asked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether Her Majesty's Government have, under the guarantees authorized by the Act 18 and 19 Vic. c. 99, been obliged to provide the half-year's interest recently due on the Turkish Loan of 1855, and specially charged upon the Egyptian Tribute, or any part thereof; and, whether he will lay upon the Table of the House an Account showing the amount, if any, so provided, and any Correspondence with the French, Turkish, or Egyptian Governments upon the subject?

Sir, the Turkish Government—the Porte—did not provide the dividend on the Turkish Guaranteed Loan which fell due in February, and Her Majesty's Government, as an act of courtesy to the Porte, requested the Bank of England, in the first instance, to advance the amount temporarily, in order to give an opportunity for the Turkish Government to fulfil its obligations. After a reasonable time had elapsed, and the money had not been provided, it was found necessary to exercise the powers given to the Government by the Act of 1855, and to issue the amount of the interest and the commission, together with the interest and the commission on the sum advanced by the Bank, out of the Consolidated Fund. The amount so issued was £77,448. We have communicated with the French Government on the subject, and, no doubt, shall receive shortly a communication from them as to the course that is to be pursued. I may add that a portion of the charge of the Guaranteed Loan should have been defrayed out of the Egyptian Tribute, which the Khedive is bound, under the firman of the Porte, to remit direct to the Bank of England; but up to yesterday, no remittance had been received from His Highness, though, in answer to the remonstrance of Her Majesty's Government, it has been announced that a small payment on account of the tribute due to Turkey would be forwarded at once. This is the state of affairs, and as soon as the Correspondence is in a proper state, it shall be laid before Parliament. Her Majesty's Government have communicated the facts as they occurred to the French Government, and they are about to reclaim from that Government a moiety of the sum which they have issued from the Consolidated Fund, in accordance with the declaration exchanged between the two Governments in 1855.

I beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether the Government has received from either of the contracting Powers, Turkey or Russia, the Terms of Peace; and, if so, whether he can communicate them to the House?

No, Sir, they have not yet been received.

presented a Petition, signed by 8,200 inhabitants of Bombay, both Europeans and Natives, against the proposed new taxes in India. He was informed by one who was well competent to judge that there was not a single mercantile firm in Bombay a representative of which had not signed the Petition. The petitioners objected in the strongest possible way to any increase of the salt duty upon people who had only recently recovered from a severe famine. The proposal of a licence tax from which all professional and official parties should be exempted also met with their strongest opposition. Considering the importance of the Petition, he should move that it be printed.

pointed out that, in the ordinary course, the Petition would go before the Committee on Public Petitions, and if they considered it of sufficient importance, they would recommend that it be printed. If the Committee did not take that course, it would be competent for the hon. Member to move that it be printed.

said, that after the explanation of the right hon. Gentleman, he would defer his Motion till he saw what action the Committee would take.

in rising to call attention to the establishment of a censorship of the Press in Bengal and Bombay, and to move—

"That legislation for our Indian fellow-subjects subversive of fundamental principles of the British Constitution should be adopted without this House being previously consulted upon the urgent necessity of such a course,"

Sir, I hope the hon. Member who has made this Motion (Mr. O'Donnell) will not suppose that I shall presume to pronounce an opinion upon the use which he has thought fit to make of his right as a Member of Parliament to introduce it to the notice of the House. No doubt he has done so under a very strong sense of the urgency of the case, and I do not at all make myself a judge of his conduct in that respect; but I must say, and that in the name of the urgency and importance and difficulty of the case, I am disposed to make an appeal to him and an appeal to others not to attempt to prosecute discussion upon it at the present time. It appears to me that the matter undoubtedly is one of extreme gravity. I have rarely read an announcement affecting the proceedings of any portion of the Government of this country with greater pain than that with which I have read the recent tidings from India respecting the Order concerning the Press of that country. And that pain will, I believe, be shared by the whole of the Members of Her Majesty's Government, and those Members of the House who may have, or may have conceived they had, information sufficient to judge the whole case, and likewise to arrive at the conclusion that the Indian Government had acted wisely in the matter. For my own part, it appears to me that the objections which obviously apply to a measure such as that which has been adopted are so strong that I must, in common fairness and in common sense, presume that the Indian Government has seen reason of very great strength in order to induce it to resort to so extreme a proceeding. Therefore I am impressed, Sir, with the belief—and I cannot help thinking that the sentiment will generally pervade the House—that both prudence and fairness, and I would almost say decency, or, at any rate, Parliamentary propriety, require that we should wait to know what those reasons are before we proceed to discuss a matter of this kind. Taking it at its best, and supposing that the Indian Government are right, still the proceeding is one which must cause us the deepest pain. It must cause the deepest pain to all Members of this House, and particularly to those hon. Members who think with me, that the questions relating to the internal government of India, and the questions which concern the morality and justice with which we treat the people of India, are of far greater consequence, and will ultimately operate with far greater force in determining the relation between this country and India than those questions about her Frontiers and about foreign Powers on which a large number of the people of this country are so fond of dwelling. If we should arrive at the conclusion that the conduct of the Indian Government was wise—and I confess the reasons must be very strong indeed which will induce me to believe that the conduct of the Indian Government has been wise—the subject must still be a painful one, and one which should only be approached with full notice, and full time and materials for its consideration. If, on the other hand, we are to arrive at the conclusion that the measure had been unwise, do not let us suppose that our path becomes thereby a clear one, for one of the unfortunate incidents of distant government—one of the necessary and unfortunate incidents of distant government—is that it often happens, and has often happened in Indian matters, that even where we may think an error has been committed, any attempts to correct the error involve greater evils than even if the error were allowed to continue undisturbed. I can, as I have already said, pass no judgment on the course taken by the hon. Member, and I wish to be understood as most carefully reserving my own opinion upon every point of this case, except that I regard the matter as one of the extremest gravity; but we are not prepared for discussion at this moment. I make no doubt whatever that Her Majesty's Government will lose no time in placing us in possession of the fullest information with regard to it; and, in fact, informing us of everything they know upon a matter of the kind, as they will be anxious that we should share, as I think we are entitled to share, their responsibility in this matter. If that be so, I would represent to others, I would even entreat them—but possibly I am anticipating what will proceed from Her Majesty's Government, and if so, I do not think I am rendering any bad service to the public interest—but I would entreat them to wait the opportunity when we may be able to discuss the question with the information before us which the examination necessarily requires, especially as we cannot anticipate the reasons which may be given. We see in India that the proposition is one which has been carried through with great rapidity, as if it were a matter of extreme urgency, and that no doubt is a part of the res gestæ upon which we may have to pronounce judgment. It does not seem to me to bear on the question whether we ought to go forward with the discussion at this moment. The matter does not stand as I admit it might stand if this had been a mere project with respect to which a long interval would elapse before the authority of the Indian Government would be committed to it; but, as I understand the matter, the proceeding has been prompt, absolute, and final. If that be so, it is obvious the question of time is a question which does not press urgently upon us; and, even if it did, no urgency could be so great, in a matter of such delicacy, difficulty, and gravity as this as to call for discussion under the circumstances. I think there would be no evil so great in a matter of this gravity as our attempting to approach this discussion without the possession of those means which are absolutely necessary to form a judgment, in order to make that discussion satisfactory.

