The Sun.
London, England, 1868-07-25 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 25, 1868.

In the House of Lords yesterday the Duke of
MONTROSE moved the second reading of the Electric
Telegraphs Bill, and showed various reasons in
favour of it, among which he stated that abroad it
was always the practice to have the telegraphs put
in the hands of the State, and the consequence was
that in those countries the communication was much
cheaper. After the second reading had been got
through, the report of amendments to the Public
Schools Bill came on for consideration, and Lord
LYTfELTON proposed an amendment, which was
negatived ; it was to the effect that the governing
bodies should be more exclud&l than they are from
interfering with the masters of boarding-houses,
but the Lord Chancellor explained that it would
not be a dezirable thing to agree to. Another
amendment by Lord LYTTELTON was rejected, which
was that certain powers should be given to the
head-master. The Duke of MARLBOROUGH showed
that these changes were not at all desirable ; and
Lord HOUGHTON, with some force, added that if all
these schemes were adopted it would be better to
abolish altogether the governing body, for they
would be reduced to a cipher if all these powers
were given to the head-master. The Lord Chan-
cellor put the case very clearly before the House,
by saying that it would be highly inexpedient and
injudicious to put the head-master, who was na-
turally the servant of the governing body, over it.
On the whole, it was quite as well that the amend-
ment was rejected, and so it will appear upon con-
sideration. The Registration (Ireland) Bill was
read a second time, and although the House did not
sit long a good deal was accomplished, and several
bills advanced a stage, which is most desirable at
this stage of the public business.

The long and hardly-contested battle of the
Foreign Cattle Market Bill has at length come to a
conclusion, but the result will not be very satisfac-
tory to the majority of the House, or of the public.
The butchers and their advocates are the only
parties who have reason to be gratified by the with-
drawal of the measure, and their customers, during
the recess, will have no alternative but to pay prices
which they choose to charge. It is certainly dis-
appointing that so much time and trouble should
have been spent over a fruitless measure, and the
tactics by which it has been defeated do more credit
to the ingenuity of its opponents than to their love
of fair play or public spirit. The sense of the House
was indisputably in favour of the bill, and on every
division large majorities supported it, yet a small
though pertinacious holy of opponents have been
able, through a series of clever manoeuvres, to de-
feat the House and the Government. The forms of
the House have been made to serve the purpose of
frustrating instead of forwarding business, and the
count-out on Thursday helped to get over an
evening, though as soon as the doors ware opened
the floor of the House was crowded by members
anxious to push on the Cattle Bill. Lest night the
same sort of policy was pursued, and Mr. AYRToN,
Mr. MILNER GIBSON, and a few others maintained
their parts, undaunted by the severe stric-
tures which were passed upon them. Mr.
AYRTON moved that the Chairman should report
progress, though in a house of 137 only 32 voted
with him, and he industriously went over the same
ground, over and over again, till his arguments
must have grown as tedious to himself as to his
hearers. At half-past two in the morning, after
half the night had bees spent in disputing inch by
inch Clause 25, Mr. AYRTON rose again to move
for reporting progress, and this time with success.
Mr. DISRAELI admitted he was just about to rise
for the same purpose, and very soon after the
Chancellor of the Exchequer announced that the
Government had given up the task in despair until
another session. Early in the evening matters had
come to a more exciting pass, and the plain speaking
on both bides called for the interference of the
Speaker. Mr. MILNER GIBSON was seized with a
sudden anxiety to preserve the privileges of inde-
pendent members. Mr. JACOB BRIcalT was seized
with a sudden sense of the impropriety of expecting