to Mr. Lloyd for an adjournment of the case, whatever it might be, with which he appeared to be about to proceed, as I was entirely unprepared to defend myself. I asked for a postponement for three days, in order that I might ascertain the nature of the charge against me and produce such witnesses as might be necessary to show that the statements made however, refused to grant me any adjournment against me were unfounded. No. 4. Mr. Lloyd, or postponement, and insisted on the case being proceeded with forthwith. No. 5. I then asked that one of the local clergymen whom I wished be present, but Mr. Lloyd positively refused to to examine for my defence might be allowed to allow the reverend gentleman to be present. No. 6. An information of the Sub-Inspector was then read, in which he stated that he be

secution against certain ladies of the town for having gone to the lodgings of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), and waited outside the door to receive and welcome the hon. Gentleman. The prosecution, however, turned out to be of so ridiculous a character that Mr. Clifford Lloyd himself was obliged to throw it overboard. While in the East Mr. Clifford Lloyd appeared to have acquired a passion for theatrical display, for it was his practice to go about Limerick and Clare, surrounded by a body-guard of policemen, and amidst the glittering of spurs and the clattering of sabres. Now, in regard to lieved me to be an emissary of an illegal the question of huts. The Committee Society known as the Land League, and that I would remember that the right hon. amongst Her Majesty's subjects. was engaged in creating discord and dissension No. 7. I Gentleman the Member for Bradford stated, as I swear the fact is, that I was solely (Mr. W. E. Forster) early in the year engaged in charitable purposes-namely, endeavisited the district of Tulla, in Clare, vouring to provide food and shelter for the families of tenants evicted for non-payment of where a number of families had been rent; but I was nevertheless ordered to enter into thrown out of their farms and cast on recognizances in £50, with two sureties of £50 the roadside. While in Tulla the right each, to be of good behaviour for three calendar hon. Gentleman was asked by the priest months, and on refusing to enter into the same was committed to Limerick Prison for that of the place whether it would be legal period. No 8. I admit I am a member of the to erect huts for these people, and the Ladies' Land League, but I deny that it is an right hon. Gentleman replied that it illegal body, and no proof whatever that it is would be legal and laudable. Encou- such was given at any trial. I say that its raged by this decision, the Ladies' Land objects are to promote the cause of charity and humanity, and I submit that until the contrary League sent down Miss Kirk to procure has been properly established the said Ladies' shelter and provide food for the evicted Land League should not have been assumed to families. Mr. Clifford Lloyd, however, have been an illegal body. No. 9. I say that suddenly took the notion that this work, if the postponement for which I applied had which the then Chief Secretary (Mr. and would have produced witnesses who would been granted I would have been able to produce W. E. Forster) had described as being prove that I was innocent of every charge legal and laudable, was illegal and dan-alleged against me, for I say that I never exgerous to the peace of the district. He arrested Miss Kirk, who had been sent on this mission of charity; and by way of illustration of the manner in which Mr. Clifford Lloyd performed his magisterial duties, he would read the affidavit sworn by Miss Kirk in the High Court

of Justice in Ireland

"I, Annie Kirk, now a prisoner in the gaol of the City of Limerick, aged 20 years and upwards, make oath and say as follows:-No. 1. On the morning of Friday the 21st day of April instant, I was arrested in my sitting room in Tulla, in the county of Clare, by the Head Constable of the district, and informed by him that I should proceed in his custody to the police barrack to appear before Mr. Clifford Lloyd. The said Head Constable added that he had a warrant for my arrest, and that I should go with him at once. No. 2. I was then taken to a room in the police barrack, which was in a few minutes afterwards entered by Mr. Clifford Lloyd, R.M., Mr. O'Hara, J.P., and Mr. Crean, Sub-Inspector. No. 3. When so arrested I was wholly ignorant of the nature of the charge made against me, and thereupon at once applied

