Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

quitted, were the claims of appeal to be allowed. On these grounds," said his Lordship, "such a proceeding ought not to be suffered to take place, unless their Lordships were prepared to say, that their fellowsubjects should not be benefited by an acquittal in all the forms of the law; that after having been committed by a magistrate, indicted by a grand jury, and, finally, declared innocent by a petty jury, they should still be liable to a renewal of the charge; and that they should be deprived of the advantage of that important maxim of the law, which says, That no man is to be tried twice for the same offence." After passing through the usual forms, the bill finally became law, and this barbarous and unchristian method of ascertaining guilt or innocence was happily abolished.

The proposed renewal of the insolvent Debtors' Act was opposed by petitions from various quarters, representing it as injurious in its operation to the fair trader, and prejudicial to commercial confidence. That such is the case, to a certain extent, is undeniable; but there can be as little doubt, that the excessive severity of the English law against unfortunate debtors requires mitigation; and that, in Scotland, where the law has guarded against the wanton cruelty of capricious creditors, fair trade and commercial confidence are as firmly secured as in any country upon earth. The number and weight of the petitions presented, however, rendered inquiry necessary; and, accordingly, on the 16th of March, the Attorney-General moved for the appointment of a Select Committee to consider the state of the law relative to the discharge of insolvent debtors, the act of the 53d and 56th of the King, and to report to the House their opinions as to the means of rendering those acts more

effectual. The motion was agreed to, and a committee appointed. The committee gave in their report early in June, on the 22d day of which, the bill, which had undergone considerable modifications, was read a third time and passed.

A bill was also introduced this session for the amendment of the bankruptcy laws, read a second time on the 2d of April, and committed on the 19th of May. The object of this bill was to remedy the inefficiency of the existing law, and to provide some check on fraudulent bankruptcy, which, as will be seen by the evidence of Mr Basil Montague before the Committee on the Criminal Law, had increased to an extent perfectly unprecedented, notwithstanding, or rather in consequence of the nominal, but never enforced, severity of the law.

On the 9th of March, Mr Brand brought forward a motion for leave to bring in a bill to amend the laws for the preservation of game. In support of his motion, the honourable gentleman went at considerable length into the game laws, pointing out their inconsistencies and absurdities, their oppressive and unjust operation, the mischiefs with which the enforcement of them is attended, their total inefficiency in restraining poachers from destroying game, their tendency to corrupt the morals of the lower classes, and the impossibility of their attaining the object they had in view, while the punishment inflicted was so severe, and so radically at variance with the sentiments of the community. These remarks led to a pretty lengthened discussion; but leave was ultimately granted, and the bill introduced, read a second time on the 19th of March, and recommitted on the 14th of May, when the bill was thrown out by a majority of 119 to 59.

On the 9th of February, Mr

sent

Sturges Bourne moved for the re-appointment of the Committee for the investigation of the poor laws, with injunctions to report their opinions thereon from time to time. The motion was agreed to; and on the 25th of March leave was granted to the same gentleman to bring in a bill for regulating the settlement of the poor. The evils attending the present system he described as threefold:1. The enormous expenses incurred by parishes, in prosecuting or defending appeals, and in removing paupers; 2. The injustice under which parishes laboured, to which old paupers were sent back, after they had spent their youth and strength elsewhere; 3. The hardship upon the paupers who, having resided many years, and formed connexions at a distance, were home to their parishes, and separated from all their friends and consolations, to die in a remote poor-house. This last was by far the greatest evil, though all three required removal. Some maintained, that the better mode would be to do away with settlements entirely, and to make the maintenance depend upon the national funds; while others contended that the settlement ought in all cases to be reduced to the place of birth the first of these proposals would be open to innumerable and insurmountable objections, and the last would at least not remedy two of the three evils he had pointed out. What he proposed was, that as settlement was now gained by residence combined with other circumstances, in future it should be acquired by residence only, but the difficulty was to fix what period of residence should confer a settlement. In the bill he should introduce, he should propose that three years' residence in a parish should gain a settlement to a pauper; but as a blank would be left in the bill, it might be filled up

with five years, or otherwise, as might be deemed most expedient in the committee. This new regulation would simplify greatly the whole subject, without interfering with what were known by the name of derivative settlements. A separation of an aged pauper from his friends and neighbours would then be avoided; provided within a certain period he went before a magistrate, and made oath to his residence. In case of dispute, he proposed that an appeal should lie, not to the quarter-sessions, but to two magistrates, by which much expensive litigation would be spared. Another point to be settled should be, what period of absence should defeat the settlement: he thought sixty days too short, and should suggest that the blank should be filled up with ninety days. This was the general outline of the measure submitted to the consideration of the House.

