us." The first principle that ought to | for Denbighshire. Then, what are we to be dealt with in this matter is that any do with the Bill of the hon. Member for law amending the law of burial should Gloucester (Mr. Monk)? It certainly does enact that there should be burial-places in not meet my view. The really important every part of England, not necessarily, provision to which I have just alluded as however, in every parish. No one of being desirable was embodied in the Gothe half-dozen Bills before the House vernment measure brought forward some touched that point, and for that reason time ago; and I cannot help thinking I deem them all unsatisfactory. The that when it is made the groundwork of Bill presented by the Government pro- legislation, as I hope it will be, there ceeded in that direction, for it provided will not be so much difficulty in making that there should be a burial-ground provision for the intermediate stage— provided convenient for every person to which will be practically the only diffibe buried in. You would find that, culty-in the work of giving a burialstarting from this point, you could make ground to every part of the country. very much better provision for the in- This Bill does not do that. It is entirely termediate stage during which the ex-permissive, and I am rather surprised isting churchyards could be used without injuring the consciences of those who are at present interested in them. See for one moment what the result of any of the Bills which we have before us would be! If one of them were passed, its effect would be to allow any religious body but the Church of England to have burial-grounds where its own religious services might be exclusively used, while the Church alone would not be allowed to provide at her own expense a burial-ground exclusively for the use of her own people. That, I think, would be a grievance, and I cannot think that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Denbighshire would press his demand to that point. Let every person, I say, be buried with the services which he or his friends like. That would not, however, be the case if the law said that the Church of England, as the Established Church of the country, were bound to provide burial-grounds, both consecrated and unconsecrated, for everybody. Surely, in altering the law we ought to consider, as far as possible, the conscientious scruples of Churchmen as well as of Dissenters; and though you may think them foolish you are not entitled to deny the fact that those conscientious scruples exist. Therefore, we ought to be as tender as possible in trying to get rid of what they consider a grievance, instead of doing it as roughly as we can. For the sake of argument, I am not denying the Nonconformist grievance; but I do not hesitate to say that the House could not inflict a greater blow at the conscientious scruples of the Laity as well as Clergy of the Church than by carrying the Bill of the hon. and learned Member that it should have been treated so seriously by hon. Members opposite. I do not myself believe that it carries the law the least bit further than it is at the present moment. I know several parishes myself, and I have a very strong impression that there are many more, which, without the assistance of this Bill, have given for Nonconformist burials considerable portions of land attached to the churchyards. If, however, the Bill did not do very much good, what harm could it do? I cannot understand the objection to that kind of permissive legislation, when not the slightest harm can be alleged against it. If asked my opinion of the Bill, there are certain things in it which I do not like. I should not like to see those little bits cut off from the churchyards; but I cannot conceive any reason why people who do like them should not be allowed to have them. I shall give my vote for the Bill, for the simple reason that it is a permissive Bill, which enables persons to do what there is not the slightest harm in doing. It will show a feeling I cannot understand, if hon. Gentlemen vote against a measure which would, at least, alleviate their grievances. I hope that when a measure is brought forward to settle the whole question it will lay down the principle that there should be burial-grounds in England where all persons should have a right to be buried with their own religious services. MR. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN said, he not only disliked little strips of unconsecrated ground attached to their old churchyards and permissive Bills, but also those little nibbling attempts to deal with a great question, which everybody knew must shortly be settled in after this debate, it must be evident that the Bill would not give that satisfaction he had expected. He was entirely in the hands of the House. He would ask leave to withdraw the Bill. MR. SPEAKER said, there was an Amendment before the House, and the Motion could not be withdrawn unless the Amendment were first withdrawn. MR. ERNEST NOEL said, he was quite prepared to withdraw the Amendment. ["No, no!"] Question put. The House divided:-Ayes 129; Noes 160: Majority 31.-(Div. List, No. 29.) Words added. Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to. another manner. But there was another | to afford relief in rural parishes; but thing he also disliked, and that was a strong Ministry which admitted that there was a grievance and yet would vote for a Bill which they acknowledged did not deal with it, and would not bring in a Bill to deal with it themselves. On both sides of the House there was too great a disposition to look on this matter in a Party light. The right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down devoted the greater part of his speech to attacking a measure which was not before the House; and then, with respect to the Bill they were discussing, said that he did not think it would do any good, but would vote for it because he thought it would not do any harm. To such legislation he (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) objected. