guns would be on earthworks and fortifi- | force upon your dockyards and arsenals, cations, in order to put a stop at once, if or the landing of troops upon your shores. necessary, to the completion of works then in course of construction, which might prove to be utterly useless; and in bringing in the Army Estimates in the following year, 1859, I expressed my opinion -an opinion of which my noble Friend Lord Herbert did me the honour of quoting and expressing his approval when moving the Vote for these fortifications-that you should make up your mind at once as to what means of defence the new range of guns rendered necessary, and proceed at once to the completion of them. I have always laid down the doctrine, to which I adhere, that the Government of the day are responsible, as far as human means can provide for it, for the security of the country; and I am not willing to relieve them from that responsibility by denying to them the means of carrying into effect the plans they propose; and I cannot conceive a stronger proof of want of confidence in a Government, or that a Government would remain in office a moment, if this House was to refuse them the means they asked for, in order to carry out what they, on their responsibility, and after due consideration, considered necessary for the security of the country. The Government have means at their command of obtaining advice, and the opinion of professional men responsible for the advice they give founded upon information, which they alone have access to; and this is admitted by one of the ablest opponents of the plans of the Commissioners, who, at page 27 of his pamphlet, says— "In order to lay down a definite scheme, an amount of information is required which is quite unattainable by any but those who are specially charged with the duty by Government." Now, there are certain points upon which If you are to assume the impossibility of an invasion, why, of course, no internal means of defence are necessary, and all the preparations we are making are useless, and the devotion of the Volunteers entirely thrown away: but I think there are very few who will come to this conclusion. What, then, is your second line of defence to be? or how are you to set about deciding upon it? My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Queen's County says "Appoint a Commission of the most distinguished officers of all arms in Her Majesty's service, to consider the whole question of the defences of the United Kingdom." Why I thought this had already been done, and that we are now called upon to read a second time a Bill founded upon the Report of these Commissioners; and when I see the names attached to that Report, I really am at a loss to conceive how these different services could have been better represented. It is perfectly true that other officers have expressed opinions differing from those of the Commissioners; but if we are to wait until a plan is proposed that everybody agrees to, not even the youngest Member of this House will live to see the country defended. It is for the Government to decide whether the opinions of the Commissioners or those of their opponents are entitled to the most weight; and they have the Inspector General of fortifications and the Defence Committee to guide them in forming their decision; and I hold the Government, and not the Commissioners, responsible to this House, not only for the plan they propose, but for the execution of it and I think this is a very important addition to their responsibility. Do not let us hear, when the works are completed, that in consequence of some error in the course of construction they do not fulfil the purpose for which they were designed, and that nobody knows who is responsible for their errors. This has happened too often. I also consider the Government responsible, not only for the expenditure, but for the provision for it; and that portion of the case I leave in the hands of my hon. Friend the Member for Stamford. I will not refer to the Budget of 1860, further than to remind the House that I predicted when it was brought in exactly what has since occurred. I warned the Government then that they had not provided for the expenditure which had already taken | nobody more competent to deal with the place, independent of that which was in- question of fortification than the right evitable, and that the necessary result hon. and gallant Gentleman who had just would be a deficit, which would lead to spoken; but he had not given a single a great outcry for reduction in the military reason for asking the House to assent to and naval expenditure. There can be no the plan proposed. All that he had done stronger advocate for a wise and judicious was, in substance, to ask the House to reeconomy in the military and naval expen- pose a blind confidence in the Government, diture than I am, because I am sure there and to accept their plans, whether right is nothing so detrimental to the true in- or wrong, leaving the responsibility enterest of the services as a lavish and extra- tirely on their shoulders. The same vagant outlay. It is always followed by doctrine was propounded in regard to the a reaction, and you go from one ex- scheme of fortifications in the time of Mr. treme to the other, and proceed to reduc- Pitt; and the answer of Mr. Fox was, that tions that are injurious to the efficiency of the House of Commons could not abdicate the services. I do not agree with the its duties on such an occasion, when