The Sun.
London, England, 1847-03-26 00:00:00

HOUSE 01 COMMONS. March 25.

The SPEAKER took the Chair at Twelve o'clock.
The following reports ware agreed to:—The Chelten-
ham Waterworks, the Darwen Waterworks and Reser-
voirs, and the Shipley Gas Bills.
SECOND READINGS.

The following Bills were read a second timei—Kil-
marnock and Ayr Direct Railway, and the North
British Railway (No. 2).
NAVIGATION LAWS.

An IloN. MEMBER presented a petition from Blythe
against the repeal of the navigation-laws.

ipk--c navigaL. .•
EDUCATIONAL GRANT.

Dr. BOWRING presented a petition from Bolton
against the proposed educational grant.
THE RAJA pF SATTARA.

Mr. SMITH O'BRIEN presented a petition from
several inhabitants of Dublin, praying for an inquiry
into the circumstances which had led to the dethrone-
ment of the Raja of Sattara.
IMPEACHMENT OF LORD JOHN RUSSELL.
The HoN. MEMBER also presented a petition from the
Rev. Mr. Maberley, complaining of the conduct of the
Government in relation to the destitution in Ireland, and
calling for the impeachment of Lord John Russell.
POOR• LAW RATING.

Mr. J. O'CONNELL presented petitions from a
number of places in Ireland, against the mode of rating
proposed in the Poor Relief Bill of Ireland; and also
against the clauses for increasing the ex-officio guardians.
THE REPEAL OF THE CORN LAWS.

Mr. HAWES presented a petition from a friend of his
whose name did not transpire, complaining of the mode
in which his interests had been affected by the enact-
ment of the corn law of 1842, and praying for re-
dress . .

-.. _....-- •... SCHO
7
OMASTERS OF SCOTLAND. ...._—
On the motion of Mr. FOX MALTLE; a return of all
the parochial setmolutysters in Scotland, who held any
other office, together with the return and emoluments
thereof; was ordered.
POSTPONEMENT OF MOTIONS.
Sir GEORGE GREY, on behalf of his Noble Friend
at the head of the Treasury, requested that all those
Members who had notices of motion on the paper would
postpone them, so as to enable the House to go into
Committee on the Irish Poor daw, and he would himself
give the example hr postponing his own motion till
Monday nf xt.
Mr. SHAW then withdrew his motion, as did also
Dr. Bowring and several other Members.
SPANISH BONDHOLDERS.
Dr. BO WRING said that as the Noble Lord (Lord G.
Bentinek) had withdrawn his motion for inquiring into
the relations of the bondholders with the Spanish Go-
vernment, he wished to ask him what course he intended
to pursue.
Lord GEORGE BENTINCIC said that he had post-
poned his motion out of courtesy to his Noble Friend
the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, but that after Easter
he should move an address to the Queen, praying that
decisive measures might be taken for obtaining redress
for the creditors of the -Spanish Government.
CHINA.
The following Members were appointed a Select Com-
mittee to investigate the state of our commercial relations
with China:—Mr. Francis Baring, Mr. Beckett, Dr. Bow-
ring, Mr. Brown, Mr. Cardwell, Lord Courtenay, Mr.
Ewart, Mr. Harcourt, Mr. Matheson, Mr. Moffatt, Mr.
Sheil, Mr. John Abel Smith, Mr. Spooner, and Sir
George Staunton.

