The Sun.
London, England, 1841-05-15 00:00:00

EDITION.

EVEN IN

•••.*

or any othei'llon. Gentleman as an attack upon- tl.
character of those With . whom he was connected, he
would not fail to have communicated his intentions before-
hand. With that. he (Mr. Gladstone) was contented at
the time, and he did not expect after the lapse of eight
years that the Noble Lord would have repeated
precisely the same imputation on the character
of his (Mr. Gladstone's) father in his absence,
and without giving hint notice.—(Hear, hear, 'hear.)
At the same time he aid not mean to accuse the Noble
Lord of having violated hit; pledge. He was perfectly
convinced he had entirely forgotten that pledge, no less
than the feelings of those who were interested in the
matter. He should say that a more absurd and irrele-
vant attack than the one in question was never made in
that House. What did the Noble Lord do ? The
Noble Lord said that the Hon. Member for -Newark had
no right to speak upon the subject, because his father
had possessed a certain estate on which according to the
Noble Lord, abuses had taken place. But what if those
abuses had taken . place ? Would it follow that
he (Mr. Gladstone) should be . responsible for
them ? And did the Noble Lord think that
his liberty of speech should be abridgeil, because
another had been guilty of abuses over which he had
no more control than the Noble Lord himself ? He there-
fore contended that the attack of the Noble Lord was
totally irrelevant and unjust. He did not, however,
mean to say, that the misconduct of any
man was to be safe from investigation. On the contrary,
he admitted that that House was the grand inquest of
the nation, and he should say, when there was a subject
of complaint, let it, by all means, be brought forward
there—let it be sifted to the bottom—but let it not be
merely used as a weapon of debate—let not that kind of
attack be made with which the worst of men might amuse
themselves, and against which it was impossible for the
best to make a defence. He was aware that he had no
right to claim a freedom from animadversion in that
House—he did not mean to set himself up as a model on
which discussion should be conducted—and he knew that
1 some had found fault with the remarks he had ad-
dressed to •his Right Hon. Friend the Member for Edin-
burgh with reference to one who had preceded him.
But what he did was this:—lf he made an attack he
made it, not by assailing the memory of those in whom his
Right lion. Friend felt deeply interested, but by pro-
nouncing on the memory of the dead a eulogy which if
it was feeble, was at least sincere—(Cheers)—and then
calling on his Right Hon. Friend to vindicate his consis-
tency, which he • did in a manner worthy of himself,—
(Hear, hear.) But if he was to be punished for his
Parliamentary delinquencies, or if other Hon. Gentle-
men were to be punished for excesses in debate by at-
tacks, having no reference whatever to themselvesor their
own conduct, but merely- aiming, through the son,
at the absent and the innocent—then he would tell
the .Noble Lord that such a description of warfare
was of a ' nature of which 'he would much rather
be the - object than the agent.—(Hear, hear.) _He
would next refer to a statement made by his Honour-
able Friend, the Uunder-Secretary for the Colonies,
on the debate on Tuesday, with respect to the Hill Coolies.
He had never heard that there was any mortality among
the Coolies beyond what was natural. He had
never heard that there was any extraordinary mor-
tality amongst them, andthe had never heerd any complaint
except by one Cooly against another. He held in his hand
a documcet which was in the possession of the Noble
Lord, which he had most courteously supplied, showing
that the Coolies were satisfied with the treatment they re-
ceived, and that they had declared themselves that they
should prefer continuing in the employment in which
they were: He had now only to thank the House for
-the patience wid: which they had listened to what he said.
Lord HOWICK was convinced that the House would
think it imperative on him to answer the statements of
the lion.- es ember, and in doing so, in the first place, he
would. state to the House what it was he slid say.—
(Hear.) On a.- . former evening on which he had
made. the statement, he thought and he appealed
to the. Gentlemen who were in the House at the
time—he thNight the Honourable Member for New-
ark in the course of his speech did bring this heavy
charge, not only against the Government but against
those who supported them, that for some mere
party pnri-cae, .or at least with a view to over-
come some financial difficulty, they were prepared
wilfully and deliberately to incur all the evils and all the
horror of increasing the slave-trade.—(Hear, In at.)
When lie (Lora Howick) said he imputed low and de-
grading motives, what he meant was this, that
he thought the Hon. Member for Newark did impute
to the Government and to those who supported them
an indifference to the vast amount of human suffering
which the encouragement of the slave trade involved.
The Hon. - Gentleman might view this question dif-
ferently from him (Lord Howick), but he could assure
the House that there was no imputation of
motives which lie felt more • deeply, and sensi-
bly than that. He thought that to suppose a
Member capable, for party purposes, of overlooking all
the sufferings of the slave-trade—he thought that would
indeed show that that man had an extremely black heart.
What he said 'expressly was this, " That he would not
impute such motives •to his opponents." His object
was to show that the Hon. Member for Newark ought
to have the same charity for others, which himself, and
Cose connected with him, required for- their own
persoiss.—((slieers.) He (Lord Howick) did not impute
to Mr. Gladstone, the owner of the Braden-hoop estate,
the horrors which he recited.—(Hear, hear.) He had not
attributed to that gentleman that he had wilfully and -.
frightfully sacrificed human :life for the pus-pose of in- '
creasing his own wealth.—(Hear.) W hat he wanted to show
was that it was important for men to put a charitable
construction upon . the actions and motives of others