a Secretary for War that efficiency is always large expenditure to be supplied from the attended with increased expenditure; on taxes of the people was involved. The the contrary, I think I could point out effect of the speech of the hon. and gallant many of the departments connected with Member for Ayrshire (Sir J.Fergusson) was the army-the Clothing Department, the this-that the navy of this country was Commissariat, and the Manufacturing De- inferior to that of France, and so long as partments, which have been placed in a it continued to be so it was the duty of state of the highest efficiency, and which the Government to turn their attention to has been productive of the greatest eco- promoting its efficiency. He agreed in nomy. Of this I am quite sure, that if that statement; and supposing the fact to the departments are in a state of ineffi- be as stated, he would grudge no expense ciency, the public service suffers from it. to put the navy in a state of efficiency. It is quite true that during the last three He argued the question on the assumption or four years there has been an enormous that it was their duty to do that at once; expenditure on the naval and military ser- but supposing we had such a navy, was it vices-in point of fact, a war expendi- possible to believe that the fortifications ture during a time of comparative peace; at Portsdown Hill and Plymouth were but I trust with this difference, that required? The normal principle of this whereas at the end of a war you have country was to have the command of the nothing to show for your expenditure but sea; and when he looked at the Return reduced means and exhausted resources, I of the forts now building, and compared believe that the expenditure to which I them with those of France, he found that allude has placed you in a very different what the French were doing was building position. If we recollect what has been movable fortifications. It was notorious done by this expenditure, I think few peo- that the harbour of Cherbourg could be ple will regret it. In 1858, a portion of bombarded at a distance of 3,500 yards, the regular army was not supplied with and Toulon at 4,000 yards; and if war broke rifled muskets, not a single regiment of out between England and France, Chermilitia had them, and there were none in bourg and Toulon would be at the mercy store. You had not a rifled cannon in of England, were it not for the building of your service, or an iron-plated ship, and movable forts. He wished to know if it were behind other nations in all these re- was possible that a sort of armada of spects. The expense of producing these, wooden vessels could bring over 80,000 or and the necessary ammunition, has been 100,000 men to attack our dockyards, when the cause of great expenditure; but I do it was perfectly certain, that unless they not think anybody will grudge it. The took the forts, not a man would go back to portion of the expenditure during that France? Still more unlikely was it that period which I do regret is the seven or an invading force could achieve a flank eight millions spent on the China war, march through a part of the country upon which would have paid for all the fortifica- which railways could pour down Voluntions now asked for, and left the country teers and regular troops in large numbers in a much better position than it is at to engage them. The resolution taken by present. Sir John Moore on a threatened invasion was shared by many gallant officers at the MR. MONSELL said, that there was present hour; and that was, to meet the invader on the sea, and to prevent him from setting a foot on our shores. It was a remarkable fact, that although Mr. Pitt held that the safety of the country depended on the construction of fortifications, yet when a war broke out a few years afterwards, which lasted for ten years, none of our dockyards were attacked or even menaced by the enemy during the whole of that period. It was a mistake to suppose that the sea fortifications were not now before them. An expenditure of many hundred thousand pounds was now proposed to them for such works; but he held that they were in the same category as those at Spithead, and that if the one was abandoned, the other ought to be abandoned too. As to our ordnance, the fact was, that after spending some £3,000,000 in improvements, we had not got a gun which could pierce an iron plate at 500 yards. He, and those who agreed with him, regretted to see the ancient policy of the country to depend on its naval supremacy abandoned, and they would take every opportunity of dividing the House to prevent the taxpayers of the country being exposed to enormous expenditure which could produce no real benefit. SIR JAMES DUKE said, he should not have risen if the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had not stated that Toulon could easily be attacked. If the hon. Gentleman were outside Toulon, as he was some years ago, he would be very glad to turn tail, and not risk the loss of his ship from the guns on the Cape. As an old sailor, he thought they ought to feel deeply indebted to the noble Lord for the efforts he was making to provide efficient defences; and he was sure the country would, for that reason alone, be ready to rally round the noble Lord's Government. He never doubted that the navy would, as in past times, maintain its honour and renown, but these were not days when they could bid defiance to any country by seamanship alone. The introduction of