have been discharged, and of the care and attention which they have shown in the education of their children." (Cheers.)

The Earl of Derby seconded the motion, with the following remarks :-" Unlike ordinary royal marriages, Her Majesty's was one not founded on considerations of policy alone, but on personal acquaintance and attachment. I hope and believe the same remark may be applied to that marriage to which your Lordships are asked to assent; and I am quite sure your Lordships can express no better wish for the future happiness and welfare of the Princess whose marriage is about to be celebrated, than that, as she enters upon married life under similar auspices, so in the course of it her happiness may be as complete and well merited as that of her illustrious mother." (Cheers.)

The motion was unanimously agreed to.

In the House of Commons, on the same evening, Lord Palmerston read the message from the bar. It was in these terms :"Her Majesty, having agreed to a marriage proposed between the Princess Royal and his Royal Highness Prince Frederick William of Prussia, has thought fit to communicate the same to the House of Commons. Her Majesty is fully persuaded that this alliance cannot but be acceptable to all Her Majesty's faithful subjects; and the many proofs which the Queen has received of the affectionate attachment of this House to Her Majesty's person and family, leave her no room to doubt of the concurrence and assistance of this House in enabling her to make such a provision for her eldest daughter, with a view

to the said marriage, as may be suitable to the dignity of the Crown and the honour of the country."

The Speaker having read the message from the chair,

Lord Palmerston, rising in his place, said he was sure the House would take the earliest opportunity of assuring Her Majesty of their deep sympathy in an event so interesting to her and to the country. "I cannot refrain from saying, that those who have had the good fortune to be acquainted with the Princess Royal must have observed that she possesses, both in heart and in head, those distinguished qualities which adorn her illustrious parents, and that she bids fair to hold out in the country of her adoption a repetition of that brilliant example which her illustrious parents have held out in this country, of a domestic happiness worthy to serve as a model of imitation for the most exalted or the humblest of Her Majesty's subjects. (Cheers.) Sir, it is impossible not to see that this marriage, independently of the prospect which I trust it holds out of happiness to her Royal Highness, from the high qualities of the Prince whom she has selected as her future husband, also holds out to the country political prospects not undeserving of the attention of this House. We all know how family alliances tend to mitigate those asperities which from time to time must be produced by those diversities of policy which inevitably arise occasionally between great and independent powers; and therefore I trust that this marriage may also be considered as holding out an increased prospect of goodwill and of cordiality among the great Powers of Europe." The noble Lord moved an address to the Crown, which

was seconded by Mr. Disraeli, and agreed to nem. con.

A few nights afterwards the Chancellor of the Exchequer moved that the House should go into Committee to consider the Royal Message. In the meantime the nature of the proposition which would be made by the Ministers for a settlement on the Princess having transpired, and some discussion having arisen upon it in the public press, objections to the intended arrangement had been started in some quarters, which found a spokesman in the House of Commons in Mr. Roebuck. The honourable Member for Sheffield now rose, and made a statement of his views previously to the Speaker leaving the chair. He described himself as fulfilling a divided duty to the Sovereign and to the people; as anxious to meet the wishes of the Queen, who had set an example to her people in all the relations of life, but at the same time to be just, and not to press too heavily on the people. What they would do in this case would be a precedent. The Princess Royal may one day be Queen of Prussia; they were not, how ever, to provide for her as a Queen, but as the wife of a Prince. When the Princess Royal the daughter of George the Third married, the British Parliament voted her a dowry of 80,000l. without annuity, but the Irish Parliament gave her an annuity of 5000l. a year. Now, he did not wish the country to be hampered with an annuity. He could not forget how England had been recently treated by Prussia. His proposal was, that a provision for the Princess should be made at once by the payment of a suitable dowry.

Lord Palmerston entreated the

House not to discuss by anticipation a proposal not yet before it.