Sir, I confess I have been a little surprised at the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. O'Donnell) bringing forward his Notice to-day, because very recently the hon. and learned Member for Louth (Mr. Sullivan), put a Question to me upon the same subject—namely, whether the somewhat meagre telegram in the morning papers on the 15th instant was a correct report concerning the Bill the Indian Government recently brought in; and he further asked if I would undertake to lay the Act upon the Table of the House as soon as we received it? In reply to that Question, I willingly undertook not only to lay the Act upon the Table of the House, but also the discussions which took place thereon in the Indian Council. In the absence of the text of the Act, and the other information, it is absolutely impossible to discuss properly or fully the Motion of the hon. Gentleman; and I hardly expected that, under the circumstances, he would have brought it forward.

I beg to make an explanation. I certainly did not ask such a Question.

I said the hon. and learned Member for Louth asked the Question; and, of course, I thought the hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. O'Donnell) would have waited till we were in possession of these Papers. The India Office is not yet in full possession of the information. I can only concur fully in the reasons which have been so ably urged by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich why this discussion should not proceed. I think it is only justice that we should postpone our judgment till the facts are fully known to us. A great deal has been said of the Act recently passed, and I think it desirable that the law on the subject as it at present stands on the Indian Code should be better known. It provides that any person who by words spoken, or intended to be read, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, excites, or attempts to excite, feelings of disaffection to the Govern- ment established by law in British India, shall be punishable with transportation for life, or for any term, to which a fine may be added, or with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years, to which a fine may be added, or with a fine. This being the state of the law in India, it is only fair to the Indian Government to say that they are entitled to apply this stringent law to the editors of papers whose writings bring them within this class of offenders; and the Indian Government may, in the legislation which they have recently passed, have been anxious to mitigate the severity of the present law, and, by mitigating it, render it more suitable to be applied in putting down, with only such severity as may be necessary, seditious libels on the Administration and the Empire. It is only right that I should make this statement, because at present there seems to be an impression abroad that there is no provision, excepting the new Act, under which the editors of papers publishing seditious libels can be punished. I hope, after what has passed, the House will not proceed with the discussion.

said, he would not continue the discussion at the present moment; but one word he must say in justice to himself, because in the telegram which reported the measure from India, the Viceroy, it appeared, stated that he (Sir George Campbell) had proposed such a measure. He must say that to the best of his belief that statement was not, properly speaking, correct. He had no recollection of having proposed such a measure. He believed he had done nothing of the kind. He certainly had expressed himself in strong language of the evils with which they had to cope in India in connection with the matter—no one could have done so more strongly; but as regarded the remedy, he thought that was a point the most difficult that could be conceived in an absolute Government co-incident with free institutions. Therefore, considering the matter as one of great difficulty, he had been very slow indeed to propose a remedy; and when he was an official in India, it was the one thing that he hesitated to deal with—in fact, so to express himself, he had rather shirked it. One part of the news from India certainly did astonish him, and that was that the Bill was passed in a most summary way. The question had been considered for many years, and that it should now have been passed in this extraordinarily rapid manner was to him most strange. He understood that no Notice was given of any intention to pass the measure; for that on one day, Notice was given, and on the same day it passed into law. He must therefore express his great surprise that the measure had been passed in so rapid and unprecedented a manner for reasons which had in no degree been explained.

hoped, after what had been stated by his right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich, that the discussion would not be continued. It was scarcely possible that the House could have to consider a more important subject; but it did appear to him that at the present moment they did not possess the requisite materials to continue the discussion. He could not imagine why the Indian Government, after 10 years' consideration, should have passed this measure so rapidly. Nothing could be more certain than that for a Bill of that kind Notice should have been given just as it would have been given in that House. It was evident, from the statement of the noble Lord the Under Secretary of State for India, that the Bill had been passed by the Indian Government without consulting the authorities in England; and it was therefore the more important that the House should be placed in possession of full information before proceeding to discuss the matter.

said, that considerable surprise had been expressed by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich, and by other hon. Gentlemen at this Star Chamber Government in India. He desired to remind hon. Members that that House, for many years past, dealt with another country in the same way that the Indian Government had dealt with India—he referred to Ireland. In 1848, in dealing with certain Press offences, the House passed an Act called the Treason Felony Act. They found, too, that in 24 hours, the British Government suspended the Habeas Corpus Act; and, in the face of Europe, England, which had the character of being the protector of civil and religious liberty, left the liberty of Ireland in the hands of a Star Chamber in the Dublin Castle for the time being; but he was not aware that either the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich or the hon. Member for Hackney had expressed surprise when that Act for Ireland was before the House. The people of England and of Europe would see from this discussion that this state of things was another evidence of the value of the British Constitution, and that every people except Englishmen themselves enjoyed it. He was sure this discussion would be read in Ireland with great interest, because it would show the position that India was fast arriving at as an Empire under the British Constitution.

said, that especially in deference to the wish of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich, he bogged the leave of the House to withdraw the Motion.

explained. He had not stated that the Secretary of State had not been consulted on the subject, but that he was not in possession of the text of the Act or of the discussion which had passed in regard to it.

