The Sun.
London, England, 1850-02-14 00:00:00

SEWERS.

Mr. FUME moved for a return showing the financial
state of each district of sewers within the present juris-
diction; the amount of rates that were uncollected; rh. e
amount of balance in hand (if any), also debts and lia-
bilities (if any) on each district, at the time they were
superseded by the Act 11 and 12 Vic., c. 112, intituled the
" Metropolitan Sewers Act:" And, account of all rates
made since that period; showing the rental, the amount
of rate, and at what rate; also, the amount received from
rates, contributions, and other sources, and how the
same has been expended, under distinct and separate
heads of works, establishment, contingent expenses, &c.,
up to the 31st day of December 1849, stating the titles
of the several Acts of Parliament under which the Com-
missioners act.—A greed ti'.
GUARDS OF HONOUR AND ESCORTS.
Major BLACKALL moved for returns of the names
i
of all officers serving n Ireland during the late visit of
her Majesty to that country, who were employed either
in firing salutes or upon guards of honour and escorts
vice in each rank respectively; distinguishing the number
in attendance upen her Majesty, their rank, period of ser-
of years employed on home or foreign service, and the
number of years upon lull or half-pay; and of the names
of all officers who received promotion by brevet on the
occasion of her Majesty's late visit to Ireland, their
rank, period of service in each rank respectively, dis-
tinguishing the number of years employed en home or
foreign service, and the number of years upon full and
half-pay.—Agreed to.
ARMY PENSIONERS.
Lord DUNCAN presented a petition from out-pen-
sioners of Chelsea Hospital, residing at Bath, praying
that the deductions which bad been made in their pay,
owing to the Bill pasted by the Secretary at War in
1847, might be returned to them.

COURTS OF LAW AND EQUITY.
Mr. HENLEY asked the Hon. Member for Kilmar-
nock whether it was his intention to move this sesvioa
for a renewal of the Committee on courts of law and
equity.
Mr. BOUVERIE said it was not his present intention
to move for that Committee, but he thought it desirable
that it should be re-appointed.
ECCLESIASTICAL REVENUES.
Mr. SPOONER asked the Secretary for the Home
Department taken on ecclesiatical
revenues would be laid on the table of the House.
Sir G.
GREwyhensaid the deheevibanice
only just got the report,
which , and he would make
qucihry had
beentbelaeidviduepnoone.the table
ihiabout
KILRUSH UNION.
Mr. MONSELL begged to ask the Secretary for
question
accountsrespecting
the Kilrush Union.
from Kilrush, stating
Hlroelanhd a
receivedad
that the number of deaths in November, 1849, was
fifteen, and in the month of February the
number had increased to 150. He begged to ask whe-
ther out-door relief was stopped at two separate parts of
the union, and whether the accounts of the deaths in the
union to which ho had referred were correct?
Sir WM. SOMERVILLE thought his Honourable
Friend could best obtain the information he wanted
by asking for papers. He (Sir William Somerville)
thought it best to give no specific answers to his
Honourable Friend's questions, lest those answers
might not prove correct. The situation of the unfor-
tunate :union of Kilrush was notorious. It was un-
doubtedly true, that the mortality in the union had
greatly increased within the last few weeks ; but such
an occurrence was not an unusual one, and it would be
impossible for hiss to say to what that increase in the
deaths was owing.
POOR-LAW RETURNS.
Mr. DISRAELI gave notice that to-morrow he should
ask a question of the President of the Poor-law Board as
to when the returns would be made.
WALTHAM FOREST.

In answer to a question from Lord DUNCAN,
Lord JOHN RUSSELL said ho had just received a
setter by which he was informed that the report of
the Commissioners of the Waltham Forest would be in
the hands of the Lords of the Treasury.
MEDICAL OFFICERS—ORDER OF THE BATH.
Sir DE LACY EVANS role to ask the First Lord
of the Treasury the result of the consideration of Go-
vernment, promised during last session, respecting the
conferring of the Military class of the Order of the Bath
on medical officers, who may have been present, and
proved deserving in important naval and military ac-
tions ?

Lord JOHN RUSSELL :aid that the question had
been for some time under the consideration (ff. the Com-
mander-in• Chief, and he had made up his mind on the
subject ; butit was necessary that his recommendations
should be reconsidered by the Government bef)re they
were published.
ELECTORAL DIVISIONS (IRELAND).