On the 25th of March, the same gentleman also obtained leave to bring in a bill to prevent the misapplication of poor-rates. This bill had been under the consideration of last Parliament; but there had not been sufficient time for the correction and modification of its objectionable clauses. Its main object was to prevent one of the great evils arising out of the present system, namely, the payment of the wages of labour out of the poor rates. The first and most obvious result of this baneful practice is to engender a spirit of idleness on the part of the labouring classes; and to destroy that ambition to better their circumstances, which is the foundation of all domestic virtue and public happiness. In the second place, this misapplication of the rates operates as a bounty to the manufacturer, and tends either to augment his profits at the expence of the capital and industry of others-wages and profits

always varying in an inverse ratioor to enable him to undersell those who are compelled to pay such wages to the labourer or operative as shall afford him the complete means of subsistence, without having recourse to any other fund to supply the deficiency. In the latter case, a higher rate of wages must be paid, and consequently the rate of profits lowered to the same amount; or, what comes to the same thing, the manufacturer must encounter a competitor, who is enabled, by the pernicious effects of this system, to undersell him in the market. There can be no doubt, therefore, we think, that this bill was calculated to produce great and important benefit, first, to the labouring, and, secondly, to the manufacturing, classes of the community. Its being lost is accordingly a subject of regret to all those who have given the smallest attention to this highly important subject. It was thrown out, on the third reading, by a majority of 69 to 46.

On the 18th of May, Mr Tierney brought forward his motion on the state of the nation. In his speech on this occasion, which was of great length, the right honourable gentleman drew the most melancholy pic ture of our condition, both as respected the state of our agriculture, commerce and finances, and the relations of our foreign policy. He dwelt with much asperity on our cooperating with our allies in imposing upon France "the galling yoke of maintaining foreign troops to preserve order, and maintain the reigning family on the throne." He next alluded to the territorial aggrandizement of America, by the acquisition of the Floridas, a position as injurious as it was possible to conceive to our colonial possessions, and likely to place them in imminent and undeniable jeopardy; and contended, that

Government had shown, in this respect, the utmost supineness and indifference. But his principal charge against Ministers was, that, from the first hour the treaty of peace was signed, they had entirely neglected every measure to improve the internal situation of the country. In proof of this, he referred to the existing state of trade; contended, that as no commercial treaties had been entered into, and that the commercial interests of the country had been neglected; and accused Ministers of not only throwing every obstruction in the way of the establishment of South-American Independence, but of destroying every hope of commercial advantage from that quarter. He next adverted to the finances of the country. On January 5. 1816, our funded and unfunded debt was L.860,000,000; yet Ministers had made no efforts to cope with so formidable an adversary. Their system, if system it might be called, was one of borrowing and postponement. He then alluded to the subject of the resumption of cash payments; but here we need not follow him, as we have already shewn how that great and necessary measure was effected. The right honourable gentleman went into a great variety of other details, all of which, he asserted, united in pointing out the necessity of inquiry; and concluded by moving, that the House do resolve itself into a Committee of the whole House, to consider of the state of the nation.

Lord Castlereagh replied to Mr Tierney, and entered into a detailed and able defence of the policy pursued by his Majesty's Government on all those points on which the right honourable gentleman had animadverted. He denied that it had been the purpose of the Allies to humble and degrade France; on the contra

ry, in the recent arrangements, they had in view only to restore her to that great space which naturally belonged to her. It was not against France, but against the Revolution, that we had been contending; and it was owing mainly to this circumstance that our efforts had been fi. nally crowned with triumph. His Lordship then proceeded to ridicule the tactics of the gentlemen in opposition, and put it fairly to the House, whether, in the course of a long and arduous Administration, the present Ministry had forfeited the confidence of the country, or been guilty of any such eminent failure as might justify the nation in withdrawing

from them that cordial support which they had hitherto received.

This being merely a party question, and evidently brought forward for the purpose of making an experiment on the feeling of the House, it does not seem necessary to detail the particulars of the numerous and declamatory speeches that followed that of the noble Lord. It is sufficient to state, that, on a division, the motion of the right honourable gentleman was negatived by a majority of 357 to 178.

On the 26th of May, Sir Charles Monck brought forward his promised motion on the subject of the cession of Parga to the Turks.

• Parga is a small town, situate on the coast of Epirus, on a rock about 240 feet in height, jutting into the Ionian Sea, and opposite the southern end of Corfu, or the northern extremity of Paxo; on the summit of which rock is a building, which Colonel de Bosset calls" a sort of citadel." The territory of Parga extends along the coast about three miles on each side of the town, and about two into Albania; and the population amounts to between three and four thousand. Till the recent discussions in Parliament, it was hardly known; and, so far as we have observed, is not noticed in any books of geography, or set down in maps. Our information respecting it is chiefly derived from the works of some late travellers in Greece and Epirus, particularly those of Mr Hobhouse and Dr Holland.