desired some explanation of the two items mentioned in the explanatory Note—

"£3,200 for the special mission of the Earl of Rosslyn to Madrid to attend the marriage of the King of Spain, and £4,500 for the Duke of Ahercorn's special mission to Rome to invest His Majesty the King of Italy with the Insignia of the Order of the Garter."

regretted that this country should not have been more fully represented on the occasion of the Funeral of the King of Italy, and that some disappointment should have been caused in the matter both here and in Italy. He thought it fortunate that an opportunity should so soon afterwards have occurred of showing that the friendly feelings between the two countries were as warm as ever; and he did not think the House would regret that that opportunity should have been taken advantage of. In regard to the ceremony in connection with the Garter, precedent had been strictly followed. The expenses af such a mission as the Duke of Abercorn's, designed, as it was, to worthily represent Her Majesty on a great occasion, and to testify to the friendly feelings existing between England and Italy, could not be estimated beforehand, and, therefore, a round sum of £4,500 was put down. The bills had not come in when the Estimate was printed; but, judging from those which had been received within the last few days, he believed the whole expenses of the mission would fall very far short of the sum mentioned in the Estimate. Probably £1,000 would be surrendered to the Exchequer. He might add that, notwithstanding the number of persons forming the suite of the Duke of Abercorn, only the expenses of four were charged upon the Estimate, and that the proper performance of the ceremonial rendered it necessary that the Ambassador should be accompanied by Garter King-at-Arms. The mission of the Earl of Rosslyn was of a peculiar character. Though there were a great many precedents for missions to invest Sovereigns with the Garter, there was an absence of such precedents for the mission to Spain. Sovereigns being usually married before they ascended the Throne, the Marriage of a King was a very rare occurrence. Moreover, there were circumstances connected with this Marriage of a special character, and of which Her Majesty's Government thought they ought to take notice. It was founded upon personal affection; and the Government thought it desirable to congratulate not only the King of Spain, but also the Spanish nation, upon an event which was likely to inaugurate a new state of things at the Spanish Court, and conduce to the best interests of Spain. Accordingly, the opportunity was taken for a warm expression of friendly feelings and congratulations, and an exchange of international courtesies. The expenses had been strictly looked into; but it was inevitable that they should be large. On arriving at Paris, the members of the mission had to provide themselves with horses and carriages, and these horses and carriages they had been obliged to take to Spain. He did not think that any expense had been incurred needlessly. Travelling was expensive in Spain; and it was essential to the main object of the mission that it should correspond with the ancient pomp of the Spanish Court, and with the representation of other countries on the occasion.

expressed satisfaction at the remarks of the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. He (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) had at first been somewhat staggered at the sum named in the Estimate, and he was glad to hear that it was beyond that which would actually be required. There could be but one feeling in the mind of the Committee and the country on the subject—that, although the expense, as it appeared in the Estimates, might seem great, it would have been more to be regretted if the mission had not been carried out in a manner consistent with the dignity of this country and the sincere good wishes which we entertained towards the Kingdom of Italy. He was bound to say that he, in common with many other persons in the country, felt some regret that on the death of King Victor Emmanuel some person intimately connected with Royalty was not sent to represent Her Majesty at the Funeral. He had, however, thought it undesirable to express that regret publicly in the House, being sure that no slight to Italy had been intended on that occasion; and it was gratifying to think that the Government had shown the desire which was undoubtedly entertained by this country to do all the honour it could to Italy, and to show its regard and esteem for the Italian Kingdom and people.

observed that he believed he was the only Member of the House of Commons who had been present at the magnificent spectacle of the Funeral of King Victor Emmanuel. He called it magnificent, for in the whole course of his life, and having witnessed many State pageants, he had never seen any which would in any way bear comparison with it. He could not help expressing his warmest admiration and respect for the noble manner in which the Italian nation had, with a spontaneous and genuine mourning, performed the last obsequies to that great Sovereign whom they had revered and loved. He could not deny that he had heard general regret expressed at Rome, that the British nation had not been represented in that splendid procession by one of our own Royal Family, or—as had been done by France—by one of those distinguished Generals who had deserved well of our country; but, at the same time, from what he had heard, he did not consider that those expressions of regret had in any way weakened or lessened those cordial feelings of friendship and esteem with which England was regarded by the people of Italy; and, looking at those feelings, he could not help wishing that Her Majesty's Government would cement more closely their alliance with that young and daily becoming more powerful nation, whose influences extended into every part of the Mediterranean—a quarter in which we ourselves had such important interests. With regard to the mission of the Duke of Abercorn, the high compliment thus paid by our gracious Queen to the new King of Italy, as well as the Representatives selected to convey the honour to Rome, had, he had reason to believe, given very great satisfaction to the Royal Family of Italy, and to the Italian nation, and had entirely effaced and removed any regret the Italians might have felt on the occasion of the Funeral; and he (Sir Eardley Wilmot), for one, could not for a moment grudge the expenditure of the sum found in the Estimates—in fact, if it had been much larger, he would have gladly voted for it, if it had been necessary for the proper discharge of the duties of the mission.

who also disavowed any desire to see this country represented in a mean or niggardly way abroad, inquired why there was no mention in the Estimates of the mission of the Earl of Roden on the occasion of the death of Victor Emmanuel?

observed that the heavy expense of missions was often due in great part to the lavishness of servants and subordinates, who went to the best hotels, and, as he understood, had carte blanche for whatever entertainment they pleased to have. Nothing, he thought, could be more unfortunate than that an English Embassy should imitate the vulgar extravagance of the American tourist. Simplicity would be much more becoming. So far as Italy was concerned, we appeared to have oscillated between the two extremes.

explained that the mission of the Earl of Roden did not appear in the Estimates, because it was one of personal respect on the part of Her Majesty.

observing that there was an item of £1,500 in this Vote for expenses connected with the proposed Commercial Treaty with France, asked what the present position of the negotiations was? He did not all complain of the amount of the Vote, which appeared to him extremely reasonable.

stated that the negotiations were broken off at the request of the French Government some time ago, and that the French Government had not since shown any readiness to reopen them, owing, as they explained, to the extremely depressed state of trade in France at the present time. He wished he could hold out some immediate prospect of the negotiations being renewed; but, unfortunately, he was unable to do so.

