The Press.
London, England, 1858-06-19 00:00:00

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THE MEMBER'S DIARY.
HOUSE OF LORDS.
MONDAY.

THE absence of the Premier from indisposition
naturally stops all business not either formal or
indispensable. Some pending debates, on Church-
rates, the Parliamentary Oaths, and other
measures, were accordingly postponed, and the
House engaged in mere miscellaneous discussion
on subjects instead of Bills. One question,
started by the Duke of BUCCLEUCH to-night,
relating to the Militia, provoked a long debate,
in which many suggestions were offered, and
some just complaints urged, touching the disci-
pline, treatment, pay, barrack accommodation,
aic., of the men. During the discussion the
House were gratified by learning from Lord
HARDINGE and the Duke of CAMBRIDGE that a
Royal Commission was shortly to be issued to
inquire into the whole subject of the Militia
organization, with the view of finding the means
of making that force most efficient in itself and
most useful as a feeder to the Line.
Their lordships are proverbially long-suffering
and courteous, tolerating almost any extent of
boredom rather than commit a breach of good
manners. But there are limits to human
endurance, and Lord KINGSTON passed the line.
The noble author of " Mexican Antiquities" had
placed and kept on the motion-paper a series of
resolutions embracing a wide range of topics, all
of personal character, and, among other things,
insinuating divers scandalous charges against
Rajah BROOKE. In fact, until Lord LYNDHURST
a few evenings since compelled his Lordship to
bring out a new edition of his queries, the
"votes and proceedings" of the Peers were made
the vehicle for circulating libels which can be
only paralleled by supposing that some pam-
phleteer or journalist had put into print a set of
questions addressed to John Smith or Frederick
Robinson, asking whether they had forged their
uncle's will,cut purses on the highway,or permeated
society cum privilegio under a ticket of leave.
In their original form Lord KINGSTON'S resolu-
tions were a scandal. Even when revised and
amended they continued to be a nuisance; and
so to-night, while the Noble Lord was still on his
legs, fumbling with papers, rubbing up his ideas,
and speaking, or trying to speak, the oppor-
tunity afforded by one of his dreary pauses was
adroitly seized by Lord REDESDALE, who moved
that "the House do now adjourn." "Sic me
servavit Apollo." Thus was Lord KINGSTON
snuffed out.

TUESDAY.
After a few, very few, last words, the Property
Qualification Bill was read a third time and
paned. By dexterous management, or inevit-
able necessity, it matters not which, the house
of Commons had made the property qualifies-
,Wl for their members a sham. They had now
limit up a Bill which imported that the qualifica-
tion, being a sham, ought to be abolished. As
the matter related exclusively to the domestic
arrangements of the Commons, the Peers could
make no objection. Besides, the whole princi-
ple of qualification had been practically surren-
dered more than twenty years ago, when the
qualifying income, which had once been strictly
limited to a revenue from land, was extended to
incomes accruing from moneys invested in stocks,
',hares, and commercial enterprises of all sorts.
By this change the property qualification be-
came anything you like, and the present Bill is
designed simply, like the manumission of the
• Lara serfs, " to make that nothing which was
• • still a name."

THURSDAY.
The slave trade, as surreptitiously carried on in
Cuba, was discussed, apropos of a petition from
a parish in Jamaica, presented by the Bishop of
OXFORD. Dr. WILBERFORCE himself, Lord
' BROUGHAM, Lord GREY, and other Peers who
possessed a long-standing title or hereditary right
to speak on the question, concurred in maintain-
ing that Spain had not only violated her solemn
-treaty- engagements for the suppression of the
slave trade, but had rendered herself liable to the
charge of having swindled England out of half a
million on false pretences in the affair. Yet the
question was evidently uppermost in the mind of
" • every speaker, What could be done with a Go-
vernment that could not be induced to keep its
faith, except at the cost of a war ?—a luxury
which Europe really could not afford just now.

TIIE Plt E s,s,

'wig, 19,

Lord MALMESBURY said the only pleasant'igii
that transpired in the debate—namely, that Mr.
DALLAS (who, by the way, was present in the
gallery during the evening) had promised to re-
commend his Government to take means for
preventing the desecration of the American flag
by a set of slave-trading ruffians.
i!” II Ott

FRIDAY. r
The Marquis of LANSDOWNE has not made up
his mind as to the expediency of proceeding by
way of Resolution to frame a new system of
Government for India. Learning, nevertheless,
from the " ordinary sources of information" that
a series of resolutions relating to that paramount
question had been adopted " elsewhere," he
inquired whether their Lordships might not have
the advantage of discussing them, instead of wait-
ing for the Bill. The Premier being still unfor-
tunately absent, Lord MALMESBURY promised to
reply on Monday.
A long discussion respecting the best means of
facilitating and cheapening private bills in Par-
liament afterwards ensued, and a Select Com-
mittee was appointed to inquire, consider, and
suggest upon the subject.
Some law-amendment bills having been read a
third time and passed, their Lordships brought
their week's work to a close.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.
MONDAY.

