three of them were so. Another case had ] of State for the Home Department the names of the person or persons who, contrary to the wish of the municipal body of Newbury, urged upon the Lord Chancellor the appointment of five additional magis trates for that borough. been brought forward by the hon. Member for Hereford (Mr. Clive) where six magistrates also were appointed, all Tories; and he now had to bring forward the case of Newbury, where five Tories had been appointed magistrates. The peculiarity of this latter case was that it was worse than the others. The Home Secretary had candidly, frankly, and honestly stated that whenever these appointments were in the hands of an individual the party friends of that individual were, of course, appointed by him, whether he were the Lord Lieutenant of the county, or the Lord Chancellor; and certainly no Lord Chancellor had worked out this principle better than the present. In November the corporation of Newbury received a letter from the Lord Chancellor or his secretary, stating that very serious inconvenience was felt at Newbury from the want of resident magistrates. The municipal body immediately met, and came to a resolution assuring the Lord Chancellor that there was no want of resident magistrates, and they sent the noble and learned Lord a resolution to the effect that they did not think the addition of magistrates necessary. There was a division in the municipal council on that resolution of seven to three. Nevertheless, in a very short time after, the Lord Chancellor intimated that he had appointed five magistrates,—and who were they? In the first place, they were not all resident, though non-residence was the pretext for their being appointed. Two of them were medical gentlemen and non-resident, and the other three were retail shopkeepers, and-strange to say were the very minority which voted against the majority of the municipal council. These three individuals the Lord Chancellor appointed, and they have the high qualification of being Tories and active partisans. He had no doubt that they would do their duty by their party at the ensuing election. After these appointments were made, a resolution was passed at a meeting of the municipal council, expressing their strong disapproval of the manner in which the recent appointments of magistrates had been made, such appointments being contrary to the wish of the council. No doubt the Lord Chancellor had this power, but if the whole country was to be overrun in this way by magistrates appointed solely on political grounds, what was to become of the impartial administration of justice? He should conclude by asking the Secretary COLONEL CLIFFORD said, he had given notice of his intention to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether any subsequent information obtained by him will enable him to qualify his statement as to a public meeting alleged to have been held in Hereford previously to the recent appointment of Magistrates in that city; and if not, whether he will state his authority for the same; and to call the attention of the House thereto? That statement had caused astonishment and dissatisfaction in Hereford, though there was no person in that House who did not believe that the right hon. Gentleman was the last person who would willingly make a statement not consistent with the facts. It would be remembered that not long since his hon. Friend and Colleague (Mr. Clive) presented a petition from the municipal authorities and other inhabitants of the city of Hereford, complaining of the appointment of six magistrates. The petitioners stated that there was no necessity for additional magistrates, that no application had been made for any, that they got no intimation of any intention to make the appointment, and that some of the gentlemen named were objectionable for special reasons, two being retail dealers, and one an uncertificated bankrupt. He was sorry to have to make a statement of a personal nature, but the petitioners made distinct mention of that matter, wishing it to be understood that their objections were made not merely on political grounds. On that occasion the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State answered that the appointments had been regularly made; that a public meeting had been held, and a communication made to the Lord Chancellor, which resulted in the appointments. It would be almost impossible for him strictly to prove a negative, but in this case he was prepared to do so as nearly as possible. Before he sat down he would be able, he thought, to show to the House that no such meeting had ever been held. He would first read a letter which he had received from the Mayor of Hereford, dated 12th of April, 1859 : Sir, I was greatly surprised to see it stated in The Times report of the proceedings in the House on Friday, that the nomination was the result of a public meeting held for that special purpose. I do not know how the Home Secretary came to be misinformed. I can say that no such meeting took place." The Mayor also enclosed a letter from the town clerk, stating that no such public meeting was ever called, and that he was first made acquainted with the intention to make an addition to the magistracy of the borough by the receipt of the following letter from the Lord Chancellor's Secretary : "Sir, I am directed by the Lord Chancellor to request that you will forward to the Crown office, through your London agent, the commission of peace for the borough of Hereford, in order that some new names may be added to it. As soon as they are finally decided on, the list will be sent to the mayor. ap