In answer to a question from Mr. HERBERT,
Sir WM. SOMERVILLE said that there ceitsinly
were causes which rendered it necessary that there
should be some delay in the formation of some of the
electoral divisions in Ireland.
PUBLIC LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS.
EIVART then moved fur leave to bring in a Bill
fug► eu4bling town•counoils to establish pablio libraries

and museums.' No country,'he said, was so inadequately
provided with public libraries as our own, and in this
assertion he was supported by the unanimous resolution of
the Select Committee which was:appointed last year, every
Member c f which agreed in the propriety of the
motion he was about to submit to the House. London
was the only great capital in Europe which had not the
advantage of public libraries, and this circumstance had
been complained of as long ago as the days of Gibbon.
Since then the British !Museum had been established,
which certainly had conferred great advantages upon
the people, both in the metropolis and the country, but
still London was deficient in those sources of informa-
tion and instruction which were given to the people by
rin Ras of public libraries; in the capitals of Paris,
Dresden, and Florence. On the continent the rule
of accessibility to these institutions was universal,
and all who had travelled through continental cities
knew that they could resort to them unquestioned and
with perfect ease. Our chief manufacturing towns, such
as Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, and Sheffield, were
in the same unfortunate condition, and for the want of
the luxury of public libraries, to which all could
resort, the literature of this country hal greatly suffered.
If the peop!e were supplied with public libraries they
might depend upon the people educating themselyo=.
He was ashamed, and yet happy, to say that America
had made far greater prc-,sesti than we had done, for
every state had a public library which Aas sup-
ported by the state, and was easily accessible.
firs Hon. Friend, the Member for Manchester, when 1
he brought forward his motion on the subject, would
enunciate the advantages which resulted to the United
States from their liberation of the taxes upon knowledge,
and the immense advantages which the Americans 1
enjoyed through having a ready access to public I
libraries. For these reasons he was instructed
by the Committee to take the liberty of introducing this
Bill to the consideration of the House, and the House
had a right, therefore, to expect from him an explicit
statement or its provisions. A few years ago he and
his Honourable Friend the Member for Pon-
tefract, at the request of a considerable num-
ber of persons, introduced s Bill enabling town
councils to establish museums, which was carried
under Sir Robert Peel's Administration, and had since
given considerable satisfaction. Now he thought it better
that that Bill should be consolidated with this (the li-
braries) Bill, thus enabling town councils to establish
libraries and museums together. In point of fact, he
proposed to begin, as it were, de novo. The Museums
Bill empowered town councils to raise a rate not exceed-
ing a halfpenny in the pound, which should be applied
to establishing museums, and in this Bill he adopted that
provision. In the next place, it enabled town councils
to purchase land for libraries and museums, and vested
the property of such buildings in themselves. The Mu-
seums Bill restricted the power of establishing
museums to towns and boroughs whose in-
habitants exceeded 10,000, but the committee thought
it better to throw the power open to all towns, and ac-
cordingly the Bill did so. In the next place the
Museums Bill enabled town councils to levy Id. upon
each person who was admitted to the museum; but as
that provision acted as an impediment to the carrying out
of the plan, it was proposed by this Bill to repeal it, and
and allow the public to be admitted gratuitously both to
the museum and the library. That was strictly the
nature of the Bill he had now the honour of laying be-
fore the House. It did not give town councils any
power of purchasing books, because it was thought bet-
ter to leave the books to be supplied by donations
and such like means. He might be asked who the
people were the Bill professed to benefit? Well, and a
very proper question that would be. His answer to it
was simply this, namely, the Bill bas been anticipated
by many towns. In some places they had anticipated
the law, and established libraries as well as mu-
seums. In Warrington a public library had been
established for some time, and he was told
that it had succeded exceedingly well. He held in his
hand the last report of the managing committe-, which
represented it to be in a very flourishing condition.
Then, again, last year a similar institution was
established in Salford, and although it had not
been in operation six months, it contained
