the speeches of counsel in criminal trials to that which prevails in civil trials.

The exclusion of the evidence of the husband and wife as to the fact of adultery, is most unsatisfactory on every ground. For in the Divorce Court, the question of the admissibility of the evidence of the husband or wife in the matter of adultery depends (such has been the careless structure of the statutes) upon the form of the suit-being admissible in one kind of suit and inadmissible in another-the fact of the adultery being really at issue in both. The law of evidence as to persons charged before the magistrates in cases of summary convictions. appears still more indefensible; but I will not anticipate the observations which will be addressed to the Congress on this point. Upon the interesting question of private international jurisprudence, relating to the expediency of establishing a uniform international law of freight, we are certain of hearing, from the gentleman to whose hands the subject has been confided, an excellent paper; also, on the questions of municipal law relating to bankruptcy, and the bearing of the administration of the poor law upon the reform of criminals, we have reason to expect much valuable information. The treatment of convicted criminals appears to me one of the most arduous and perplexing subjects which it has ever been the duty of a legislator to consider. The records of the jurisprudence and policy of the most civilised nations of antiquity furnish no materials for our guidance in this matter; and no Christian state can be said to have arrived at a satisfactory conclusion respecting it. Certainly our own experiments have been hitherto unsuccessful; though it is only just to add that, latterly, at least, our failure has in great measure arisen from the absence of physical resources which some other nations possess, and which, till lately, whatever use we made of them, we had ourselves. The area within which the reformation of our criminals is to be worked out, is no longer a large and ample territory; the scene is no longer removed from the associates and objects connected with their guilt. It is within the walls of a narrow space in this densely-populated land in which the crime was committed, and in which land the criminal, when his sentence has expired, is to earn his future livelihood, that the theory of the amendment of the criminal. by prison discipline has been necessarily put to the test. Nobody denies that for the greater number of offences, limited imprisonment, with or without hard labour, is the necessary punishment. The convict must go into prison, but he must also come out, and the condition in which he comes out affects the interests of society quite as much as the power of putting

him in. If he be practically taught, or internally convinced, that he has for ever forfeited the position of an honest manthat the world's hand will ever be against him, whatever be his repentance and amendment-in most cases his exit will be as much to be dreaded by society as that of a wild beast, retaining all the ferocious passions of its original nature, but endowed with intellect, and informed by experience how to gratify them with least personal danger.

The discipline of the prison should be such as to inspire not only horror for the punishment, but sorrow for the crime, not only regret for the past, but hope for the future. In these last words lies the problem to be solved. But even as to sentences of imprisonment for life, ought there to be written over any gaol, "abandon hope all ye that enter here;" or ought not the hope of bettering his condition—perhaps of ultimately regaining his liberty-to be seen even by those who have merited this terrible sentence, through the long vista of continual toil and penitential discipline? The question of capital punishment is also on the paper for discussion. There are those who think that society has no right to inflict this punishment; there are others who admit the abstract right, but deny the expediency of inflicting it, and upon various grounds, but chiefly, I observe, because the scandalous scene of a public execution attracts the base and demoralises the good. Surely, however, this publicity is not a necessary incident to the maintenance of capital punishment. The horror which it ought to excite for the crime would run no risk of being converted into compassion for the criminal if the execution took place under proper guarantees and precautions within the prison walls. The arguments against this much required reform have never seemed to me sufficient; at all events, it deserves to be well considered. There are other topics of much interest proposed for the consideration of this Congress, on which the passing hour admonishes me not to dwell. Let me, in conclusion, observe that it has not been permitted to many, as it has been to our illustrious President, to witness the reaping of the harvest sprung from the grain which his own hand scattered over what once appeared very unpromising ground. But let no man who contributes an honest endeavour to the melioration of the law be disheartened by the present rejection of his proposal. Nitor in adversum must be the motto of all reformers; the seed which he sows may lie long in the earth before it ripens. It may be that, like Romilly, Mackintosh, and Grenville, he will never behold the fruit of his labour. The outward man perishes, but the thought which he has uttered for the benefit of his fellow-citizens survives. The lamp which

he had kindled is not extinguished, but passed on to other hands for the future welfare of mankind; and perhaps there are not many reflections more soothing to the close of life than the recollection that you have used the talent which God has given you in the endeavour, however humble, to improve upon earth the administration of that justice which is only perfect in Heaven,

32

Address

BY

THOMAS CHAMBERS, Q.C., M.P.,

ON EDUCATION.

