The Sun.
London, England, 1854-05-24 00:00:00

..:.-4.-Otrl eriEtittion.

BATH RACES.

(THIS DAY.)

(BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.)

CITY CUP.

Rataplan
Jephson
WESTON STAKES.
f. by Sir Hercules out of Dexterous
Bessie
DYRH AM STAKES.

Noi-ette .
Postulant

ARISTOCRATIC HANDICAP.

Defiance

LATEST BETTING.
DE RBY.
3to 1 on the field.
7to 2 agst Dervish.
10 to 1 agst Andover.
16 to 1 agst Neville.
18 to 1 agst Hermit.
20 to 1 agst Autocrat.
6to 1 agst Hermit and Andover, coupled.

.1
.2
.1

fourtb _Zb(ttton

SUN OFFICE, Seven, o'Clock.

MONEY MARKET.

CITY, FIVE O'CLOCK.

The Bank of England has received notice that
the interest upon Exchequer-bills will in future be
2/d. per cent. per diem.
The Honourable East India Company have ad-
♦anced the interest on their bonds to 4 per cent.
Exchequer Bills have fallen to ss. discount to par.
Consols have been without change at 88i to 89.

TATTERSALL'S.

(THIS EVENING.)

THE DERBY.
9to 2 agst Dervish (taken).
7to 1 agst King Tom.
Bto 1 agst Andover (take 10 to 1).
20 to 1 agst Autocrat (taken to 1751.)
25 to 1 agst Hospodar (take 30 to 1.)
From 7 to 2 taken at ;the commencement King Tom
receded to 7 to 1 offered.
At the close it was stated that 30 to 1 had been laid
against him at the Club.
Dervish was also on the decline.

BATH RACES.

(THIS DAY.)

(BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPII.)
LATEST BETTING.
DERBY.
2to 1 Dervish (5 to 2 taken).
10 to 1 agst King Tom (20 to 1 also laid).
9 to 1 agst Andover.
40 to 1 agst Autocrat.
66 to 1 agst Middlesex.

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT

HOUSE OF COMMONS—(THIS DAY.)
The SPEAMER took the chair at 12 o'clock.
PETITIONS.

Petitions were presented by Mr. FoLEY from Wor-
cestershire against the opening of public-houses on Sun-
days ; by Mr. W. 0. STANLEY from, the Attorneys and
Solicitors of Chester,. praying that the originals of wills
may not be removed from that diocese ; by Mr. COWAN,
frGin the brewers of Scotland, complaining of the pro-
posal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to levy the
increased malt taxon stock in hand ; by Mr. A. PELLATT,
from Southwark and other places, praying for the aboli-
tion of church-rates ; by Mr. COLLIER, from the mayor
and town council of Plymouth, praying that the univer-
sities may be thrown open to all classes of her Majesty's
subjects ; by Mr. LUCAS, from a place in Ireland,
against any further legislation on the subject of corn
rents.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
The following hills were read a third time and passed :
—Londonderry Bridge ; North Yorkshire and Cleve-
land Railway ; Oxford, Worcester, and Wolverhampton
Rail way(Stratford-upon-Avon and Stourbridge branches).
The following bills were considertd and ordered to be
read a third time :--Bethesda and Llanlleched Improve-
ment ; Cork and Bandon Railway ; South Devon Rail-
way.

