asked the Vice President of the Council, If, having regard to the advanced period of the Session, the Government have fixed a time for proceeding with the Elections (Parliamentary and Municipal) Bill (commonly called the Ballot Bill)?

Sir, if my hon. Friend has observed, as I have no doubt he has, the recent course of Business in this House—perhaps the state or the stagnation of Business would be a more accurate expression—he must be aware that his Question, of which he has given us but short Notice, is really part of a much larger question with respect to the condition of Business, and I think I can only answer him by making a general reply. There are two measures of the Government in particular with respect to which great uncertainty appears to prevail as to the precise amount of time which their discussion might occupy. I do not wish to say anything of a controversial character, but I think the proposition I have just stated will be admitted; and those two measures are the Army Regulation Bill and the Ballot Bill. Now, as far as the Government are concerned in regard to those two measures, it is our firm and final intention to persevere with them and to obtain the definitive judgment of the House upon them without any reference to time whatsoever. That is an announcement which it is not altogether agreeable to me to make, because none of us, I suppose, wish to make unnecessary sacri- fices of time and personal convenience; and the prospect of a Session prolonged beyond the ordinary time is probably in itself not agreeable to anyone who sits in this House. At least, I can speak for myself. But we are of opinion that there are considerations of public principle and public duty involved in both of those measures which leave us no alternative whatever; and if we are supported by the majority of this House we shall give full effect to the intention that I have just announced. I will make no reference now to any other measures of importance on the Paper, because I am not aware that in regard to any of them any special difficulties appear to be likely to interpose themselves to our obtaining the judgment of the House upon them.

asked the Secretary to the Treasury, If there is any intention of bringing in a Bill with reference to the General Valuation of Ireland this Session; and, if so, when?

, in reply, said, it was the intention of the Government to bring in a Bill on the subject; but they had no hope of doing so in the present Session.

asked the Secretary to the Admiralty, Whether he adheres to the statement "that Commander Cheyne had admitted in writing that he had received his appointment in the Naval Hospital at Plymouth only till he should have attained the age of 55 years, and not for life," or whether, having made further inquiry, he will now modify that statement?

Sir, I have to state that, having made further inquiry into Commander Cheyne's case, I must admit that I was in error in stating that this officer had made an admission that his appointment was not for life. The error arose from my having mistaken the signature of another officer who held a similar appointment, and with somewhat similar name to Commander Cheyne's, in a letter making this statement with reference to his own case. In saying this, however, I must again repeat that Commander Cheyne held his appointment upon the terms I have stated—namely, till retirement from active service, and not for life. Captain Hall, who was the Duke of Somerset's private secretary at the time, and communicated with Commander Cheyne on this subject, has informed me that he could not have given that officer to understand that he was to hold the appointment upon other terms than were then in force, and under which such appointments were vacated on retirement.

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, If his attention has been called to the betting advertisements which were published on Saturday the 20th May by "Bell's Life in London," "The Sportsman," "The Sporting Gazette," "The Liverpool Mercury," "The Manchester Examiner," "The Newcastle Daily Chronicle," "The Nottingham and Midland Counties Daily Express;" and, if he will take steps to ascertain whether they were "illegal;" and, provided they were so, if he will cause the proper authorities to take proceedings against all or any of those papers, under the 7th section of the Act of the 16th and 17th years of Victoria, c. 119?

said, he was unable to add to the Answer he had given the hon. Member yesterday. The greatest attention was being paid to the subject. As to advertisements in the provincial Press, he thought the local authorities should attend to them. In regard to those appearing in the London newspapers, the police were occupied in an investigation respecting them.

, in rising to move to leave out the word "now," and add, at the end of the Question, "upon Thursday next," said, that the object of his Notice had nothing to do with the merits of the University Tests Bill; but that his intention in placing it on the Paper had been to protect the rights and privileges of the independent Members of that House. On the 8th of May last the right hon. Gentleman at the head of Her Majesty's Government stated that the object of the Government in asking the House to consent to Morning Sittings being held at so early a period of the Session was to enable the Westmeath Crime and Outrage Bill to be passed as speedily as possible, and the conduct of the Government in putting down the consideration of the Lords' Amendments to the University Tests Bill as the first Order for that day was a distinct breach of the pledge which the right hon. Gentleman had given on the occasion to which he referred, that the Westmeath Crime and Outrage Bill alone should be considered at this unusually early period of the Session. Surely the intention of Her Majesty's Government in thus hastily forcing on the University Tests Bill was not to throw a sop to the discontented among his supporters? He asked the right hon. Gentleman whether, while the discussion upon this Bill was being proceeded with, the inhabitants of the disturbed districts in Ireland were to be left ad infinitum to the mercy of the brigands who were terrifying and murdering them. He called upon the right hon. Gentleman to give a distinct enunciation of his policy with regard to the Westmeath Bill, because it appeared to him that the right hon. Gentleman, in bringing forward that measure, had been trying to execute a mere party move instead of doing his best to remedy the dismal state of things that existed in certain parts of Ireland. He had an- other objection, however, to make to the course that had been pursued by Her Majesty's Government which would have even greater weight in the minds of private Members. He protested against the growing practice of holding these Morning Sittings at this early period of the Session. Before the year 1862 Morning Sittings were rarely held before July, and it was not until 1867 that they began to be held in May. In the two previous Sessions only 10 Morning Sittings were held, and yet in the present year the House had already held four such sittings, which number would be increased to five on Friday next, and thus half the ordinary number of Morning Sittings would have been held by the 26th of May. Under these circumstances, he gave Notice that whenever the Report of the Committee upon Public Business was brought up, he should object to its being adopted. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of Her Majesty's Government had always assigned as an excuse for holding these early Morning Sittings that they were rendered necessary by the growth of Public Business; but looking at what had been the result of the past two Sessions, he should maintain that Public Business, instead of growing, had been decreasing. The right hon. Gentleman had taken his stand entirely upon political measures, having brought in a Reform Bill, and agitated the Irish question from every point of view, thereby preventing measures of domestic legislation being brought forward—measures which the majority of Members of that House, and of the people, would much rather see settled. The Government of the right hon. Gentleman had been one continued series of failures. His foreign policy was a failure; his Irish policy was a failure; his licensing policy was a failure; his financial policy was a failure; his army policy was a failure—["No, no!"]—at least, hon Members would admit that his policy of economy was a failure. Under those circumstances, he submitted that the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues, who constituted a Cabinet, not of all the talents, but of all the incapables, had no right to ask for these Morning Sittings. ["Order!"] He had not said anything out of order, but he would withdraw the phrase, and substitute for "incapables" "official incapacity." What right had the right hon. Gentleman to filch—he knew no word so fitting to describe what he meant—the modicum of time which independent Members possessed in which to discuss their measures? He felt there was a crisis of affairs in this House. He therefore called upon hon. Members below the gangway on the opposite side to support the Amendment which he had brought forward in defence of their rights and privileges.

said, he thought that this subject of Morning Sittings was one which required very careful consideration on the part of the House. Hon. Members had seen these sittings gradually increasing in number year by year, and no one would deny that, owing to their being held at so early a period of the Session, independent Members did suffer to a great extent in regard to the business which they might have to conduct in that House. As a sequel to Morning Sittings, accidents happened such as that which occurred at an Evening Sitting a few nights back. He was one of the unfortunate Members who came down to the House to assist in carrying on the Business of the House; but he was prevented from doing so by the count out. It had been justly stated that there was no implied understanding on the part of the Government to keep a House. But the circumstances had altered since the last arrangement was made. If the Business of the House was really growing to such an extent that Morning Sittings became indispensable at an early period of the Session, it might well become a question whether the Government might not ask for Morning Sittings on the days of Government nights, instead of on the days the nights of which were devoted to private Members, and whether they might not allow the Morning Business to be suspended at the end of the Morning Sitting so as to be resumed at the Evening Sitting. The advantage of this would be that in any case of urgency like that of Westmeath the continuous sitting throughout the day and evening would have brought the question to an early conclusion. If such a system as this were carried out the Government, being of necessity bound to keep a House on their own nights, there would be no more of those disagreeable circumstances resulting in counts out. He hoped that when the Report of the Select Committee on the Business of the House came to be considered there would be a strong protest on the part of independent Members against any curtailment of their rights.

remarked that it was quite impossible that he and other Gentlemen sitting near him could give any support to the Amendment of the hon. Member for Whitehaven (Mr. C. Bentinck). Looking at the course of proceeding which had lately been adopted by the hon. Gentlemen opposite, it seemed extremely probable that the House would be driven to a very late period of the Session without having accomplished any legislative work whatever. From the repeated Motions, having very much the same object, and the repetition of speeches, very much in the same terms, which had been made on the Army Regulation Bill, it was beginning to be well understood out-of-doors that the policy of hon. Gentlemen opposite was a policy of obstruction to the Public Business. He thought that a considerable amount of satisfaction would be afforded to the country by the statement of the Prime Minister that such a course of policy would not be successful, and that the Government would continue the House in Session until they had procured its verdict in regard to the two great measures before it—namely, the Army Regulation Bill and the Ballot Bill. He was quite willing to sacrifice his privileges as a private Member, in order to support the Government in the course which they had announced.

said, the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands), who had just spoken, was perfectly aware that one at least of the direct supporters of the Government agitated the country before the Session began on the question of Army Reform. The Members of the Opposition found themselves in this position with reference to the Army Regulation Bill, that an attempt had been made to prejudice the opinion of the country by agitation, and that it was absolutely necessary to continue the debate on the Bill with the view of removing erroneous impressions. The hon. Gentleman stated that he hoped the Government would use force in order to pass that measure. If it came to the use of force the Government would find that the Opposition would also use force. The Prime Minister had been in the habit of not giving adequate notice of his intention to appoint a Morning Sitting or of the course of Business that was to be pursued. If the House once lost its character as a deliberative assembly it would fall in the estimation of the country. By the uncertainty of these Morning Sittings, by crowding the Order Book with Notices that could not be duly considered on the days for which they were appointed, such elements of uncertainty were introduced into the Business of the House that it was totally impossible for the independent Members duly to consider the vast variety of subjects which were thrust on their attention. There could be no doubt that the policy of the Prime Minister had been a sensational policy. The House had had a great many changes of the Constitution thrust upon it during his Premiership—changes which, whether as to number or extent, were totally unprecedented in the annals of Parliament. The measure with regard to licensing introduced by the Secretary of State for the Home Department did the right hon. Gentleman great honour, though it was extreme in its character; it was unfortunate that the Government, instead of a scheme for providing compensation for the officers of the Army, had not proposed compensation for the holders of publichouses. He felt so strongly that it was the duty of independent Members to insist that an adequate interval for consideration should be given between the introduction of great measures of change such as Her Majesty's Government had brought forward that, whether the Motion of the hon. Member for Whitehaven was opportune or not, he would vote with him in order to mark his sense of the undue hurry with which those measures were pushed through the House.

protested against the appropriation of the Morning Sittings to business of comparatively small importance. They had now been called upon for another Morning Sitting of Irish Members, who had with great pain given their votes to Government on the Protection of Life and Property in certain Parts of Ireland Bill, because they thought it was necessary for the protection of Ireland, and they now found that they had to discuss the University Tests Bill, which, he thought, might have waited until life and property in Ireland had been protected.

agreed with the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken that the proper subjects to be considered at Morning Sittings at this time of the year were matters of urgency. Well, the Bill for the Protection of Life and Property in certain Parts of Ireland was one of an exceptional character; but the Bill relating to the University Tests was not of a sufficiently exceptional character to warrant the Government in submitting it to a Morning Sitting. With regard to the general question raised by the hon. Member for Whitehaven (Mr. C. Bentinck), there, too, there was legitimate ground for complaint. Her Majesty's Government, by introducing a greater number of Bills than they could hope to carry into law during the Session, had produced in the conduct of Public Business a confusion which necessarily gave rise to that discontent which had found vent in the Motion of his hon. Friend. The Government Business in that House had been so managed that they were reduced at this early period of the Session to Morning Sittings, while, at the same time, they were without that prospect of success in the passing of measures of urgent necessity which would justify the appeal for Morning Sittings. It appeared to him that these Morning Sittings ought to be regarded by a prudent Government as a prudent Government would regard the income tax—namely, as an instrument of great force and value if used with discretion and directed to temporary objects of urgent importance. But when it was attempted to make use of these Morning Sittings for the purpose of considering measures of great public importance certainly, but which had not that character of urgency which was requisite to justify Morning Sittings at this period of the Session, then the House was brought into that state of confusion and discontent which led to the Motion of his hon. Friend. He suggested that if they were to have these Morning Sittings at the instance of Government on the days devoted to private Members, whether it was not worth while considering if the Government Business on those days should not be brought on at the Night Sittings, and the Business of private Members be taken at the 2 o'clock sitting. He trusted that after Whitsuntide the House would arrive at a settlement of the question on some such basis as he had spoken of.