As to the question brought before Parliament by Sir Charles Monck, we do not remember an instance where so much absurd clamour and misrepresentation has been raised and circulated, not only in the absence of authentic information, but in the face of the most notorious and irresistible facts. By the treaty of 1800, concluded between the Porte and Rus. sia, the Seven Islands were erected into an Independent Republic, and Butrinto, Parga, Preveza, and Vonitza, ceded to the Porte in sovereignty for ever; and, in the end of 1800, Parga passed under the Turkish dominion, and continued so for nearly six years. In 1806, war broke out between Russia and the Porte; and in 1807 the Ionian Islands were delivered up to France, by an article in the treaty of Tilsit; and a garrison of 300 men was placed in Parga, by Berthier, Governor-General of Corfu. Ali Pacha, however, demanded the cession of the place to the Porte; which was only prevented by the earnest intercession of the Parguinotes themselves, who naturally dreaded the fate which had befallen Preveza, Vonitza, and Butrinto. In March 1814, the Ionian Islands fell into the hands of the English; and, soon after, the Parguinotes surrendered their fortress to the English, under General Campbell, without, however, any stipulation that they would "follow the fate of the Ionian Islands," but only that they should continue provisionally under British protection till their final destination should be arranged at the conclusion of a general peace. In a letter dictated a few days before his death, General Campbell most positively denied that any officers were ever authorised by him, either verbally or otherwise, "to enter into any engagement on the part of the British Government, or to give any assurances to the Parguinotes, with respect to Parga remaining permanently under the protection of Great Britain." At the Congress of 1815, the sovereign protection of the Ionian republic was offered to Great Britain; and in the November of that year, a treaty was signed, by which these islands, and their dependencies, as described in the treaty of 1800 between Russia and the Ottoman Porte, were solemnly placed under the protection of his Britannic Majesty. Thus Parga formed no part of the Ionian Republic; and, therefore, beyond those good offices prompted by humanity, we had no right whatever to oppose the cession of Parga in terms

The object of his motion, he said, was to vindicate, to a great num. ber of persons who were threat ened with the loss of them, those privileges which we ourselves possessed in so eminent a degree, and which were so highly prized; namely, security of person and property, and liberty for every one to practise religion according to his own opinion. He believed they were not as yet deprived of those rights which they held so dear; but when he reflected on the measure in contemplation, it was impossible for him to say that they were in full possession of them. They were to be obliged either to remain in the country of their fathers, to be slaughtered by a merciless enemy; or to expatriate themselves, to leave their property to be plundered, and to abandon the churches in which they had been brought up in Christian liberty. Such was the situation of the people whose cause he

had undertaken to plead; and although conscious of the inadequacy of his abilities, he would do his best in endeavouring to discharge the du ty which had devolved upon him. The motion which he intended to submit to the House was for the production of certain papers, to show under what conditions Parga had surrendered to military occupation in 1814, under what terms the British commander received that occupation, and what promises of protec tion were held out to the inhabitants. In the year 1800, the Russians and the Turks entered into a treaty, by which the independence of the Grecian islands was recognised, under the name of the Septinsular Republic. By the treaty of Tilsit, in 1807, the Grecian islands were given up by the Russians to the French; and it was worthy of being remarked, that afterwards a right honourable gentleman (Mr Canning,) in an official note

of the treaty above referred to. The speech of Sir Charles Monck, therefore, proceeds upon a fundamental error, which vitiates all his conclusions. But this, perhaps, is not its worst fault. He hardly refers to, or assumes, a single fact that has not been found to be false. The Pacha's army of 20,000 men were, he tells us, defeated at Aja, a village within the limits, by the brave Parguinotes, and the Pacha's nephew slain. That 300 or 400 Parguinotes should defeat 20,000 well-disciplined Albanians is not very probable, although the story was believed and circulated by Colonel de Bosset, the most credulous of mortals; but the real truth is, that the nephew of the Pacha was shot by a Parguinote lying in ambush ; and this is the whole matter; the battle and the victory being a mere piece of fiction imposed upon De Bosset. The pretty little episode, too, of the British flag being smuggled into the citadel under the petticoats of a woman is likewise as false as it is ridiculous; the flag having been introduced by four stout fellows disguised in women's clothes, who overpowered the sentinel, killed a French commissary, and hoisted the English colours. No less false is the theatrical story of the disinterment, by the Parguinotes, of the bones of their forefathers; and, in short, all and every part of the machinery of this notable fiction, got up for the purpose of casting odium on our Government, who, in its whole conduct to these people, as is evident from the equivalent received for their property, when the surrender took place, by such of them as did not choose to live under the Ottoman yoke, appears to have been actuated by an enlarged and generous spirit, and to have, in fact, gone farther than they were strictly warranted, in order to protect these people against that vengeance which they had so often provoked. As to the Parguinotes themselves, they are described by Mr Hobhouse as the worst of the Albanians; and by Lord Byron as pirates, -"The pirates of Parga who dwell by the waves." And of many of the songs of the coun. try-not the worst evidence of national character-the burden is, “Kλ‡T5 #wole Пapya; Kriplus wole Пapya: Robbers all at Parga; Robbers all at Parga." The cant about “Christian Parga,” therefore, can only mislead the ignorant, or gratify the credulous, but appears in its true colours when the real state of the facts is once laid before us.

« ПредишнаНапред »