A night of suggestions. Topic—lndian Go-
vernment. Special question—Shall the Council
for India be nominative, elective, or both ?
Every one had his plan and his propositions for
the regulation and infusion of each separate
" element." Lord STANLEY, after describing the
various combinations into which election and
nomination could be thrown, and the results
likely to accrue from each, proposed the Minis-
terial resolution, simply declaring that the
Council should be partly elective and partly
nominative. Lord JOHN RUSSELL wished to
make the whole Council Crown nominees, as
also to enlarge their official incomes and render
them eligible to sit in Parliament. He moved a
formal amendment to carry out his nomination
scheme. Lord PALmEasToN, of course, opposed
the elective principle, which had not appeared in
his own Bill. Sir J. GRAHAM proposed that the
first Council should be composed of members se-
lected from the present Court of Directors, with
a proviso for the future that when vacancies oc-
curred the Councillors should themselves elect a
new colleague. Many other members contri-
buted each their suggestion, or segment of a
suggestion, to the heap. Ultimately, Lord
JOHN'S amendment was negatived by a majority
of 65 (250-185). A dilatory motion for ad-
journing the debate was immediately afterwards
negatived by a still larger preponderance of
votes, and Resolution 5, the last of the debatable
resolutions, was carried without further trouble and
in the precise shape proposed by the Ministry.

TUESDAY.
What Mr. DISRAELI aptly called the magic
power of a morning sitting was tried upon the
Transfer of Land (ireland) Bill, with the effect
of landing in safety three or four clauses of the
measure through the foaming breakers of
eloquence which roll upon the House whenever
an Irish Bill is under debate.
The evening was given up to Scotland. Mr.
BAXTER believes that North Britain produces
an amount of special political work which re-
quires the appointment of a special Under-Secre-
tary of State, and brought forward a resolution
to that effect. Mr. W. WILLiAms phunply ne-
gatived the scheme, on the ground that it would
cost 1,5001. a year, if not more. Less insensible
members treated the question on broader prin-
ciples, and the Finance Minister himself acknow-
ledged that, if it could really be shown that there
was work to be done, he should not begrudge a
handsome salary for any functionary who would
do it. But it appeared that ninety-nine hun-
dredths of the Scotch business was of legal cha-
racter, and the Scotch had already a special and
most able legal representative on the Treasury
bench in the person of the Lord Advocate. Was
there not, moreover—Lord DuNcAN reminded
the House—a " Scotch Lord" of the Treasury?
Mr. EDWARD Eu.rcE remarked that the Under-
Secretary for Scotland, if once appointed, would
prove to be nothing more than a "fancy man,"
cutting out work for his own occupation ; and as
work in this sense meant taxes, he predicted that

tric very ilinctionary whose appointment was
now asked for as a right or solicited as a favour
would be unanimously voted a nuisance. There
were but 47 members who could be persuaded
to follow Mr. 13AvrEit into the lobby against
174 on the other side. So Scotland must pine
for the present, Under-Secretary-less.

WEDNESDAY.
Scattered again. Our north-country repre-
sentatives are running some risk of forfeiting
their excellent character for settling all disputes
out of doors. The question related to the local
impost called the " Edinburgh and Annuity
Tax," which Mr. BLACK wanted to abolish. The
usual arguments were urged against the main-
tenance of a tate levied for the support of certain
clergymen from persons who did not in all cases
belong to their communion. The reply that the
tax had existed from the days of the Stuarts—.
that it was really paid by landlords who had
bought or inherited the property with the
liability already attached—and that its abolition
would simply rob one class of individuals in
order to give the money to another class to whom
it did not belong—was apparently too obvious to
be noticed, since it never was answered, by the
advocates of Mr. BLACK'S proposition. Ulti-
mately, on a division, the motion was rejected
by 130 against 129. The majority was small,
but sufficient for the purpose. In any event the
Bill could not have passed ; but it is gratifying
to know that the House has got rid of it for the
present session.

ii,___