I shall pass by with much patience and long suffering all those charges with regard to the incapacity of the Government, their policy, and so forth, with which hon. Members have contrived to intersperse their remarks in the course of this not very long but rather comprehensive debate; but I must say one word with regard to the subject of "breach of faith" which the hon. Member for Whitehaven (Mr. C. Bentinck) has advanced against me very much in accordance with his ordinary custom. [Mr. CAVENDISH BENTINCK: "Breach of engagement."] I consider a breach of faith to be a breach of engagement, and a breach of engagement to be a breach of faith. The hon. Gentleman read an extract from a speech of mine which seemed to show that I referred exclusively to the question of Westmeath. I will read the passage from The Times. ["Order, order!"] I am sorry the hon. Gentleman has had the advantage of me, because, by the aid of the scissors, he was able to read a passage which I am not allowed to quote from the whole newspaper. But with respect to the allegation that independent Members have lost so much of their rights, I must say that there is no Session which I recollect during which independent Members have occupied a larger portion of the time of the House than the present Session. This has been the only year in my recollection in which it has not been possible for the Government, by attention and care, to make a good deal out of odds and ends on Tuesday and Friday evenings, which in the present year has been found entirely impossible. The main question that has been raised is with regard to these Morning Sittings. Two—perhaps more than two—suggestions have been made for an alteration of the practice with respect to them. The noble Lord opposite (Lord John Manners) thinks it would be a great improvement if on Tuesday Morning Sittings Notices of Motion were taken at 2 o'clock in the beginning of the Session, and the Government were free to proceed with their Orders at 9 o'clock. I do not intend to give an opinion on this subject at first hearing the suggestion. The noble Lord must not, however, suppose, that by causing the House to meet at 2 o'clock for the purpose of considering the Motions of private Members, he would get rid of the reasons for counting out, unless he stipulated that the House should sit until 7 o'clock without adjournment. [Lord JOHN MANNERS: Hear, hear.] But this is not a matter which I can undertake to deal with at the present moment, nor is it possible for me to deal with the suggestion made by the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson), which would primâ facie take away a considerable amount of time which unquestionably the business of the Government gains under the present arrangement. It is said by the noble Lord that Morning Sittings ought to be devoted to the passing of measures of immediate urgency, as distinguished from those of paramount importance. But I think there was very much force in the declaration of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Buckinghamshire, who pointed out on a recent occasion the convenience of Morning Sittings for despatching business in Committee. As far as our own knowledge went, we had no reason to suppose the disposal of the Lords' Amendments in the University Tests Bill was likely to occupy the five hours between 2 and 7 o'clock. We had also arrived at the conclusion that the Westmeath Bill had been so exhaustively discussed on the three days given to its consideration that it would be in the power of the House to dispose of both the subjects set down for its consideration. With regard to the position of the Government and the time when Morning Sittings are to commence, I am very desirous to avoid matters of a controverted character; but we do not disguise our opinion that, in the present position of Public Business, and with a view to promoting the credit, dignity, and character of the House, to which the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) so very judiciously alluded, it is necessary to take the most effectual means in our power to forward Public Business. On these grounds it is our intention to propose that Morning Sittings shall commence immediately after Whitsuntide, and continue—I will not say until the end of the Session—but, at any rate, until we see our way more clearly than we do at pre- sent to the disposal of the contested part of the business now before the House. That, as I understand it, is the question raised by the hon. Gentleman, and I shall be glad to hear the judgment of the House pronounced upon it.

I agree with those hon. Members who have expressed their opinions that the state of Public Business could scarcely be more unsatisfactory than it is at present; but, at the same time, I think my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven (Mr. C. Bentinck) was perfectly justified in vindicating the rights of those hon. Gentlemen who are described as private and independent Members. I am satisfied that it would be impossible to carry on the business of the House satisfactorily or agreeably—and it is never satisfactory unless it is agreeable—if the rights of private Members are not treated with respect by the Government of the day; but I should always feel it my duty to support as far as I could any appeal made by the Government to those hon. Members who are not in responsible situations to assist it in so arranging the time of the House that the business of Parliament may be forwarded. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government is at the present moment in such a position that it is necessary for him to make such an appeal; but, at the same time, he must, when making these appeals, bring his mind into that condition which will enable him to endure such criticism as may be uttered by hon. Members. I think it was a great mistake on the part of the right hon. Gentleman, when commencing Morning Sittings this Session, to devote them to the second reading of an Irish Coercion Bill. I feel persuaded that if he had brought forward the Westmeath Bill at an Evening Sitting it would have been read a second time in one evening, and then it might well have been afterwards considered in Committee at Morning Sittings. I mention this because I think the principle involved may apply to the subsequent legislation of the present Session. I am under the impression that Her Majesty's Government stated we should have to consider the Report of the Committee on Public Business before Whitsuntide; but I do not at all press that impression, because the right hon. Gentleman must be very much influenced by events that have occurred after making such a declaration which must always be taken with a liberal interpretation. I cannot sit down without noticing some remarks that have been made by the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands). The hon. Member for Warrington is a didactic Member. His experience has not been very long in this House; but he never rises without endeavouring to guide and inform our minds, and striving to regulate the course of our business with more advantage to the public service than could be hoped from the efforts of gentlemen possessing wider experience. That hon. Gentleman finds great fault with those who sit on this side of the House because they debate, and at such length, the Army Bill. I must protest, on the part of my hon. Friends, against this attack upon their Parliamentary conduct. It would be most unreasonable to expect that a Bill of first-rate importance should pass this House without discussion. It is true that this Bill has been discussed at some length; but every division that has been taken upon it has shown a more evenly balanced state of opinion, and I would ask whether such a consequence does not prove the advantage and the necessity of discussion. Such will, it seems to me, be the natural inference drawn from the circumstances out-of-doors—that discussions are necessary when they are not fruitless. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House has had too much experience not to be aware that the Army Bill must be the occasion of frequent and long discussion. I shall, under all the circumstances, be glad to assist any proposal which can have the effect of forwarding Public Business; but I hope that, before presenting any such proposal to the House, it will have been well matured, and will not be one of such a nature that subsequent events will render it unadvisable or impossible of execution. I shall support any proposal which will give us a fair prospect of advancing Public Business, and will respect as much as possible the rights of private Members.

said, they had now reached a stage in the present controversy when it was necessary that, in the interest of the Universities, some settlement should be arrived at if possible. The very interesting evidence taken by the Committee of the House of Lords had put the issues raised by this Bill in a clearer and more defined light than they had ever been put in before. Before that evidence was taken they had the opinions of the colleges and Universities in their corporate character; but they had never received conclusively the opinions and views of those who took the greatest interest in the University with reference to the changes to be made by this Bill. There were two principles for which they had all along contended—namely, first, the continued connection between religion and education—a principle which, in the action of Parliament with regard to the subject of elementary education and endowed schools, had received legislative sanction—and, secondly, the admission of every student, provided the first principle was acknowledged, to a general participation in the advantages and benefits which the University could confer. With these principles he believed that a negative test such as the one under discussion was perfectly consistent. But he was free to admit that there was a difficulty about the wording of this clause which might touch the scruples of a few conscientious people. From what he had heard from the University of Cambridge, he was given to understand that in the opinion of many who were opposed to this Bill there might be renewed agitation and irritation if this clause were retained in the Bill. So far as he was personally concerned, he should have liked to see some such clause in the Bill; and he could not assent to the disagreement with the clause as far as his own opinion went. But under the circumstances to which he had referred he did not wish to press his own view upon the House, and should not go to a division on this question.

thanked the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. S. Walpole) for not attempting to insist upon a clause which the Liberal Members of the University of Oxford unanimously believed would prove nothing but a snare and an annoyance. Indeed, they would far rather submit to the existing restrictions than see them re-enacted in the form in which they would be embodied by this new clause. He considered that it had been introduced by a wanton caprice of power on the part of the Upper House, and that it was almost an insult to the House of Commons. There was no definite meaning which could be attached to the words in this clause, and the result of it would probably be that many pious men, whose reverence for the Holy Scriptures could not be doubted, would feel themselves very much hampered in the discussion of such subjects as astronomy, science, and geology.

observed, that the test contained in the clause was the same as that proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Richmond (Sir Roundell Palmer) two years ago, and though it was then advocated in one of the ablest speeches he had ever heard in that House, the proposition was very coldly received by hon. Members opposite, and was rejected without a division and almost without discussion. The hon. Member for Chester (Mr. Raikes) had described it as certain to produce the "minimum of utility with the maximum of injustice." Another hon. Member opposite had compared it with the attempt of Mrs. Partington to keep out the Atlantic with a mop; in fact, the only hon. Member on the other side who supported it was the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate), of whom it was only just to say that he had never changed his opinions on anything. For his own part, he had always objected to all tests, on the ground that they kept out the wrong men. They excluded conscientious and high-minded men, and were disregarded by those who preferred their prospects to their principles. Of this he would give a practical illustration. In 1854, shortly after the test for the B.A. was abolished, it was thought necessary still to keep up the distinction between Dissenters and Churchmen, by making candidates either sign a declaration of Dissent, or else submit to an examination in Church divinity. The effect of this was marvellous, and Dissent soon became rampant in the University. He remembered the case of one gentleman who having come up as a churchman broke down in examination on the Thirty-nine Articles. He was accordingly plucked; but in the evening he made a solemn declaration of Dissent. The Examiner told him he was too late, as it was impossible to accept a retrospective declaration, whereupon the candidate exclaimed—"Oh, I am a retrospective Dissenter." These things happened every day. The old test was infinitely better than the one under discussion, which was no doubt skilfully framed to catch the votes of orthodox Dissenters in that House. But he could not help thinking that Dissenters both in and out of the House would care as little for this "soft sawder" as they did for the blows and cuffs that were administered to them in former days.

said, the facts which the last speaker had brought under the notice of the House were such as were not known to anybody but himself. When the declaration was proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Richmond (Sir Roundell Palmer) he thought it would not carry out all that he desired; but when there was a determination to get rid of a liberal and fair test—a test not interfering with consciences, but securing the distinctive religious character of Governing Bodies; and when both branches of the Legislature had agreed to make the Governing Body undenominational, he felt certain that no declaration and no test would be satisfactory, and he did not see his way to any declaration that would give security that the teaching would be of such a character as he could approve of. He had seen on the part of Liberal Members no readiness to accept such a declaration as this; and what he preferred was enacting clauses to direct religious instruction to be given, rather than try by a test to prevent the religious opinions of the youth of the country being influenced by the teaching of any man. He thought the country was greatly indebted to the House of Lords for the inquiry which they had instituted; and if the hon. and learned Gentleman who had last spoken conceived that young men ought to receive any instruction at all in religion it could not be denied that they ought to have it in some definite shape. When young men went to the University they were not fit to be left entirely to themselves, and were not fit to form their conclusions on religious matters, and it was far better that the same kind of teaching which they had before received should be continued. He could not, however, see any hope of a solution of the question in the Amendment; it would give none of the securities he desired, and therefore he did not feel in any way bound to support it.

said, the hon. Member for Denbighshire (Mr. Osborne Morgan) had said that he (Mr. Newdegate) was the only Member of the House who never changed his mind. Now, a man who never changed his mind was a fool; but perhaps the hon. Member might not be aware that his (Mr. Newdegate's) conduct in that House was the result of his having been in the habit of considering what he should say, and what he should do before he came down to the House. The whole argument in favour of the abolition of University Tests had been that they ought not to be capable of legal enforcement and inflict legal disabilities. Now, here was a test framed in such terms as not to render it totally incapable of legal enforcement, yet it was a direct appeal to conscience and to honour. He did not fear to appeal to the conscience and honour of Nonconformists any more than he feared to appeal to the conscience and honour of Churchmen in defence of Christian education. The test was originally framed by the hon. and learned Member for Richmond (Sir Roundell Palmer), and his proposal had been adopted by the House of Lords, which had so framed this declaration that it should comprehend everyone who was willing to admit the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, and accept them as the embodiment of Christian doctrine. If the country was to have Christian teaching, why should not the Legislature say so? He preferred the requirements of a declaration very much to any security in the personal character of the individual teacher, and for this reason—because the teaching must be given in public and on behalf of the University. The public opinion of the University would try that teaching by the standard of the declaration if it was enacted. It was for that reason that he supported the test that had come down from the other House. He regretted to find that some of the right rev. Prelates had objected to this declaration; the course they had taken manifested a great want of moral courage and great imprudence, for if the Bishops were not to teach Christianity according to the Bible, he (Mr. Newdegate) and many other Churchmen would care as little about them as do the Nonconformists. It was a curious fact that the Quakers were the only denomination who had no religious test of communion among themselves. Every other denomination had some test, and it now appeared that the Liberal party had in their objection to all tests adopted this peculiarity of the Quakers. He (Mr. Newdegate) would give an historical illustration of the effects of this system. In 1687 Penn, acting in the interest of James II., was sent to negotiate with the then Prince of Orange, and he held in his hand an account of that negotiation. It was a passage in history which had been much overlooked by Liberal Members, or they would not be so ready to adopt the theory of the Quakers. The whole of these Liberal objections to all tests were objections which prevailed in no denomination in its own government except among the Quakers. He wished to show Liberal Members what in former times had been the consequence of the course then adopted. In Burnett's History of His Own Times he found the following passage:—

"Complaints come daily over from England of all the things that the priests were everywhere throwing out. Penn, the Quaker, came over to Holland. He was a talking, vain man, who had been long in the King's favour, he being the vice-admiral's son. He had such an opinion of his own faculty of persuading that he thought none could stand before it. Though he was singular in that opinion—for he had a tedious, lucious way, that was not apt to overcome a man's reason, though it might tire his patience—he undertook to persuade the Prince to come into the King's measures, and had two or three long audiences of him upon the subject. And he and I spent some hours together on it. The Prince readily consented to a toleration of Popery as well as of Dissenters, provided it were proposed and passed in Parliament; and he promised his assistance, if there was need of it, to get it to pass. But for the tests, he would enter into no treaty about them. He said it was a plain betraying the security of the Protestant religion to give them up. Nothing was left unsaid that might move him to agree to this in the way of interest. The King would enter into an entire confidence with him, and would put his best friends in the chief trusts. Penn undertook for this so positively that he seemed to believe it himself, for he was a great proficient in the art of dissimulation. Many suspected that he was a concealed Papist. It is certain he was much with Father Peter, and was particularly trusted by the Earl of Sunderland. So, though he did not pretend any commission for what he promised, yet we looked on him as a man employed. To all this the Prince answered that no man was more for toleration in principle than he was; he thought the conscience was only subject to God; and as far as general toleration, even of Papists, would content the King, he would concur in it heartily. But he looked on the tests as such a real security, and, indeed, the only one, when the King was of another religion, that he would join in no counsels with those that intended to repeal those laws that enacted them. Penn said the King would have all or nothing; but that, if this was once done, the King would secure the toleration by a solemn and unalterable law. To this the late repeal of the Edict of Nantes, that was declared perpetual and irrevocable, furnished an answer that admitted of no reply. So Penn's negotiation with the Prince had no effect. He pressed me to go over to England, since I was in principle for toleration; and he assured me the King would prefer me highly. I told him since the tests must go with this toleration, I could never be for it."