complained of the excessive charge made for pilotage in the Canal, and hoped the Government would call the attention of the Directors to the fact.

said, the Government had had this question before them for some time. It was a difficult one to settle; but he could assure the hon. Member that the aim of the Government would be to secure the best terms possible.

asked if this amount would complete the commutation of the Schomberg Annuity, or whether a further sum would be charged on the Consolidated Fund for that purpose? The amount of £18,000, charged as a Supplementary Estimate on an original Estimate of £8,000, seemed a very large one for the commutation of small annuities.

said, he did not think the commutation of the Schomberg Annuity would be quite completed by the amount granted under this head. As to the remainder, the sum was taken for the commutation of upwards of 70 small allowances hitherto paid from the Consolidated Fund; and the principle which had been observed in respect to those commutations was the generally accepted one—that, whenever the Treasury could purchase small annuities charged on the Fund, on satisfactory terms, they did so, though it would be obviously undesirable to take extraordinary steps to purchase them.

inquired when the Report of the Commission on Local Government and Taxation of Towns in Ireland would be presented?

said, the Commission referred to was appointed on the recommendation of a Select Committee of that House in the year 1876, and it was thought desirable that local inquiries should be made by the Commission in Ireland. The Commission was re-appointed in the year 1877, and, as the hon. and gallant Member knew, it had collected a large amount of valuable evidence as to the condition of Ireland. The Commission would meet for the purpose of considering its Report before Easter, and he hoped it would be presented very soon after Easter. As regarded the Poor Law Unions, Ireland, Commission, it had not yet concluded its labours; but its Report would be laid before the House at the earliest possible moment.

said, he should be glad to know whether the Report of the Poor Law Unions, Ireland, Commission would be presented before the end of June?

asked for some particulars as to the number of gentlemen on each Commission, and the salaries received by them? The item for salaries to the Local Government and Taxation of Towns Commission was considerably over £4,000, and that seemed to be a very large expenditure under such a head.

said, it would be seen by the Estimates that the work of the Local Government Commission had extended over two years, and the legal Commissioners were each paid five guineas for every working day.

said, it seemed that the Commissioners were also allowed one guinea a-night each for subsistence, so that they would be receiving six guineas a-day each for their services. He wished to know how it was that the Commissioners were paid at such a rate? The Irish Poor Law Union Commissioners appeared to have received three guineas a-day each. When temporary Commissioners were appointed in England or Scotland, their services were given without payment; and he did not know why men could not be found to do gratuitously the work of such Commissions in Ireland. The Vote referred to their leisure time, as being occupied in the work, and he thought well-qualified men could easily be got, as in England and Scotland, to do the work, without making a charge on the public purse.

wished to know what was the evidence given before the Local Government and Taxation of Towns Commission which involved an expense of £1,000 for shorthand notes?

said, that out of three of the Commissioners two were gentlemen of standing at the Irish Bar, who ought to be fairly remunerated if they had to leave their professional duties to attend to the business of a Commission. Five guineas a-day did not appear to be too much to pay for such a service. One of the Commissioners did duty voluntarily, and simply with a desire to obtain information for the benefit of the public. With regard to the charge of £1,000 for shorthand notes, the Local Government Commission collected a great deal of evidence which it was thought necessary that a shorthand writer should take down and transcribe.

did not think the explanation of the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland was a satisfactory one. Why were the services of gentlemen of the Bar necessary at all in such a case? Would not gentlemen who were not members of the Bar have performed the duty equally well from patriotic motives? Commissioners were found to give their services gratuitously out of Ireland. It would appear as if the Members of the Local Government and Taxation of Towns Commission had found time to perform their duties after the Courts had risen.

asked for the names of the Commissioners, and then it could be ascertained whether they were absent from the Courts while they were performing their duties on the Commission?

replied, that two of the Commissioners who were barristers were—Mr. W. A. Exham, Q.C., and Mr. E. B. Lawless, Q.C. The third Commissioner was an Englishman, formerly in the service of the Local Government Board, and was not a barrister.

said, he was most anxious to know when the Poor Law Union Commission would present its Report?

asked for the name of the gentleman on the Local Government and Taxation of Towns Commission who did his work voluntarily?

believed it was Mr. Livedale Corbett. He hoped the Poor Law Union Commission would conclude its labours and Report before the end of the Session, but he could not say positively.

said, these Commissions appeared to be appointed in Ire-at very considerable expense to the State, and some of the remarks made during the discussion appeared to involve the principle that barristers should not give their services to the nation gratuitously. He had sat on several Royal Commissions in Scotland, on which there were bar- risters of high standing, who had acted zealously in the discharge of the duties entrusted to them without the slightest pecuniary consideration for the work they performed. He did not see why Irish barristers should be remunerated for acting as Commissioners simply because they were Irish barristers.

inquired why the expenses of these two Commissions had not been included in the ordinary Estimates for the year, instead of in the Supplemental Estimates?

said, the Poor Law Union Commission had been appointed on the Motion of that House on the 6th March, 1877, and therefore the sum for its expenses could not appear in the Estimates for that year. The other Commission was appointed on the recommendation of a Committee which had reported in favour of further information being obtained. He could not say why the expenses for the Commission were not included in the Estimates for the year, but would make inquiry and answer a Question on the subject if the hon. Gentleman would put one.

supposed the Vote could not be refused, but he considered the explanation unsatisfactory and the charge extravagant. If the Commission had sat out of Ireland, such fees would not have had to be paid.

saw no reason why these heavy charges should be paid. The fact of two of these gentlemen being barristers was no reason for paying them over liberally. It was well known that a system of petting the Bar existed in Ireland; and, looking to the probability that these paid Commissioners simply employed their leisure time in doing the work of the Commission, half the remuneration asked for would be sufficient. He would move to reduce the Vote by the sum of £2,319.

said, the amount seemed rather a large one to be devoted solely to meet the cost of conferring the Order of St. Michael and St. George on several Colonists, and for completing the insignia of various classes of the Order. He would suggest that an alteration might be made in the device attaching to the Order. As the Order was now conferred exclusively for Colonial service, it should, in his opinion, bear the device—"Imperl Porrecta Majestas," instead of the Ionian motto—"Auspicium melioris ævi," which had a taint of irony in it.