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of London (Mr. Hubbard) claimed liberty for the Church of England; but the Church of England did not require liberty, for she claimed authority, and her demands for liberty were quite of another character from those of denominations which protested against and existed in spite of her authority. The true wisdom of the Church of England was not to exclude Nonconformists, but to open her arms to receive them. With Infidelity on one side, and the Church of Rome on the other, the real policy and the safety of the Church of England was to encourage, and not to check, that feeling which led Non-MKENNA, Sir ANDREW LUSK, Mr. MUNTZ, Sir conformists to wish their dead to be laid in the old churchyards, and to smooth away rather than to perpetuate the points of difference between Nonconformists and Churchmen. He strongly opposed this Bill. MR. MARTEN said, that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sandwich (Mr. Knatchbull-Hugessen) objected to permissive Bills; but the Act of 1867 was permissive. The right hon. Gentleman also regretted that a strong Government like Her Majesty's Government did not bring in a comprehensive measure to deal with the question. The answer to that was that Her Majesty's Government had brought forward such a measure, and if it had failed in the House of Lords, the attempt was an honest one, and the failure was through no fault of theirs. MR. MONK regretted that his hon. Friends around him had unanimously condemned the Bill. It was intended Second Reading put off for six months. MOTIONS. HALL-MARKING (GOLD AND SILVER). Select Committee appointed, " to inquire into the operation of the Acts relating to the HallMarking of Gold and Silver manufactures."(Sir Henry Jackson.) And, on March 5, Committee nominated as PATRICK O'BRIEN, Mr. ONSLOW, Mr. PULESTON, MEDICAL ACT (1858) AMENDMENT (NO. 2) BILL. HOUSE OF LORDS, Thursday, 27th February, 1879. MINUTES.]-SESSIONAL COMMITTEES-Standing Orders Committee on Private Bills, Committee of Selection on Opposed Private Bills, Office of the Clerk of the Parliaments and Office of the Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, appointed and nominated. a hope that the Government would keep themselves clear of all the nonsense of quarantine. He fully admitted that it was quite competent for a medical gentleman to express any opinion he pleased on such a subject; but he ventured to think that anyone connected with a Government Department was bound to observe great caution, and to use the most guarded language in dealing with such a subject. No doubt, his object was to discountenance anything like a panic; but, at the same time, he was bound to attach due importance to it. He (the THE PLAGUE IN RUSSIA-SANITARY Earl of Carnarvon) now repeated what THE EARL OF CARNARVON, in asking a Question of his noble Friend the Lord President, of which he had given him private Notice, said, that at the commencement of the Session he had, as their Lordships would remember, put a Question to his noble Friend with respect to the plague in Russia, and received a reply stating what precautions had been adopted by the Government on the subject. That morning he had read a startling announcement in the papers, to the effect that the plague was no longer confined to the south-eastern districts of Russia, but, by a sudden bound, had made its way to St. Petersburg, and that 48 persons who were supposed to have been in contact with a person seized by it had been interned. It would be wrong to say anything on the subject which would have a tendency to create any agitation in the public mind; but the matter was one of a very serious character. The plague was of a deadly description, and there was a great difference between its existence in the province of Astrachan and its making its appearance in a capital, which one might say was within a few hours' journey of this country. He was concerned to read in the papers to-day that in a debate which took place upon this question in a learned Society yesterday-the Epidemiological Society-in the course of which a great deal of valuable information was given, and in which certainly nothing was said which could create a panic, a gentleman connected with a Government Department seemed to attach so little importance to the absence or presence of the disease in England that, speaking upon he had said upon a former occasion-that he trusted that Her Majesty's Government would take every precaution that lay in their power. He was sure, from what his noble Friend had said, that he considered it his duty to adopt every possible precaution. In the discussion which took place last night among the medical authorities at the learned Society to which he had referred, it was pointed out that our sanitary code was an excellent one, but that it had not as yet been brought into practical operation. Of course, it was for his noble Friend to consider whether it was possible to do So. If this newspaper report was true, the danger was very close at hand. Upon one point all authorities seemed to be agreed, and that was that distress, poverty, and want of food were conditions that were very favourable to the existence of the plague; and, unfortunately, these conditions existed at the present time to a higher degree than had been experienced for a very long time. He was sure that while his noble Friend would not give any undue importance to any rumours on the subject he would regard the subject as one deserving the attention of the Government; and therefore he hoped he would take every precaution that seemed desirable to prevent the introduction of the plague into this country. THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND GORDON, in