He had cited this passage as a warning to the House in the course upon which it was now entering; for this distinguished Quaker, who was opposed to all tests, was employed by a Roman Catholic Prince to negotiate with the Prince of Orange for the abolition of all tests. William III. declared for full toleration; but would not consent to the abandonment of tests, and drew a wise distinction between the two. James II., on the contrary, while professing vast Liberalism, was aiming at the establishment of personal government, and in doing so acted consistently with his religion as an Ultramontane Roman Catholic. And what was the result? He aimed at personal government in everything, and the tendency of our legislation at present was a preference for reliance upon individuals rather than upon principles, and on that difference rested the whole difference between the principles of arbitrary government and government by law. It was noteworthy that Dr. Manning had hailed the doctrine of the Pope's Infallibility because he hoped that in the exercise of the supreme authority thus attributed to him, the Pope would be able to annul all effective examination of different religions by the light of history, and thus silence all objection to his authority and to his decrees. Religion had formed a large part of the history of this country, and Parliament was now dealing with the education of those who were to succeed them as legislators; they were now touching the foundation of the future legislation of the country, and his fear was not for religion, but that, if they lost this opportunity of comprehending in one system of education by law all those who were attached to Christianity, they would lose the foundation of that respect for freedom in the future generations of our legislators that it was so essential to maintain. For these reasons, and not on account of any mere religious bias, he should certainly oppose the rejection of the Amendment which had been adopted by the House of Lords.

said, he wished to put himself straight with the House with regard to the course he proposed to take on the question. It was inaccurate to say he was the author of the declaration; it was, so far as it went, in the very words which Parliament had required from the lay Professors of the Scotch Universities when tests were abolished, and had always been made without scruple; and he had recommended its adoption, because, requiring no declaration of religious belief or disbelief in any tenet whatever, it could be made by all men of whatever reli- gious views, and was simply a negative promise to teach nothing contrary to the doctrine of the Divine authority of the Scriptures, no matter what their own opinions might be on the matter. He believed the law at present would require teachers to conform in their teaching to all that this declaration would bind them to; but it would be better if, in addition to the requirements of the law, they were made responsible under their own declaration. He regretted that it had been described as a test, because to do so was almost to make it one; and if, being so regarded, it would deter the scrupulous, as was alleged, from making it, without deterring the unscrupulous, his motive for pressing it was gone. He, on a former occasion, did not press the clause on the House in that state of things: and he could not but hope that it would not be pressed to a division now. After what they had heard from his right hon. Friends the Members for the two Universities (Mr. S. Walpole and Mr. G. Hardy)—men in every sense as eminently qualified to speak for the Universities, and also—if he might venture to say so—for the general body of the Church of England, as any Members of the House could be, it was evident that, in their judgment, the reasons against pressing that clause preponderated over the reasons in its favour. And he would venture to add another reason of his own—namely, that, believing it to aim at the declaration of a true and sacred principle, he should deeply regret that there should appear to be a vote taken by a considerable majority of that House which could by any person be represented as affirming the contrary of that principle.

expressed his extreme disappointment that the Government, while endeavouring to effect a final settlement of this question, could not consent to the retention of the words which had been inserted in the clause by the other House of Parliament. The Bill, in its Preamble, recognized the principle that there ought to be proper safeguards for the maintenance of religious instruction and worship in the Universities, colleges, and halls; and the provision embodied in this Amendment he regarded as an essential safeguard. The heads of colleges should in time to come, as in times past, continue to be members of the Church of England. Last year was the first time in which that question was dealt with as a Government question; and the Bill of 1870 embodied not only the conclusions of the Government, but also the result of their communications with the Universities. All he asked the Government now to do was what they deliberately proposed to do last year; and he hoped the House would adhere to the decision of the House of Lords, and join in bringing the Bill back to the shape in which it was introduced in 1870. He should take the sense of the House upon the question.

rose to protest against the House going to a division in this hurried manner upon a question which so materially affected the Universities. The question was one not of minor importance, as the House seemed to think; but one on which the future of these great national institutions very much turned, and it would be unfair to the Universities, and to the question itself, if it were not regarded with a little more attention. The Universities, and all their emoluments, were to be thrown open to all; but he did hope that the headships of colleges would be reserved to members of that denomination—to put it on its lowest ground—which was the unquestioned religion of a large majority of the people of England. If this concession were refused, and the headships of colleges were thrown open to persons of all denominations, the result would be that the smaller colleges would become a fighting ground and scrambling place for the different denominations, and if a chance majority belonged to a particular denomination, the head of the college would be chosen to represent that denomination. Then, in case, as would be probable in the course of time, the opinions of the majority became changed, the head of the college would find himself in hostility with the fellows who formed the council of advice. On the contrary, the limitation of the choice to persons who belonged to the largest religious Body in the kingdom—the Church of England—would be a pledge of moderation. The head, who was elected on those conditions, would feel that the raison d'être of his office so limited was one of impartiality to all religionisms, none of which would come into collision with himself. In the cause of true liberality he trusted that the House would agree with this Amendment of the Lords.

said, he had been in communication with the Liberal party both at Cambridge and at Oxford, and he believed that there was a strong feeling against the exemption of the heads of colleges from the operation of the Bill. He believed that the extreme of concession had been arrived at, and that it would be impossible for the House to accept the Amendment made in the clause by the other House of Parliament.

said, he regretted that his right hon. Friend had not sought to improve the Lords' Amendment instead of entirely discarding it. He (Mr. Talbot) must protest against allowing Governing Bodies in colleges to make changes without the world knowing what they were doing.

said, he thought it was important if any changes were made they should emanate from the colleges themselves. Nothing, he believed, was more important for the two Universities than that they should remain as free as possible to act for themselves, and that no extraneous agencies should be brought to bear on them. For these reasons, he agreed with his right hon. Friend at the head of the Government.

said, he did not think the clause satisfactory. What was meant by providing religious instruction? Did it mean the same amount as there was in the Universities at present? If so, all he could say was that when he was at college they had no religious instruction at all. They were only compelled to go to Church once every Sunday and once every week-day, under the penalty of being "gated." The hon. Member was proceeding to move the omission of the clause, when—

suggested that he should wait until the question of the Amendment was settled.

said, if they were to have this provision for the religious instruction of all undergraduates of the Church of England, they at once introduced a distinction between the classes of undergraduates. There would be two distinct camps—a Nonconformist camp and a Church of England camp. He always understood that that was just the very thing they wished to avoid. If the word "all" was to be retained, the authorities of the colleges would be obliged to have a sort of religious census in order to ascertain all who belonged to the Established Church. He objected to that process. If his hon. Friend the Member for Devonport (Mr. J. D. Lewis) should move the omission of the clause, he would go into the lobby with him. In the meantime, he begged to move the omission from the Amendment of the word "all."

begged to ask hon. Gentlemen who held that religious instruction ought to be the basis of all education, why it was to be given only to members of the Established Church and not to members of other denominations. This clause, as now worded, was entirely inconsistent with the principles of the Bill, and, as far as he understood, with the principles of the hon. Gentleman opposite also.

observed, that the question of the hon. and learned Member for Oxford answered itself; it was not given to members of other denominations because they were Nonconformists, for the corner stone of Nonconformity was the protest against interference by the State with its worship or religious instruction. On that account the difficulty had been to admit Nonconformists to the Universities consistently with the connection of the Universities with the Established Church. For years they had been trying to settle that question, and at length it was about to be settled, as the difficulty of the Gordian Knot had been settled, by cutting it. Then came the fact that the Church of England, being Established, did not object to Parliament legislating for its religious education; but the Nonconformists did. If his hon. and learned Friend would move, in the name of the Nonconformists, that religious education should also be provided for the Nonconformists, he would have a good chance of the assistance of Members on the Opposition side in carrying the Motion.

said, it had been suggested to him that if the clause was left in its present form, taking the word "all" in conjunction with the Conscience Clause, the effect would be a Parliamentary compulsion on those students who were members of the Established Church. That would be beyond the province of Parliament, and therefore he agreed with the Motion. With regard to the merits of the clause, the Government would have been glad to have the Bill without it. The true state of the case was this. The House had been going through the Amendments of the Lords to the Bill, and had thus far rejected the whole of those Amendments. They ought to ask themselves this question, whether for the sake of each of the Amendments they had rejected they were prepared to incur the loss of the Bill. The Government had asked themselves that question, and with regard to the three important Amendments which the House had got rid of they were prepared to incur the loss of the Bill. Then came the question whether they ought to incur the loss of the Bill rather than accept this clause, which was not intended to secure an invidious distinction, but to assert, on behalf of Parliament, the importance of religious instruction. It was true it provided religious instruction only for members of the Church of England; but, as his hon. Friend the Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. B. Hope) had pointed out, it would not mend the clause in the eyes of Nonconformists if this provision were extended to the members of other denominations. The Government would be loth to incur the responsibility of losing this Bill on account of a somewhat vague and indeterminate provision asserting the opinion of Parliament that religious instruction ought to be provided. They did not see anything improper in such a declaration; but, on the contrary, they thought it highly proper to make provision for religious instruction on behalf of the students according to the communion to which they might belong. The only communion which could be introduced in that respect into the Act without risk of giving great offence was the communion of the Church of England; and it would be a misfortune to lose a Bill of this kind when they had apparently reached the last stage of a controversy which had lasted for 40 years, because an alteration had been made of which it was impossible to say that it interfered in any serious manner with the objects and principles of the Bill.

observed, that the House of Lords had practically adhered to the declaration contained in the 4th section, and had, in substance, not interfered with it. With respect to the Amendment of his right hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Bouverie), he did not see that it would be modified by the omission of the word "all." As to the clause generally, he thought the House had been met pretty fairly by those who sat on that (the Opposition) side, and he thought the other side should not abuse their position so far as to take away the small advantage which this clause afforded.

objected to the clause on the ground that it was not the business of Parliament to provide religious instruction, but rather the duty of heads of colleges, who would do it as a matter of course. He trusted that the body of the House would pause before they agreed to what was a perfectly needless enactment.

was expressing, as he believed, the opinions of a large number of Protestant Nonconformists, when he stated that the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Bouverie) was unnecessarily offensive towards the feelings of many. In this Bill the question of religious observances was left to the discretion of the Governing Bodies. Of that they did not complain, and no further security for religious observances would, he maintained, result from the adoption of the course now recommended. He should not think it worth while to trouble the House to divide upon this question; but he thought it right to protest against the insertion of these words. They were unnecessary; and while they were offensive to some, he did not think they would give any advantage to the Universities or colleges.

believed there would be great difficulty in giving effect to the clause; and argued that it was inconsistent with the dignity of Parliament to encumber an Act with provisions which could never be enforced.

desired it to be understood that the omission of the word "all" from the clause was not intended to encourage any undergraduates to stay away from chapel, but was assented to because such an alteration would not affect the meaning of the clause. He would remind the hon. Member for Bradford (Mr. Miall) that if Nonconformists wished for instruction in their own doctrine there was no objection to allowing them to have it; but the House had recently determined, by a large majority, that there should be an Established Church, and so long as it was in existence it would be the duty of Parliament to provide religious instruction in accordance with the doctrines of that Church.

said, that many hon. Members had been dissatisfied with the Government for insisting on sending the Bill in such a form to the House of Lords; but they assented to it on the suggestion of the Government that the Lords would not object to a Bill in that form. This clause, however, made a material alteration in the Bill, and he thought the Government were not keeping faith with their supporters when they asked the House to agree to such a serious modification, which was inconsistent with previous legislation, and in direct contradiction to the principles adopted in the Bill for education in Scotland. He hoped his hon. Friend would go to a division on the clause.

entirely agreed with the speaker who had just sat down. The introduction of such a clause into the Bill as that proposed would be to throw an entirely new duty upon the heads of colleges; whereas in such matters they ought to be left to their own free will.

said, he had supported the Bill on the representation that it was intended to repeal all University Tests; but this clause seemed to introduce entirely new matter. When he was at Cambridge he did not experience the benefit of any sufficient religious instruction; in fact, he received no religious instruction whatever. They were certainly taught a certain amount of Greek Testament; but that was merely as a lesson, and not as religious instruction at all. This clause was inconsistent with the scope and aim of the Bill.

said, he thought the hon. Member (Mr. Bristowe) had got into some confusion in trying to draw a distinction between religious lessons and religious instruction. The learning of the Greek Testament might and ought to be to a certain extent religious instruction. This clause was intended to give an assurance to English parents that the religious instruction hitherto given at colleges would be continued after the passing of this Bill, and he believed it would be beneficial in its operation.

said, that the clause had nothing whatever to do with the maintenance of religious services in the colleges. If it was passed, the result would be that a new test would be imposed on the Universities.

said, he wished to call attention to the exact position of the clause and the Amendment moved by the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government. He proposed to confine the operation of the clause to colleges now existing; but supposing there should be in any of the existing colleges at any future time but one single member of the Established Church, were they going by Act of Parliament to declare that that college should have morning and evening service according to the forms of the Established Church? Suppose, also, that the majority of an existing college should belong to some other denomination than the Established Church, they would compel for ever the performance of morning and evening prayer for the minority in that college. They had often contended below the gangway against exclusive proposals even in the interest of the majority; but here it was proposed to enact in favour of the minority provisions to which the majority might disagree.

expressed his regret at the introduction of the clause, and he should ask the judgment of the House on it. The House had nothing to do with prescribing religious teaching in these colleges. He also regretted that the Government should have departed from the position they took up when the Bill was in that House, when they resisted all Amendments to it. The Government had receded from that position, and now adopted such Amendments as they thought fit.

said, the Bill had been sent to the House of Lords in the shape it was believed it would be most acceptable to them; the question now was as to how much of the Lords' Amendments it would be expedient to take—what price, in fact, it would be advisable to pay to secure this settlement of the question. ["Oh!"] He was unconscious of his having said anything to provoke that expression of feeling. He thought he was only speaking the plain truth. If his own personal feeling had been consulted in the last division he should have gone with the minority, and on this occasion his entire sympathy went with the clause. When Parliament deprived the Church of England of the exclusive possession of the Universities it did not seem much to provide that the same services which had been celebrated in the college chapels for many hundred years should be celebrated there still, especially as the majority of those in the Universities would be members of the Established Church. When it came to one member, as the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. V. Harcourt) had stated, a totally different state of things would arise, when it would be the duty of Parliament to interfere.

looked upon the acceptance of this and the companion clause by the Government as nothing less than a breach of faith on the part of the Government.

said, he read the operation of this clause in a different sense from many hon. Members. The Act of Uniformity required full services to be celebrated in the chapels of the colleges, and this clause was an Amendment of the Act of Uniformity, inasmuch as it allowed an abridgment or adaptation, whatever that might mean, of the services. The services to be held in the chapel must necessarily conform to the custom of one religious Body or another, and as the great body of Dissenters did not object to the prayers of the Church service it was no great hardship to require the Church of England service to be continued in the college chapels.

said, that what he wanted to know was this—Supposing that in a college now subsisting there should at any future time be no member of the Established Church, were they going by Act of Parliament to declare that that college should have morning and evening chapel according to the forms of the Church of England?

said, they had got to the last contested point in this very thorny controversy, and they were asked again to divide in the hope of reversing the judgment of the House, which there was not the slightest possibility to believe would be respected by the other branch of the Legislature. ["Oh, oh!"] He was only stating his opinion; and therefore he thought it was not desirable to have the Bill brought back again and to be asked to eat their own votes; nor, on the other hand, was it desirable for the sake of this point to provide that in certain consecrated buildings of the Church of England there should not be continued those services which had been celebrated there for centuries, and thereby throw over the result of their labour and leave the controversy open.

rose to bring before the House the Reports which had been presented by two Royal Commissions—the Commission appointed in 1866 on Water Supply, and presided over by the Duke of Richmond, and the Commission appointed in 1868 to inquire into the best means of preventing the Pollution of Rivers. There was much in the Report of the latter Commission which would hereafter deserve the separate consideration of the House, but he proposed on that occasion to confine himself exclusively to those parts of the Reports which had an especial bearing upon the Motion which he should have the honour to submit—

"That, in the opinion of the House, the water supplied to householders in London should be derived from pure sources, and should be delivered on the constant system."

