The Sun.
London, England, 1850-06-06 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON,

The CHAIRMAN said, that as this was a meeting of a
particular society, met to discuss the affairs of the
society, he thought it was incompetent for any gentle-
men not belonging to the society to address the meeting.
Mr. REYNOLDS (drawing out his purse)—Well, then,
I am ready to become a member.
The CHAIRMAN—If the gentleman becomes a member
it will be competent for him to speak at any future
meeting of the society, but he cannot be heard at the
present.
A scene of great confusion then ensued, Lord Ashley
standing forward, amidst loud cries, to move the second
resolution, and Mr. Reynolds also persisting in his at-
tempt to move an amendment. Both gentlemen spoke at
once, while loud cries of " Reynolds, Reynolds!" from
one part of the meeting, and " Shame, shame!" from the
other, mingled with cheers and hisses, prevented both
gentlemen from being heard.
After some time, Mr. Reynolds, finding himself un-
able to obtain a hearing, desisted from his attempt, and
shortly afterwards left the room.
The meeting then proceeded without interruption,
and after passing several resolutions expressive of ap•
proval of support to the society, concluded with a vote
of thanks to the Chairman.

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.
(THIS EVENING.)

HOUSE OF LORDS.

Their Lordships met at Five o'clock.
ADMINISTRATION OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE
IMPROVEMENT BILL.

This Bill was reported.
FEES (COURT OF COMMON PLEAS) BILL.
This Bill was read a third time and passed.
SUNDAY FAIRS PREVENTION BILL.

This Bill was read a third time and passed.
EXCHEQUER-BILLS BILL.
This Bill was read a third time and passed.
PETITIONS.

The Earl of RODEN presented several petitions
against Post-office labour on Sundays.
The Duke of RICHMOND presented several petitions
complaining of agricultural distress.
Lord MONTEAGLE presented a petition from the
Hon. F. Scott, the agent for the colony of New South
Wales against the Australian Colonies Government
Bill, and praying to be heard by counsel against the
same. He gave notice that en Monday when his Noble
and Learned Friend would present a similar petition
from Mr. Low, he should move that these parties be
heard by counsel against the Bill.
GREECE.

The Marquie of LANSDOWNE thought it right to
draw the attention of the House to the motion of which
the Noble Lord had given notice for to-morrow. Com-
munications had been going on with France on the sub-
ject, which as yet had not lead to any result, but he had
hopes that they would lead to a satisfactory result; but
satisfactory or not the result must be known in a few
days; but the discussion of that motion at present would
tend to interfere with these negotiations, and he there-
fore hoped the Noble Lord would, on consideration of
the subject, defer his motion for a few days. He would
enter into an arrangement for the accommodation of the
Noble Lord, but he suggested to him the propriety of
deferring his motion.
Lord STANLEY thought the Government had tried
to the utmost extent the Parliamentary courtesy which was
usually extended on such occasions. The Noble Mar-
quis,had before asked for the postponement of the motion.
Since that time six or seven weeks had elapsed, and since
that all th© papers having been laid on the table, the
ransom having been paid, and the fleet having been
withdrawn, he hoped that the discussion of which he
had given notice would take place and now on the very
eve of the discussion, the Noble Marquis
asked for a further postponement on the ground
of the negociations going on with France. He
might have to touch upon that subject, but the great
object of the motion was to ascertain the (pinion
of that House with regard to the original demands
on Greece and the manner of their enforcement.
lie therefore was loth to defer the discussion for
a single day; but if the Noble Marquis was
prepared to say that an impartial settlement
of the affairs of Europe was likely to be come to, or to
be put an end to in the course of a few days, and that
the discussion would tend to interfere with that settle-
ment. If the Noble Marquis would undertake to say
that in a few days the question would be settlei, he
would postpone his motion until Monday se'nnight, with
the understanding that on that day, settlement or no
settlement, the discussion should come on.

