demands, and in you, Sir, we have of the great services which you have found them all fulfilled. [Loud cheers.] rendered to this House, and in associating No one who has not spent his nights and myself with him by seconding the resodays in the House of Commons can esti- lution I feel that I am only expressing mate the weight of the public care which sentiment which every one of my falls upon the Speaker, the perpetual hearers feels, that never before has labour and the constant anxiety of that this ancient formula been charged great post. The changes which have with such an amount of feeling as it is been made in our procedure during your charged with on the present occasion. term of office, have added greatly to [Loud cheers.] We are going through its responsibilities. The real authority no formal or merely complimentary cereof the Speaker rests absolutely on the mony this afternoon, but we are exconfidence of the House [Cheers.] That pressing from the very depths of our confidence you have earned, and that hearts feelings which far transcend the authority you have exercised to your high powers of expression which we may honour and our great advantage. [Cheers.] possess, and which, if they could be You have won from all the meed, not only expressed, would hardly be fitting for of reverence and respect, but of esteem an occasion of this kind. Sir, as the and affection-[cheers]-and the severance of the ties which have bound you to this House and this House to you is to us a subject of poignant and of lasting regret. We know well that the weighty duties of your office makes great demands, not only upon mental power, but physical resource. It is with deep regret we learn that your strength is no longer equal to the strain. We trust that on your retirement from that chair you will still have many years of future happiness and health-[loud cheers]-which we feel assured will still be given to public usefulness and your country's good. As we shall cherish the recollection of the services which you have rendered, it will be a satisfaction to you to know that those services are duly valued by this great Assembly, of which you have been so long the chief and the ornament. You will feel in the days that are to come, that you have added fame to a name among the most illustrious in the annals of the House of Commons-loud cheers] and that you have exalted the dignity of a station the highest to which an English gentleman can be called It has been said that the memory of the departed who have deserved well of their country is a possession for ever, and the House of Commons, when you have left it, will enshrine the record of your Speakership among its purest and its noblest traditions. [Loud and prolonged cheers.]—The right hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Resolution.

Leader of the House has just reminded us, you have held office during a period in which the future fate, as I think, of this House hung in the balance. The 11 years during which you have held office have been years of great change in this Assembly. There has been in those 11 years one great Reform Bill passed, the greatest Reform Bill since the Reform Bill of 1832; there have been great changes in the constitution of Parties; there have been questions mooted among us which have raised, necessarily raised, to fever heat Party passion; and, above all, there have been changes in our rules which have thrown upon you, Sir, responsibilities shared by none of your predecessors. [Cheers.] Sir, the Administration which proposed those changes and the House which accepted them were deeply conscious at the time that they were taking upon themselves no light responsibility, and were, it might be, in their desire to increase the efficiency of this Assembly, throwing upon the holder of your office a weight which it was impossible to bear; and many were the prophecies, made in no pessimistic spirit, that it would be impossible in the future for the Speaker to be, as he had ever been in the past, the impartial mouthpiece not of one Party only, but of the sense of the House taken as a whole. Sir, those prophecies have not been fulfilled. [Cheers.] Through the great qualities which you have displayed that crisis in our history has been safely passed, and I trust that no similar crisis is ever likely to arise, for it has been given to you, Sir, to show in the Chair that kind of authority which no rules

and no privileges can give, which cannot recognise your absolute impartiality be conferred even by the support of the [loud cheers], as well as all the many House, but which must be inborn in the other exalted qualities which you have man who exercises it-[cheers]-and displayed in the Speaker's Chair. Many which shows the kind of genius appro- and many of us have had to consult you priate to the great place which you fill. on questions of order and to appeal to May it, Sir, be our lot in the future to you for counsel and guidance, and we find men, as in turn each holder of the have always been received by you in Chair resigns his office, who, I will not the kindliest fashion, and have been say will equal you, but who will approach given the most willing advice. We you at all events in the exercise of this have been received by you as comrades, incommunicable gift. [Cheers.] I can- if I may adopt your own enchanting not sit down without adding to this tes- expression in your speech yesterday. timony of the great public service which [Cheers.] Mr. Speaker, you were born you have rendered the expression of the to an illustrious name; you have added personal feeling of grief which animates to that name a new and peculiar lustre. us all at the inevitable severance now so [Cheers.] I will only say, speaking for near. [Cheers.] For it will be said of all the Nationalist Members for whom you, Sir, not merely that you have occupied a great place in the long line of illustrious Speakers, perhaps the greatest place for many generations past-[cheers] but it will also be said of you that each individual Member of the House found in you a kind and considerate guide[cheers] and that you carried with you in your retirement not merely the respect and the admiration of all who have watched your great career, but also the love and the affection of every single Member of that great Assembly whose interests you have served so well. [Loud and prolonged cheering.]