He supposed no one would deny that hardly any subject could engage the attention of the House of greater importance, not only to this Metropolis, but to the country generally. They were all deeply concerned in the cleanliness and health of their capital. Whether they were inhabitants of London, whether they were only occasionally resident in London, or whether they were, as Members of that House, responsible to the ratepayers of London, it seemed to him that the supply of pure and wholesome water was a subject of the deepest interest to them. The subject to which he desired to draw the attention of the House was but a part of the great problem of sanitary reform of the whole country; and now that they had, by the legislation of the first half of the present century, given to the people of that country political and commercial freedom, and a system of national education, he thought that no subject deserved a larger share of the thoughts of Members of Parliament than the subject of sanitary reform. They were told by a high medical authority, Dr. Simon, the Medical Officer of the Privy Council, that there were no less than 100,000 preventible deaths in this country in the course of a year, and if they were entrusted with the knowledge how those deaths might be prevented, he ventured to assert that they, as Members of the Legislature, might be held, in a great degree, responsible for that loss of life. Regarding this subject in so serious a light, he asked the kind attention of the House while he proceeded to justify the course in which he would ask them to embark. Her Majesty's Government, at the commencement of the Session, introduced a Bill for the purpose of amending and enlarging the Metropolis Water Act of 1852. His hon. Friend the Member for the Universities of Edinburgh and St. Andrews (Dr. Lyon Playfair), who would second his Motion, had undertaken, as a division of labour, the consideration of that Bill so far as it related to the Motion; and therefore he (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) would only make one or two passing observations upon it. The Bill seemed to him to deal with the subject in a very incomplete and unsatisfactory manner, and it was on account of its incompleteness and unsatisfactoriness that he had desired in any discussion that might take place upon the Bill to raise a larger and wider question as to whether they should not go to purer sources for their supply of water. But there seemed no prospect of such debate at a late hour on a Government night. He had, therefore given notice of his present Motion that he might ask the House not to tinker the present system of water supply, but rather to follow the example, not of our modern cities and towns only, but even of ancient Rome and the great cities of Italy, when they went to distances comparatively great in order to ensure for their large populations the inestimable advantage of pure water. His first duty was to convince the House that their present supply was derived from polluted sources, that it was always suspicious, and sometimes absolutely dangerous in character. He should have to dwell on many unsavoury topics, for his object was to disgust the House, the country, and the ratepayers of London with the water now provided. Their supply was chiefly derived from the River Thames. There were two companies, the Kent Water Works Company and the New River Company which did not supply that water. The Kent Company's water was altogether drawn from chalk wells south-east of London, and the New River Company's water to a great extent from the chalk springs which formed the head waters of the River Lea; and though it was in part taken from the Lea itself, where the river was open to suspicion of contamination, yet, on the whole, the water supplied by the New River Company and the Kent Company would bear examination. But the East London Company, the Chelsea Company, the West Middlesex Company, and the Grand Junction Company, which supplied London north of the Thames, and the Lambeth Company, and the Southwark and Vauxhall Company, which supplied the South of London, obtained their water either exclusively from the Thames, or, in the case of the East London Company chiefly from the polluted portion of the River Lea. The Chemical Commission, which consisted of Professors Graham, Miller, and Hoffmann, in their Report, presented to the Home Office in 1851, mentioned the great disadvantages of this water supply in the following order:—first, its fluctuating temperature; secondly, its turbidity after floods, shown by the yellow flood tinge of the Thames, with which they were all acquainted; thirdly, its vegetable discolouration during the autumn, which rendered the processes of the laundry very much more difficult; and fourthly, that its source was the main drain of a populous district. He (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) objected to such a supply, and could state fearlessly that such water was a great cause of diarrhœa, cholera, and typhus fever. He would not rest that statement on his own authority. In the evidence which Mr. Simon, the Medical Officer of the Privy Council, gave before the Royal Commission on the Water Supply, he was asked—

"Have you any idea of the outbreak of cholera in any part of London having been caused by the quality of the water?"

Mr. Simon replied—

"It is, I think, a matter of absolute demonstration that in the old epidemics, when the south side of London suffered so dreadfully from cholera, the great cause of the immense mortality there was the badness of the water supply then distributed to those districts of London. In the interval, between the 1849 epidemic and the 1854 epidemic, one of the two companies which supply the south side of London had amended its source of supply—it had gone higher up the river—and we at once lost a part of the mortality on that side of the river. But it was found that this great difference did not prevail uniformly through the south side of London, but was confined to those houses which were supplied by the improved water supply. There was still great mortality on the south side of the river, but this belonged exclusively to the houses which were still supplied with impure water."

Mr. Simon called this "a gigantic crucial experiment performed on 500,000 people," and gave details which showed that whilst the cholera death rate per 1,000 was greater in 1854 in the houses still supplied with impure water than in 1849–13 instead of 11·8—in those supplied by the new water it had sunk from 12·5 to 3·7. But he could give more recent evidence of the assertion he had made, that this pollution was a great cause of cholera. He would take the case of the epidemic of 1866. In order not to weary the House with quotations he would simply give what Mr. Simon said on the subject in his evidence. He said—

"As is now a matter of notoriety, within the area of another water company in London the population last year [that was in 1866] suffered very dreadfully from the cholera; I refer to certain eastern parts of London. Cholera in high development was confined to those parts of London, and those parts of London were in the area of one water company. And what makes the case the more remarkable is that not the whole area of that water company suffered; the water company gave two waters, and the high cholera mortality was apparently restricted to those parts of London which received one of these two supplies: so to speak, to half the district of the East London Water Company, The source from which the company supplied this half of its district was a source peculiarly exposed to contamination from a foul part of the River Lea. The contamination was sewage. Speaking broadly for the whole Metropolis, the area of intense cholera in 1866 was almost exactly the area of this particular water supply, nearly, if not absolutely, filling it, and scarcely, if at all, reaching beyond it."

He knew it would be said in answer to that statement, that the Committee, which was presided over by the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works, made a Report which completely whitewashed the East London Water Company. But he thought the combined testimony of the Registrar General, Dr. Farr, and Mr. Simon, and almost every other medical authority who knew anything about the subject, would outweigh the opinion of that Committee. The danger to the population from polluted water was not confined to cholera. Sewage pollution of water produced many other fatal diseases, and they knew that typhoid fever especially had been frequently traced to the drinking of polluted water. An interesting case occurred at Guildford in 1867, where a high and healthy part of the town was for a single day in August supplied with water out of a particular well. About 500 cases of typhoid fever occurred immediately afterwards, and there were 21 deaths. In all those cases, except three, the persons stricken had on that particular day drunk water from that particular well, and on examination it was found that sewage had made its way from a neighbouring sewer into the spring which fed the well. It might be said that the Thames Conservancy Act would purify the London water; but the fact was that the Thames was more polluted than ever. It might also be said that a River Pollution Bill, based on the Report of the Commission on the Pollution of Rivers, might be passed, which would mitigate the mischief to a great extent. But although that legislation was most desirable and most pressing, and though they might make rivers look decently clean, might get rid of smells, and improve them sufficiently to enable fish to live in them, yet the Rivers Pollution Commissioners told them, in their first Report, that—

"No process has been yet devised of cleansing surface water once contaminated with sewage, so as to make it safe for drinking."

The sewage of Oxford, Reading, and Windsor might be purified, so to speak, by filtration or irrigation, and admitted into the Thames; the Commissioners, speaking of this purified sewage, said—

"Although this water cannot be used for domestic purposes without great risk to health, it is so bright, colourless, and sparkling, and contains, moreover, such a minute proportion of organic matter, that the most fastidious could not object to its admission into running water."

That was in their first Report; but in their third Report they said—

"The use, for domestic purposes, of river water to which sewage (even after deodorization or employment in irrigation) gains access, and of that pumped from shallow wells in populous districts, ought to be carfully avoided, since the analyses which we have made of very numerous samples of water from such sources, in various localities, have rarely failed to reveal in it the presence of organic matter of disgusting origin; and we have proved in our first Report (1870) that no possible length of flow in any British river affords any guarantee that such sewage or organic matters have been oxidized and destroyed."

And they then went on to use strong language, which, however, under the circumstances, he (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) thought he was justified in quoting. They said—

"If it be admitted that it is disgusting and dangerous for man to drink water containing his own excremental discharges, it is our deliberate opinion that all water which is intended for domestic purposes should be intercepted either by reservoirs, conduits, or deep wells, before it reaches the beds of sewage-contaminated rivers."

The conclusion to which he wished to draw the attention of the House was that they should go either to heads of rivers or to springs from pure sources for their supply, and that they should not go to a river after it had passed through populous towns and had been polluted by sewage. He knew it would be argued that any sewage thrown into the Thames was destroyed by oxydation after a flow of a dozen miles in the river, and he was aware that Dr. Letheby had given evidence before Committees and Commissions tending to that conclusion. But Dr. Letheby was not an independent authority. He had for many years been the analyst of the water companies, and his evidence must be looked upon as having been given with a certain bias; and, when one found that it was in direct contradiction to that of great authorities, he thought they might safely disregard it. What did Dr. Frankland, in his evidence before the Royal Commission on Water Supply, say? He was asked the following question:—

"Then you do not accept the theory that sewage travelling down the river is so oxidized, as it passes a distance of six or seven miles, and is so entirely destroyed that its original elements are not to be found, but it is converted into some other substance or substances which are not detrimental to human health?"

And he answered—

"I believe that that is by no means a generally true proposition. I believe that, under favourable circumstances, that effect may be produced as far as regards the dead organic matter in the sewage, but not at all as regards the living germs that may be present in that sewage."

And Sir Benjamin Brodie, the Professor of Chemistry at Oxford University, entirely confirmed that view. He replied, in answer to a question—

"I think what is stated by Dr. Frankland is true—that there are no known causes in operation on which we can adequately rely to remove the sewage from the water."

And Mr. Simon was asked—

"Supposing that sewage is discharged from one of the sewers—say at Windsor—would it be possible to detect the presence of that sewage seven miles lower down the river, having regard to the volume of water in the river?"

He answered—

"I believe it would be absolutely impossible for chemists to discover it; but the practical sanitary question is different.

"Supposing tape-worm eggs to be sent into the river with that sewage, would those tapeworm eggs be alive seven miles down, and assuming (which is a frequent pathological opinion) that the respective contagia of typhoid fever and cholera are living germs, would those germs be alive seven miles down?—I cannot say they would not;"

and he added, that he could only detect them by their effects. Dr. Farr gave similar evidence. Mr. Simon further said—

"I think the rule ought to be that no sewage should go into any water that can be used for drinking purposes. I think even that allowance should be made for the proper decent taste of people. Water into which sewage has been discharged is, in relation to the matter now under consideration, an experiment on the health of the population, and I do not think that that experiment ought to be tried. I think the drinking of such water is dangerous."