reply, said, that no official confirmation of the report which had appeared in the newspapers of the appearance of the plague at St. Petersburg had been received by Her Majesty's Government-in fact, he had received no information on the subject beyond what his noble Friend possessed. to the speech to which his noble Friend As FAIRS AND MARKETS (IRELAND). QUESTION. OBSERVATIONS. as having been made by a gentleman | left on the 4th instant, and the substance connected with a Government Depart- of her despatches was forwarded by telement at a meeting of the Epidemological gram from Madeira on Saturday last, the Society, he hoped he should not be re- vessel itself might be expected to arrive garded as wanting in courtesy if he this evening. Another steamer left the declined to endorse all the opinions of Cape on the 11th, and the Government that gentleman-supposing him to have hoped to receive telegrams forwarded been correctly reported. From the by her from Madeira on Saturday statement of his noble Friend, that next. gentleman was reported, in the first place, to have said that he would not object to one or two cases of plague occurring here in order that they might be scientifically considered. If he had been correctly reported then, in his (the Duke of Richmond and Gordon's) humble opinion, he had much better not have said it at any rate, he thought he would not find many persons to agree with him. His next statement was, that he hoped the Government would keep clear of the nonsense of quarantine. To that he could only say that quarantine in certain cases was part of the law of this country; and so long as it remained so, and he continued to fill the office of President of the Privy Council, he would see that the provisions of the law with respect to quarantine were effectually carried out. Scarcely a day passed without the subject of the plague coming before him in some way or other; and he could assure his noble Friend that the Government had been adopting, and would continue to adopt, all due precautions. He was in constant communication with the officers of Customs, and he was of opinion that the powers already possessed by the Privy Council were sufficiently strong. SOUTH AFRICA-THE ZULU WAR DESPATCHES.-QUESTION. EARL GRANVILLE asked, Whether Her Majesty's Government had received any further information from South Africa? EARL CADOGAN, in reply, said, that the Government had received no despatches from the seat of war by the Asiatic, the steamer which arrived on Wednesday night; but that she did bring Government despatches from the Cape. It must be remembered that the Asiatic left the Cape only two days after the steamer which brought the first news of the disaster, and had been 27 days on her voyage to this country. Another steamer VOL. CCXLIII. [THIRD SERIES,] VISCOUNT MIDLETON asked the Lord President of the Council, Whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to introduce, during the present Session, a Bill for the better management of Fairs and Markets in Ireland? The noble Viscount said, that of late years there had been a considerable increase in the practice of holding fairs and markets in small towns in the South and West of Ireland. Those fairs at present created a great deal of inconvenience; and if they were properly regulated, it would involve a certain expense in making proper provision for their management. the want of proper accommodation was, that the fairs and markets were held in the high roads or the main streets of the small towns, and that practice caused great inconvenience to the community in general. Some attempts had been made in both Houses of Parliament to legislate upon the subject, but nothing had been done. He hoped that some attempt would be made this year to deal with this question, which was of more importance than their Lordships might, perhaps, think. The result of THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND GORDON said, he could corroborate the statement of his noble Friend, that attempts had been made in both Houses of Parliament to deal with this subject. In the year 1854, in the year 1857, in the year 1861, in the year 1862, and in the year 1867, Bills were introduced either into this or the other House of Parliament for the purpose of dealing with that question; and the Bill of 1857, and that of 1861, went before a Select Committee. Moreover, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland appointed a Commission of Inquiry into the subject in 1852, and that Commission made its Report in 1854. The only successful attempt 3 N to deal with the subject was by a very small Bill, which became law in 1868, enabling the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland to alter the legal times and days for the holding of fairs and markets. The difficulties in legislating on this subject were great, owing to the private interests which were affected by it, and that was, no doubt, the reason why, up to the present time, there had been no legislation upon it. With the amount of Business that Her Majesty's Government had in hand, it was not intended -at all events, at present--to bring in a measure in either House of Parliament for dealing with this subject. FRENCH LAW OF BANKRUPTCY-THE BANKRUPTCY BILI.-QUESTION. SIR GEORGE BOWYER asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether, before further progress is made with the Bankruptcy Bill, the Government will obtain and lay before Parliament a statement of the French Law of Bankruptcy, and the way in which it is administered in that country? MR. ASSHETON CROSS: I have consulted the Lord Chancellor upon this subject, and I find that it will be impossible to delay the progress of the Government Bankruptcy Bill in its early stages whilst the information asked for is being obtained; but if the hon. and learned Baronet will move for it, I will do my best to obtain such information as he wants. |