EMB

MBARRASSED by the reflection that I am placed suddenly in a position for which I am utterly unprepared, I feel painfully conscious that I only occupy the situation which Dr. Hook (whose absence, and the cause of it, we all so much deplore) would so well have filled. As a substitute for his able and well-considered address, I can but offer to the Association, as the result of scarce an hour's preparation, a few cursory and unconnected remarks upon the important subject belonging to the section.

That subject-EDUCATION-does not diminish in interest nor in importance as time rolls on. Indeed, it is curious to see how the area over which it extends has been gradually but rapidly widening. When public attention was first called to the question, it was to education so far as it related to the working classes of this country that the sympathy of the philanthropist and the labours of the legislator were directed. No other class was then at all considered in connection with this subject. Inquiry and interference in regard to any other class was looked upon (if thought of at all) as at once unnecessary and impertinent. But since then-and more and more as we come nearer to the present time-the interest, and even anxiety, awakened on this matter have continually been spreading over a wider area, until at this moment they cover the whole surface of society, and include every grade and rank and order of the population. Having begun with the lowest, the poorest, the most helpless classes amongst us, we now find the millions of the middle classes, and even the youth of the highest class, the subjects of investigation and experiment in relation to the momentous matter of education. A Royal Commission has severely scrutinised and fully reported on the quality and character of the instruction given at our great public schools; and more recently, as the result of a memorial

prepared and presented to the Government by the council of our Association, a similar commission was issued to investigate the great subject of middle-class education. One could not have anticipated, fifty years ago, that any such inquiries would have been necessary in reference to those who paid for their own instruction, and whose demand for it was to be met by unrestricted competition. It might naturally have been concluded that free trade in schooling would of itself have brought into the market a sufficiency of education in quantity, and the best in quality. How far that conclusion would have been from the truth we have already some means of judging, but when the commissioners shall have made their report, its utter fallacy will be more fully known. Even now, all who are competent to form an opinion upon the subject are agreed that it was high time that a searching investigation should take place, and its results be placed before the public. We are all alike interested in the question. Not the helpless classes only-the pauper, the vagrant, the criminal, the very

r-but the labourers, the artisans, the clerks, the shopkeepers, the traders, the professional men, and even the highest orders in the state, are all deeply concerned in the efficiency of any system of education and training which may be in operation amongst us. The inquiry which had been made into the condition and working of our great schools-Eton, Harrow, Winchester, and others-was the means of eliciting much valuable information, but it was felt that the range of that inquiry was too narrow to justify the commissioners in recommending the adoption of any particular plan, or even in suggesting any scheme. Hence the importance of the step taken by our Association, and the consequent issue of a commission, in December last, to inquire into the provision made in this country for middle-class education. The objects of that commission are well developed and very clearly stated in a paper issued by Mr. Fitch (one of the assistant commissioners) to the keepers and proprietors of schools in the district (Yorkshire) for which he was appointed. The investigation will take the widest range, and will include all our grammar schools, all collegiate, proprietary, and private schools of every kind, and will seek to discover what is the nature, amount, and quality of the instruction given in them, their systems of training, their terms of admission, and the like.

The commissioners will inquire as to endowments for educational purposes, their number and amount, the localities where they exist, the nature of the control under which they are placed, the patronage they involve, the classes of persons for whom they are now available, and upon what conditions

D