PROPERTY DISPOSAL BILL.
On the question for resuming the adjourned debate
on the second reading of this bill,
Mr. MALINS supported the bill, the object of which
was to prevent professed nuns from disposing of their
property in favour of convents, without the deed or in-
strument of disposal was executed in the same manner
as deeds are executed by married women in favour of
their husbands. No objection had been made to the
principle of the bill, but it was said the preamble con-
tained improper assertions. As the preamble, however,
was a matter of secondary importance, he was sure his
hon. and learned friend who had charge of the mea•
sure would consent to strike it out altogether, if
the house would only sanction the substance of the
bill. The hon. and learned gentleman then proceeded
to argue that ladies who take religious vows renounce
the world and its temporal affairs, so that they had no
free will in the disposal of their property ; and it was
therefore only right that some protection of the sort
proposed by this bill should be thrown around them.
Sir J. YOUNG had hoped that the hon. and learned
member for Enniskillen would have been disposed to
follow the example of the hon. member for Bath, and,
withdrawing his bill, relieve the house from those po-
lemical discussions which had produced so much excite-
ment out of doors, and especially in Ireland. With
regard, however, to the bill itself, it was hardly likely
that it would be accepted by the Roman Catholics,
coming from the quarter it did. The evils or injustice of
the system which the bill dealt with, fell wholly upon
Roman Catholics, and if the bill had come from a mem-
ber professing that faith, there might have been some
reason for adopting it, but coming from a Protestant
member who was not remarkable for any predelictions
in favour of Catholicism, it was only natural that it
should be looked upon with doubt and distrust.
Besides, the Roman Catholics received it as cast-
ing a dishonourable suspicion upon an important
class of their body, and knowing that there was no
foundation for such a suspicion, they had unanimously
rejected it with scorn. A stronger animus actuated
the promoters of the bill thin a desire to assimulate the
law relating to nuns, with that affecting married women,
and hence the bill, supposing its provisions had been
sound, would have been distasteful to the Roman Catho-
lics. He denied that the Government opposed measures
like this for the sake of obtaining Roman Catholic sup-
port, they resisted them because they were opposed to
the tolerant spirit of the Reformation, and being ani-
mated by the same feeling, he was confident the house
would negative the second reading of this bill.
Sir J. PAKINGTON denied that this was a polemical
question, and said he viewed this subject from a directly
opposite point to that of a religious view. He protested
also against its being supposed that the supporters of
this bill were actuated by a persecuting spirit, nr that
the provisions of the bill were at all opposed to the
principles of toleration established by the Reformation.
The policy of the Church of Rome was aggressive and
anti-tolerant, but that should never induce him to sup-
port any attack upon the religious liberty of his Roman
Catholic fellow-subjects. Ths bill, however, meditated
no such attack, it was altogether divested of anything
like a religious character, and proposed to deal only with
one of the temporal matters of the Roman Catholics.
The only ground upon which this question could be dis-
cussed, was simply this : was there, or was there
not, something in the constitution of these ,mo-
nastic and conventual establishments which vio-
lated the rights of the subject. I He believed there
was as their rules and regulations interfered with the
great civil right of disposing of private property, and
that was the reason why he supported this bill, which
would only extend to Roman Catholics the same law
that already applied to Protestant. He denied that the
bill assumed that the disposal of property in favour of
convents was invariably made under undue influence ;
it assumed nothing of the sort, but it did assume that
there were occasional cases of such a disposal being made
under duress, and it was to meet such cases
that it was now proposed to assimilate the
law in reference to the inmates of convents with that
which applied to married women. In the absence of a
bill of this nature there was only one alternative for the
house to adopt, and that was to revive the law which
held nuns to be civilly dead.
Mr. HADFIELD thought the acts of the right bon.
baronet presented a strange contrast.to his professions.
He professed to entertain a high respect for the Roman
Catholics, and yet he was ready to support a bill which
cast a most offensive insult upon that body. The Roman
Catholics made no demand upon the house in support
of their religion, and what right, then, had the house to
interfere with their religious establishments / but, above
all, what right had the supporters of the bill to interfere
with them/ None whatever ; and he advised the house
to reject the bill, as in this enlightened age neither this
nor any other mortmain law was necessary for the sup-
port of civil rights. He felt humbled as a Member of
Parliament to find these religious differences being forced
upon the house. In the American Legislature polemical
discussions were never allowed to take up the time of
the senators, because there the religious sentiments of
all were respected, and the same rule ought to.prevail
in the House of Commons.
Mr. COLLIER suggested an amendment to the
jszd observed that if these amendments were
_ _