The Marquis of LANSDOWNE admittad that on a
former occasion he had asked for the postponement of a
motion of which the Noble Lerd had only given notice
on the preceding night. He had hoped up to this morn-
ing that the discussion might have taken place ; but
stated on his responsibility as a Minister that he be-
lieved that the discussion, if it came on to-morrow,
would be detrimental to the public service, but he could
not say he thought it would be dangerous to the
peace of Europe. He was convinced that the
French Government had entered into that nego-
tiation' with perfect good faith, and it had
been Oar wish throughout to co-operate cordially with
them. ; He was not surprised at the Noble Lord's anxiety
to bring on the discussion, and he should not, under any
circumstances, renew his application to the Noble Lord.
Lord STANLEY—Under those circumstances, I shall
postpobe the notice to Monday se'ennight.
PARLIAMENTARY VOTERS (IRELAND) BILL.
The Marquis of LANSDOWNE rose to move the
second reading of the Parliamentary Voters (Ireland)
Bill, and he did not anticipate any opposition to the mo-
tion, because it was admitted on all hand, and by men
of all parties, that the present state of the Parliamentary
franchise in Ireland was a mere mockery of the principle
of representation.—(The Noble Marquis's voice was here
completely drowned by the noisy conversation of certain
persons at the foot of the throne, the Noble Marquis
turned towards them, and reminded them that a debate
was going on. This remonstrance was received with
loud cheers from all parts of the House). Silence having
been restored the Noble Marquis proceeded to detail
the provisions of the Bill, and was
(LEFT SPEAKING.)

HOUSE OF COMMONS.
The SPEAKER took the Chair at Four o'clock.
PRIVATE BUSINESS.

The Lords' amendments to the following Bills were
considered, and agreed to:—Exeter and Crediton Rail-
way, Nottingham Freemen's Allotments, Royal Col-
lege of Surgeons of Edinburgh.
The following Bills were read a third time, and
passed :—Croydon and Reigate Turnpike Road; Eastern
Union Railway; Newcastle-upon-Tyne Improvement,
Amendment of Acts, and New Streets; Snaith and
Cowick, Union of the Townships, &c.; Teak( sbury
Severn Bridge and Roads; Ulverstone, Millthorpe,
and Lancaster Turnpike Road; Wolverhampton Water-
works Act (Amendment and Extension of Works).
The Oxford, Worcester, and Wolverhampton, Birming-
ham and Oxford Junction, and Great Westaru Railway
Companies Bill, as amended, was considered and agreed to.
PETITIONS.
Mr. DUNCAN presented a petition from a place in
Forfarahire against Sunday labour in the Post-office.
Admiral DUNDAS presented a petition from Green-
wich against certain clauses in the Savings' Bank Bill.
Mr. ELLIOT presented petitions from Ha s ick,
Peebles, Selkirk, Galashields, and other places in Scot-
land, against the Ten Hours' Bill ; also petitions pray-
ing for an alteration in the Scottish Poor-law.
Mr. HOPE presented a petition frotn Hull against the
Mercantile Marine Bill.

Mr. R. PALMER presented a petition from the trus-
tees Uf a savings bank in Dorset against certain clauses
in the Savings' Banks Bill.
Lord HOTHAM presented a petition from the East
Riding of Yorkshire also against certain clauses of the
same Bill.

Admiral GORDON presented a petition from Dun-
dee against Sunday labour in the Po,t•office.
Mr. SLANEY presented a petition approving of the
Sayings' Banks Bill, but objecting to certain clauses.
Mr. J. CLAY presented a petition from the Hull
Chamber of Commerce against the Mercantile Marine
Bill.

