The Sun.
London, England, 1851-04-15 00:00:00

T lIF, S U LON DON, l:‘ tIEBOAY

hal been issued, inasmuch as the Commissioners had no
legsl authority to issue them. The Honourable and
Gallant .iLlember then cited some cases in which serious
accidents had been occasioned through the large travel.
ling barrel-organs and traveliing vans, and expressed a
hope that summary means would be taken to put a stop
to the nuisance'.

Sir G. GREY said he was perfectly willing to do all
that he could, c,misistently with law, to prevent the nui-
sance of which the lieu. Member complained. it was
certainly stated in the public papers that orders had been
issued by the Commissioner.; to stop street music, and
the Commissioners stated that they had no such po‘ver;
but that any person, on the ground of illness in hi
family or any other reasonable 2,ause, might compel
street musicians to desist from playing before his house
under a penalty. The order issues on the 2lst ult. was
not to prohibit all street music, bit to stop it where it
was calculated to occasion impediment or obstruction, or
danger to life. lie had no objection to grant the return
moved for.

Mr. BROTHERTON defended street musicianF.
Agreed to.
ST. ALBAN'S ELECTION.

Mr. AGLIONBY presentedr;:petitien from 11. Ed-
yisrde,, praying (as we understood) to be heard in his
justification. He begged to move tbt it he printed with
the votes, for the purpose of being considered to-morrow
(this day).—Agreed to.
The House then adjourned at One o',;lock.

HOUSE OF LORDS, April 14.
no LORD CHANCELLOR took his scar. on the Wool-
sack at Five o'clock.
PETITIONS.

The Bishop of EXETER presented teural petitiors
against Papal aggression.
Lord CAMPBELL presented petitions from several
plf.,c:l; in Scotland to the same effect.

The Earl of EGLINTOR-PieSentel several pc thins
to the saw() effect.

The Earl of MOUNTCASHELL presented several
petitions from places in Ireland to the same affect.

The Earl of a-LENGAlEp;isentCd several petitions
from places in Tipperary to the same effect.
The Earl of HARROWBY presented petitions from
places in Staffordshire and Cheshire to the same effect.

COUNTY COURTS.
Lord BROUGHAM moved for certain returns re
latiog to the county courts respecting the fees received.
Ho considered that it was most unjust to demand from
suitors that they should not only havo to pay for the ad-
ministration of justice to themselves, but that they should
havo to provide for the expenses of the administration o'
justice to others who should come after them. It was
entirely contrary to the principles laid down by Mr.
Bentham, and in the justice of which all were agreed.
He would take the opportunity of stating that the num-
ber of cases in which the matter in dispute was above
101. which had been decided by the county courts was
32,000. The Noble and Learned Lord then asked in what
state of forwardness waslhe Criminal Law Digest ?
The LORD CHANCELLOR said that without no-
tice he could not answer the question.
CHURCH BUILDINGS ACT AMENDMENT BILL.
Thu Earl of CARLISLE moved the second reading
of this Bill. The Bill was founded upon a report which
had met with the approval ot the two Archbishops, the
Earl of Harrowby, and several ether members ot the
Church Building Commission. The object of the Bill
was to amend the law relating to ehurce buildings, arid
to give to the Church Bailding Commission the power
of regulating pew rents, and of securing free sittings to
the poorer members of the Church iu all new churches.
The report expressed a desire that Parliament should deal
with the question of church-rates, but as the touching of
that subject might lead to irritation the Bill did not pro-
pose to deal with it.
The Earl of PO WIS tnzdo some observations, but in
so low a tone that even their purport could not be caught
in the gallery.
After a few words from Lord STANLEY,
The Bill was read a second time.
RATINGS IN IRELAND.

Lord MONTEAGLE rose to present, according to
notice, a petition from landowners of Kerry on the sub-
ject of local assessments for the construction of railways
in the south of Ireland. It was essential that their
Lordships' attention should be directed to this subject.
Their Lordships had on a former occasion entertained a
Bill for opening the line from Dublin to Cork, and this
was now one of the finest public works in Ireland. It
had been recommended in Mr. Drummond's report that
this line should be carried on to the west; that had
been undertaken by la company, but they had not
been enabled to complete the whole, and the petitioners
had consulted the localities, and had applied to the
grand juries of Kerry and Cork for assistance, and the
grand juries had unanimously decided on assisting from
their rates in the completion of that work, and the
question was whether Parliament was now disposed to
sanction that decision, and to authorise the advance-
ment of money from these rates to complete the
railway. In Galway a Government advance had
been made for the completion of railways, and the peti-
tioners asked that the counties might be permitted out
of their own resources to do that which the Govern-
ment had done for Galway. The proposed railway ran
through the poorest districts in Ireland, and the comple-
tion of this railway would furnish work to from 3,000 to
4,000 of that destitute population. He asked for no grant
of public money, but merely to use their own rates for
this purpose, which would give employment to the desti-
tute population.
Lord REDESDALE admitted the importance of the
question. It was a question as to whether they should
rate the public at large for the benefit of private indi-
viduals. By this Bill the original projectors of the
railway proposed to get rid of 111 a share on their
original proposal when the Bill was passed, and they
also proposed to take the power of borrowing upon
the security of advances from the county rate, instead of
upon their own subscriptions, and thus they proposed to
construct a line for their own profit, entirely upon the
responsibility of the county-rates. There was also, it
must be remembered, a line proposed to be con-
structed from Killarney to Valentia, a competing line, the
subscribers to which did not come to Parliament to seek
this power of taxing the counties which was sought for by
those whom the Noble Lord supported. He did not
think, unless further reasons were shown, that it would
b 3 advisable to grant the prayer of this petition.
Earl GRANVILLEE deprecated the discussion of
general principles upon the presentation of petitions. He
agreed very much with what had fallen from both Noble
Lords. The Railway Commissioners declined giving
opinions on the merit of Railway Bills, merely pointing
out ❑nusual provisions in them; there were unusual pro-
visions in this Bill, not in accordance with general rail-
way law. He admitted that great distress existed in the
county in question; but it was obvious that great care
should be taken in the case under notice, and it was the
duty of the Government to consider all the bearings of
the case, and in what form the subject could be brought
before Parliament.

