The Sun.
London, England, 1862-03-18 00:00:00

REGISTRY OF DEEDS OFFICE.

Col. GRE VILLE asked the Chief Secretary for Ireland
if his attention had been called to the state of the Registry
of Deeds Office in Dublin ; and if Government intended to
bring in a bill to carry out the recommendations contained
in the report, which had just been printed, of the Council
of the Incorporated Society of the Attorneys and Solicitors
of Ireland on the subject?
Sir R. PEEL replied in the affirmative.
INTERNATIONAL MARITIME LAW.

Mr. LINDSAY resumed the adjourned debate upon the
following motion of Mr. llorsfall : " That the present state
of International Maritime Law, as affecting the rights of
belligerents and neutrals, is ill-defined and unsatisfacl ory,
and calls for the early attention of her Majesty's Govern-
ment." He said that his hon. friend (Mr. Cobden) who
was to have resumed the debate was unavoidably absent
through the state of his health., but he hoped to
be able to take some part in the debate. He con-
tended that the existing state of the law re-
quired amendment in consequence of our extended
and altered commercial relations with other countries. He
referred to the (pinion of the Merchant Shipping Commit-
tee to show that the alteration he advocated was ren-
dered necessary. He pointed out the horrors of war, and
the injurious effect it exercised on commerce. He alluded
also to the principles laid down at the congress of Paris
in 1856 in reference to neutral flags and belligerent States,
and argued that the rights of commerce and the interests of
humanity imperatively requirel a change in the law. He
urged, at some length, the other arguments in favour of his
views, and appealed strongly to the house not to sanction
the continuance of the existing system.

The LORD-ADVOCATE cautioned the house against
adopting any abstract doctrine on this subject, which at
the present time might be productive of very serious evils.
He believed that any discussion on the subject in that
house would lead tono practical effect, though it might give
rise to a misunderstanding with friendly Powers. He
denied that they could lay down any principle
which could possibly be reduced to practice, that in war
private rights or private property could be respected. The
true humanity in respect to war was, that it should be sharp
in order that it might be short, and it was a principle in re-
gard to war that you were entitled to take property belonging
to the enemy wherever you could do so.l iThe extent to
which private property was to be violated Was in the pro-
portion of the necessities of the warfare, and private rights
were inevitably sacrificed. It had been said,carrectly, that
private debts were not confiscated at the breaking out of
war, but there was no argument against his views from
that fact, because when debts were contracted in
time of peace the faith of the belligerent countries was
pledged to their security, but in war there was an end to
commerce between the hostile countries. The right hon.
and learned gentleman argued at considerable length in
support of his views. It was net true that private property
was protected on land. More private property was de-
stroyed in a siege than in a hundred naval captures.
Sir S. NORTHCOTE protested against the outcry
against the shipping interest on this question as dictated
only by self-interest. When the country was in danger the
shipping interest was the first to come forward for its de-
fence. He entered largely into the benefits which that in-
terest conferred upon society, and which demanded consi-
deration in return. He contended that any conventions on
this subject, concluded in time of peace, would be recog-
nised in time of war. At the same time, he admitted that
the time was not come for the adoption of such a resolution
as the present, and while he pressed the subject on the at-
tention of the Government, hoped that the resolution would
be withdrawn.

Mr. L. GOWER considered the resolutions as utterly
uncertain in their tenour, and impossible to be carried out
in time of war.

Mr. CAVE supported the resolution, commenting on the
barbarity of the present mode of ocean warfare.

Sir F. GOLDSMID, on legal grounds, opposed the re-
solution.

Lord H. VANE observed that after the Paris revolution
there would be great difficulty in adapting maritime war
for merchant vessels. He thought they ought to go fur.
ther, and adopt at least the spirit of the motion before the
house.

Mr. BUXTON argued that our supremacy at sea would
be in no way endangered by the adoption of the resolution.
We should still retain ample means of offence while we
preserved our own shipping interest.
Mr. NEWDEGATE contended that the adoption of a
commercial
.treaty which foreign Powers would disregard
at the first opportunity, would wily lead to dangerous
delusions. The effect would be to induce a false security,
and create a trap to the mercantile marine of England. He
would be very sorry to trust the protection of that marine
to any treaty.