Mr. KERSHAW presented a petition from Stock-
port against the Ten Hours Bill.
Sir B. HALL presented a petition in favour of the
enfranchisement ut copyholds; also a petition from
Marylebone in favour of the Government Interments
Bill, but objecting to certain clauses.
Mr. B. OSBORNE presented a petition from Coventry
in favour of secular education.
Col. CHATTERTON presented a petition from Coik
against the Mercantile Marine Bill.
AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS.

maMnuriapctiuSrßer tradesman,AEs, presentedLi
the county Palatine of Lancaster, with 15,130 t
l aabpoeutri
et ire; ,
n from
ad landowners,
artzaen s,in
signa-
tures attached to it, complaining of the injurious fre
of our experimental legislation on the s
labour
and productive power of the country, of the
unrestricted admission of the produce of foreign labour;
that the owners and occupiers of land with diminished
means had to suffer additional burdens; that the hasty
abandonment of protective duties had been injurious to
the agricultural interest without benefiting the country,
and praying the House to redress those grievances, and
to adopt such a system as should place them in
fair competiton with the foreigner, and give a renewed
stimulus to agriculture, encourage manufactures, and
promote the extension of commerce.—(Cheers from the
Protectionist benches.)
Mr. HUME presented a petition from Montrose
against the Mercantile Marine aorip MOTION.
Mr. lON.
Mr. SCROPE gave notice that to-morrow he would
put a question to the Right
evictions.
t Hon. the Secretary for Ire-
land ou the subject of

THE OVERLAND ROUTE.
Mr. DIVETT moved for a statement showing the
total cost cf transmitting the mails and dispatches
b..
tween Bombay and Suez by the East Company,lndia
and towards which the sum of 50,0001. per annum he's
been granted out of the revenue of the United Kingdom,
during the years 1848 and 1849, or to the latest puled that
the accounts can be made up, including wages, victualling,
and allowances of officers, crews, and engineers, coals and
engine stores, and sea stores, and an allowance of ten
per cent. for repairs, five per cent. for depreciation, six
per cent for sea rise in lieu of premium of insurance, and
four per cent. interest per annum on the total
first cost of the steam-vessels employed; the net
t!..noount of passage money received by the
ast India Conipany, deducting victualling and
h;allowance to the commanders or other persons for the
same periods; the same a) to the cost of transmitting the
bimonthly mails between Bombay and Aden : also the
names, tonnage, and horse power of the steam-vessels
arrival
continuation
ereEnsplectivel
atßo
employed;
respectively,
dates of their departures from and
Bombay and Suez, and Bombay and Men
0_ each voyage during the same period (in
Ilion ,n.,„_
_t,,Parliamentary paper, No. 746, of sea- i
A °"). Agreed tO.
~ , a I

SUPPLY.

On the motion that the orders of the day be read,
Mr. lIUME said there was a notice for a vote in Sup-
ply on the paper to-night. Was it intended to take that
vote to-night or to-morrow?

Sir G. GREY was afraid it could, not come on to-
night. _

HUME appealed to Government to give him an
early opportunity of bringing on his motion respecting
the New Houses of Parliament.
FACTORIES BILL.

The House then went into Committee on this Bill.