The Earl of HARROWBY said there was such great
distress in that county that he was sorry any technical
rules of the House should stand in the way of its relief.
Earl GREY said there were two ways in which rail-
ways were of advantage—one in direct returns to the
proprietors, the other in opening up the land and so in-
crewing its value. Ireland had suffered so much f3r the
want of facilities for opening up the land that it might
be a matter of consideration for landed proprietors to
adopt the principle of the petition, which he, therefore,
thought ought not to be hastily rejected. He agreed
that measures founded on this principle—especially in
Ireland—should be scrutinised with the greatest care, so
as not to become a job.—(Hear, and laughter.)
Lord BEAUMONT thought there was something
particular in the case, as it was not the company but the
rate-payers who petitioned the House to be permitted to
give a ;guarantee upon the land. It would be a hard
to refuse its prayer.
case in bsiTs
AopsinLioEny, tshacidrc fiotrwe
generally admitted this
was a proposition of an exceptional character, while on
the other hand there was a concurrence of opinion that
the parties petitioning should have the power of burden-
ing themselves, and that there was a case made out for
sanctioning, in the instance of an Irish railway, a gua-
rantee of the county rates. The very body which now
petitioned would in the case of an ordinary road have
not alone the power of giving the guarantee in question,
but of raising and expending the money. It was, there-
fore to be considered whether in this peculiar case that
power should not be extended to railroads. It might
never cost the county a penny. On these considerations,
he thought the case was one in which technical consider-
ations should not be adhered to, but that the work should
be considered as a public work.
The Earl of POW'S said that to reject this line would
be to give the Galway line an unfair preponderance.
With due precautions ho considered the case had a claim
upon the indulgence of Parliament.
The Earl of WINCHILSEA said the same principle
had been introduced into a Bill for making a railway
from London to Dover, but it was not permitted by Par-
new one, should be carefully considered before it was
Par-
liament. He thought, therefore, the principle, being a
adopted.
Lord REDESDALE explained.
Lord MONTEAGLE replied.
The subject then dropped.
BRITISH GUIANA.

h oe t
ta was in an unusual
several
tacked
k e
Lord STANLEY then rose to lay before their Lord-
ships the petition of which ho bad given notice on a for-
mer evening, signed by a very large number of the
d together, as
in-
habitants of British Guiana, praying for a local legisla-
ture for that colony under representative government.
form,
petition, twheasNotbole Lsaoyrd, observed,t
sheets of
which it was composed were n
was the custom, but bound; but he hoped that would
not interfere to prevent its reception by the House.
To that petition there were no fewer than
5,000 signatures; among which he saw not only names
familiar, no doubt, to'the Noble Earl opposite, as those
of persons holding prominent positions in that colony,
but also names pertaining to all classes and denomina-
tions of colonists—clergy, merchants, traders, barristers,
shopkeepers, landed proprietors, Planters, and labourers.
He was sorry, however, to see, as regarded the progress
of education in the colony and among the colonists, that
there were a large number of signatures made by marks
to this petition, and that the deficiency applied not alone
to the bibourers, but likewise tl small areeholderp, and,
stranger still, to persons engaged in trade, who might
naturally be supposed to have a knowb-dge cf writing
sufficient to carry on their respective business. But he
was in a position, however, to state that the trades and
designations of the whole of these 5,000 petitioners were
given in the petition; and, moreover, in every case where
the signature was by a mark, the attestation of a respect-
able witness as to its genuine character was given in the
same column. He believed that a great number of the
lower class of the petitioners had ;
s.gned this pe-
tition because it had been represented by cer-
tain parties that the views it contained were
not those of the colonial community at .large, hut cf a
1 small set of persons who, under cover of the Act of the
i Noble Earl opposite, were desirous to establish an oli-