who differed from them. He had asserted before, and
he repeated the assertion, that Mr. Gladstone could
not be supposed to approve of the treatment of his slaves,
but it was the tendency of the system itself. lie wished to
show hovaimportant it was for Mr. Gladstone and his son
(the Hon. Member for Newark) that they should make
allowances for the Motives of others, and not put the
harsher and more uncharitable interpreta-
tion upon their conduct. He would repeat the statement
which he had made as to this fact, that where
there was a large production of sugar, there was
also a large mortality.—(Hear, hear.) lii 1833, when he
argued this question with the Hon. Measlier for Newark,
that Hon. Gentleman did not dispute his facts, although
he drew a different conclusion from them. The mor-
tality upon the sugar estates was vastly greater than upon
the cotton plantations. In both classes of cultivation the
proportion of births to limbers was the same, the dif-
ference was in the great mortality upon the sugar estates.
And that was a mortality which fell not upon the old
and infirm, but upon those on whom all the burden of
the sugar cultivation devolved. That was the statement
which he (Lord Howick) made in 1833—that was the
statement which he had then with him. It was a very -long
paper containing a list of deaths, and it was hardly possi-
ble he could make it intelligible to the House. But if the
Hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) wished, he would re-.
peat the motion which he (Lord H.) made in 1833 ; and,
let hint state; that Hon. Gentleman's account of what tract
taken place on that occasion was not strictly correct,
On the Occasion referred to, he (Lord H.) moved for re-
turns, showing the number of deaths which had taken
place on that estate.. The Hon. Gentleman objected to.
the motion, because he said the house could not conic
to a fair conclusion from the return, because sufficient
means of information did not exist in the colony for that
purpose. He (Lord H.) did not withdraw his motion. He
still conceived that the returnwould elicit all the informa-
tion which he thought necessary, and he only abstained
from pressing his motion to a division, because Earl Spencer,
then at the head of her Majesty's Government, stated
his intention .or not granting the return, and
he (Lord Howick) was . then aware, accord-
ing to the usages of the House, that there
was no possible object in requiring the information. But
to say, as the Hon. Gentleman now said, that he (Lord H.)
had withdrawn his motion, because he had departed from.
the statementwhich he had made—(" No. no,' from Mr.
Gladstone.) He (Lord Howick) would appeal to the recol-
lection of the House whether the Hon. Member had
not ten minutes ago, in stating that he (Lord Howick)
had, in withdrawing his motion, said„ " And by
so doing he 'in • fact gave- up the case." He
(Lord ' Howick) totally • deided that he gave up
the case. He gave up the inquiry, because he was not,
allowed to proceed with it ; that was the explahatiem
which he (Lord Howick) wished to make, and he begfred
to say that he did not mean anything offensive to hon,
but he wanted to show that it was the Hon. Member and
those with whom he was connected, that required the in-
' dulgent consideration of the House for their conduct, as
much so at least as Hon. Members on that side of the House,
who supported the proposition of her Majesty's tiffoveih-9e-
meat. That was the explanation which he hto too yr. .
could sincerely assure the Hon. Gentleai!th .ththelaNts :
s
so
9n great
ali
sorry to have given him pain, but he had! thought
it
was not unimportant he should,
at-
tempt had beets made to excite a Cl')
ciwasi
connected,
country
of inhumanity anainst those wide whom h _ ascot,
themselves for the
that others should suffer not less than .
nzotives to men's eonduct.
when
practice of imputing. the worst
the -se, .
sal cam Lord, state-
,Mr. GLADSTONE said that
__tr
meat, as he understood it, Wai very di et ent from that
',lt If he meant to argue
which he made the other no, • a
that the cultivation of sugar destrnctive to hu-
man was more _ .. .
man life than the cultivation of cotton, that was a general
was ready to admit. But he could
- proposition which
he
'aclusion which was dr-t
not agree with
tirco, 'd the Hon. " vn 'from it.
Lord HOWILIa said .Gentleman had just.
reminded him that he had omitted' one point,Which
he'
intended to mention. He W•m Ild repeat what had been:
asserted, that the
Produce
upon that estate was consider-
the average produce in the colony. The
Consider-
ably. above ,
eo.
r.ave.
, n •oauec for y n aro employed was
rag- '..1 showed The greater than
usual. documents that there were some
about 2,000
where lbs, of sugar produced for every neo-ra
employ-cal on that estate ; and that upon another estate
on which there had been no decreaseof
production had not been e than a half.
Mr. GLADSTONE, taking into consideration the im-
provement of miehinery, unequivocally, 'distinctly, and
broadly denied that statement of the Noble Lord.
Mr. VERNON SMITH said the mismanagement or
the Hill Coolies in British Guiana was the cause of the
objection to their introduction into the Mauritius. As
explanations were the order of the day, he wished to
correct a misstatement of his argument by the Noble
Lord the Member for North Lancaster. The Noble
Lord would lead the House to infer that his (Mr. V.
Smith's) argument was, that the main object of eman-
cipation -was to put an end to slavery in other coun-
tries ; now, what he really meant to state was, that the
object of emancipation was to put an end to slavery in
their own colonies.
The Order of the Day having been read,
Mr. P., HOWARD rose and said, that after the
lengthened discussion the subject had already under-
gone, he
.WOlO not trespass for any time on the atten-
tion of the House. Some Hon. Gentlemen opposite hail
seemed to treat the question as if it merely regarded the
introduction of sugar into this country ; but in
his opinion it embraced many other considera-
tions ,of a higher nature. With regard, however,
aeon to the question of sugar he believed it waoerronee
neousiy supposed that the stmpply of sugar from the West