Mr. BANKES said it was some time since the atten-

lion of the House was occupied with this very interesting
question. He had now to state that the important
amendment which was to be introduced by the Noble
Lord the Member for Colchester (Lord John Manners)
would not be proposed at this stage of the pro-
ceedings, but on the bringing up of the report. He
(Mr. Bankes) made this explanation on behalf of the
Noble Lord, who was unavoidably absent from the
House, and was at that moment attending a public meet-
ing in a distant part of the country. The amendment to
which he referred had in view the confining the work in
factories, of young persons and young females, to ten
hours a day.
Mr. ELLIOT rose to move the following amend-
ment:—Clause 1, page 2, line 8, leave out all words after
the word " that," for the purpose of inserting these
words—' it shall not be lawful for young perscns and
females to be employed or to work in any factory for
more than ten hours daily between half-past five o'clock
in the morning and half-past eight o'clock in the evening ;
and it shalt be lawful for said young persons and females
to work by sets or relays. Provided always, that each such
set or relay shall, during the hours between half-past five
in the morning and half-past eight in the evening, be
absent from the factory for a period of not less than
three consecutive hours. Provided always, that on
Saturdays the period of work of such young persons or
females shall not exceed eight consecutive hours, exclu-
sive of meal times, between the hours of half-past five in
the morning and four in the afternoon." The Honourable
Member proceeded to refer to the relay system at
present adopted among the factory operatives of Rox-
burgh, Berwickshire, Selkirshire, and Peebleahire.
Those persons were at present working contentedly and
happy, and earning good wages; but for some reason or
other they were now to be at once discharged from their
work and thrown on the parish for a subsistence. Ho
wished to know why such a calamity was to be in-
flicted on so large a manufacturing district as that ?
Mr. Horner's reports stated that if it were possible to
keep the machines in mills going all through the twenty-
four hours it would be much more advantageous for all,
He protested against any law being passed which would
have the effect of placing the mills in his part of the
country on the same footing as the mills in the north of
England, which were generally owned by large capitalists.
The Bill as it stood would have a very injurious effect
upon the owners of watermills, for in winter time it was
impossible to say when the mills would commence
working, owing to the floods, and in dry wea-
ther, ;when they would be compelled to stop.
Indeed, ho thought the Bill would ruin many
of the millowners, and be the means of throwing out of
employ a great number of labouring people, who would
have no other means of livelihood. Although he was
quite ready to admit that only one rule was to be ap-
plied to all mills and factories, yet he had to remind the
House that, while that one rule would not interfere
with the operations of one class of the persons who were
to be affected by the Bill, it would act in a very
injurious manner to another class.—.(Hear.) He, there-
fore, thought it his duty to propose the amendment of
which he had given notice.
Sir G. GREY said the amendment of the Hon. Gen-
tleman was opposed to the whole spirit and purpose of
the Bill. He was quite ready to admit that a general
law of this kind must operate somewhat unequally in
different parts of the country; but that was un objection
not only to this Bill, but to the whole course of legisla-
tion on the subject, and his Hon. Friend had, in fact,
raised the whole question whether there should be
any legislation at all as to the duretion of labour
in factories. If he thought mills worked by water-
power should be specially exempted, he ought to
have proposed a separate clause to that effect, and not
proposed a general alteration of the law, which would
have the effect of sanctioning the relay system through-
out the whole kingdom, subject, of course, to his sug-
gestion that the workers should have an interval of three
hours during the day. Rather than have the altera-
tion inserted in the Bill he would leave the pre-
sent law as it stood, because the effect in the
former case would be to keep the children employed in
factories away from their homes during a period of
fifteen hours. As to water mills, a clause would shortly
come under their consideration, which provided that
under certain circumstances mills might work until a
later hour, to make up for lost time arising from a too
deficient or a too abundant supply of water. But as the
amendment of the Hon. Gentleman would have the effect
of sanctioning the relay system throughout all the manu-
facturing districts, he felt bound to give it his opposition.
Mr. HEYWOOD said if there was one thing in
factory legislation more to be deprecated than
another it was provisions cf a partial nature.
He regretted that the Right Hon. Baronet the Secretary
of State for the Home Department should have given
the sanction of his name and the sanction of Government
to any departure from the Ten Hours Act.—(Hear,
hear.) Before the Right Honourable Baronet,
however, gave that sanction, ho ought to have
found out what really was his own meaning and the
meaning of the Legislature in reference to th Factory
Enactment. If the Right Honourable Baronet ha I
discovered that the intention of the Legislature was iu
favour of the relay system, the better course wonld
have been for Government to have introduced a Bill
declaring that henceforth the relay system should be
tolerated though for his own part he was prepared to
vote for any proposition that would have the effect
of restoring the Ten fours Act to its integrity.—
(Hear, hear.) He had sufficient confidence in the en-
terprise and stability of English manufacturers to be-
lieve that they could overcome almost every restriction
that might be imposed upon them by factory acts, but so
long as so much uncertainty prevails on the subject—so
long as the system was tolerated of having one law
this year and another next, it was impossible for
then to carry on their operations with success.:(Cheers.)
He approved of the Ten Hours Bill when it Ras passed,
and ho did so now because he believed the Bill
was for the protection of women and children
who were unable to protect themselves. (Hear,
hear, and cheers.) He never wished to place
any restrictions either upon manual labour or machinery,
and he was still as hostile to that as ever; but as far as
regarded women and children, he was quite ready to
adopt restrictions for their safety.—(Hear, hoer.)
Mr. EDWARDS said he had the honour to represent
a large town in the West Riding, where he had lived
since the time he was born, and he thought he under-
stood the interest and feeling of that part of the coun-
try as well as any gentleman in the House.—(Hear,
hear.) When he had the honour of seconding the
declaratory Bill of the Noble Lord the Member for Bath
he hardly expected that he should ever have to say any-
thing in defence of it, recollecting as he did the eazi-
quence and powerful arguments brought to bear upon it
by the Noble Lord himself. The Noble Lordhad up till now
had advocated the cause of justice and humanity, the
Noble Lord had always been looked upon as the cham-
pion of the factory operative, and he for one could see
no reason why he should desert them now. The petitions
for and against the Bill presented the true feeling which
the country entertained upon this important measure,
the petitioners, in fact, were somewhere about 1,000 as
to G, and the signatures appended to that petition in
proportion of 3 to 1,000. The great bulk of
tho population of both the West Riding and
Lancashire were perfectly satisfied with the declarations
of the Noble Lord, and if it had not been for a letter
bublished in the newspapers and signed " A Manufac-
turer," the vast proportion of the mills owners would
have been perfectly reconciled to the Ten Hours Act as
it was intended when it Ras passed by the House.
Utter ruin had been predicted at the time of the passing
of the Ten Hours Bill, but all those predictions had been
falsified. The factory operatives had not, as was pre-
dicted by many Hon. Members, spent the greater leisure
which had been given them in beer houses, but they
were found spending that leisure in reading-rooms or in
their cottage gardens.—(Hear.) The rule in Yorkshire
was to live and let live. The late Sir R. Peel, thirty-five
years ago, advocated a Ten Hours Bill, and since that
lime the people in the manufacturing districts had been
carrying on a peaceful agitation. He (Mr. Edwards)
declared he would rather see the Bill thrown out alto-
gether than that those paltry amendments should be
embodied into it at the instance of the Government.--
(Hear, hear.)

