The Sun.
London, England, 1859-02-12 00:00:00

HOUSE OF COMMONS-(YESTERDAY.

The SPEAKER took the chair at four o'clock.
NEW MEMBER.
Mr. SAMUELSON took the oaths and his seat as member
for Banbury.

PETITIONS.
Mr. lIADFIELD presented a petition froth Whitfield, and
Mr. SAMUELSON from Banbury, praying for the abolition
of the duty on paper. A number of other petitions were
presented to the same effect. ____ , ox., „, tam
The LORD ADVOCATE presented a petition from a
tr borough in Scotland against the continuance of the opium
ade.
Mr. BRIGHT presented a petition agreed to at a pub-
lic meeting in Edinburgh, and another from Lancashire, in
favour of Parliamentary eform.
Mr. CONINGHAM presented a petition from the inha-
bitants of the city of London for the same object.
PATENT LAW* AMENDMENT.
Mr. T. BUNCOMBE asked the Chancellor of the Ex-
cheluer whether it was the intention of the Government
to introduce any measure for the improvement of the Patent
Law Amendment Act (1832), or to reduce the stamp duties
payable on letters patent for inventions to Z5O, payable be-
fore the expiration of the third year, and to £lOO, payable
before t
falls e expiration
xt year of the seventh year of the patent right
whichdue .
Sir S. NORTHCOTE said, with respect to the first
question, it was not intended atpresent to make any altera-
tion ; and as regarded the other questions of the hon. mem-
ber, it was not considered advisable to reduce the duties
alluded to.

SCOTCH LUNACY ACT 'OF 1857.
In rep to Mr. BAXTER,
The LORD ADVOCATE said that the commission to
inquire into this subject had made their report only very
recently, and if the question came again before the house
he would be able to give a more decided answer.
THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
Lord ELCHO asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer
whether the Government had come to any determination as
to the enlargement of the British Museum, or the arrange•
ment and distribution of its heterogeneous collections ?
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said that
the subject of the organisation of the Museuxa was Am
under the consideration of the Government.
INDIA.

Lord STANLEY gave notice that on Monday next he
would bring in a bill to enable the Secretary of State for
India, in Council, to raise money throughout the United
Kingdom for the use of the Government of India.

IRISH SPIRITS.
Mr. HASSARD asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer
if it was his intention to propose that any reduction should
be made in the duty now payable upon spirits manufac-
tured in Ireland ?
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER replied in
the negative, and expressed his pleasure in being enabled
to state that there had been no increase in illicit distillation
in Ireland, notwithstanding the increase of the duty on
Irish spirits.
THE NEW POST-OFFICE ORDER.
Mr. RICH called attention to the order of the Post-
master-General of the 27th of January last directing, in
effect, that after the 10th of the month all letters
which were not prepaid should be opened by the post-
office authorities ; and to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exche-
quer what provisions had been made thenceforth to guard
the inviolability of letters sent through the post-office.
The hon. member contended that the order sub judice was
most impolitic and unjust. It had been ascertained that
within a certain period there were 1,273,000 letters dropped
into the Post-office improperly directed, which gave an
amount of 610,000 a-year which never reached their desti-
nation. It was very unfair to the public to open•the let-
ters which were carelessly posted, and which being of a
confidential character should have been respected.
Sir S. NORTHCOTE assured the hon. member that
the order was not made for the convenience of the Govern-
ment or for Treasury purposes, but for the convenience of
the public, and that its operation was injurious to the re-
venue. The order was in conformity with the plan of Mr.
Rowland Hill, and had his approval. It was a fact that a
great number of the letters in question were sent for pur-
poses of annoyance. There were 523,000,000 of letters
posted in the United Kingdom in the year. Two
and a-half millions of them were not prepaid, of which
no less than 60 per cent. were of an annoying cha-
racter. With reference to valentines he begged to state
that these. were not always of such a character
as might naturally be supposed to pass between young men
and women. (A laugh.) Out of 800,000 of these there
were no less than 60,000 (which were not pre-paid) which
were of an offensive description ; some of them contained
soot and the dead bodies of certain animals. (Alaugh.) A
great number of these letters also contained merely the
advertisements of tradesmen, and to such an extent had
the nuisance proceeded that numbers of persona had given
order that no unpaid letters should be received at their
establishments, which, of course, sometimes led to the re-
jection of letters that were of importance. Six thousand
letters were returned daily to the dead-letter office, which
were not only immediately forwarded to the writers by the
first mail, but free of expense. In no case whatever had
there been an instance of the contents being abused. (Hear,
hear.)

ARMY AND NAVY EXPENDITURE.
Mr. W. WILLIAMS asked the right hon. gentleman
the member for Radnor to inform the house why the Com-
missioners of Audits' account of the expenditure on- the
army and navy in the year ending the 31st March, 1856,
was £1,156,509 more than the Treasury account of the said
expenditure presented to this house ?