Chancellor, declaring more magistrates to be absolutely necessary, and upon that plication five names were added to the commission, two Liberals, and three Conservatives, the Lord Chancellor consulting in the choice of those names the chairman of quarter sessions, and some of the neigh- 66 "I was present at a meeting of about twenty persons, of whom seven were town-councillors, held at Hereford early in April, 1858, for the purpose of considering who should be recommended to the Lord Chancellor as additional magistrates." He added, that another meeting was held on the 13th of that month, whereat several The House would thus see that no public meeting had ever been held. But he believed the fact was, that a meeting of two or three solicitors took place. There was also present a gentleman resident in the neighbourhood who considered that he had great claims for services offered rather than rendered; and he proposed a list of names which, as the others could not agree upon a list, was forwarded to the Lord Chan-town-councillors and others attended, and cellor. He felt confident that the right hon. Gentleman would be able to state that he had been misinformed, and further than that, that he would be able to add on the part of the Lord Chancellor that he had also been misinformed and deceived. There was a strong opinion in Hereford that the appointments had been made only for political purposes, and that the whole affair was one of the grossest political jobs on record. MR. SOTHERON ESTCOURT said, that in reply to the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. Duncombe) he had to state that the person who, he would not say urged upon the Lord Chancellor the appointment of five additional magistrates for Newbury, but upon whose application that appointment took place, was no other than the Recorder of the borough. That gentleman wrote to the Lord Chancellor to say that there was such a deficiency of magistrates that very often a bench could not be formed, and he suggested that his Lordship should write to the town council and ask them to send up the names of competent gentlemen. The Lord Chancellor did so; but the town council could not agree upon the names, and so resolved that no additional magistrates were wanted. The Recorder afterwards wrote a second time to the Lord 66 there were other subsequent conferences on the subject. The question was, whether he (Mr. Sotheron Estcourt) would qualify his expression that a public meeting' was held. Possibly the word " public" might have been an incorrect term; but he could not say that was his opinion. When a meeting of twenty persons, of whom seven were town councillors, was held on a subject of interest to the whole community, he could not characterize that as a hole-and-corner meeting. He could only say that, according to the information furnished to him, he adhered to the expression which he had formerly used, but if the hon. and gallant Gentleman, either now or hereafter, could show that he was mistaken, or could prove that the Lord Chancellor had been misinformed, he (Mr. Sotheron Estcourt) should be perfectly ready to make the acknowledgment due not only to the truth of the matter but to the courtesy with which it had been brought forward. LORD WILLIAM GRAHAM said, he might refer to a local newspaper of Radical or Liberal politics for a proof of the necessity for the appointment of additional magistrates in Hereford. It stated that on the 4th of March, 1858, two summonses for assault were returned, which could not be heard because only one magistrate was in attendance. On Monday, the 27th of the same month, no magistrate at all was in attendance, and the parties having business at the court were dismissed. They retired, making many observations on the value of time, and the necessity of having a stipendiary magistrate. When a Radical paper began to discuss the necessity of having a stipendiary magistrate it was a good proof that some additional magistrates were required, and that it was high time for the interference of the Lord Chancellor. The objection that all the six new magistrates were of the same political party came with a very bad grace from the hon. Members for the borough, who were returned principally through the influence of a corporation which never nominated any but Whigs for the magistracy. It was true they once sent up the names of two Conservatives, but they took care to ascertain first that one would not serve, and that the Lord Chancellor would not appoint the other because he was a distiller. MR. CLIVE said, the noble Lord had referred to what took place in March, 1858, to prove the necessity of the pew appointments. But they were not made by the Lord Chancellor until ten months after, and at a time when it was evident, from the good attendance on the bench, that there was no necessity for any additional magistrates whatever. He believed it was not true that only two Conservative names had been sent up by the corporation. It was utterly untrue that they had any reason whatever to believe that Lord Chancellor Cranworth would not appoint the gentleman alluded to, who was a wine-merchant in large business, and a man of the highest respectability. On the contrary, their feeling was that the Lord Chancellor had been extremely hypercritical. He took it upon himself, therefore, to give the flattest contradiction consistent with the rules of the House and his respect for the noble Lord to the statements he had just made. The right hon. Gentleman had given no answer to the allegation that one of the gentlemen recently appointed had been a bankrupt. As to the meeting, the right hon. Gentleman might as