Mr. Sexton

cited discord or dissension amongst any of Her Majesty's subjects, and I never intimidated or attempted to intimidate anyone, nor was I then or at any time engaged in any illegal practice, nor was I guilty of any misconduct whatsoever or any act which would justify the order made against me. No. 10. I submit that the said order ought to be quashed; that I was taken entirely by surprise by the proceedings, and was denied all opportunity of defending myself or obtaining professional assistance which said opportunity, if granted, would have enabled me to give complete proof of my innocence," &c. Such was the case with regard to Miss Kirk. It was a case disgraceful to Mr. Clifford Lloyd and to the Government, and it was typical of the manner in which the law had been administered in Ireland during the last few months. Mr. Clifford Lloyd, and others like him, refused to allow adjournments of cases, so that the persons brought before them could not put their cases in a legal shape. He hoped the Attorney General for Ireland would attend to this matter. Mr. Clif

"We, the undersigned, evicted tenants from the property of Major Molony, D.L., of Kiltanon, Tulla, now occupying and about to occupy the houses provided for our shelter by the Ladies' Land League, having seen the state-cutive upon the case of these huts. Lord ment of Mr. Clifford Lloyd, read by Mr. Forster in the House of Commons on Thursday last the 20th instant (April), to the effect that many of us had privately paid our rents, are not permitted by the Land League to return to our farms, and are forced to occupy the Land

veracity came into conflict, in his mind | Lloyd happened to be the official on the the moral claims of veracity went by the spot, and he arrested the people. It was board. He had disgraced the magis- a terrible thing for respectable people to terial service; he had caused heartburn- be accused of a foul murder, and, thereings wherever he had gone, and he had fore, he hoped the Government would created a sort of mutiny among the state what they intended to do in the people. He had done all that the most matter. active official could do in the way of exasperating the people; and, at the same time, he had done all that an incompetent official could do to exasperate those who acted under him. The Committee would remember what happened last Friday in Limerick. Mr. Clifford Lloyd had the audacity to call upon the police to parade before him, and to interfere with their financial arrangements with the Government. He insulted them because they had combined together; afterwards the men refused to parade before him, and he had not the temerity to appear again. The time had really come when the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary might invite Mr. Clifford Lloyd to retire from the Public Service. It was not merely a calamity to the country, but it was a disgrace to the Government that so incapable a man should be continued in so responsible a post. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would represent to the Cabinet the propriety of reconsidering the position of Mr. Clifford Lloyd. The Government, by retaining this man, condemned themselves. He moved the reduction of the Vote by £1,000.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £62,238, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1883, for the Salaries, Allowances, and Expenses of various County Court Officers, and of Magistrates in Ireland, and of the Revising Barristers of the City of Dublin."-(Mr. Sexton.)

COLONEL NOLAN said, that some weeks ago a very horrible murder was committed in Loughrea, and 26 people were arrested in the town. Many of the Many of the people he happened to know. Several of them occupied very respectable positions, and he believed three of them were Poor Law Guardians or Town Commissioners. These people were arrested upon evidence, or they were not; but certainly the time had come when something definite should be done. If no evidence could be brought forward, the people ought to be released. Mr. Clifford

MR. T. D. SULLIVAN said, that as the salary of Mr. Clifford Lloyd was included in this Vote, he thought it would be very desirable that the Chief Secretary should inform the Committee what Mr. Clifford Lloyd really cost the country, since the date of his appointment as a Special Resident Magistrate. There was more than the actual salary of Mr. Clifford Lloyd concerned when he spoke of what he had cost the country since the date of his appointment; for instance, allowances were made to him for servants and orderlies. If Mr. Clifford Lloyd was withdrawn from the service of the country, the service of a large number of police, who had been told off for his special protection, as he called it, would be dispensed with. These men, as the hon. Member for Sligo (Mr. Sexton) had put it, had been withdrawn from the service of the country for the pleasure of Mr. Clifford Lloyd, and to give him the satisfaction of making a grand military display wherever he went through the streets and cities and towns of Ireland. It was a fact that he went out in "high pomp and circumstance." He was fond of going about with an advance guard and a rear guard; and in the house where he lived he had a large body of police on guard in various passages and lobbies, and so forth; and therefore, in calculating the cost of this famous gentleman to the country, all these circumstances were bound to be taken into account. It was desirable that the Committee should freely and honestly be told what the country had to pay for such a man as Mr. Clifford Lloyd. He (Mr. Sullivan) saw the hon. Member for Drogheda (Mr. Whitworth) in his place, and he had never forgotten the testimony which that hon. Member gave, some time ago in that House, when first the name of Mr. Clifford Lloyd began to come up in debate; he had never forgotten the testimony that the hon. Gentleman gave as to the character of Mr. Clifford Lloyd, and as to the effect which was likely to be produced in any part of the country which might be afflicted with his pre

sence.