asked why the Estimate was brought forward in the shape of a Supplementary Charge for the year ending 31st March, 1878, whereas part of the proposed Vote had been spent in previous years? Then a sum of £5,163 appeared to be set down for the expenses of the Commission during the year 1878–9, a proceeding which seemed perfectly inexplicable in a Supplementary Estimate. No doubt these expenses had been incurred through the passing of an Act of Parliament; and the preservation of Epping Forest, as an open space for the public, was an object worthy of support; but the Vote ought to have been brought forward in the ordinary Estimates for the year.

also desired some information as to the Vote, as he felt a difficulty in understanding what all the money was wanted for. What had Parliament done for Epping Forest? What had the Government done for it? He knew the Corporation of the City of London had spent money to preserve the Forest as an open space; but, so far as he knew, the Commissioners had been simply an obstruction. How was it this charge came into the Supplementary Estimates?

said, it appeared that one of the Epping Forest Commissioners was paid three guineas a-day "when employed on the business of the Commission," and two guineas extra when sitting as Chairman. What were the circumstances under which the day's fee was charged? Did a Commissioner give a whole day's work to the public service, or did he simply walk down to the office, and say—"Well, how are you getting on to-day; is there anything to he done?" and charge a fee for that? The system of charging so much per day seemed to be rather a dangerous one, and he should like to know whether any rules were laid down on the subject?

said, he was afraid he could not give any minute information upon the point referred to, but the usual rule was that the Commissioner stated himself what days he had been employed, and his statement was taken upon his authority. It was not to be supposed that any fictitious charge was made. There was no doubt that gentlemen employed on these Commissions did give a great deal of time to the work, and their disposition was rather to give more than less. The inquiry of the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Monk) arose, he thought, from a printer's error. The Papers stated that an item of £5,000 was to be taken for the financial year 1878–9, and it should have been 1877–8. The total would show that the amount was for the last-mentioned period. The Epping Forest Commission had now made its Report, which, he hoped, would be the foundation of legislation on the subject.

asked whether the sum of £11,300, put down in the Estimates, covered the whole expense of the Commission from its foundation in August, 1871, to the 31st March, 1878? If that were so, it was only a reasonable charge; but if it were for the expenditure of the financial year only, it was an enormous and uncalled-for expense.

said, the Vote showed that the bulk of expenditure had been already advanced from the Civil Contingencies Fund, and this was an adjustment of the balances.

directed attention to the amount of £333 17s. 4d., being the charges for the preservation of cemeteries abroad—namely, for the Anglo-French cemetery at the Piraeus, moiety of the wages of the custodian, £16 16s.; for the British cemeteries on the Bosphorus, salary of custodian and wages of labourers, £317 1s.4d. Both these charges were for the year 1876–7; and he would like to know in whose care the British cemeteries in the Crimea were placed, and who were responsible for their preservation?

replied, that the British cemeteries in the Crimea were under the care of a Russian pensioner, who had a cottage to live in, and was paid the sum of £20 a-year. His duty was to maintain the walls and keep the tombs in a proper state.

called attention to the sum charged for expenses in connection with the Dover Harbour Bill, 1874. They were brought up to the year 1878, and amounted to the considerable charge of £1,470 10s. 7d. A great deal of interest was taken in the Dover Harbour question, and an explanation as to the largeness of the sum placed in the Estimates would, no doubt, be acceptable to the Committee and the public.

referring to the same item, asked the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury, whether it was a fact that the Government, having paid that money to the Harbour Board of Dover, and gained the control of the measure by that arrangement, on the understanding that they would carry out the scheme, were not now prosecuting any improvement of Dover Harbour? If that was so, the expenditure seemed to him, under the circumstances, most impolitic and unjustifiable. He would like to know, also, from the First Lord of the Admiralty, in the absence of the President of the Board of Trade, whether the right hon. Gentleman considered that the present state of Dover Harbour could be regarded as satisfactory in reference to the present contingency of war?

thought his hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Freshfield) could hardly expect him, without any Notice being given of the Question, to give an answer, to which considerable importance would be attached because of the character of the subject. The expenditure had been incurred in the Sessions of 1873 and 1874. The hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir. Whitwell) would, doubtless, remember that, in 1873, the Dover Harbour Bill was prosecuted in that House by the late Government as far as the second reading. The Bill was taken up by the present Government on their coming into power, and was afterwards sent to a Committee up-stairs; but on consideration, it was found that the circumstances were not such as to enable the Government to proceed further with the measure. The expenditure to which hon. Members had referred, had been incurred at the instance of the late, and also of the present, Government; and they thought it would not be right to allow the cost of conducting the Bill to fall upon the Dover Harbour Trust. Therefore, the charge had been taken out of the public fund.

wanted especially to know what the money was really for, and what were the conditions upon which the Town Board of Dover entered into the Harbour question? Had any money been paid to the Board for the relinquishment of their assumed rights over Dover? He had objected to this charge on a former occasion, and had pressed for information respecting it. He maintained that the charge was one which would more properly come under the Vote for Harbours, in which case the President of the Board of Trade might be called upon to explain it, and justify it.

said, as this expenditure partook of the nature of a legal charge, and not a Harbour charge proper, it came more appropriately under this Vote than it would under that for Harbours. The Bill had been withdrawn only after the fullest consideration. The expenses incurred in the preparation and prosecution of the measure were chiefly for the charges of the surveyor, solicitor, and Parliamentary agent; and, considering the national, as well as the legal, character of the undertaking, it was reasonable that the money should be paid out of the public funds.

asked, whether the Treasury had paid any money, and, if so, to whom, for the expenses incurred by the Sheriff Clerk of Aberdeen in defending an action brought against him in his official capacity?

inquired whether the cemetery in the Crimea was kept up at the expense of the English or of the Russian Government? If at the expense of the latter, perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman could inform the Committee in what condition the ground was?

asked why the salaries of the custodians of the cemeteries in the Crimea and on the Bosphorus were charged in this Vote, if the payment was a regular one?