well say that the meeting held the other day to decide who was to go to Dovor was a public meeting. MR. NEWDEGATE said, he had listened to numerous discussions that had been raised on the appointments to the magistracy made by the Lord Chancellor. When the Government sat on the opposite side of the House he did not recollect anything like this amount of interference ; but hon. Gentlemen who now sat on the Opposition side were constantly objecting to the magisterial appointments of the Lord Chancellor, and complaining that they were tainted by political designs. He would ask what could tend more to the tainting of justice with political feeling than the course persevered in on the other side of the House? He could only say, as an independent Member, that if such a course were persevered in, it might be found that a similar course would be adopted with respect to hon. Gentlemen opposite. He could conceive nothing more mischievous than the course that was being followed, and nothing more calculated to render necessary the appointment of stipendiary magistrates throughout England, which, along with other disadvantages, certainly would not increase public economy. He knew what the appointments of the Lord Chancellor were in his own part of the country, and believed his conduct had tended to balance political opinions on the bench, and was calculated to produce beneficial results. MR. E. P. BOUVERIE said, that when the same proceedings took place on the part of other Lord Chancellors the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Newdegate) would be justly entitled to complain. There could not be a breath of suspicion in reference to the way in which the late Lord Chancellor had exercised his patronage. He must altogether repudiate the theory just laid down by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire as to the justice of effecting a balance in the political views of the magistrates. It should be recollected that in most of the towns political feeling ran strongly in one direction, and the consequence was that if the leading gentlemen of those towns were put in the commission, the larger portion of them must necessarily be of one political opinion. If politics were to be regarded in this matter, which he did not think they ought to be, he could never concur in the doctrine of his hon. Friend, that however small a party might be in a borough, nevertheless that an equal number of gentlemen representing that party should be appointed magistrates, as had been appointed from the party of the great majority. In Scotland they never heard such complaints. In that country the appointments of the magistracy were in the hands of the Lord Lieutenants, who were never influenced by any political feeling. He had heard with very great astonishment a statement made some time since by the hon. Member for Canterbury, that he had actually waited on the Lord Chancellor to ask him to appoint some political partisans to the bench in that city. If the present system of appointing magistrates went on, he thought that the House would feel itself called upon to take away the patronage from the Lord Chancellor, or any other Minister, for the purpose of placing it in the hands of some more impartial authority. MR. DE VERE said, he must express his surprise at hearing it stated by the hon. Member for Hereford that one of the magistrates to whom the commission of the peace was given was an uncertificated bankrupt. If that statement were true, he thought no appointment could be more disgraceful, and that this House was bound to call upon Her Majesty's Ministers to institute an inquiry into the subject, and if it were proved that the appointment had been given under such circumstances, then such appointment should be revoked. LORD JOHN MANNERS said, his simple answer to this charge was this:-The gentleman alluded to was a bankrupt some thirty-two years ago, in consequence of the failure of his brother. That gentleman had been carrying on business ever since, without the slightest stain having ever attached to his character. new tariff would apply to goods shipped from this country before the change of duties had become known to the manufacturers of this country? MR. HADFIELD said, he wished to ask the Secretary of State for India whether it is contemplated to impose any, and, what Duty on Hardware under the new Tariff in India? MR. WILSON said, he also wished to ask a question with regard to this tariff. On a former occasion he had thought it his duty to call attention to the fact that the tariff then existing in India was, as far as it related to English goods, a protective tariff, since under its imports from England were charged 5 per cent, while imports from foreign countries were charged 10 per cent. He had also stated that that was a principle which had been abandoned years ago with regard to our Colonies, and he could not understand why British manufactures in India should require protection in the Indian market. He had therefore taken the liberty of suggesting that it would only be fair to raise the duty on British manufactures to an equality with those of foreign manufactures. He wished to ask whether the increase referred to in the telegram just received referred only to the duties on British manufactures, so as to raise them to an equality with foreign manufactures, or whether both the duties on British and foreign goods were to be increased in a corresponding manner? RETIRED FIELD OFFICERS. COLONEL KINGSCOTE said, he wished to ask the Secretary of State for India whether it is the intention of Government, now that the Commissioned Ranks of Her Majesty's Indian