MR. SPEAKER put the Resolution formally.

I am entitled to speak, that every Nationalist Irishman in this House will remember your past with the highest honour, and offers to you now the most cordial wishes for your future. [Loud cheers.]

MR. J. CHAMBERLAIN (Birmingham, W.): I desire to add two or three words only, and I wish to do so lest silence should possibly be misconstrued, and lest it should be thought that any party, or any section of any party, in this House was indifferent to the services which you, Sir, have rendered or ungrateful to you for them. My friends and myself accept most willingly the words that have fallen from the MR. J. M'CARTHY (Longford, N.), leader of the House and the leader who was received with cheers, said of the Opposition as our spokesman on Mr. Speaker, on behalf of my Irish this occasion, and we desire to associate Nationalist colleagues in this House and ourselves with all that they have said. for myself, I desire to say that we We recognise with them that the funcassociate ourselves most gladly with the tions of the Chair will have been exercised well-earned tribute which the House of in recent times in circumstances of inCommons is about to offer to you for creasing difficulty, anxiety, and labour. your splendid services in the Speaker's As had been said by the Leader of the Chair. ["Hear, hear."] We cannot but House, these circumstances have called remember at a time like this, and if for the manifestations of great qualities, we could have forgotten it your own the possession of any one of which in its words yesterday would have recalled highest degree would be unusual, but to our memory that when you first the combination of all of which could mounted the Speaker's chair it was what hardly have been expected from a single you yourself in a most expressive phrase personality. [Cheers.] Sir, I think it yesterday called a time of "storm and is the universal sense of this House that stress." It was a time of storm and stress for you; still more perhaps for myself and for my colleagues. But we have learned to know each other better since that time, and I am now glad to say, proud to say, on behalf of all my friends in this House, that we Mr. A. J. Balfour.

you have shown that remarkable combination ["Hear, hear!"], and that you have accompanied it with unfailing kindness to all of us who have, at any time, found it necessary to seek your assistance and advice. ["Hear, hear!"] We feel that you have added lustre to the

I

Retirement. great position you have occupied. We in a very small minority indeed. deeply regret your retirement, and we cannot help remembering also that the earnestly trust that you may have storms to which you alluded were storms before you many years of happiness in which raged round the Party to which I which you may enjoy your well-earned belonged, and the cause which I was and well-deserved repose. [Loud advocating. Sir, I recognise also that cheers.]

in the past we have more than once MR. JOHN REDMOND (Waterford): been forced by our conception of our I trust that the House will not consider duty to utter what seemed a jarring note it out of place on my part if I ask its in the deliberations of this House, and permission to add just two or three words to take action which undoubtedly was to what has already been said in support distasteful to the sentiments of the of this resolution. [Cheers.] It seems majority of its Members. But, looking