Lord LorASHLEY denied that he had ever considered
himself the champion of the factory operatives' but he
had considered himself their friend—(Hear, hear)—
and ho declared before God that he bad done that which
he conceived to be best for their interests, in giving in
hie adhesion to the Government Bill.—(Hear, hear.)
He had sacrificed much of his time in advocating their
interests, and now it appeared he had sacrificed his re-
putation by giving his adhesion to that measure.—(Loud
cries of "No, no.") He would say in passing, that he
had just received an address agreed to at a large meet-
ing of delegates, at Glasgow, which set forth that they
vi ere fully satisfied with the zeal and self-devotion of
him (Lord Ashley), that they could not, for a
moment, imagine that he had deserted their interests,
and that he had acted wisely in giving up the Ten Hours
Bill to secure the inestimable benefit to the factory ope-
ratives of leaving otf work at six o'clock. That might
show public men that amid all their difficulties and dis-
avointments they bad their consolations.—(Hear, hear.)
The Noble Lord concluded by stating that he would vote
against the amendment.

Mr. W. BROWN supported the amendment. He
was quite ready to admit the zeal and talents of the
Noble Lord who had just spoken, but he thought he was
very much misinformed. There was a great spirit of hos-
tiiiryto the manufacturing interest abroad which attempted
to refer all the vices and miseries of the working-classes
to the mills. It was said the manufacturing districts
was the hot-bad of vice, but the State Papers showed
that the palm of vice was borne off by purely agricul-
tural counties.

Mr. AGLIONBY said that the amendment, "as
he understood it, was entirely subversive of
the whole spirit of the Bill, and he
should give it his most strenuous opposition.
Mr. J. WILLIAMS observed that the petition which
had been presented from Ilawick against the Bill had
bnn got up by the millowners themselves, who had
threatened to discharge their labourers if they did not
sign it; and added tnat a public meeting of factory la-
bourers had afterwards repudiated the petition.
Mr. ELLIOTT denied that coercion had been used
to procure signatures.

.
Mr. B. ISENISON said he believed the working
classes in the West Riding felt grateful to the Noble