Now, they had been trying that dangerous experiment for many years, and they ought not any longer to continue it. The population of the Thames basin in 1867 exceeded 1,000,000 persons. Oxford, Reading, and Windsor, and many other towns and villages, drained into the Thames, and whatever might be done by filtration, that water could not, in his opinion, be made fit to drink. Whatever they might do with the ordinary sewage of a town, supposing he were to admit, which he did not, that they could by irrigation, deodorization, and purification, render it unobjectionable, yet they could never prevent flood waters washing in vast quantities the sewage or manure from the towns or from the land, and that alone would render the Thames water very unfit to be a source of water supply to the Metropolis. Mr. Simon, in his Report on the cholera visitation of 1866, after asserting that an Englishman who contracted cholera might be said with almost absolute certainty to have received it from cholera sewage, laid down two local conditions of safety—the one that all fæcal impurities should be promptly removed—the other that water supply should be derived from such sources and conveyed by such channels that its contamination by excrement should be impossible. He had said enough in condemnation of their present system of water supply from the Thames. But it would be his duty to offer some alternative plan or plans, whence they might derive a sufficient supply of pure water for their population. Now, the Royal Commission had before it several alternative plans. First of all, there were plans for obtaining water from mountainous districts. Mr. Bateman had a plan for bringing a vast supply from North Wales; Messrs. Hemans and Hassard proposed to procure a supply from the lakes of Cumberland and Westmoreland; Mr. Hamilton Fulton had a plan to bring it from the River Wye in Mid Wales, and Mr. Remington proposed to bring it from the hills of Derbyshire. One very serious objection to those schemes was that of expense. That of Mr. Bateman would involve an expenditure of £10,850,000. Another argument was urged against them—namely, that the water would have to be carried in such large open conduits that the supply would be liable to interruption in frosty weather, and possibly, if ever they should have the misfortune to be at war, and to have an enemy on the soil of England, which was a contingency that Englishmen very seldom contemplated, they would be ex- posed to the risk of having their water supply for London cut off. He dismissed those plans with less reluctance since there were other sources than mountainous districts from which an excellent supply might be obtained. The water in the chalk round London had been frequently proposed as a source of supply. The chalk strata in the neighbourhood of London were a formation extending over more than 2,000 square miles. It was stated by the Commissioners of 1851 as being 3,000 square miles in extent. The strata varied from 500 feet to 1,000 feet in thickness. The Water Supply Commission stated this and added—

"Almost all the rain falling on the surface is absorbed or percolates through the fissures of the chalk, and so close is its texture that the bulk of the rain takes weeks and months to filter down to the level of the water-line in the interior of the chalk hills, a line the depth of which below the surface of the ground may vary from 100 to 300 feet, according to the height of the hills."

Considering the quantity of water which the chalk formation could hold, the House would not be surprised at hearing, on the estimate of an eminent engineer—Mr. Homersham—that there would not be the slightest difficulty in getting 10,000,000,000 gallons a-day for the supply of London. Already, he might remark, the towns of Brighton, Croydon, Hull, Portsmouth, Chatham, Gravesend, Canterbury, Winchester, and many other towns, derived their whole supply from the chalk strata, and the Water Supply Commission reported that the highest demand that need be reasonably looked forward to for the metropolitan supply on the constant system, with a population increased to 5,000,000, was 200,000,000 gallons a-day, being only one-fiftieth part of what Mr. Homersham said that the chalk would yield. The Royal Commission on Water Supply, in their Report of 1869, said—

"With natural subterranean reservoirs extending over above 2,000 square miles, a storage reserve is provided comparatively independent of the seasons, and maintained by the ordinary operations of nature, while no filtration can equal that effected through masses of sand, sandstone, earthy limestones or chalk, from 50 to 300 feet thick. The quantity of mineral matter taken up is, in most cases, moderate, while the really objectionable ingredient—the organic matter—is reduced to a minimum. At the same time, the water is kept at a uniform low temperature, and protected from light and air—conditions unfavourable to the existence of living organisms. Springs from such sources probably represent potable waters in their best state; and amongst the favourable specimens of such waters may be instanced many chalk springs, the water from the lower chalk at Caterham, and some of the springs of the lower greensands of Surrey."

It had been urged, as a great objection, that this water from the chalk was very hard water. He did not doubt that there were great inconveniences in hard water; but the hardness of water depended on the presence in solution of carbonic acid and carbonate of lime or chalk. Now, a very simple means had been invented by Dr. Clark for the removal of that hardness. It consisted simply in adding lime, which combined with the carbonic acid, increasing the quantity of chalk, which, however, was insoluble in water not containing free carbonic acid. Thus all the chalk was precipitated and removed from the water. The cost of that process was inconsiderable; and as the water was perfectly filtered by passing through the chalk, the expense of other filtration would be avoided. The Chemical Commission of 1851 said, at the conclusion of their Report—

"The inhabitants of London appear to have within their reach, in these chalk strata, a supply of water which is asserted on good authority to be inexhaustible, and which may be considered as everywhere of a uniform composition and quality. After having been softened, it is an extremely pure water. The chalk water alone is uniform in its excellence at all times, the sources of it lying beyond the influence of weather or season. In the judgment of the Commissioners, this softened chalk water is entitled, from its chemical quality, to a preference over all others for the future supply of the Metropolis. The water recommended appears to approach most closely to the standard of all that is excellent in a town supply, and is worthy of the greatest efforts and grandest works to procure and convey it; but the sources are near at hand, and the water is attainable without difficulty or great expense. It is our deliberate opinion, which we would enforce in the strongest terms, that the much desired and most necessary improvement in quality of the London water is associated with these sources of supply, and will depend upon their proper application to the uses of the public."

Another advantage of this chalk water was its temperature. The temperature of chalk water was uniform at about 51° Fahrenheit in summer and winter. Therefore it was pleasantly cool in summer, and it did not freeze in winter. It would not alter its temperature appreciably in passing through pipes and mains on the constant system, because it would not take more than 18 hours in its passage from the depths of the chalk basin to the mouth of the consumer. He now came to the estimate of the cost of the chalk supply to London. The present supply to London from the chalk was about 20,000,000 gallons a-day by the Kent and New River Companies, and Mr. Homersham said the cost of wells, boreholes, and works to procure a further supply of 100,000,000 gallons a-day would not exceed £200,000, and that might be considered an outside estimate; and he said he would guarantee to procure a supply of double that quantity—that was, of 200,000,000 gallons a-day for £400,000, and that he also considered an outside estimate. And in support of that estimate of Mr. Homersham, which might appear to them somewhat startling, he (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) might mention that the total cost of 600,000 gallons a-day for Plumstead was only £2,500, and that the total cost of procuring a supply of 1,200,000 gallons a-day was only £700 or £800 more—namely, £3,500—and that the cost of increasing the Brighton, supply from 800,000 gallons to 2,500,000 gallons was about £3,000. And now as to the cost of the softening process. That took the place of the filtering process, and it must be remembered ought to be applied to their present Thames water, which was nearly as hard as the chalk water. Mr. Homersham's outside estimate of the cost of structural works for softening water in covered reservoirs was £6,000, for 1,000,000 gallons; and therefore, for 100,000,000 gallons a-day, their present supply, the cost of those structural works, the initial cost, would be £600,000. And he was advised by persons competent to form an opinion that they considered this a very excessive estimate. Besides the expenses at starting for the softening of the chalk water, there would be the cost of lime and labour. The expense of lime would be about £1 per 1,000,000 gallons, and that of labour about 7s. per 1,000,000 gallons, making a total of £1 7s. Mr. Simpson stated that £1 per 1,000,000 gallons would be a nearer estimate, and Dr. Frankland went still lower, and stated the current expenses at 15s. per 1,000,000 gallons. But perhaps the best estimate was that of the Chemical Commission of 1851, who calculated that the additional cost for softening the water would not amount to more than 2 per cent on the present price of water, and some return would be obtained for the lime used in the process, for Mr. Homersham estimated that the precipitated chalk would be sold at 15s. or 16s. per ton. In any case he thought the expense of softening the water ought to be incurred even for their present Thames water, as by softening the water a vast outlay would be saved in the expenditure of soap. The saving of soap in Glasgow, after the introduction of Loch Katrine water, was fully one-half. The question, as affecting laundries and the washing of linen, was important. They spent a great deal more in the washing of their shirts than they did in buying them. The total expenditure for soap in London was £1,000,000 a-year, and according to Mr. Bateman's estimate £500,000 would be saved by the use of soft water. Even supposing that estimate to be exaggerated, some £100,000 or £200,000 might be saved, which would more than cover the cost of the softening process. There would also be an economy in wear and tear, as the linen would be washed without the use of any chemicals. He now came to the second part of his Motion, which dealt with the way in which water was delivered. At present the water was supplied on the intermittent system, which stinted the supply of one of the chief necessaries of life, and occasioned great loss, since fires could be far more promptly extinguished under a system of constant supply. The constant supply system would save the expense of putting up cisterns in new houses, and lessen the liability of pipes to become frozen in winter. But the great objection to the intermittent principle was that water kept in cisterns was liable to contamination from soot, dust, filth from insects, vermin, sparrows, and cats; stench from adjoining cesspools, and smells from the waste-pipe. It was often stored in dirty, mouldering, coverless butts. The evidence of Mr. Simon, and of all the authorities before the Water Supply Commission, showed that an intermittent supply could not be defended. Even if the cisterns were ever so clean, the long retention of the water in them made it very disagreeable to the taste. It was most undesirable that men should be forced to the gin-shop and the tavern for want of pure and agreeable water. All the scientific and medical authorities, all the Commissions reported in favour of a constant service; and the supply of water on that system had been successfully carried out almost in every large town of the United Kingdom. Indeed, it was quite exceptional to find a town with an intermittent supply; and London was therefore conspicuous for its disadvantages both in the quality of its water, and in the mode of its supply. In London the average consumption of water per head per day on the intermittent principle was 32 gallons. In Plymouth, Devonport, Shrewsbury, Oxford, and other places on the same principle, it was 30 gallons or more. But the average consumption in the large manufacturing towns of Lancashire and Yorkshire, including that for trade purposes, was only from 16 to 21 gallons on the constant system. In Manchester, the consumption for domestic purposes was only 14 gallons on the constant principle, less than half of the total consumption in London. In Mr. Bateman's opinion, the normal requirements of the inhabitants of the Metropolis, even including a large supply for baths and water-closets, which were great sources of waste, would be met by from 15 to 20 gallons per head per day. It was urged that under the constant supply the pressure was so great on the pipes that they would burst; but he maintained there was greater pressure under the intermittent system, where the pipes were idle for the greater part of the day, and then were suddenly put to a great strain and pressure for a short time, having to force water to the tops of houses. Mr. Bateman had never known pipes to burst in consequence of a constant supply. It was said that there would be great interruptions during repairs. But Mr. Bateman said complaints of such inconvenience were never heard of in towns where the supply was constant. He also said that the introduction of the constant supply into Manchester had reduced the amount of property destroyed by fire from 21 to 7 per cent, and increased the amount saved from 78·6 to 93·2 per cent; and Captain Shaw, chief officer of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, said that by the use of constant high-pressure service the quantity of water used in extinguishing fires would be greatly reduced, and being applied at an earlier stage of a fire would be far more effective than a large quantity later. It might be urged against his proposal that it would create considerable alarm in consequence of the increase of rates which it would cause; but that objection was not difficult to meet, by the experience of other places. In Manchester the supply had cost £1,780,000, and in Glasgow £1,600,000, the result being that in Manchester the water rate was a great deal less than formerly, whilst in Glasgow it was no greater. Mr. Bateman gave the Water Supply Commission the following estimate as to his own plan—

"The people of London could be supplied, after the expenditure of nearly £8,000,000, with the softer water of Wales at a rate of 10½d. or 11d. in the pound on the rateable value. These rates are much lower than those charged for the supply of the hard water of the Thames."

He might quote comparative statements of the outlay actually incurred in several large towns for improved supplies of water, including compensation to old companies—Glasgow, £1,600,000; Manchester, £1,780,000; Liverpool, £2,000,000; Birkenhead, £320,000. The Water Supply Commissioners said that the proportionate outlay for London would be more than £25,000,000 on the basis of the assessable value of the dwelling-houses; but great as was that expenditure, he maintained that they should not shrink from it, if the result be that they obtained a pure water supply for the Metropolis. But such an expenditure was not necessary, and the cost to be incurred would be much less. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving his Resolution.

I congratulate my hon. Friend (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) on the ability and knowledge which he has displayed in introducing this important subject to the attention of the House. If I do not follow him very closely in regard to the sources of supply to which he has directed our attention, it is because I prefer to accept the challenge of the Secretary of State to make this discussion one upon the subject of the Bill which is to be presented to us for a second reading tonight. I suppose he thought this Motion would serve as a conduit pipe for the flow of our ideas on the subject-matter of his Bill, and I think he is right. As I cannot technically discuss a Bill which is not formally before us, I shall confine myself to its general scheme, and especially to its Preamble, which professes to secure "a constant supply of pure and wholesome water." Parliament is perfectly justified in imposing any restrictions on the water companies, for though they are private commercial ventures, yet they enjoy a monopoly gigantic and complete. The supply of gas is a monopoly also; but in no sense so complete as that of water. If I am discontented with the gas, I cut it off, and illuminate my house with oil or candles. But I am bound, hand and foot, to a water company, for the wells and pumps of London afford us only the filterings of cesspools, sewers, and churchyards. It has been said that the money interest of the companies, involving a capital of £10,000,000, is sufficient to ensure proper quality in the supply. This is contrary to the history of the whole subject. I need not go so far back as 1827, when a water company's director, in a fit of death-bed repentance, published a famous pamphlet to atone for his sins in supplying 7,000 families with poisonous water. I have in my hands a Parliamentary Paper of 1856, in which the medical officer of the Privy Council, referring to the cholera epidemic, two years before, speaks of one water company as

"Purveying the filthiest stuff ever drunk by a civilized community.…Contaminated with the out-scourings of the Metropolis, and containing unmistakable molecules of excrement."