explained that the charge for keeping the cemeteries in good order had always appeared in this Vote. He, however, acknowledged that it would more conveniently come under the Vote connected with the Foreign Office. With respect to the preservation of the cemeteries, according to the last Report, they were considered to be in a perfectly good state.

asked for some information respecting the International Sugar Conference, which had been held at Paris, Brussels, and the Hague. In this Vote, the item appeared of £326 16s. for the expenses of Messrs. Walpole, Le Feuvre, and Payn, in attending at the Conference. As no duty was now imposed on sugar by this country, he did not think there was any need for sending Representatives to the Conference. The labours of the Conference had not yet terminated; and, as further charges for expenses might be incurred when it re-assembled, he thought the Committee ought to be assured of the necessity of England being represented at its sittings.

said, he could not agree with the hon. Member (Mr. Courtney) that this country had no interest in this question. The manner in which the duties were to be charged on the different classes of sugar involved the question whether bounty was, in point of fact, to be given by any foreign Government upon the sugar manufactured in their own country?—and that had been a question of considerable difficulty for many years past. Some years ago, there was, in the International Convention, a discussion, or an arrangement, as to the basis on which the sugar duty should be charged, so as to encourage fairness of treatment. The British Government had been a party to that. Of course, since the duty had been taken off, their position was in some respects different to what it had been before; but the Government of this country were still interested in maintaining a fair system of charge between themselves and foreign countries, as regarded the mode in which the duty was levied in France, Holland, and elsewhere, their object being to see that fair play was given to our refiners as compared with the refiners of the other countries concerned. Therefore, Her Majesty's Government felt they were doing quite right in appointing Commissioners to go to this International Convention, which was attended by the Representatives of the other Powers interested.

had no doubt the sugar refiners of this country were interested, but he did not think the nation was. At all events, our interest was remote. It was purely a class interest, and he did not consider there was any necessity for the attendance of British Representatives at the Convention.

asked the Secretary to the Treasury for an explanation of the balance—£197 17s. 7d.—of the expenses incurred by the Sheriff Clerk of Aberdeen in defending himself in an action, and wished to know whether that action had arisen from his own default?

said, £600 had been paid in the previous year on account of these expenses incurred by the Sheriff Clerk of Aberdeen, who was made the subject of an action for an alleged illegal process. Having appealed to the House of Lords, and obtained a verdict, the Sheriff Clerk applied to the Treasury for his expenses incurred as a public officer. The Treasury agreed to pay them, as an act of grace and discretion.

said, he thought that if the payment to the Sheriff Clerk was a matter of grace and discretion, the Treasury should have left the Sheriff Clerk to pay his own expenses. With reference to the Sugar Convention, the interest of the refiners in the United Kingdom was an extensive interest, and the Government deserved credit for protecting it. If they were to act otherwise, and the trade were ruined, no doubt a just remonstrance would be addressed to them.

maintained that, if the sugar interest was to be protected in this way, other trades might claim similar consideration. It was a fallacy to adhere to these old notions, and he contended that we had nothing to do with the sugar trade, except to buy it in the cheapest market wherever we could.

inquired whether it was intended that the various items which appeared in this Vote of "Civil Contingencies Fund" should be allotted to the Votes in respect of the different Departments to which they properly belonged, or were the items to remain where they were? The different Departments ought, in his judgment, to apply for each item under its proper head, and not in this one Vote of this Fund. Thi3 was in reality a banking fund account for all Civil Departments to draw on for money in excess of the funds voted to the regular order under the respective Votes. It stood to the Civil Department in the same relation as the Treasury Chest Fund stood to Army, Navy, Colonial, and sometimes political services. But both funds should be kept strictly to the business of lending money—the loans being repaid by the Departments borrowing applying to Parliament for additional moneys.

alluded to two other items of charge—namely, £35, the amount spent by the Crown Agents for the Colonies to enable a Native of Johanna to return to his native country, and £4 8s. 8d. for expenses incurred in transmitting a manumitted female slave from Constantinople to Malta. He called attention to these charges, because he supposed the circumstances in both cases must be of an exceptional character.

replying to the hon. and gallant Gentleman (General Sir George Balfour), explained that the charges were laid, in the first instance, on the Civil Contingencies Fund. The Auditor General had brought them into that Fund, because there was no Vote to which they were properly chargeable. Whether they would be placed afterwards to the credit of the particular Votes concerned, he was not himself in a position to say. They would be brought under review, he believed, a second time; and he was inclined to think they would be placed under their respective Votes.

asked whether the following payments were to be continued or not:—Extra pay to officers of the United Kingdom Telegraph Company, £576 10s., and allowances to directors and staff of the same Company? A foot-note explained that these payments were disallowed in accordance with the opinion expressed by the Public Accounts Committee in 1876. He wished to know what had become of Votes for the expenditure incurred since 1876, and whether the amount would continue to be paid?

explained that there had been some error committed in the mode in which the payment was made. The payment was not a continuous one.

complained that the telegraph clerks were paid at a lower rate in Dublin than in London, and also, he believed, in some provincial towns. This was unfair. The same work ought to be paid at the same rate, wherever it was done. The clerks in London were also paid for extra work; but in Dublin they were, in lieu of extra pay, allowed to leave their work earlier on less busy days, though they preferred to remain and receive additional pay, because they did not know how to occupy the spare time profitably elsewhere. He hoped the noble Lord the Postmaster General would, in this respect, place the Dublin telegraph clerks on the same footing with the London clerks.

pointed out that the subject had no connection with the Vote before the Committee. He would, however, promise to deal with it when the proper Vote came under consideration.

wished to know from the First Lord of the Admiralty, how he explained the fact that whilst he claimed credit for savings in the Admiralty Votes by reason of diminished cost of provisions, the Army, on the contrary, found it necessary to ask for a large Supplementary Vote because of the increased price of provisions? He therefore wished to know where any saving had been effected?