Sir G. C.-LEWIS explained that it was impossible the
audits could agree in any two years.
After a few words from Sir W..JOLLIFFIit
The subject dropped.
THE NEW FOREIGN OFFICE. •
Mr. TITE asked the Chief Commissioner of Works what
steps had been taken with reference to the rebuilding of
the Foreiom Office in Downing-street, and entered into
details of the proceedings of the commission on this
subject. He understood that Mr. Scott was the architect
who had been selected to construct the building,
andfthat it was to be in the Gothic style ; if so, that syle
would not harmonise with the buildings that would sur-
round it. The Duke of Buccleuch, it was understood,
would rebuild his dwelling in the Italian style, and he con-
tended that that style would be preferable for the new
building, not only on that ground, but in consequence of
the other architecture in the very neighbourhood of the site
of the proposed new office.
Lord J. MANNERS—In answering the question of the,
hon. gentleman, I thick I cannot do better than recall to
the recollection of the house the exact position in which
this subject stood when the change of Government took
place last year. That position was, in fact, a complete dead
lock. It then appeared to me, as it also did to this house,
that the best mode of meeting all the difficulties of the case
was to appoint a select committee thoroughly to investigate
all the complicated details connected with the question. That
committee sat for a long period, examining all the most im-
portant witnesses, and they eventually arrived at some very
definite and satisfactory conclusions on the whole subject.
. Their report was not ready until the middle of July, and it
was impossible to ask the house to take any steps then, in
consequence of the late period of the session. However, I
devoted a good deal of time during the recess to the recon-
sideration of the whole subject, and to an examination of the
report and evidence. The main points of this question to
which the committee refer are four. They first recommend
that one of the successful competitors should be appointed
architect of the Foreign-office. They next express an
opinion that as far as the style of architecture is concerned
there is no material difference in economy, commodiousness,
and public utility between the different styles. In the third
place, they recommend that in any plan that may be
adopted care should be taken that tho plan selected should
be so arranged as to be in harmony with any more general
concentration of public offices. Lastly, they recommend
that purchase should be made of the plot of ground be-
tween Charles-street and Downing-street. In conse-
quence of that last recommendation I directed notices to be
given in November for the purchase of that plot of ground,
and a bill will be brought before the house in a few days
with that object. It then became my duty to consider what
recommendations should be made to the Treasury and what
steps should be taken to bring the question in a certain and
definite shape before Parliament this session. The com-
mittee recommended, and I agree with them, that the archi-
tect should be selected from the successful competitors. As
far as appears from their examination and from the public
results of the competition, the first three prizes stand upon
an absolute par. They also decided that in respect to
commodiousness and public security there was no pre-
ference between the contending designs of what may
be called the national or foreign styles—the Gothic or the
Italian. That being the case, I had to decide which of the
three prizemen should be the architect employed, and which
of the contending styles should be adopted. I say that
ta
decision on that point was arrived at, not by Government,
but by the site on which the building was to badPcil'Y a
The selection of the architect was governed by the decision
in regard to the site. A few days after I heawall.° u"'
re-
commendations to the Government, I received
intima-
tion from my noble friend the Secretary of
that it was highly expedient that
.gro_wl
te
hbourhood of Down-
ing-street should, df,o ri
flnpodsi a-
Bible, be found in the immediate.
for the new Indian. er; Upon due considers-
groundlioinibnlgetflrietnpdroinpocsedounfechr
tion we found a piece of Lno
the erection of a Foreign-atic!..,.
Go-
decided that this ground "'"---d purchased of the o
architectof the
as
s tlndian-officee Foreign-office.sho d
veniment, and that the erec
be confided to the ?
sal;d sanction the proposed arrange-
Thus if the house
ment, there will be should
of design, and these two
offices will make one great whole. Theo now Itendmovia to
Indian-onka
will occupy the place which under a former
the War-office, with this agreeable differ,
'll be defrayed out of Indian
be occupied by
once, that the whole expense twit
instead of imperial resource*. It now becomes my duty to
a ion with the
desire Mr. Scott to put himself incommunic t.
and to makea plan
authorities of the Foreign-office,
circumstances of the
the drawings acande.plainsa,mand
adapted to the altefried.eaeiving
, daily expectation o
.to adopt is one which, if the house
the course I propose
should sanction it, will, I thipk, tend to promote the pub-
lic convenience, and be consistent with due economy. I
propose,. as soon as I have seen and approved these plans,
to submit the working drawings and sections to the
com-
petition of some of the most eminent contracting building
firms. When I have received tenders from them, it is my
intention to place in the library of the House of Commons
for the inspection of every member, the matured plan and de-
sign of the architect, and the estimate at which the contrac-
tors guarantee to complete the building so far as the build-
ing itself is concerned. I believe that if the house co-ope-
rates with the Government in this course they will see this
long vexed question settled in a way which will be satisfac-
tory to the public—that a Foreign-office will be erected
worthy of the country, and that the expenditure will be by
no means disproportioned to the importance of the building
to be erected. (Hear.)
Sir B. HALL said that the noble lord having declared
that when he came into office he found this question at a
dead lock, it looked as if there had been a want of activity
on the part of the noble lord's predecessors in office.f
‘!",!.
J. Manners disclaimed the imputation.] Heth_ Ty6t ro a 'bound to state the cause of this dead lock.o
In
com-
mittee was appointed by that house to consider the whole
of their
question of the public offices, and in consequence