Mr. MASSEY argued that the resolution was a neces-
sary corollary of the second article of the Declaration of
Paris. In former days we had pressed hardly on neutrals
—at present we were going into the contrary extreme, and
throwing all the advantages into their hands.
Mr. BENTINCK agreed with Lord Palmerston that the
resolution would be an act of political suicide. He con-
demned the Declaration of Paris, but could not agree to the
remedy thus proposed.
Mr. BRIGHT observed that there had never been a ques-
tion brought before the house during the time he had had the
honour of a seat, which was more deserving of serious and
dispassionate consideration than the one now under discus-
sion; and he was bound to say, looking at the course which
the debate had taken, that there was no appearance of a
partisan or party spirit in the discussion, and that both sides
of the house seemed to think that it ought to be discussed
with reference to the interests of the country, and the inte-
rests of humanity at large. (Hear, hear.) The motion was
couched in very general terms. It had been stated by one
member on the Treasury bench that the object was to get a
large acquiescence in the house; but he believed that the
principal object was to get into the hon. gentleman's net
the gentlemen on the Treasury bench. The motion was not
intended as a hostile manifestation azainst the Govern-
ment, but it was so drawn that the Government might
accept it, because it would not pledge them to any course,
i but would rather leave them open to adopt such a course of
proceeding as they might think advisable hereafter on this
important question, and to give them the opportunity of
ascertaining the opinion of the house on the subject. In the
year 1856 he believed the Government took a very proper
course. From the period of the termination of the last great
war until the commencement of the Russian war there
passed a period of forty years of wonderful changes, not
merely in this country and in Europe, but on the American
continent. A great nation had there grown up, with a large
mercantile marine—so large as to bo almostequal to the
mercantile marine of this country. When the Russian war
broke out the Government advised the Queen to issue a
proclamation, which did in respect of the time occupied by
that war what the declaration of Paris had done for all
future time. The Government found it impossible to carry
out the old policy any longer. Unless we could blockade
every port of Russia it was clear that the American mer-
cantile ships would have carried on their trade with Russia
as they did before the war; and if they had had Russian
cargoes in their ships they would not have permitted with-
out remonstrance, and probably without resistance, the
exercise of the right of search with regard to those ships,
and the taking from them of the property of Russia, which
was then the enemy of England. If her Majesty's Govern-
ment had not taken the course which they did in 1856, by
issuing that proclamation, most probably in the course of
six months they would have been involved in a very
serious discussion with the United States Govern-
ment, which might have been the cause of a calamitous
war with the United States in addition to that in which
we were then engaged with Russia. (Hear.) Lord Palmer.
ston was at that time a member of Lord Aberdeen's Go-
vernment, and no doubt his opinions had great weight with
the Cabinet. They acted wisely on that occasion, and did
that which was absolutely necessary, (Hear.) In 1856
Lord Clatendon and other diplomatists met at Paris. They
knew the cause of the issuing of the proclamation of 18E4.
They knew that in future the same difficulty might meet
them, and they most wisely agreed to the declaration with
which so much fault had b een found by some hon. mem-
bers. The course taken at Paris was one that could not
have been avoided. It was inevitable, and being inevitable
then, he believed it to be irrevocable now. (Hear.) What
did that Congress do ? It declared that henceforth no war
should be made on the trade of a belligerent, with the ex-
ception of the act of a blockade ; that his exports and his im-
ports should be free as in times of (peace, only on one con-
dition, that they should be carried to neutral ships ; that if
belligerents, for instance, England and France, were atwar,
these belligerents might trade in peace, not only with each
other, but with all neutrals, provided their trade was car-
ried on in the ships of neutrals, that was to say, if the ene-
my kept his own chips at home, we undertook to do no
harm to his trade at sea. (Hear.) The case of Rngland
and France was ono that afforded the most obvious illustra-
tion. France had no great mercantile navy, but she had a
large war navy, and there could not have been the smallest
difficulty, under the declaration of Paris, for the trade of
prance to have been carried on by neutral ships—say ships
Of the United States—rosuminr, of course, that the ports
ofk Prance were not block--1(1Ni ; and France might have
of Franco would
theregisteras 3
insist on the same thing as regarded
naconnited States, the Baltic I'orts, Greece,
trade with zingls2ould furnish ships to carry on the
belonging to jun:i, and the great bulk of the ships
(Hear.) That was a''erir would be kept in harbour.
cantilo ships of England at:tomcat of the case. The leer-
would be driving a trade raoornelfici ;be
shut up'
warolu,:itshing than before. The
and neutrals
same results a ould follow a
t:e.en. England and the
United States. Ile agreed with
e nen- member for Sale