Of stores.

thought there must have been some misreport to the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Admiralty. This Vote seemed to assume that there was increased cost in the price of provisions. Now, he would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman, whether corn was any higher last year than the year before? So far as his experience went, corn was not dearer, but cheaper. Then it was said that beef was dearer. That was not so. Sugar was not dearer, tea was not dearer, coffee was not dearer, and he would like to know what articles of provisions were dearer than in the year previous? It was desirable that the Government should give some tangible reason why the Vote was larger.

said, the chief reason for this £150,000 was the additional cost with regard to broad stuffs, and also with regard to meat. The Estimate was made just previous to the rise, and hon. Members would remember that the rise in corn naturally caused a rise in bread. As hon. Members were aware, there had been a rise in the price of meat as well. There had also been an addition to the number of soldiers borne on the Establishment. The number had been fully up to the mark, and rather larger than in former years. These were the three material causes of this increase of £150,000.

said, that was not a satisfactory answer at all. He did not question the additional expense of an additional number of soldiers, but this was put down to the additional cost of provisions; and he submitted again that the price of corn last year was not dearer than the year before; and, if hon. Gentlemen knew much about the price of beef, they would know that last year beef was cheaper than the year before, because American beef came into the market. He had no objection to the £150,000 for additional soldiers' rations; but that was not the reason. It was put down to high prices.

said, that perhaps he ought not to rise in connection with this Vote; but, inasmuch as the Estimates last year were prepared partly under his direction, he was bound to exonerate his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Loyd Lindsay) from any charge. This he knew, that before he left the War Office a rise had taken place in the price of corn and in the price of rations abroad. At the same time there was, no doubt, considerable excess in the Estimates in the course of the year. The additions were partly owing to the growth of recruiting and other causes; and, therefore, he might frankly say that if anyone had to stand in the white sheet he must. He must say the Estimates were not perhaps as precise as they could have been.

wished to say that he sold corn at the commencement of last year at 45s., and at the end of the year he sold some thousands of tons at 65s.

said, he had made inquiries, and he believed that the bread served to the soldier was made partly of seconds flour, and inferior to that which the soldier ordinarily purchased.

said, he saw no earthly reason why all these charges—except, perhaps, one—should not have been submitted to the House in May last year. He considered it an essential obligation on the part of every Minister entrusted with the control of public moneys to relieve himself of all the many responsibilities connected therewith, and to obtain the authority of the House of Commons for all unauthorized outlay, immediately its occurrence became known to him.

did not know whether they were required to discuss that sum of £12,000 altogether; because, if so, he should move the reduction of the Vote by £780 1s. 10d.

remarked that the hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite (Major Nolan) was not quite clear as to what this particular Vote was. It was the result of careful examination by the Comptroller and Auditor General of the expenditure by the Public Departments of their several Votes in the year 1876. The Comptroller reported that certain Departments not only spent the Votes given to them, but exceeded them to the extent of the amounts stated in this Excess Estimate. Separate items had been carefully examined by the Public Accounts Committee upstairs, and the Public Accounts Committee had allowed these charges as having been properly incurred under the circumstances. At the earliest moment it was the duty of his hon. Friend the Secretary of the Treasury to come down to Parlia- ment and ask for a Vote in the year 1877–8 for the amount spent in excess of the Votes for the year 1876–7. The consideration of the House was exercised by the Committee upstairs, and when he was a Member of that Committee with an hon. Gentleman opposite, they were most careful in passing these Excess Estimates. As for himself, he was glad to see that the amounts were lower this year than they had ever been before.

was exceedingly indebted to the right hon. Gentleman for the explanation he had given; but he considered there was more to be said. No doubt, the Public Accounts Committee had the important duty of detecting all omissions and commissions; but there was a primary duty to be performed by the authority who spent money which the House of Commons had not voted. The responsibility for such unauthorized expenditure was so great that the party incurring it ought to relieve himself by applying to Parliament for sanction for his assumed liability. But here they found that the Board of Trade, in the month of May, 1876, and in January, 1877, gave an order to incur expenditure at Dover, without the sanction of the House of Commons; and they perfectly well knew when they did that they were exceeding the Estimates passed by that House. They ought to have come to that House immediately the House met in February of last year and asked for an increase to the Estimates. That had nothing to do with the Committee on Public Accounts. He quite agreed that the £12,000, as compared with former excesses, was very small indeed; and he had no doubt the course pursued by the late Secretary to the Treasury had had a great effect in preventing irregularities.

moved that the Vote be reduced by £780 1s. 11d. At 2 o'clock that morning the Irish Members moved the adjournment of the debate; but they were not allowed to report Progress; and thus they were not only deprived of the opportunity of expressing their opinion, but their opinion could not be given to the country. The position of the Irish Members in that House was. this—they saw no hope that the Government would do anything whatever for Catholic Education in Ireland. Last year they did not debate the Esti- mates, because they had hopes that something would be done; but at present they were entirely without hope from the Government, and there was no sign of any kind or description that they intended to place Catholic youth in Ireland on a similar footing with the children of Secularists and Protestants. They could not allow that to continue, and it was their firm resolve to oppose the Vote by every means in their power without wasting time needlessly. Ireland contributed £8,000,000 a-year to Imperial taxation; £3,000,000 or £4,000,000 might be required in Ireland, and a surplus of £3,000,000 or £4,000,000 was sent over to England to be devoted to English purposes. The fact was, the Irish people paid for their own education, and therefore ought to have whatever education they chose. Let them, therefore, have equal means of education, or let them have no endowments at all. Let Protestant and Secular endowments be swept away, and let them have their own education. In moving the reduction of this Vote, he wished it to be understood that he had no animosity to Secularist education. It was quite right that if anyone wished to educate his child at a Secularist University, he should have ample opportunities of educating his child, and he was quite willing that every man should have the opportunity of educating his children. But from what he knew, Irish Members would, in the future, very much object to voting money for the endowment of Secularist education, when only Secularist education was to be endowed in Ireland; and it was his intention, whenever a Vote came up which would afford him the opportunity, to protest against this system. If the Government insisted on forcing this money on Ireland, it was going against a majority of three or four to one as far as Ireland was concerned. Why the Government should force this measure of Secularist education on Ireland, against the wishes of the Irish people, he could not understand. If the Government persisted in this Vote, it would be seen that Irish feeling was so strong that they could no longer disregard it, and a couple of Sessions would not pass before they would find it convenient to abandon the present system.