Finding the necessity of improving the quality of supply thus neglected by commercial venture, this House, ever since 1828, has had numerous Select Committees, and has passed various Bills for the protection of our teeming population. And now this Bill is intended to fulfil the recommendations of the later inquiries, especially those of the Select Committee of 1867, presided over by the First Commissioner of Works (Mr. Ayrton), and of the Royal Commission of 1869. London is not now polluted with such water as it had during the cholera epidemic of 1853–4, for the Act of 1852 obliges the water to be drawn from above Teddington Lock. But even above this source of supply, there is a watershed of 3,656 square miles, securing the main part of the ex-crementitious drainage of 860,000 human beings, besides the manurial drainage of 2,250,000 acres of land. London has already spent £6,000,000 to get rid of its own filth, and when this Bill asks us, possibly at least, to spend twice as much more for the regulation of the water supply, it is not too much to inquire whether it gives us security that the water shall not contain the filth of the towns and villages above us. Yet, in fact, the Bill which requires the Board of Works to secure pure and wholesome water to the Metropolis gives to that Board no power to do so, for they are made the mere distributors of water, even when they purchase the companies, and are not associated in any way with the conservancy of the two rivers, the Thames and the Lea, which supply seven out of the eight water companies. No doubt there are the Acts of 1866 and 1868, by which these rivers are put under conservancy; but it depends wholly on the manner in which these Acts are carried out whether either the companies or the Metropolitan Board of Works can give us unpolluted water. Yet, with the usual fragmentary and chaotic form of our sanitary legislation, these Acts are not even mentioned in the Bill. If the conservators of the Thames and Lea do not properly scavenge the surface of their rivers, and divert the sewage of the towns and villages on their banks, the Bill cannot give to us pure and wholesome water; and we must be content to drink, as heretofore, our share of the excrements of 660,000 human beings. My hon. Friend was perfectly right in pointing out the erroneous conclusions drawn by the Royal Commission as to the spontaneous purification of the river. I may be permitted to profess knowledge on this subject, as the Royal Commission itself has done me the honour to quote largely from my evidence. But I prefer to support my views by the direct experiments made by the Rivers Pollution Commission, which has proved beyond doubt that the dissolved filth of a river is destroyed with extreme slowness and uncertainty. The Metropolitan Commission chiefly rested their conclusion on the apparent purification of the Thames after its junction with the Kennet below Reading; but they were ignorant that these rivers are not effectually intermingled until they reach the rapids at Sonning Bridge, and they mistook the dilution of the impure Kennet with the purer water of the Thames for a process of self-purification. At all times such purification is slow and uncertain; but in epidemic periods, such as typhoid fever, scarlet fever, and cholera, there is no evidence at all that the actual seeds of disease are destroyed, as inert sewage matter is by simple oxidation, or burning up by the air in water. The excrementitious matters of sewage in such epidemics have intensely infectious properties, and there is a large experience to indicate that rivers thus polluted are powerful means of spreading diseases through the water-drinking populations on their banks. At all events, in typhoid fevers and cholera the experience is as large and decided as one can expect to attain. Yet in this Bill the whole sanitary conditions of the subject are left in disorganized disassociation. You tell us that we are to have pure water by this Bill, and yet those who are intrusted with the scavenging of the surface of the rivers, and with the prevention of its pollutions by sewage, are wholly disassociated from its distribution. You do make a junction of importance when you bring in connection with the water companies, which control the inlets of water, the Metropolitan Board, which has charge of its outlets. This is more important than is at first apparent; but, even here, we have only a fragmentary reform, for though that Board controls the main drainage, the branch drainage is under the management of the vestries, and they have shown little intelligence on the question before us. So that even when we pass this Bill, see in what an unsatisfactory position we stand by our piecemeal legislation. There will still be eight water companies, two Conservancy Commissions, a Metropolitan Board of Works, and numerous vestries—all of whom should be consolidated in any general scheme which is sufficient to secure the health and comfort of this great Metropolis in its relations to one of the two great necessaries of life. The Preamble of the Bill is too ambitious. It will not, if passed, assure to us wholesome and pure water without further consolidation; but it may secure a constant supply of such water as the Conservators of the Thames and the Lea send down to the water companies. Is the necessity for a constant system of supply, as distinguished from an intermittent system, so important that we should accept this Bill as another fragmentary instalment of sanitary reform? I have no doubt on this subject, for a constant system of supply is an immense gain to the community. The present intermittent system requires that each house shall store water in a cistern of sufficient capacity to ensure a supply during those hours when the water is cut off from the pipes. In the houses of the wealthy this is a mere question of cost, for they take care that the storage room is ample and sufficient for all their wants. But in the houses of the poor the case is altogether different, for they possess neither money to erect large cisterns nor space to afford for them. In order to economize cost and space, the smallest possible store cisterns are used, so that the poor are stinted, and even practically defrauded, of their fair share of the water supply, which amounts in the Metropolis to an average of 32 gallons daily. It is not only by reducing the quantity, but by largely deteriorating the quality of the water, that cisterns act injuriously. The waste-pipes of the cisterns are connected with the sewers, and very frequently by an untrapped communication. At all events, I can testify that this untrapped communication existed in a house which I recently bought in town, and that the same thing was found in the houses of two of my friends, one of whom had typhoid fever in his family in consequence. If this sanitary evil is found to prevail in dwellings such as Members of this House occupy, we may be certain that it is common in houses of the poor. Under such circumstances, the sewer gases find their way into the cisterns and become absorbed by the water, which is thus rendered unwholesome both for potable and culinary purposes. Besides this common source of evil, the water in a poor man's house is often fouled by the unventilated air of the dwelling, and is rendered hot and unpleasant for drinking purposes. If any hon. Member will go into a poor tenement, and draw some of the hot and vapid water from the cistern, cask, or tub, which forms its substitute, often resting upon, or in close proximity to, the most objectionable places, he will understand how it is that the poor so often resort to other beverages than water. At least, one of the West-end vestries has petitioned this House to reject the Bill, because it proposes to ensure a constant system of supply. They forget that this is not a rich man's question, but a poor man's question. In large wholesome dwellings, with plenty of space and air, the intermittent system of supply is sufficient for health and comfort. But the constant system, offering always cool, well-filtered water, not fouled by keeping, is of vital importance to the poorer classes. But it must be given freely and without stint. I read the evidence of a water company's official in the Blue Book before me, which filled me with indignation. He coolly proposes to introduce constricting rings into the delivery pipes for houses of the poor, so as to diminish the supply afforded. If these are to be the tactics of any company, the sooner they are absorbed by a public Board the better it will be for all of us. The greatest sanitary law for large cities is contained in the few words addressed to the leper of old—"Wash, and be clean," and nothing should stand in the way of the poor from obeying this law. The constant system of supply, apart from such dodges as constricting rings, gives the best conditions for its observance. By it, water is delivered fresh and unfouled by vitiated air. As it does not involve the necessity for cisterns, the cost of its introduction to a poor tenement is insignificant. Water is always present, and is never cut off as now on Sundays, the very day when the poor require it most. At present, in most districts, the Saturday morning's supply has to last for 48 hours, on the very two days when abundance is most needed; and, as a poor man's house has no room for large store cisterns, the absence of supply becomes an intolerable evil. I need not stop to remind the House of the palpable advantages which the constant system offers in cases of fires. It may be sufficient to state that since Manchester has adopted it the amount of property saved, after having actually taken fire, has gradually risen from 60 to 97 per cent—a result, if only attained in a distant degree in the Metropolis, that would reconcile us to a very large expenditure. Recognizing then, as I do—and as all men must do who have considered this question in a public point of view—the immense advantages of the constant system of supply, I would accept this new instalment of sanitary reform with gratitude, fragmentary though it be, if I felt assured that the Bill was powerful enough to achieve its purpose in this respect. But even here I have misgivings. We have already intrusted considerable powers to the Board of Trade by the Act of 1852; but many of the reforms then indicated remain unachieved. Clause 4 of that Act renders efficient filtration compulsory on the companies; and yet I hold in my hand a Report from a competent authority, which tells me that one company, at least, has delivered water on various occasions, during the past year, in such an unfiltered state "as to be entirely unfit for domestic use." If the Board of Trade, with the powers of this Act, are unable in eight years to perfect such a simple and well-known process as filtration, I fear that the vis inertiæ of the water companies will be too great for the Metropolitan Board of Works, especially as there are real difficulties to contend with in changing from an intermittent system to a constant system of supply. Some difficulties are real, others are imaginary; but both will be formidable, when the interests of the companies are involved in magnifying them. No doubt there will be a large cost involved in altering fittings for the change. For as long as water is supplied by cisterns, the goodness of fittings is more a question for the consumer than for the company. But they must be made good to prevent waste of water, if it is to be on at all times and without cisterns. A public trust could make the change on better terms than the companies. A differential rate might be applied, lower for houses with good fittings and higher for those with bad, and a water police, with power to lower the rate, would soon bring about a cordial co-operation between the consumers and the public trust. When the fittings are properly adjusted, all experience shows that there is greater economy in the supply on the constant than on the intermittent system. On the intermittent system you turn a cock, and, finding no water, leave it open, and the water, when it comes, is wasted; but on the constant system no such negligence is likely to occur. There is little doubt that, with a well-managed system of constant supply—taking the experience of Manchester, Norwich, Wolverhampton, and other towns—you might reduce the average consumption in London by one-third, and this saving would enable you to introduce water into many separate poor tenements which now depend upon some common stand cock. The Government have, I think, committed a grave error in abandoning the compulsory clauses of purchase which they introduced, wisely and advisedly, into their Bill. They had ample justification for their bold step; but none, that I can see, for retracing it. It is true that they may plead the Report of a Select Committee of this House in 1867, which recommended that the companies should be united with a metropolitan public Board, and that this union should frame rules for controlling the house arrangements. But the Royal Commission reported, in 1869, against such an arrangement in the following terms, with which most of us will agree:—That it "would be difficult for such a complex arrangement to work satisfactorily." Yet this is the state in which we are landed by the withdrawal of the compulsory powers of purchase. The Royal Commission recommended most strongly the course which the Government originally took, and which they now abandon. In their Report of 1869 they say—

"The constant supply cannot be effectually introduced in London so long as the supply remains in the hands of private companies, to whom it would be inexpedient to confer the great powers necessary for this purpose."

This is, in fact, a reiteration of the recommendation made by the Health of Towns Commission in 1846. Well, why have the Government yielded to timid counsels? They are only postponing the evil day. Had the Government bought the companies in 1856, as proposed by the General Board of Health, they would have probably purchased their interest at £4,000,000 less than they will have to pay now. The companies try to frighten us by saying that the cost of changing the intermittent into a constant system will be £1,500,000. It undoubtedly will be large; but in no way could it be more costly performed than by eight distinct companies, with their separate engineering staffs and management. The Bill loses altogether the advantages and economy of consolidation. It actually goes out of the way to defeat these advantages by the separation of accounts, and by treating each company's work, even when bought, as a separate unit. In 1851, when this subject was before this House, the economies from consolidation were estimated as being at least equal to £90,000 per annum; and they must now be still greater. The sum capitalized would have been more than sufficient to change the intermittent to the constant supply without increased cost to the ratepayers. The supply of a first necessary of life, like air or water, is a most unfit subject for commercial speculation. In the ancient history of the kingdom, the supply of water was always considered a public duty, and the violation of the trust was first committed in the case of London, when it contracted with the New River Company. Following our bad example, other towns ceded the supply of this necessary of life to commercial adventurers; but, as the Records of the House show, they have been rapidly coming back to us to obtain powers for purchasing the private companies. In almost all such cases they have changed the intermittent into a constant system. London stands almost alone among great cities in adhering to the antiquated system. Our fragmentary way of dealing with great hygienic subjects has grown into an intolerable evil, and with the Report of the Sanitary Commission before them, I think the Government might have offered us a bolder Bill. Yet it is only fair to admit the difficulties of their position. Any hon. Member who has read a Parliamentary Paper, with a very uninviting title—the Report of the "Shoreditch Improvement Bill"—will learn with regret that the Metropolitan Board of Works takes little cognizance of the necessities of the Metropolis as a whole, but is easily influenced by the clamant demands of particular vestries. The latter have shown small interest in obtaining a constant supply of water for the Metropolis, and as they seem to be the springs of action of the Metropolitan Board, and as this Bill continues to keep them so, I fear that the Bill, when it becomes an Act, may be as little effective as the Act of 1852, which also had provisions for constant supply. Doubting the efficiency of its machinery, the Government may have disliked to ask for larger powers till it got a better system of local government for the Metropolis. In sympathy for their difficulties, I shall vote for the second reading of the Bill when it comes before us; but I do not conceal from myself, or from the House, that a subject of this magnitude, affecting, as it does, the health and habits of a population almost equal to that of a nation, deserves a larger and bolder treatment than it receives in this Bill. Whether the Bill realizes its purpose or not, it records our opinion that London should no longer stand almost alone among large cities in adhering to the antiquated and unhealthy system of an intermittent supply of water, and that the supply of such an important necessary of life should be regulated, and, I think, should altogether be performed, by a public trust, and not by commercial venture.

said, the hon. Member for Hastings invited the House to affirm two propositions. The first was that the water supply of London should be taken from pure sources. It would be difficult to get a more simple proposal, or one that the House would be more inclined to regard with favour. But it was asserted that the quality of the present supply of water to the Metropolis was prejudicial to health. They must remember, however, that in 1867 and 1869 there were two exceedingly painstaking and accurate inquiries, in which men of known science assisted, and he thought he had a right to say that such facts as were elicited by the Committee presided over by the Chief Commissioner of Works, and by the Duke of Richmond's Commission, ought not to be altogether ignored. First, with regard to the Report of the right hon. Gentleman's (Mr. Ayrton's) Committee—it said that the quality of the Thames water might compare advantageously with the water of any other town; and in the Report of the Royal Commission there was no evidence to lead them to believe that the water supplied by the companies was not generally good and wholesome. Those statements were the result of the most careful investigations, and the highest science that could be obtained, and it did appear to him that if his hon. Friend wished to upset the Reports of the Committee and the Commission, his proper plan would be to ask for another Committee or Commission, by which he could prove that the statements he had made that night rested on the highest authority. At present his statements must be accepted with less deference than the Reports of the Committee and the Commission. His hon. Friend had proposed a substitute for the Thames water; but his idea was not new, and, if it be adopted, it should be only adopted upon high authority. Now, the Royal Commission, amongst other things, reported with regard to the supply from the chalk districts. It did not agree with those who contended that an unlimited supply could be obtained by simply tapping the chalk; and it went on to say that, if a supply could be obtained, it could only be done by subtracting from the supply of it to the rivers. Now, would it be a considerable benefit if, by supplying London from such a source, they were to dry up the rivers? However, let his hon. Friend prove his case. Let them have a Commission, and then they would see whether, if his hon. Friend got his supply, he did not dry up all the neighbouring small streams. He would not, he (Mr. Clay) believed, wish to dry up the Thames, because that was not potable water. A great deal of evidence on that point was taken by the Royal Commission, as to the difference between chalk water and Thames water for drinking and other purposes, and many scientific men were examined, and the majority gave their opinion that one water was just as good as the other as to softness, some going so far as to say that the Thames water was decidedly the softer. They were, therefore, asked to express their approbation of the system of drawing water from chalk in direct opposition to those scientific men, and when they did get it, they must expose it to Dr. Clark's softening process. Now, supposing that 100,000,000 gallons was the daily consumption of London—which he believed was the amount stated by Dr. Frankland—he asked what would be the expense of softening such a vast amount of water as that. Dr. Frankland fixed it at 15s. per 1,000,000 gallons, but he (Mr. Clay) fancied he had seen an estimate for 14s. 7d. Mr. Homersham had, however, calculated the cost at 27s. per 1,000,000 gallons. He (Mr. Clay) had himself consulted an engineer, who thought it would not be less than 27s. He would, however, split the difference, and take 20s.; and, putting the expense of erecting the reservoirs for softening at £600,000, that sum, at 5 per cent, would give £30,000. They were asked to give an increased supply from this new and doubtful source, and to do it at a cost of £66,500 a-year. He did not say that the proposal was absurd; but he asserted that the hon. Gentleman was bound to establish his facts, and not to ask the House, in this casual way, to affirm his Resolution. There was another proposal, which had been gone into at great length by the hon. Member for Edinburgh, and which contained the principle of constant supply. That principle had been more than once alluded to. But he would rather prefer saying what he had to say respecting it when the Bill came before the House. In 1852 the water companies were obliged—and to his mind very properly obliged; he made no complaint whatever about that—but they were obliged to go up the river, and take their supply from where they took it now—namely, at Hampton. That necessitated a very great expense. But the companies fulfilled the commands of Parliament, as they had always done, within the time, with the utmost accuracy and without any complaint whatever being made against them. He was sorry, therefore, to hear complaints made by the hon. Member that such was the vis inertiæ of the water companies that they never would do anything. All he could say was, that he challenged the House to point out anything which Parliament had desired the companies to do that they had not done with the greatest accuracy. He would only say that if he spoke against the constant supply, he did not do so in any way as the representative of one or more of the water companies, but as a householder, and he should ask Parliament not to enforce it upon him.

