The Sun.
London, England, 1846-08-26 00:00:00

T 26, 1848.

Levant. He could only repeat that Russia seemed most
desirous to consult the wishes and interests of the other
powers.

COLONIES (REVENUE).
Dr. BOWRING moved for returns, in a tabular form,
for the last year in which they can be made up, of the
gross revenues, under their different heads, of each of
her Majesty's colonies, exhibiting the costs of collection,
and any deductions made in their progress to the public
treasury, together with other returns relating to the
colonies.

After a few words from Mr. HAWES, the returns
were ordered to be laid on the table.

In reply to a question from Dr. BOWRING.
Mr. HAWES stated that Sir W. Pinn received a pen-
sion of 3001. a year for the services he had rendered.
lIAYDOCK UNION LUNATIC ASYLUM.

Mr. WAKLEY moved for returns from the Haydock
Lodge Lunatic Asylum, and for the appointment of a
commission thereon. He held in his hands petitions
that showed the justice of this motion. The Honour-
able Member then read documents at considerable
length to show that very ()Teat neglect had taken place
in the management of the asylum at Haydock Lodge,
and temaiked upon the appointment of Mr. Mott, in
March, 1845, as auditor of the unions in the
district, in the midst of which stood this asylum,
over which he acted as superintendent. He was of
opinion that the disclosures made on this subject
reflected far more on certain parties than
any disclosures connected with the Poor-law.
The mortality in these asylums was always less during
the first year. He had no means of knowing what the
mortality was during the first year in this instance,
but during the second year it was 112 out of 450.
The Poor-law Commissioners were aware of this fact,
and yet no inquiry was made; and he therefore sincerely
hoped that the Right Hon. Gentleman would take mea-
sures to have an inquiry into these scandalous proceedings.
In the year 1845 an addition was proposed in the dietary
tables of the establishment by the visiting magistrates.
Upwards of sixty persons had died in the year pre-
ceding the Ist of October, 1845. The recommendations
then proposed had not been carried out, and he thought
the proper course would be to deprive the
proprietors of this establishment of their license; he was
sure the late Lord Chancellor would have cone so, and
he did not think the present one would act with less hu-
manity than the late one. The next inspection which had
been made was after the institution had been in existence
one year and eleven months. The result of that inspec-
tion was, that the magistrates were of opinion that the
house should only accommodate 367 persons instead of
the 50 who had been compelled to live in this establish.
ment. What he wanted of the House was a
commission to inquire, not only into the conduct
of the managers of this institution, but also
into that of the Poor-law Commissionsrs themselves.
The visitors of Haydock Lodge Lunatic !Asylum stated
that they had had the pleasure of meeting the lunatic
Commissioners in that asylum, and that on the day of
their visit they found that the inmates had one
quart of rice for their dinner, with half a pint of
beer. The rice was formed into a kind of soup,
or rather rice-water. No wonder, therefore, that
many of them died from dysentery and diarrhma on
account of the water diet to which they were subjected.
The Commissioners ascertained that they had bad a
similar dinner the day before, and they suggested that
the regimen should be changed. The Commissioners of
Lunacy were, it appeared, of the same opinion,and thought
they ought not to have such dinners more than twice
a week. No question there was great neglect some-
where, and it was the bounden duty of the Goigrn-
meat to institute a searching inquiry. The fllor-
tality alone was sufficient to demand such an inquiry
—one hundred and twelve demented individuals having
died in the course of twelvemonths. Many of the in-
mates in the coldest seasons of the year:were on y
allowed one blanket to their bed. This was a great
hardship, especially as the walls were damp, and
as the inmates were not fully fed they were more liable
to feel the cold. No wonder they died of these diseases.
Then the Poor-law Commissioners had decided that a
person who held the office of guardian of the Chester-
field Union could not supply milk to the persons who had
contracted to serve it to the workhouse without rendering
himself liable to the 55th Wm. IV., c. 137. In another
case, that of the Plimpton Union, they had decided that
a person could not be a guardian who was the owner
of a lunatic asylum, without incurring similar penalties.
If the Honourble and Learned Gentleman, the At-
torney-General, declared that a commission would
not be a legal mode of inquiry, he would withdraw
his motion, and give notice of his intention to move for
a Committee of Inquiry on the very first day
of the next session. But, for his own part, he
thought a commission was the best and most legal mode
of inquiry, and he trusted after the facts he had stated, the
Right Hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home
Department would appoint one.—(Hear, hear.)
Sir J. FEILDEN said the proceedings to which the
Hon. Gentleman had alluded were perfectly disgraceful,
and he had much pleasure in seconding the motion.
The question having been put,
Sir G. GREY admitted that Dr. Roberts had done a
great public service by bringing forward these facts
concerning the unfortunate inmates of the lunatic asylum
in question. He regretted that the Hon. Member had
brought forward this most important subject before so
thin a House. All the facts which had been stated
with so much force, were contained in the papers
which had already been laid on the table of
the House. He admitted that those facts showed
that private lunatic asylums were in the most
deplorable state, and he was afraid that it was entirely
out of the power of Parliament to remedy that state.
With regard to a Commission of Inquiry, the
Honourable Member must remember that the
Commissioners of Lunacy were not at all implicated in
this ill-treatment of lunatlcs. He admitted that it was
most discreditable to any parties employed under the Poor-
law Commission to be connected with the management
of lunatic asylums. After th?disclosures that had been
made, he thought that the Commissioners of lunacy
ought to direct their most close attention to the conduct
of the managers of the Haydock Lunatic Asylum.
The only remedy for the evils connected with Lunatic
asylums was in the hands of the magistrates of this
county, who should immediately set about erecting
County Lunatic Asylums. He hoped, in conclusion, that
the Hon. Member would not press his motion.
After a few words from Mr. R. YORKE and Mr. P.
BORTHWICK,