new and

to me, Mr. Speaker, that the real value back now, as I do, over all those years, of this resolution largely depends upon I can truthfully say it is my belief the absolute unanimity with which it that on all these occasions, and will be passed. ["Hear, hear!"] The under every circumstance of excitement character of this House has of recent and unpopularity in this House we met times undergone one remarkable change. with, from you, uniform courtesy and Instead of two great parties only exist- impartiality. [Cheers.] The alteration ing in the State, to-day this Assembly in the procedure of this House put into consists of many sections of many groups the hands of the Speaker a of Members with many individual aims enormous power. That power, we beand distinct interests of their own. lieve, has been used by you invariably This resolution will, indeed, be a high for the protection of the just rights of tribute to the absolute impartiality of minorities, and for the maintenance of the Chair if it receives, as it will receive, freedom of debate. [Cheers.] I venture the hearty support of every Member of most humbly to express the belief that, every section in the House. [Cheers.] should it ever come to pass that the I belong to, I believe, the smallest group great office of Speaker of the House of of Members in this House, and on their Commons should be degraded to the behalf I desire to be permitted to level of a mere partisan office to be associate myself with all that has been scrambled for by successive party said in support of this Motion. The majorities in successive Parliaments, authority and impartiality of the Chair not only would the power and prestige are the property of the House at large; of the House of Commons suffer, but they are the guarantee of its continued those who would suffer most would be power and influence in the State; they those small minorities who must, in the are in a special manner the safeguard of nature of things, look for protection the minorities-["Hear, hear!"-and to a strong and impartial occupant of the smaller the minority may be the the Chair. [Cheers.] Sir, as a Member more need there is for the strong and of one of those small minorities, I desire impartial hand which will protect to express our deep regret at your resigthem from the despotism of majorities nation of the high office that you have and safeguard them in the exercise of elevated and adorned, our gratitude to their just rights and privileges. ["Hear, you for your unfailing courtesy and fairhear!" You, Mr. Speaker, yesterday ness to us in many troubled times in the spoke of having presided over this past, and our sincere hope that you may Assembly during many Sessions, some for many years to come enjoy the reof them, as we have been reminded, of wards of your laborious and honourable storm and of stress. It was my fortune services. [Cheers.] to sit as a Member of this House during MR. D. NAOROJI (Finsbury, Cenall those Sessions, and I cannot help tral): In the peculiar position in which remembering that during the whole of I am placed here I offer to you, Mr. that time I sat here as a Member of a Speaker, my most sincere and heartfelt Party which was in a minority, and gratitude for all the kindness and helpduring a considerable portion of that ful counsel you have always extended to time as a Member of a Party which was me. [Cheers.]

:

Motion carried unanimously amid

NAVAL WORKS BILL.

On the Order for the Second Reading

CAPTAIN BETHELL (York, E.R.,

MR. SPEAKER addressed the House, the second Motion which stands on the as followeth, all the Members being un- paper, namely— covered I am greatly honoured and "That an humble Address be presented to deeply touched by the speeches Her Majesty praying Her Majesty that she will which have been delivered in moving be most graciously pleased to confer some signal and seconding the Resolution now before mark of her Royal favour upon the Right the House by the right hon. Gentleman Honourable Arthur Wellesley Peel, Speaker of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and by this House, for his eminent services during the the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of distinguished ability and dignity presided in important period in which he has with such the Opposition. I am not less touched the Chair of this House; and to assure Her and honoured by the speeches which Majesty that, whatever expense Her Majesty have been delivered by the hon. Gentle- shall think proper to be incurred upon that account, this House will make good the same." man the Member for North Longford, by the right hon. Gentleman the Mem- MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I beg to ber for West Birmingham, by the hon. second that. Gentleman the Member for Waterford City, and by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Central Finsbury. It was loud cheers. my duty yesterday to give such expression as I could to the emotions which were aroused within me by my imminent retirement from this Chair. The fewest of this Bill, words, perhaps, will best befit me to-day. If I use only conventional language in returning thanks for the honour Holderness) said, the Bill that they had which you do me-which the whole in their hands dealt entirely with the House has done me [Cheers]-I hope great works which were being carried it will be believed that there underlies out in connection with the needs of the that merely conventional language a Navy. They were concerned with the deep and abiding sense of gratitude to new works at Gibraltar and Portland, this House- a deep acknowledgment of and also a certain number of important that personal kindness, I would say, matters of another character, such as the which has been shown to me from all alteration of some of the larger dockquarters of the House-a kindness the yards. He thought that, so far as the expression of which adds perhaps to the works at home were concerned, the poignancy of my feelings and accentuates judgment of the Admiralty was sound my regret on leaving the Chair, but in what they proposed to do. the memory of which will after a short thought the alterations and additions to time mitigate, I am sure, to me the in- Portland were of greater importance evitable pain of parting. [Cheers.] Ithan the proposals as to the harbour at desire respectfully to thank you. [Loud Dover. It was not necessary to enter Cheers.] into the question as to whether these *THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EX-strategical matters were desirable; no CHEQUER: I beg to move that it be one who had given any attention to the entered in the Journals of the House that this motion was carried nemine contradicente. [Cheers.] I also have to move

that

"The thanks of this House be given to Mr. Speaker for what he has said to the House, and that the same be printed in the Votes of this day and entered on the Journals of the House." MR. A. J. BALFOUR formally seconded the Motion.

