of such facts, it was no answer to point to the increase of building in Coventry or the revival of trade in parts of Lancashire. The President of the Poor Law Board, after speaking of the great demand for labour in certain parts of the country, nevertheless went on to say that pauperism had increased 1 per cent. By the Report of the Registrar General it appeared that the deaths in the metropolis last year amounted to 73,798, and one-sixth of those deaths occurred in hospitals, gaols, and workhouses. At the docks whenever 10 men were wanted there were 100 applications. It was also to be observed that while trade increased, the amount expended on account of pauperism also increased. In the metropolis the average pauperism was, in 1864, 99,000; in 1865, 100,000; and in 1866, nearly 105,000, although that was a year of exceptional commercial success—there had at that time been no crisis. How did the right hon. Gentleman account for that anomalous state of things? With regard to the migration of labour from one part of the country to the other, it had been stated to him that the Poor Law Board prevented the guardians from assisting in that object.

said, that the Poor Law Board afforded every facility for the purpose.

said, he was glad to learn that such was the case, though he had been informed to the con- trary; and he must, in conclusion, as the representative of a large working-class constituency, express his opinion that the hon. Member for Finsbury had only done what was right in inviting attention to the question he had brought before the House.

said, it was impossible to consider the Bill at so late an hour, and he would, therefore, beg to move that the debate be now adjourned.

said, that at that very late hour he would compress his arguments in favour of referring the Bill to a Select Committee. He admitted there was a case; but it was not properly met by the Bill, which trod on thorny ground—the indelibility of Holy Orders. Criticizing the provisions of the Bill, he said that in the Committee he would propose to relieve of disabilities all clergy who had not actual cure of souls, keeping them on those who had. A measure so framed would do that which the present one failed in—namely, avoid that thorny and difficult ground of the character of Holy Orders. As to the clause allowing clergymen who had unhappily taken the step of renouncing their clerical functions to return, he would only say that had such a Bill as the present one been law without a provision of the kind some years ago, the recent return of Mr. Ffoulkes, over which all sound Churchmen so truly rejoiced, would have been impossible. He moved, that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee.

said, he hoped the Motion for adjournment would not be pressed. They might as well divide on the Motion to refer the Bill to a Select Committee. The object sought was inconsistent with the principle of the Bill. After some discussion as to proceeding with the debate at that late hour,

, he had sat for 13 ours in the House consecutively, except when he was at dinner, and he begged to move that this House do now adjourn.