Artillery and Engineers have been so fully assimilated in other respects to those branches of the Army at home, to complete the uniformity by extending to the Retired Field Officers the privilege enjoyed by those of the Royal Artillery and Engineers, of not allowing them to be superseded (in rank) by their brother officers who remain on the effective strength of their corps? THE 41ST REGIMENT AT TRINIDAD. SIR DE LACY EVANS said, he would just express a hope that the Government intended to mark their sense of the transcendent services of Sir J. Lawrence by aside the advice tendered him by Sir John Lawrence, as well as that tendered him by Sir Archdale Wilson, to treat_with_the King of Delhi. His right hon. Friend, he thought, in making that statement, had overlooked two important facts-namely, that Sir John Lawrence had never given Viscount Canning any advice on the sub General Reid had been in command at the period to which he alluded. A similar statement had been made by a noble Lord in "another place" on a former occasion ; a communication from Sir John Lawrence to that noble Lord had followed, and he should appeal to the noble Lord the Secretary for India to say whether facts had not come within his cognizance which clearly demonstrated the justice of the position which he (Mr. Kinnaird) had now taken up. He had that very morning received a communication from Sir John Lawrence with respect to the point at issue, which the House, in justice to an absent man, would perhaps allow him to read. The facts of the case, as stated by Sir John Lawrence, were as follows: conferring upon him some higher reward than had yet been offered to him. He rose, however, to ask the Secretary of State for War by whose authority, and for what reasons, the detachment of the 41st Regiment at Trinidad, which had been moved out of barracks into camp on account of the mortality and disease which had occurred in the former, were subse-ject, and that not Sir Archdale Wilson but quently ordered back into barracks, where the severe losses to which they had previously been exposed were renewed? When he called attention to this subject on a former occasion, the Secretary of State for War stated that an order had been issued to withdraw the troops, but they had since been sent back to the barracks where all the mortality occurred. The correspondence on the subject had been delivered that morning, and it appeared that five months had been occupied in correspondence. The detachment had been exposed to danger, he supposed on the ground of economy; but he could not help thinking that no worse mode of effecting a saving of expenditure could be adopted. Authority ought, in his opinion, to be invested in some person to incur the expense of building new barracks where those already in existence were so situated as to be prejudicial to the health of the troops. When Lord Metcalfe had had to deal with a similar state of things as that to which his question related in Jamaica, he had ordered new barracks to be built, and when reprimanded for having done so, replied that the money expended might be taken out of his private means if they were insisted upon, but that he had deemed it to be his duty to act as he had done. He trusted the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the War Department would do everything which was necessary to promote the health of the troops. DISTURBANCES IN TRAVANCORE. MR. KINNAIRD said, before he referred to the subject respecting which he had given notice of his intention to put a question to the Government on the subject the disturbances in Travancore-he was anxious to allude to what had fallen in the debate of the previous evening from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Northampton (Mr. Vernon Smith). His right hon. Friend observed that Viscount Canning had put aside the advice tendered him by both extremes, that he had put "The King of Delhi made overtures which had been referred by General Reid to Sir John Lawrence, who suggested in reply that they should be accepted on conditions which the King could not comply with, and the matter dropped. The reason why those overtures had been entertained at that early time for a moment was, that had the King been in a position by his innocence of bloodguiltiness to accede to those conditions the best neck of the mutiny would have been broken, the possible results might have been produced, the lives of thousands of our countrymen who died in the struggle which ensued would have been saved, a most distinguished general (General Nicholson) would have been spared to his country, and What Lord Canning had really done months after millions of money would have been economized. these negotiations had ended, was to write to the Lieutenant Governor of Agra to say that no negotiations should be entered into with the King of Delhi without his sanction. That communication, however, had had no effect whatever on the siege of Delhi, as, in the meanwhile Sir John Lawrence had sent down troops and munitions of war which had enabled Sir A. Wilson to storm the fortress successfully. Lord Canning's message, in fact, before the storming of Delhi took place, and the could only have reached Sir A. Wilson a few hours scene of operations was so distant from Calcutta that whether he wished or not he could have had no influence on the siege." He (Mr. Kinnaird) thought it his duty to state these facts, in order that his right hon. Friend might have an opportunity of explaining and correcting the observations which had fallen from him the evening before. Having done so, he should proceed to advert to the subject which he had given |