said, that in the few words he had to say on this subject, he would not lead the House to suppose that he was not a party, to a certain extent, interested in this question. He was the inheritor of certain shares in the New River Company, which had not been attacked to-night, and, therefore, he was not going to address himself to any point connected with that company. But in consequence of that connection he had certainly taken great interest in the question of water supply, and he believed that he had, as far as possible, made himself acquainted with the whole of the evidence that had been given on the subject with reference to London. He could not help thinking to-night, as his hon. Friend the Member for Hastings was speaking, how easy it was for a counsel to bring forward a very satisfactory case. They knew that if in a Committee the opening speech of counsel was taken in the place of evidence, the decision of the Committee would be very simple and very easy. But when his hon. Friend proceeded with his case, and, quoting from Mr. Bateman and the other great authorities who had been examined before those different Commissions and Committees, said, he was not going to bring forward their scheme, but was about to back up a scheme of his own,—that of getting water from the chalk formation—then he (Mr. G. Hardy) could not help thinking how very improper a tribunal he was addressing with a view to inviting them to come to a decision upon such a question. The House of Commons was called upon to overthrow, at the bidding of a single Member, backed though he was by the hon. Member for the University of Edinburgh, conclusions arrived at by Commission after Commission and Committee after Committee; and they were asked to do that at once, and come to a conclusion upon the statement of one hon. Member in the House, without any reference whatever to any evidence that had been adduced upon this subject, as though none of the matters referred to had never been inquired into at all. He would venture to say that if the House would take the trouble to look at the extracts from the chemical evidence which were in the Report of the Royal Commission on Water Supply, they would see that chemists, like doctors, differed materially. They would see a great deal more than that. They would see that chemists of the greatest eminence were content to place their conclusions before the Commission by guess-work, and not from actual experiment. He ventured to say that there was not in that chemical evidence which had been pressed upon the attention of the House to-night one single instance of chemical analysis upon which they relied for the conclusions to which they had come. Look to the evidence of Dr. Simon. He was asked about the flow of the water through the soil, and whether he had formed any opinion as to whether the water taken from above Teddington Lock, and running 15 or 20 miles, would be safe water, and his reply was—

"I should think it quite as safe water as regards the danger we are speaking of."

Then he went on to say that—

"A speculative answer is not enough on this subject, and I can only give a speculative answer at present. I think the water would be harmless, but possibly the result might show that the water could not be deemed quite safe."

And that was the nature of the evidence of every one of the chemists. He (Mr. G. Hardy) took up the death-rate of different towns, and what did he find? That in the towns supplied with that beautiful soft water which the hon. Member for the University of Edinburgh alluded to, the deaths were 28 in 1,000, while in the towns where the people were supplied with hard water the deaths were only 22 in 1,000. He did not come to the conclusion that the water was the cause of death in each instance; but surely in cases where the chemists could not detect what existed in the water, it was just as unreasonable that they should, come to the conclusion that the water was the cause of the exceptional death-rate in other parts of the country. But here they found a conclusion drawn by one medical man quite contrary to that drawn by another. When his hon. Friend told them that his wish was to disgust the House with the water drunk in London, he confessed he felt a little uncomfortable; for, when in London, a glass of water every morning and the last thing every night was what he had taken for many years past, and he had never experienced any of those dreadful and poisonous effects from it. There was a disposition, however, to attribute every evil under the sun to whatever beverage a man drank. If a man was pleased to drink beer, it was supposed to be adulterated; and if he (Mr. G. Hardy) were to be ill, his hon. Friend the Member for Hastings would probably attribute his illness to the Chelsea water, for he had the misfortune to drink Thames water, and had drank it for many years past. With respect to the cholera outbreak in 1849 and 1854, he would ask was, it owing to the water supply here. He did not say it was not. He had no means of knowing. All he wished to point out was, that the greatest possible difference existed amongst the doctors themselves on the subject; and he knew that the conclusion arrived at by the Committee over which his right hon. Friend the Member for the Tower Hamlets presided, and which was selected with great care, was, that the water was not the cause; at all events, that there was no proof that it was the cause. They went further, for having investigated the supply of water in London, they came to the conclusion that it was impossible to say that the Thames water was not a safe supply. He would refer to one passage on this subject which his hon. Friend the Member for Hastings did not read to the House. In 1867 the Committee reported that they were satisfied that both the quantity and the quality of the water supplied from the Thames was so far satisfactory, and that there was no ground for disturbing the arrangement made in the Act of 1852. His hon. Friend (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) said he threw over Dr. Letheby. Well, it was true that Dr. Letheby and others took different views from those of Dr. Frankland, and adopted different modes of dealing with the water. What conclusion did he (Mr. G. Hardy) come to upon that subject? Not the same as his hon. Friend, who threw over all those who did not agree with his own conclusions. He (Mr. G. Hardy) said that the chemists had not arrived at a definite solution of a great question, and that we ought to wait. He was quite content that those matters should be referred to a Committee, and to wait the result of further investigation. With respect to the question of compulsory sale, he had not a word to say against it. If they could find a public body who would and whom Parliament could, thoroughly trust to deal with this great question, and if they thought the thing could be done better by a public body than by commercial bodies, he personally had no objection to substitute such a body for the water companies. But with respect to commercial speculation, let him remind the House that without that commercial speculation, beginning with the honest Dutchman who preceded Sir Hugh Myddelton, they would never have had anything like a water supply. Much also was due to James I., who did a successful thing in promoting the New River scheme, and in committing the whole management of it to the adventurers who took half the shares, so that to that day, though the Crown was no longer interested in them, the King's shares had no part in the management. With respect to Manchester, so far from the water of Manchester paying its way, he did not believe that it paid its way at that moment. He believed they took £12,000 a-year from the profits on gas, which was also in the hands of the corporation of the City of Manchester, to pay the expense of the water, and he had always thought it a most unjust thing that the supply of light should be taxed for the purpose of supplying other people with water. His hon. Friend talked of £25,000,000 for the Metropolis as if it were a mere fleabite. But what was the most remarkable thing in this whole transation was, that instead of the metropolitan Members coming forward to tax themselves for the benefit of their constituents, and with a view of affording a supply of water to the Metropolis, his hon. Friend complained that they cried out against the proposal. With respect to the chalk formation, he ought to speak favourably of it, for the company with which he had the good fortune to be connected by inheritance, got its main supply from the chalk, and very excellent water it was, no doubt. He noticed that his hon. Friend laughed when an allusion was made to the effect which might be produced from pumping too much from the chalk. But one of the greatest geologists in this country was a reverend gentleman whom he had had the honour of meeting on several occasions, and he knew he was consulted on these subjects continually. What did he say on this subject? He disapproved of obtaining water from the chalk. He said—

"You would obtain a certain quantity, but it would be at the expense of the rivers. The rivers would cease to flow. When my advice has been asked, I have invariably said, 'Take the water which flows down above ground, and do not tamper with it below.' That is what I have invariably said, and I believe it is sound advice."

The Commission embodied what he said in their own words. Many years ago Mr. Napier, an engineer of ability, proposed to supply London with water from the Surrey sands. In the course of the inquiry into his scheme experiments were made as to softening the water, and it was found there were two kinds of softness, or rather hardness, one of which was permanent, and it was ascertained that water from the Surrey sands was of 6° of hardness. He (Mr. G. Hardy) believed that the water with which London was supplied was of 14° of hardness, but when it was boiled it was reduced to 6°—the same as the water from the Surrey sands. Therefore, when his hon. Friend put forward the advantage of soft water, he did not think his hon. Friend could remember the Report on Mr. Napier's scheme. In that Report he would find that the process of boiling water made the greatest difference possible. Thus they came to the necessity of using Clark's process, which he admitted to be one of the most beautiful known in science. But there was one great objection to it, independent of the expense. The process, to be effectual, must last 24 hours, and they could not duly supply so vast a place as London with water if so long a stoppage of the flow was necessary. It might be easily done in such a place as Canterbury; but just think of the enormous reservoirs that would be required for London. In fact, the delay, combined with the expense, would render it totally impossible. With respect to the points which had been put forward by the hon. Member for the University of Edinburgh, who said they had a right to impose conditions on a monopoly, he agreed with the hon. Member there, and he thought that the great water monopolies should be subject to conditions the same as railways or other similar large undertakings. He did not object to that on the part of the water companies. He thought it a fair subject for inquiry; but it must be remembered that the Act of 1852 was supposed to establish State control. He would now say a word with regard to constant supply. In the Act of 1852 it was provided that if four-fifths of the inhabitants of a district asked for a constant supply they should have it, and it had never been applied for up to the present day. With respect to the poor, he knew that several of the companies had made great efforts to supply them, but a great difficulty arose in the shape of the owners of houses. Many propositions had been made. It was proposed, for example, to have a stand-pipe in every court. But then it would disappear the first night, if there were any metal about it that could be sold. If they established such a supply, they must also establish some means of protecting it. All those things must be considered. His hon. Friend might make his speech and propose his abstract Resolution, but, after all, the question was one of evidence, and must be carefully considered and inquired into. He was not connected with the management of the New River Company, but he was authorized to say in its behalf that the managers were, and had been, most anxious to supply the poor districts abundantly. They had in many instances supplied their poor customers on Sundays, and were ready to extend the advantages of constant supply to all cases where they were really needed. With respect to the rich, he knew that they cried out against the constant supply, and would prefer to be left with the large cisterns which gave them, in fact, constant supply. He was sorry that the hon. Member for Bath (Sir William Tite) was not here, but the hon. Member told him (Mr. G. Hardy) that his house, being full of costly books and pictures, he dreaded the results of a constant supply, in case of any extraordinary pressure being put on the pipes and causing them to burst. In such a case, he told him, an amount of damage would be done that nothing could repair. The companies were perfectly ready to have the question inquired into, and had no doubt but that it would be justly decided on by that House. But let it not come to any rash conclusion. They could not carry out their own Acts of Parliament already passed. The towns up the river which polluted the Thames with their sewage were prohibited from doing so by Act of Parliament, but they continued to do so nevertheless. He objected, not only as regarded the water supply, but generally to these abstract Resolutions that pledged them for ever after. It was a serious question that of how they should obtain the best water for the supply of such a vast population as London. Do not let the House be led away by specious arguments, but let the question be tested by the body of evidence in their possession. Let the subject be inquired into by the public, and then come to the conclusion as to whether the Metropolis should be supplied by private companies or public bodies, and whether the water was to be drawn from the present or from any other source.