upwards of 5,000 volumes, which had been
presented to it,while from Birmingham and Sheffield de-
putations had been sent up to wait upon Government,
and urge them to support the Bill. In Ireland it was
also desired, and if he had time he could multiply in-
stances where attempts had been made to anticipate this
measure, but he felt he had said enough to in-
duce the House to allori him to introduce it.
If he should have the satisfaction of carrying this mea-
sure, he could assure the House that in sanctioning it
they would receive the gratitude of the great body of
the people. It was the abject of the Bill that the insti-
tutions which it sought to establish, popular as they
were in their object, should be popular in their origin—
that they might be founded by the people, sustained by
tits people, and enjoyed by the people. With these ob-
servations, he begged to move for leave to bring in a
Bill to enable t awn councils to establish public libraries
and museums.—(Cheers.)
Mr. BROTHERTON seconded the motion.
Leave was then elven to bring in the Bill.
MINISTERS' MONEY IN IRELAND.
Mr. WILLIAM FAGAN presented a petition nu-
merously signed from Cork against Ministers' Money.
The Hors. GENTLEMAN then rose to move for a Com-
mittee of the whole House, to take into consideration
the law relating to the rate or tax called " Ministers'
Money," in Ireland, with the view to the repeal of so
much thereof as relates to the said rive or tax; and fur-
ther to take into consideration the Act 3 and 4 Will.
IY., c. 114, called " The Church Temporalities Act," for
the purpose of amending the same so as to provide
thereby a substitute out of the revenues of the Ecclesi-
astical Commissioners as a provision for the Protes-
tant Ministers in certain corporate towns in Ire-
land, in lieu of the annual sums now re-
ceived by them, under and by virtue of the
Act 17 and 18 Charles 11., cap. 7. The Honourable
Member stated as a reason for his motion, that the tax
called Ministers' Money pressed with great severity
upon the poorer classes of the Roman Catholic popula-
tion in the large towns of Ireland, particu-
larly in Dublin, Cork, Clonmel, Kinsale, and Water-
ford, and led to the lamentable and end-
less sectarian rancour among the Irish people.
He thought that the least that the Catholic population
of those towns could ask from the Government was that
they should be freed from this odious impost. Last year
he had endeavoured to show that a substitute could be
easily provided from the funds of the Ecclesiastical Com-
mission. On that occasion the Right Hon. Baronet the Home
Secretary bad moved the previous question, which he
took as a proof, that he (the Right Hon. Baronet) ac-
knowledged the justice of his sentiments. In a private
interview which he had had with the Right Hon. Baronet,
he had understood him to be favourable to his project:
and in addition to this, he argued from the late visit of
her Majesty to Ireland, that the Government were desir-
ous of relieving the known grievances of that country.
It was in this stage of the question, that he (Mr. Fagan)
came forward to provide a substitute for this tax.
On the death of the principal bishops the income of the
Ecclesiastical Commission in Ireland would be increased
by the sum of 13,500/., making a total income of 300.0001.,
and he submitted that it would be of advantage to the
Commission to encourage the purchase of perpetuities;
and in other ways to relieve the people of this impost
He proposed that the sale of perpetuities should be ap-
plied as income till the revenue of the Ecclesiastical Com.-
mision should be increased. He had prepared a
the House would allow him to bring it in. to meet the dif-
ficulty of the case, which measure he thought with the
advance of 30,0001 would obviate every difficulty.
There was no such thing as Ministers' money in Eng-
land, and he did not see why the Catholics of Ireland
should be burthened with it. He deprecated the neces-
sity of their coming there year after year to put
an end to so miserable a tax of 15,000/. a year, while
the Protestant Church were in possession of almost all
the best lands of Ireland. The Hon. and Learned
Member concluded by moving the resolution of which he
had given notice.
Sir G. GREY regretted that as the circumstances of
the case were at the present moment is the same
condition as they were last year when the Honour-
, able Gentleman brought forward his motion, he
must pursue the same course that he did then, and move
the previous question. While he admitted the candid
and open manner in which the Hon. Gentleman bad
brought forward the question, he doubted the policy and
efficacy of his doing so.
Mr. POWER deprecated the tax of minister's money,
because at present it fell entirely upon the poorer class
of the Catholic artisans, and its object was to support
those who put forth doctrines which they did not believe.
(LEFT SPEAKING.)

LAW INTELLIGENCE.