Mr. WAItLEY replied, and hoped the Right Hon.
Gentleman the Home Secretary would make an effectual
inquiry into the case bef re the next session of Parlia-
ment; and if this could not be done, he should feel it to
be his duty to move for an inquiry to investigate the
circumstances.

The motion was then, by leave, withdrawn.
The other orders of the day having been disposed of,
the House adjourned at Six o'clock. li

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE OF LORDS, August 25.
POOR EMPLOYMENT (IRELAND) BILL.

Lord LANSDOWNE, on the order of the day being
read for going into Committee on this Bill, said he
would then enter into the provisions of it. He referred
their Lordships to the volume of correspondence
on their Lordships' table, out of which this
Bill had originated. He said they would see
in that volume all the various circumstances
of the distress which existed in different districts in
Ireland, from a disease in, and the failure of, the
potato crop. The late Government, seeing that, had—
and most properly in his opinion—originated mea
sures for the relief of the people afflicted under
these circumstances. But notwithstandiug this
efforts which had been made by the late Government,
new prospects had opened up of such distress that her
Majesty's Ministers did not think they could allow Par-
liament to separate without providing for the emer-
gency. The late Government werejustified in the
steps they had taken under the circumstances that then
existed. In the second place, the circumstance
that occurred was quite novel. Besides, it could
be scarcely supposed that the ordinary means to meet
the want of food could be immediately and effectively
resorted to. The measures that had been taken had the
effect of preventing that upward tendency in the price
of the staple food of the country which occurred under
such circumstances as the present. He would therefore
call their Lordships' attention to the fact, that
during the last month they bad been sitting they
had heard renewed accounts of the distress in Ireland,
and were induced to recommend for the adoption of the
Houses of Parliament such remedial measures as the na-
ture of this calamity might require. In doing that, her
Majesty's Government, as well as the late Govern.
ment, felt the weight of the responsibility that was
thrown upon them. They considered that it
would be culpable in them, the Government. if
they proposed any measure which could in any way
terfere materially with the supply obtained through
the ordinary channels afforded by commercial enterprise.
This he need hardly state to their Lordships, who were
very conversant with such subjects, was one of the most
delicate operations in which any Government or
any Parliament cculd engage, because the inevitable
consequence of interfering with the artificial supply of
food would be to dry up the channels through which food
was ordinarily supplied, as well as any attempt to inter-
fere with the ordinary principles which regulated the
demand for labour, by making the demand artificial in
one quarter was liable to the possibility of diminishing
that demand in another, and more extensive quarter—
the demand which originated for labour from the
cultivators and proprietors of the soil. They had, there-
fore, been endeavouring to avoid both these consequences
in the measures that were now placed on the table. With
respect to the supply of food, he was enabled
distinctly to state that there was ne inten-
tion, under any circumstances, to introduce food into
the country under its agency, because:there was a perfect
and just reliance, from all the knowledge which they
had obtained ou this subject, and from the successes
which had already attended private speculators, after
information acquired as to the extent and production of
that particular quality of food upon which private specu
lation had been brought to bear—he said there was
a confident reliance that as the demand grew
so would the supply, and that the supply of meal which
had already reached Ireland would be followed up by
other supplies, which, it was hoped, if they did not alto-
gether remove the danger of scarcity, that the supply
would at least to a great degree diminish that scarcity.
Upon that subject, therefore, he had the nega-
tive to state that the Government would not
become the importers of corn or meal, and he
had reason to know that the late speculations
were suspended for a time within the last six weeks,
under the apprehension that the Government might
possibly again have recourse to that species of commerce,
and become importers of grain; but from the moment it
was made known to those parties that the Government
would not undertake that duty, immediate orders were
sent out to a great extent upon private account, which
were at that moment in the course of execution.