so

The hon. Gentleman told the concerned in the murder of Mr. Blake, House, upon the authority of his brother, at Loughrea, to trial or to release them. who was a magistrate in Drogheda, that He was very much surprised to find it was his opinion that wherever Mr. that the Government had yielded to Clifford Lloyd was sent, whether it be to Mr. Clifford Lloyd, after that murder, the South, East, North, or West of Ire- far as to make these wholesale arrests. land, he would produce something very It was not until Mr. Clifford Lloyd came like a rebellion. That was told to them into the town of Loughrea that the a very long time ago, when the name of arrests were made, and it was evident Mr. Clifford Lloyd was almost new to that they must have been made upon them; but did not the facts and circum- his suggestion. He should be very instances which had since occurred bear disposed to attach any weight to any reout the description of Mr. Clifford presentation Mr. Clifford Lloyd might Lloyd's character given on that occasion? make with regard to the act of any He would be glad if the hon. Member person, unless he was willing to bring for Drogheda would again refresh the him before a magistrate in order to memories of the Committee by repeat- make out his case. He could tell some ing, on this occasion, the testimony he strange stories to the Committee of the gave at that time. On a previous occa- language and action of Mr. Clifford sion he (Mr. Sullivan) referred to Mr. Lloyd towards accused persons who had Clifford Lloyd as a very costly luxury to been brought before him. He knew the British Government. Besides the that in many cases Mr. Clifford Lloyd actual cost in salary and allowances, Mr. held his inquiries in prisons and other Clifford Lloyd had been an enormous places, in the absence of the Press, and burden upon the country in other re- that he had sought to bully and intimispects. There was no estimating the date people into admissions of guilt. amount of mischief he had done; there He could tell a story with regard to a was no estimating the amount of evil he prisoner who was brought before Mr. had created; and long after that gentle- Clifford Lloyd for attempting to murder man should have disappeared from the Mr. Wilfrid Lloyd, and who was sent stage which he was now so unworthily under the Coercion Act to Kilmainham occupying, the evil he had done would subsequently. No particle of evidence remain. It was absurd and improper had been brought against the man, and for the Government to maintain this he could repeat to the Committee exgentleman in the position he now held, pressions used by Mr. Clifford Lloyd because, instead of doing service to the during his secret inquiry into the case cause which they professed to have at against the prisoner which were an outheart-the cause of peace and order in rage to all justice, and certainly exIreland-Mr. Clifford Lloyd had shown pressions which a Resident Magistrate himself its enemy. That being so, un- should be ashamed to use towards_an less the Government wished to maintain accused person. The Government in Irethe irritation of the Irish people; un-land appeared at one time to imagine— less they desired to show themselves to be bullies of the Irish people, why did they maintain this firebrand in the position he held? Let the Government justify, before this Committee and the country, their policy in maintaining such a man in an office he so unworthily filled, and filled to the detriment of good order and government in Ireland, and to the shame of the Government that maintained him.

MR. PARNELL wished to join the hon. and gallant Member for Galway (Colonel Nolan) in urging upon the Government to bring the gentlemenfor many of them were in the position of gentlemen and respectable traders who were arrested on suspicion of being Mr. T. D. Sulliv in

he would not say they did so now-that they could succeed in creating a respect for the law by meeting the illegal acts, which had undoubtedly been done in some cases by the popular agents, with intimidation of a much more extreme kind on their own side. The struggle carried on in Ireland resolved itself simply into this-whether the officers of the law should use more illegal intimidation than the people themselves. So far, certainly, the effect had been that the officers of the law, instead of vindicating the law, had simply put down popular right by the exercise of intimidation. Mr. Clifford Lloyd had proved himself one of the most unscrupulous agents in the administration of that sys