GENERAL FAST.
On the motion of Sir G. GREY the thanks of the
House were given to Dr. Dealtry for his sermon at St.
Margaret's Church yesterday, on the subject of the
General Fast.
PUBLIC WORKS (IRELAND).
Mr. J. O'CONNELL, before the House went into
Committee, begged to draw its attention to the dreadful
evils that would result from putting the labourers a
the public works in Ireland, the doing of which would,
he believed, be only consigning them to immediate
misery and a speedy death. In order to show the ex-
tent of the evil that was likely to ensue the Hon. Gen-
tleman read several letters from clergymen and other
offirials in Ireland stating their apprehensions on the
subject. The Hon. Member then read several extracts
from the Freeman's Journal, giving a description of the
distress in Cavan, Longford, Kildare, Waterford, and
other parts of Ireland, stating that persons holding one,
two, three, and four acres of land, were reduced to as
great destitution as those who had no land whatever.
These poor people had to this moment borne their
sufferings with the greatest patience and resignation,
and he thought this should give them a still
stronger claim on the Government to preserve them
from starvation. He implored the Government to inter-
fere even now, and exert themselves to avert the entire
annihilation of the people of Ireland.
Mr. S. O'BRIEN concurred with the Honourable
Member for Kilkenny, that the mode by which
the disbanding of the labourers from the public
works was proposed to be carried into effect would
produce the greatest mischief. He thought the
relief Committees, to be appointed under the new Bill,
should have commenced their labours long since, so that
the transfer from the one mode of relief to the other
could be brought about more effectively, and with less
suffering to the people. He hoped the appeal of the
Hon. Mmber for Kilkenny would have the effect of
inducing the Government to come forward now, at the
eleventh hour, and do something to avert the wholesale
destruction of the people.
Mr. LABOUCIIERE said, that the greatest caution
was necessary in removing the labourers from the works,
and though twenty per cent. of the labourers were or-
dered to be struck off on the 20th inst., a great discre-
tion was left to the Irish Government to apply that
order as it might think advisable. The accounts which
they had of late from Ireland were much more
cheering.—(Hear, hear.) Provisions were flowing into
the country in great abundance. Thus proving that
the Government, in leaving the providing of the pro•
visions to private enterprise, were correct in that policy,
anti in the anticipations they had formed of its success.
In the port of Limerick alone he had accounts stating
that 23,000 tons of bread-stuffs had been imported since
September last, and there were 150 vessels at present in
the Shannon laden with provisions.
Mr. SHAW thought it unsafe to remove the la-
bourers from the works by any strict rule—at aoy rate
till the relief committees were appointed, as by this
means the transfer from the one mode of relief to the
other would be less felt.