He

matter would dispute that we must have large harbours for our men of war equipped against the attack of torpedo boats, and that was at the bottom of these proposals. He could not help thinking that Portland, excellent harbour as it was, lay a long way to the east, and experience seemed to show that it would be very essential to have some harbour westward of it. Plymouth Harbour was, of course, largely closed in by the Breakwater; but the entrances to Plymouth Sound were now extremely *THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EX-large, and would, he thought, constitute CHEQUER: I have now, Sir, to make a danger in time of war. The distance

Motion agreed to unanimously.

between the north end of Plymouth the same method of raising their money, Breakwater and the nearest point of the and he could only say that their action shore was nearly half a mile, and the now certainly did not harmonise with distance was nearly the same on the their criticism of some years ago. south side; and although this considerable entrance was not available to large LORD GEORGE HAMILTON (Midships, it was available to torpedo boats, dlesex, Ealing) said, he did not desire to and he would very much like to know enter into any detailed examination of from the Civil Lord if this matter had the works proposed to be constructed, been under consideration at the Ad- but to examine the principle which miralty, and whether the necessity of a underlies this Bill, and the method by harbour secure against torpedo boats which the Government proposed to give further westward than Portland had effect to it. On the Conservative side of been considered. In regard to Gibraltar, the House they had given the Governduring past years two schemes had been ment hearty support in increasing the proposed very like that now unfolded to strength of the Navy. But when they them, and one of these was, that a har- understood that the Government probour should be made on the east side of posed to take a certain portion of the the rock. It was fair to assume that expenditure which had hitherto fallen on the Admiralty had come to their present the Annual Estimates out of the Esticonclusion after careful consideration. mates, and to expedite the work by He pointed out, however, that during raising money on loan, they were surrecent years the range of guns had enor- prised, and now wished to examine the mously increased, and a distance of four methods and principles on which the or five miles could be covered by every money was to be raised and continuously modern gun. The consequence was, that applied. This question of finance was if two or three guns were put up on the really not an Admiralty, but a Treasury hills at a distance of four miles, un- question, and therefore any criticism of doubtedly they could throw shells into his would not be directed against the the harbour that was to be constructed Admiralty or the Naval Lords. Whenat Gibraltar. Such guns, of course, ever any large expenditure was taken might be dislodged by land forces, but out of the Annual Estimates, and the it appeared to him to be very doubtful Government of the day had recourse to whether they were right in spending this loans or terminal annuities to defray it, large amount of money upon a part of they did so on one plea only, urgency. Gibraltar which was within the range of The first condition which should underlie guns. He could not help thinking that a Bill such as this was that if it was to incur the greater expense of establish- worth while to construct works out of ing a harbour on the east side of loan, there should be a time limit within Gibraltar might, perhaps, be the wiser which works so commenced should be policy. He should be glad to hear that finished. Then, when the House this subject was being carefully con- asked to adopt exceptional procedure, it sidered by the Government. He be- should be in possession of the total cost lieved there was no possible chance of of the work which the Government proour being at war with Spain, but the posed to take in hand. Another conhistory of the past two centuries showed dition, quite as important as the other that whenever we had been at war, either two, was that if the Bill was an annual with France or Spain, the other country Bill, and only met a portion of the had been dragged in. He did not pro- expenditure, а statutory injunction. pose to criticise the financial proposals of should be imposed on future Chancellors the Government, and he did not think of the Exchequer that when the money it really mattered two straws whether was exhausted another Bill would be amounts of money of this sort should be brought in to provide more. Every one voted in the Estimates or by a Bill. It of these conditions was wanting in this had a little startled hon. Members on Bill. He believed that no Bill to comthat side of the House at first to find mence works out of loan in which these that Gentlemen who had criticised their three conditions were wanting had been action some years ago, should after such successful. He believed the Bill was a short lapse of time propose practically based on the Fortifications Act of 1860

was