The House then went into Committee, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer made a long statement, describing the position of the Crown deprived of its hereditary resources, and dependent upon Parliament for a maintenance adequate to its dignity; contrasting that position with what occurred in the reign of George the Third, In describing the latter, he went into minute details; quoted Blackstone; and went back for precedents to the reign of George the Second, which excited some laughter. The Civil List of George the Third amounted to 447,4367.; that of the present Queen to 385,000l. George the Third did not surrender the whole of the hereditary revenues; during his reign he derived 12,705,4617. from those revenues, of which 2,600,000l. was applied to the public service, and 3,372,8347. paid away in prize-money. George the Third received the revenues of the Duchy of Cornwall during the minority of the Prince of Wales; Her Majesty has applied a part of that revenue in payment of the education of the Prince of Wales, and the remainder has been vested for his benefit. During the reign of George the Third, the Parliament voted a total of 3,297,000l. in payment of debts incurred by the Royal Family. From that system the reign of Her Majesty has been altogether exempt. Allow ances were granted to the younger branches of the family of George the Third; no grant of the kind had been made to the children of Her Majesty. Her Majesty. Queen Victoria had been subjected to large expenses of a public nature. "I allude particularly to the visit which Her

Majesty paid to the Emperor Louis Napoleon at Paris-a visit which was purely for public and state purposes, and not for her individual pleasure. (A laugh.) That visit was not merely for the personal enjoyment of Her Majesty, but for the public good, as was well understood at the time, and it was accepted as such by the Emperor Napoleon." The expense of the visits of George the Fourth to Hanover and to Ireland and Scotland were paid by the country. Her Majesty had paid 34,000l. for the furniture and repairs of Buckingham Palace; she also paid 61801. a year to the peace and 15,500l. to the war incometax. There are two precedents applicable to the question. before the House. The eldest daughter of George the Second received an annuity of 5000l. and a dowry of 80,000l. Similar sums were granted to the eldest daughter of George the Third.

The precedents had been followed, but with a difference dictated by the change of circumstances. Sir George Lewis proposed that the annuity should be 80001., and the marriage-portion 40,000l.; and he moved a resolution granting the annuity.

Mr. Roebuck moved, by way of amendment, that the marriageportion be a sum certain, and not an annuity. By voting an annuity, he said, we might get into what was termed "an entangling alliance," and looking to the large amily the nation would have to provide for, as representatives of a hard-working people, they ought, while generous, to be just.

Mr. William Williams seconded the amendment.

Lord J. Russell considered that there was nothing extravagant in

the proposal of the advisers of the Crown; that a capital sum of 40,000l. and an annuity of 8000l. was by no means an exorbitant provision for the eldest daughter of the Queen, and he saw no advantage in adopting the proposal of Mr. Roebuck. He believed that no class in the country, however poor, would refuse this mark of affection for the Sovereign.

Mr. Disraeli observed that this was one of those subjects upon which unanimity was most desirable. He had always been of opinion that the Crown of England was placed upon these occasions in a painful position. But the House should remember the cause of these appeals the jealousy of Parliament, which, in his opinion, was carried too far; and, remembering this, it became them to consider in a generous spirit an appeal not only necessary, but which all were ready to welcome with sympathy and respectful affection. The point in discussion was of a very trivial character. If the principle of the grant had been opposed, it would be different; but the principle not being in dispute, the House ought to consider the question in a spirit that would bring it to an amicable and unanimous decision.

Being urged by Lord Elcho and other Members, Mr. Roebuck eventually withdrew his amendment, and the Committee voted the annuity-the grant of the principal sum being passed in Committee of Supply.

On the bringing up of the report of the 25th of May, however, some further opposition appeared to the proposed settlement. Mr. Coningham, M.P. for Brighton, objected to the vote of the annuity on principle, and as a precedent

for other votes hereafter. He objected also to the amount, and moved that it be reduced from 80001. a-year to 6000l.

Lord Palmerston expressed his regret that Mr. Coningham should again have raised this question, and hoped that the House would abide by the vote of the committee.