Sir GEORGE GREY said if the Hon. Gentleman
would refer to the papers which had been furnished this
morning he would find that the relief works would not
be discontinued until the relief committees were in full
operation ; he would also find that an increase of
250,000 men had recently taken place in con-
nexion with some of the works. From the last
report of the Board of Works it appeared that
the farmers had experienced some difficulty in obtaining
persons to work at field labour. What his Hon. Friend
had stated was not that a simultaneous reduction in the
persons employed on the public works would take place
in every locality, but a gradual reduction. The time
when such reduction should take place, and the locality,
being left to the Board of Works. There was ample
employment now in field labour for those who had left
the public works.
Lord G. BENTINCK said he could not allow the
last observation of the Right Hon. Baronet the Secre-
tary of State for the Home Department to pass without
some notice. That Right Hon. Baronet had informed
the House that, although cultivation might be going on
in some parts of Ireland, yet it had been discontinued in
other parts from causes over which the Government had
no influence ; but when the House recollected the press-
ing letter of the Earl of Besborough, in January last,
to Lord John Russell, urging him to cause a supply
of seed to be sent to Ireland, and stating that
there were many parts of Ireland in which it
was not possible for the farmer to obtain seed without
the assistance of the Government. When the House
also recollected that Captain Wynn sent a letter to the
same effect, and then that the Government came down
to that House in the first fortnight of the session, and
announced that it was their intention to advance 50,0001.
for seed ; and further, that it was not till the eleventh
hour—till they had given the whole Irish people reason
to believe that they would receive assistance from the
Government ; and' further still, that at the last
moment the Government had disappointed them, he
was perfectly justified in saying that the Government
had exercised a most pernicious influence over the culti-
vation of the soil. Why, when there were 100,000
farmers in Ireland who, thinking the Government were
prepared to make the advances they bad proposed, and
when they recollected that the Lord-Lieutenant, had
pressed the Government not to furnish green seeds,
but corn seeds, and that the farmers were
led to believe that they would be sup.
plied with corn seed, and when they had
induced the farmers to purchase green seed
out of their own funds, the Chancellor of the Exche-
quer now came down fo the House and told the Irish
people, in this place, that the 50,0001. was to be advanced
not for corn seed, but for the green crop, which they
would not require till the summer, and which would
only be useful for turnips, parsnips, and grass. There-
fore, he (Lord G. Bentinck) wanted to know whether
under these circumstances, her Majesty's Government
were not most blameable with respect to the course
they had taken with regard to th* supply
of seed. Then he could not allow some
of the observations of the Right Hon. Gentleman the
Secretary for Ireland to pass without observation. He
had glorified himself and the Government to-day for
basing supplied various places in Ireland with provi-
sions. He had told them that since the month
of September—that was now six months-50,000 ton' of
provisions had come into the port of Limerick. But in
one week, in the course of t'lis year, 30,000 quarters of
corn went out of the port of Limerick; so that, after all,
what did these 50,000 tons of provisions amount to when
placed by the side of the 30,000 tons exported from the
same port?—(Hear.) But that was not all. It might
be true that these provisions were now imported by private
speculators; but what compensation was that for the deaths
of some 200,000 who had died from starvation, or from
pestilence growing out of starvation, whilst waiting
for this supply? But if the Government bad had one-
tenth part of the sympathy shown by the people of
Boston, by America, for the starving people of Ireland,
all that food might have been supplied at least six
months ago. What did they see by the last returns?
They were told that, although the meal depots had been
diminished, yet, in truth, they had increased, and that it
was quite a mistake to argue that, because there were
now 24 depots, whereas there were 93 when they came
into office, that the amount of provisions distributed had
been in like manner diminished. He had looked at the
last calculation. and what was the value of the food dis •
tributes! for the week ending the 6th of March by the
present Government? It was 262,C00/., about 1,048,0001.
a month—but one tenth part —scarcely an eleventh part
—of the food distributed by the late Government in the
month of June last, when the famine was not a ninth
part what it was at the present moment. It was under
these circumstances that be considered the Right Hon.
Gentleman, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, had little
cause to congratulate himself when he reflected upon the
hundreds of thousands of persons who had died under
his administration of affairs in Ireland.
Mr. WILLIAMS thought that statements of the ex-
penditure for Ireland should be weekly laid on the table
of the House, in order to show how much this country
was doing, and how little the landlords of Ireland were
doing for the relief of their own countrymen. In South
Wales one small town subscribed at a meeting 3,000/
for the relief of the Irish distress, and at the different
assizes in that part of the kingdom large sums of money
had been subscribed for a similar object. This country
was doing much, but those on whom the people of Ire-
land had the greatest reason to look in their present
suffering were doing absolutely nothing.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said that
the observations which bad been made by the Noble Lord
were merely repetitious of his speech the other evening.
The Government could not answer such repetitions,
which would merely occupy the House, and he hoped
that Hon. Men,b,rs would allow the Bill to goon.
Mr. COLLETT said that he rose in consequence of
information which he had received on Saturday last
from Wicklow, from a gentleman resident there. It was
stated to him that the preservation of the public peace
was very doubtful, in consequence of the discharge of
nemerous men from the public works. Nearly 1,000
persons had been discharged, and they could now have
nothing but. plunder to loak to for the preservation of
Seretary for
i
lite. He had felt it his duty, seeing the
Ireland in his place, to rise and give the
ntormation as
he had received it.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCIIESLI ER wished
to say one word. He had that day received a letter
from Colonel Jones, in the district referred to by the
Hon. Member, and he stated that thereduction of the