Does the hon. and gallant Member propose to omit the item or to reduce the Vote?

Sir, I propose to reduce the Vote.

really would appeal to the hon. and gallant Member, and would ask him to listen to a conclusive reason against his Amendment. He was not an admirer of the Irish Queen's Colleges, and therefore did not speak from that point of view; but the fact was, that under the regulations the fees received from students, instead of going directly to the Professors, were passed as a matter of account through the Exchequer, and an estimate was made of the probable amount to be paid to those who were entitled to the money. In the present case, it appeared that a larger amount than was at first estimated had been paid into the Exchequer, and it was necessary to take a Vote to pay it out. Therefore, if the Committee rejected the Vote, the position of the thing would be this—the Exchequer would have received £700 from fees which would go into the Consolidated Fund, and would not pay over to those to whom it properly belonged. Fees which had been received from students, which were intended to be paid as a matter of account to the Professors, would thus be retained by the public. The Exchequer would retain the students' money and the Professors would lose it. He was sure that the hon. and gallant Member did not wish that.

would be quite willing to vote compensation to the students if they were at all wronged; so that he did not see that the difficulty suggested need stop him on the present occasion.

was of opinion that the action of the hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Major Nolan) was not action against the present Vote, but was a protest against the whole system. It was a question which they had no means of raising in public except by their action in that House. This appeared to them the most feasible way of doing it. In many of the constituencies in Ireland, one of which he had the honour to represent, there were 97 per cent of Catholics, and for the last few years not a single student had been sent from them to any of the Queen's Colleges. As the hon. and gallant Member for Galway had put it, if the Secularists in Ireland were so numerous as to require a separate system of education, let them pay for it. He had no hesitation in saying that the Irish Catholics would have no objection to pay as they were paying at this moment; and he was sure the Presbyterians would not object as they had one College—namely, the Queen's College, Belfast. One of these Colleges—namely, that at Galway, was so much a failure, that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone), when he introduced his Bill for the system of University Education in Ireland, proposed to leave it out altogether. Seeing that the action of the Irish Members was a protest against the whole system of Queen's Colleges in Ireland, he hoped the hon. and gallant Member for Galway would continue to resist this Vote.

said, it appeared to him that the hon. Member who spoke last (Mr. O'Clery) had not accurately understood the remarks of the right hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers). The Government were not taking money in any way. They were only in the position of trustees who had received a sum of money and wanted to repay it. If hon. Members wanted to attack the Queen's Colleges, the proper time to do that was when the Queen's Colleges came before the House. This being merely a Supplementary Vote, he hoped the hon. and gallant Member would not trouble the House to divide upon it.

would go so far as to say that he was disposed to go so far as to suggest that the Professors should have full compensation for the fees they had not received. When the Professors accepted their Chairs in the Queen's Colleges, they expected a large amount in fees from a numerous attendance of pupils; but they only found a thin attendance at the classes, and their Chairs, accordingly, were not remunerative to anything like the extent that for their position and attainments they had a right to expect. The present was an opportunity on which we were called upon to form an opinion one way or the other. The Government might be the trustees; but the Irish Members of that House were in no respect the trustees for the Queen's University. The Representatives of the Irish Party had opposed the Grant to Queen's Colleges and to the Queen's University in Ireland from the commencement, and they would continue to put their opposition in a practical shape in every possible way and on every occasion when the question came within their ken. They would seize every opportunity of marking their sense of these anti-national and most prejudicial institutions.

said, he should be glad if his hon. and gallant Friend (Major Nolan) could see his way not to press his Motion to a division. There was no man who would more persistently than himself oppose grants of public money to the Queen's University; but he did not look upon this Vote in the light of a grant. It was simply a Vote for the purpose of handing to the Professors certain moneys which had been voluntarily paid into the Exchequer on their behalf by the students. The Professors were entitled to certain fees from the students, and an arrangement was made whereby these fees instead of being paid directly to the Professors were paid into the General Fund for the purpose of equal distribution. The money having been thus paid into the Exchequer for a particular purpose, all that was now sought was that the Exchequer should not be allowed to retain this money; but that it should be handed over to the persons for whose use it was paid. It was in no sense a grant, nor was the principle for which Irish Members contended so strenuously the other night at all involved. Indeed, the pressing to a division the Amendment would very much weaken the opposition to the Queen's College Votes. He appealed, therefore, to his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Galway (Major Nolan) not to persevere in his effort to throw out this Vote. If, however, he did so, he (Mr. Meldon) would vote with him, because the outside public would not draw the distinction between the Votes, and it was very important that the Irish people should know that the Irish Representatives were determined not to allow this system of education, so abhorent to them, to continue. He should be sorry, further, if a Vote was taken on the matter, as a Vote of the kind was apt to be misconstrued out-of-doors by people who could not distin- guish between the amount now asked and the motive and meaning of its payment, and a sum actually asked to be voted as a grant from the country to the University.

said, he could not withdraw from a position which was perfectly logical. If they started upon the common basis that the Queen's Colleges were not for the education of the majority of the population of Ireland, then they were perfectly right in objecting to the Vote. The effect of the process contemplated by the Vote was simply to make the Government trustees of the money paid by the students, and it was to this quasi-trusteeship to which we objected so strongly. He should not object to the money being returned to the students, who could deal with it as they thought fit; but he certainly could not sanction the system of trusteeship on the part of the Government which the Vote would set up and perpetuate.

again objected to the granting of money to an institution which, as he had stated on the previous evening, tended to lower the standard of intermediate education in Ireland.

hoped, that after the long discussion which had already been taken on the Vote, and the number of divisions to which that discussion had led, the hon. Gentleman would accept the decision at which the House had arrived, and would not put hon. Members to the trouble of dividing again for the eighth time.

said, there was no occupant of the Treasury bench from whom an appeal was entitled to greater consideration than from the hon. and gallant Gentleman. He regretted, however, that the Irish Members generally could not accede to it, for the fact was, they felt themselves constrained to challenge every item in the Vote in connection with the Queen's University. Consequently, the matter must be pressed to a division. He trusted the House would not misunderstand him. They felt it their duty to oppose to the last, and they were pledged to resist in every possible way the Vote.