After a few remarks from Mr. French and Mr. Gilpin, the House divided, when the resolution was affirmed by 328 to 14. On the Report of the Committee of Supply the grant of 40,000l. was opposed by Mr. Maguire, who considered that the annuity constituted a sufficient marriage portion. Mr. Coningham and Sir J. Trelawny likewise opposed the vote; but it was affirmed on a division by 361 to 18.

Soon after the assembling of the new Parliament, Mr. Spooner, the pertinacious opponent of the grant to Maynooth College, gave notice of his intention to repeat his usual motion in condemnation of that system. Having secured an early day for the consideration of his subject, the hon. member for North Warwickshire submitted it once more to the House of Commons on the 21st of May. In stating the reasons which induced him to take this course, Mr. Spooner disclaimed any animosity towards the Roman Catholics and all personal motives, the task being, he said, a very painful one which an imperative sense of duty alone compelled him to undertake. He proceeded to argue that Parliament, by this grant, paid for the teaching of doctrines hostile to the Protestant constitution and to the principles of civil and religious liberty, destructive of morality, and antagonistic to the Reformed VOL. XCIX.

Established Church, which the Sovereign by the Coronation Oath, and Parliament by the Oath of Allegiance, were bound to maintain. He denied that there had been any Parliamentary contract in this matter; Sir R. Peel, on introducing the measure of 1845, distinctly stated that it had not been a subject of stipulation or contract. As upon former occasions, he read extracts from works of Roman Catholic writers of high authority, enunciating doctrines subversive of morals, which, he said, were only a few samples of a most abominable system; and he asked whether these doctrines and the denunciation of those who were stigmatized as heretics-doctrines immoral and rebellious-ought to be taught at the expense of a Christian and a Protestant assembly. He warned the Government of the effects which must be produced in time by the instilling of such principles with the money of the public into the minds of the ignorant, and called upon the House to consent to the motion, and thereby restore the Protestant character of the nation.

The resolution he proposed was, "That this House do resolve itself into a committee to consider the Acts for the endowment of Maynooth, with a view to the withdrawal of any endowment out of the Consolidated Fund, due regard being had to vested rights and interests."

Very little debate took place on the motion, the opponents having, as it appeared, concerted to negative it by votes without entering upon a new discussion. General Thompson made a few remarks, saying that Mr. Spooner's argument resolved itself into an as[H]

After the division some altercation took place as to the proceeding by which the debate had been brought to a close. Mr. Newdegate alleged that his honourable colleague's speech had not. been answered. Mr. Henry Herbert rejoiced that Mr. Spooner's own friends had forsaken him, there having been only two or three members on the opposition benches during his speech. Mr. Spooner said that this was quite true. The members on his side of the House had not thought it worth their while to attend. But although his opponents had triumphed by force of numbers, they had not answered his arguments, which remained unrefuted. Lord Palmerston said that Mr. Spooner's speech-than which he had never heard one more inciting dissent had only been unanswered because members were unwilling to enter upon an irritating polemical dis

cussion.

A motion was made early in the present Session for leave to bring in a Bill to abolish the charge commonly known as "Ministers' Money" in Ireland, which had formed for many years a topic of

Sir George Grey said that it would have been very ungracious to take the measure out of Mr Fagan's hands. The Bill was founded on the report of a Committee which sat in 1847.

Leave was then given to bring in the Bill.

On the 19th of May, being the day appointed for the second reading of the Bill, a rather important debate took place in the House of Commons.

Mr. Fagan, in moving the second reading, gave a succinct history of the question from the date of the imposition of the tax in the reign of Charles II., citing in the course of it the argument of Lord Derby (when Mr. Stanley) against church cess in Ireland. He then adverted to the funds at the disposal of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which were, he said, annually increasing, and he contended that, although the expenditure was wasteful, there was an ample surplus out of which to pay this charge of Ministers' Money. The principle, he maintained, had been conceded when Sir John Young's Act passed in 1854, although that measure was a compromise.

Mr. Napier moved to defer the second reading for six months. The principle of the Bill, he argued,