said, that those who were present at the commencement of the debate must have been struck with the ability with which the subject had been treated both by the Mover and the Seconder of the Resolution. The Resolution itself consisted of words to which no Government could possibly take objection. It said "that the householders of the Metropolis should be supplied with water from pure sources." Surely no one could take any objection to such a proposition. It also asked that the water should be delivered by the constant system of supply; and that was already sought by the Bill of the Government. With much of the speech of his hon. Friend the Member for Hastings he cordially concurred, but there was one reservation he would make. The hon. Gentleman quoted most correctly a great number of authorities, eminent chemists and others, as to the polluted quality of a great deal of the water supplied to the inhabitants of London, and as to the pollution of the sources of supply; and he thought his hon. Friend was also careful to read the dates of his quotations; but the effect on the House would have been very different if they had recollected that many of the charges contained in those quotations were applicable to a state of things which had long since passed away, and were by no means applicable to the London of the present day. He knew himself that much of what his hon. Friend had said was not applicable to the present state of things. For example, nothing could be more explicit than the quotation from Dr. Simon; nothing more emphatic than that gentleman's condemnation of Thames water; and yet he knew, as a matter of fact, that if proper care was taken to prevent pollution, Dr. Simon would be perfectly satisfied to retain the Thames as a source of supply. The statements of his hon. Friend were, in fact, not new to the House. Over and over again it had been asserted that the Thames was not a safe source of supply. Alarms had been raised, and inquiries instituted, but always with the same result. In 1849 it was asserted that the Thames water ought not to be used for potable purposes. A Commission was appointed, and that Commission included some of our most eminent chemists. Their Reports had been quoted by his hon. Friend as strongly condemnatory of the Thames as a source of water supply. But what was the ultimate finding of the Commission? The finding of the Royal Commission, which included the names of Dr. Miller and Dr. Hoffmann, who was now, unfortunately for them, in Berlin, was that the Thames water was perfectly wholesome, palatable, agreeable in flavour, and uniform in temperature. The Commission, however, recommended that means should be taken to prevent contact with the sewage, and that the water should be drawn from sources above the tidal range. They reported unfavourably on some of the schemes submitted, but drew attention to the chalk basin at Watford, supposing that its water could be made soft. In consequence of that Report the Act of 1852 was passed—an Act which, however, fell far short of the expectations of those who framed it. The opposition of the companies foiled much that was intended by the Act—especially the project of uniting all the companies under one organization. Supposing that scheme to have been carried out, a great economy would have resulted, but that idea was ultimately abandoned. The Act also provided for a constant supply for the Metropolis, provided that it was demanded by four-fifths of the inhabitants of a district. His right hon. Friend (Mr. G. Hardy) asked how it had come to pass that the constant supply had never been asked for. He should like to know for what purpose four-fifths of the inhabitants of a district had ever been able to come to a common agreement? The hon. Member for the University of Edinburgh had drawn a frightful picture of the immense amount of contamination suffered by the water of the Thames. He said that, in round numbers, some million of people lived in the basin of the Thames, and that the whole of the sewage of that population passed into its waters. But that statement was in direct contradiction to the finding of the Commission. [Dr. LYON PLAYFAIR: I said 860,000.] Then it was the Mover of the Resolution who gave the figures without any deduction, whereas the Commissioners made very large deductions, and stated that, in their opinion, only a very small part of the pollution that might be anticipated from that large population really did pass into the Thames. But the answer to the supposed charge was that natural causes—in the flow of water and the various chemical processes going on in the flow—had the effect of purifying the waters in their passage down to the various sources of supply. Dr. Frankland, the Commissioners of 1851, and the Committee of 1867 were all agreed that the water of the Thames was good and wholesome; and after hearing the fullest evidence from gentlemen perfectly competent to give an opinion on the subject, the latest finding they had was that there was no evidence to lead them to believe that the water now supplied to the Metropolis was not generally good and wholesome. The right hon. Member for the University of Oxford was quite justified in saying that the House, and he (Mr. Bruce) might add the Government, must rely in those matters on the finding of authorized Commissions and Committees, and not upon the opinions of hon. Gentlemen, supported by individual cases. He had no doubt the water of the Thames was capable of considerable improvement, but he had also no doubt that it was in course of receiving that improvement at the present time. A good deal of what had been said was derived from the Report of an inquiry into the East London Water Works, and no doubt very hard and true things were said of that company at the time; but it has since exerted itself to improve its supply and delivery, and it now stood at the head of all the companies in the pains it took to give the poorest classes in London a constant supply. He held in his hand an abstract of the Metropolitan Water Companies Returns, and he found that, whilst there were in all London only 35,188 houses that received water on constant service, the East London Company supplied 32,723. Out of 96,000 houses in their district they had succeeded already in giving a constant supply to 32,000. He quite admitted that, as a rule, for the better class of houses an intermittent supply was quite sufficient for all the ordinary purposes of health and cleanliness. For the reasons he had stated he could not accept the Resolution in the sense that it was condemnatory of Thames water, but as a general statement he had no objection to it at all. In the face of all this evidence, depending upon different inquiries by different minds, the most scientific as well as the most practical, it was impossible to accept the conclusion that the Thames was not a proper source of water supply for this Metropolis. When he came to the second part of the Resolution, he confessed he should be glad to see it adopted by the House. At the same time he must admit that there was great force in what was stated by the hon. Member for Hull (Mr. Clay), and also by the right hon. Member for the University of Oxford (Mr. G. Hardy) as to the difficulty of providing a constant supply so long as the supply was in the hands of various companies, each of which it would be necessary to arm with very large powers for the protection of their property, if they were called upon to give effect to the constant system. The subject had been carefully considered by the Government, and they had introduced a Bill, which he should be glad to see read a second time, and referred to a Select Committee. He would not anticipate the discussion that might take place on that measure, but would only say in regard to it that he thought the Government had been met by the water companies in a very fair and liberal spirit. He had no doubt that the effect of a constant water supply on the health and happiness of the people would be great indeed. His hon. Friends had quoted evidence to show the evil results of the present intermittent supply. They had shown, from the evidence of persons authorized to speak on the matter, the foulness of the water drunk by a large portion of the poor people of London. They had shown that it was collected in receptacles which were receptacles of a great deal besides water, and that of a filthy description, and in all their great towns the constant supply system was found not only conducive to health, but, properly managed, to economy also. The Government, therefore, felt it better to introduce a measure which they admitted to be imperfect, but which was capable of conferring great advantages, than to wait till they could consolidate the various companies into one, and hand the management over to such a system of government as the corporations of Manchester and Liverpool. He was glad this discussion had preceded the discussion on the Bill which the Government were anxious to pass, because he thought that whatever might be the opinion of Members as to the details of that measure, no one who had heard that discussion would venture to assert that the measure was not called for by the exigencies of the Metropolis. To the Resolution as it stood he, on the part of the Government, could offer no opposition, although he could not accede to the interpretation which his hon. Friends had put upon a certain portion of it. The Resolution itself was perfectly harmless. It was an abstract proposition which bound the House to that which he believed every Member was at perfect liberty to affirm, and therefore, on the part of the Government, he was very willing to accept it.

said, that the necessity for obtaining a softer and a better water for the purpose of supplying London had been, in his opinion, enormously exaggerated, and when the Thames was properly purified, he had no doubt whatever that it would supply a sufficient quantity of good and wholesome water. Nothing could be more erroneous than the deductions which were drawn from statements with regard to the purity or impurity of water. The idea that very soft water was good for nothing except the laundry or the tea-maker, he was prepared, upon very good sound physiological grounds, to assert was not correct, nor did he say that the deduction which the right hon. Member for the University of Oxford had drawn with regard to the connection between hardness of water and mortality was absolutely correct; but he said it was a simple fact, that in 50 or 60 of the largest towns of this country exactly in proportion as the hardness of the water decreased the mortality had increased. In towns where the average degree of hardness was 16 per cent, the mortality was 21, and in those towns and districts where the average hardness was only 1 3/10 per cent, the mortality was 28 per cent. As to the question of constant supply, he found, that in London one-third of the houses supplied by the eight companies were under £20 a-year rental, and more than one-half of all the houses supplied were rented at less than £30 a-year. Now, he believed that the solution of this great and important question was not to adopt a gigantic scheme which would cost the Metropolis millions of money, but to trust to the companies—who had done much to improve the supply, and were still spending large sums for the purpose—to trust to them to give the lower class of houses the requisite supply upon the constant system. Consider what must necessarily take place if they put all London upon a constant supply. Let Members reflect for a moment upon what took place in their houses from half-past seven till ten o'clock in the morning on any given day; there was a rush upon the boiler, upon the bath, and upon other services, which demanded a very large supply of water, and if all the houses of London—of the middle and upper classes of houses more especially—were to make that rush upon one main during those hours, no company in or out of London could give them a sufficient supply. During the rest of the day, no doubt, the supply would be more than abundant, but between those hours no main would supply as much as was wanted. He thought it probable that the House would come to the conclusion that it was incumbent to furnish a constant supply to all the poorer class of houses, and to leave those that had an abundant supply, and had no want at the present moment, to the supply they already possessed. After this discussion, he hoped they would be content with simply calling upon the existing companies in London to do that which the House had a right to demand; but he hoped they would not be led by high-flown ideas, either medical or chemical, to rush into a stupendous expense such as that proposed by the hon. Member for Hastings, and of which failure was the only probable result.

said, that as far as he understood the question the result was this. If the first part of the Resolution meant anything, it meant that the present supply of water to London was not derived from pure sources; but the evidence given before the various Committees and Commissions did not prove anything of the sort; and he was not prepared to affirm by his vote that which he did not believe to be true. With regard to the second part of the Resolution, he thought it should again be referred to a Committee to consider. He believed that as respected the occupiers of the higher class of houses, they would consider it an intolerable nuisance to have the constant service forced upon them. At the same time, he believed, there were great advantages in applying it to the lower class of houses. He should not have risen but for an observation made by the seconder of the Resolution, who complained of the vis inertiæ of the companies in respect to improve- ments. Now, as respected one company, he could state that they drew their supply for many years from the Thames at Hungerford Bridge, and then at a great expense, paying a large sum annually, they removed their works to a higher part of the river, and they subsequently spent £40,000 for the purpose of obtaining the water some dozen miles still higher up. He did not think it right, therefore, to charge the companies with vis inertiæ in the matter of improvements, seeing that they expended these large sums of money to improve their sources of supply, although they would obtain no increased revenue in return for that outlay. The water companies of London had got no more than a fair return for their capital.

said, the hon. Member who had just sat down had reflected very much the opinion of the House. He thought the House had been placed in considerable difficulty by the Home Secretary having assented to this Motion. There was no doubt that the water supply of London ought to be derived from as pure sources as possible; but the question was whether the present supply was not for all practical purposes derived from pure sources. Then they had heard from high authority that if they had the water driven into their houses on the constant system the pipes in a great number of the houses would be totally insufficient to bear the pressure. Therefore, to agree to a Motion of this kind might lead to dangerous consequences. At the same time he should be sorry to negative it. He thought the House would do well to remain content with the discussion that had arisen, and that it should, for the present, postpone giving a decision on the subject, and therefore they should say it was a question that ought not to be put. He begged to move the Previous Question.

seconded the Amendment. Notwithstanding the many instructive speeches they had heard, no opportunity had arisen for any of those who represented the ratepayers of the Metropolis to be heard, even for a moment, on this question; and, seeing that it so vitally affected their interests, they ought to have that opportunity before the House came to a decision. But there was one thing which his experience in that House had taught him, and that was the danger of passing general abstract Resolutions; and this was espe- cially the case when the Resolution was on a subject on which no half-dozen Gentlemen were agreed. A gloss had been put on the Resolution by the Home Secretary, and if they passed, the Resolution they would have people saying to-morrow that the House of Commons had condemned the present sources of supply, and the inadequacy of the present sources of supply, as well as decisions so carefully framed by Committees of the House, more than one of which had investigated this subject, not empirically, but by the light of scientific and practical evidence. He might remind the House that he was the only Member now present—and he believed the only one who was now a Member of the House—who sat on the Committee on whose Report the Act of 1852 was passed. That Committee comprised men whose business qualities were certainly never surpassed in that House; and after 40 days consecutive sitting, and after the examination of numerous scientific and other witnesses, they came to the conclusion that the Thames afforded one of the best sources of supply. This Resolution was a virtual censure on the proceedings of that Committee, because they had been told by the supporters of it that the Thames was an unfit source of supply. He believed that was a mistake; he believed that the water of the Thames was capable of being made a perfectly healthy and useful source of supply. They should then, he thought, be careful not to pass an abstract Resolution of this kind on the eve of sending a Bill on the subject to a Committee. They ought to be very careful not to lead Members of that Committee to a foregone conclusion. Why, on that Committee of 1852 they had a scheme brought before them similar to that propounded by the hon. Member for Hastings. The late Mr. Hope had a favourite idea that the water supply of London should be taken from the chalk at Watford, and Mr. Hope Scott introduced the subject in a long speech, in which he said that the water had fallen from Heaven about the year 1668, that it had since percolated through the chalk slowly, and that it was now, to use his own words, "prime old water." In a matter which affected the lives of millions, he did not think that the House should rashly restrict itself to any particular plan, and therefore he hoped the hon. Gentleman would not press his Motion.

said, the House had been told that the opinion of the hon. Member for Hastings (Mr. Kay-Shuttleworth) rested on his own authority and that of the hon. Member for the University of Edinburgh (Dr. Lyon Playfair). But the Report of the Committee had produced on his mind a totally opposite impression. In fact, their opinion appeared to coincide with that of the hon. Member for Hastings. Again, Dr. Graham, Mr. Hoffmann, Dr. Miller, who constituted the Chemical Commission, preferred the water from the chalk. The Water Supply Commissioners said the water from the present sources—the Thames and the Lea—would be good if means were taken for excluding sewage and other pollutions, and obtaining a proper system of filtration—in other words, that the Thames water would not be so good as that from the chalk without two conditions, which it was physically impossible to obtain. Of course if no impurities were allowed to enter the river the water would be comparatively pure; but, considering the large and increasing population in the district drained by the Thames, he feared this would be very difficult. On the other hand, the chalk was a natural filter, and from the chalk an immense supply might be obtained at comparatively small expense. With regard to hard water and soft, it was true that boiling diminished the hardness, but the boiling must be continued so long that it was a question whether it would not be more economical to apply Clark's process. As to the objection that taking water from the chalk formation would exhaust the surface rivers, he could not see that this effect could be produced more by taking water from a deep reservoir than in taking it from the surface, for the same quantity would be taken in each case. He did not wish to say a word against the water companies, for he thought they did their best under the circumstances; but it was of the utmost importance to the Metropolis to have a supply of pure and wholesome water.

said, that he entirely agreed in what had been said as to the impropriety of passing an abstract Resolution, so that he should certainly vote for the Previous Question, if it were pressed; but, at the same time, he was convinced that a constant supply was indispensable to the population of London; though it was right to say the de- ficiency that had hitherto existed in this respect was not so much the fault of the water companies, but was chiefly owing to the want of efficient arrangements in the houses supplied. By constant supply, he meant water constantly in the mains, from which it could be drawn at pleasure. In the case of houses with cisterns the difficulty was capable of an easy solution; but in the poorer class of houses some control was required in order to secure a sufficient supply without waste. In regard to the question of purity of water, he believed that the Thames water might be rendered unobjectionable.

said, there were some things stated in the debate to which he should like to have replied, but considering the kind manner in which he had been received, he would not occupy the time of the House any longer. He should be quite ready to withdraw his Motion, being satisfied with the discussion which had taken place, but should take an opportunity of raising it on another occasion.

thought it was very undesirable to occupy so much of the time of the House in the discussion of abstract Resolutions, and if the right hon. Member for Shoreham would press his Motion he would vote for it.

objected to the withdrawal of the Motion of the hon. Member for Hastings.

said, that in that case he should have great pleasure in voting for the Motion of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. S. Cave).