steam had produced a change of circumstances which no one could ignore. The gallant General the late Secretary of State for War had nobly supported the proposals of the Government, and a majority of the House of Commons would support any Administration which evinced the same spirit as the noble Lord in seeking to put the country in a proper state of defence. SIR JAMES ELPHINSTONE said, he did not intend to repudiate the Resolution to which the House came in 1860, to support Her Majesty's Government in the proposals which, upon their responsibility, were stated to be necessary for the defence of the country; and he was prepared to support them now, though he was ready to admit that the fortifications proposed to be erected were not likely to be so effectual as at the time they were proposed. They were now in a state of transition, the most serious of the navy transitions within his memory. The system of naval defence was entirely altered, and a differ ent sort of ship was required to defend our shores and to maintain our naval superiority in distant parts of the world. He believed that there were not less than seven classes of iron ships now in course of construction by the Admiralty, but unfortunately none of them had been adequately tested; and he also desired to know what provision was being made for the dock and harbour accommodation of these vessels. He should support the Government in the vote to-night, but he trusted they would give speedy consideration to the momentous questions which recent experience involved. CAPTAIN WILLES JOHNSON said, he held in his hand the accumulated wisdom of the Defence Commission-that wisdom which had produced a Report quite antagonistic to the evidence before them. When he first entered the service, the word "defence" was not to be found in our naval vocabulary. But now the word "attack" was never mentioned. If it ever escaped any one's lips, it was "with bated breath and whispering humbleness" lest it should give umbrage to gallant men on the other side of the Channel. It never seemed to have entered the heads of the Commissioners that our naval forces could attack as well as defend. He was sure, that if the noble Lord the Secretary to the Admiralty were at the head of a fleet, and were asked which he would rather attack, Cherbourg or Spithead, supposing both to be a possession of an enemy, he would say Cherbourg. Cherbourg had been a bugbear to the old women of the country, and to the old men and young men also. He had conversed with many hon. Members who had gone to visit that harbour and arsenal, and they came away with the idea that it was a second Gibraltar, and that it was not only impregnable but invulnerable. Toulon, Brest, and L'Orient, being cul-de-sac harbours, SIR FREDERIC SMITH said, he would withdraw his Amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. The House divided:-Ayes 158; Noes 56: Majority 102. Bill read 2o, and committed for Thursday. FORTIFICATIONS (PROVISION FOR EX- Resolved, That the Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury be authorized to direct the payment to the Governor and Company of the Bank of England, out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of the sum of £600, as an allowance for the expenso of management of the contributions to be received by the said Governor and Company under any Act of the present Session for providing a constructing Fortifications for the protection of further sum towards defraying the Expenses of the Royal Arsenals and Dockyards and the Ports of Dover and Portland, and of creating a Central Arsenal. were difficult to attack, but Cherbourg monument of our weakness, of our folly, was easily assailable. Cherbourg had a and of the decline of the greatest naval broad roadstead, without rocks or shoals, Power which ever existed in the world. and all the British fleet might be carried through that roadstead with perfect impunity. What was France arming for? She could not fear a descent on her coast, with her army of 700,000 or 800,000 men, and with a population of 40,000,000 in a ring fence. What, on the other hand, had England to fear, with a seafaring population of 350,000 men, the best and hardiest seamen in the universe; with a small but incomparable army, unequalled in gallantry and discipline? with a well-organized militia and a band of Rifle Volunteers, who were not only the glory of this country but the admiration of the world; with a naval reserve of 15,000 men, who could be increased at any moment to three times the number, and who recently showed their patriotic spirit by coming forward as one man to resent an insult offered to the British flag; and with the best engineers and artificers in the world, and an inexhaustible supply of coal and iron? We had really nothing to fear except an inglorious ultra-defensive policy, that gave courage and confidence to our enemies, while degrading and humiliating the British navy. The place to defend our own shores was on the coast of the enemy, as in the olden time. He had supported the noble Lord at the head of the Government on the Alderney Vote, but he was sorry to say he could not follow him into the lobby on the present occasion, believing that whenever fixed fortifications became our chief defence, the sun of our naval glory would have passed its zenith, and nothing would remain for us but to throw up the sponge and declare ourselves beaten. No man in that House, not even the hon. Member for Birmingham, looked upon war with greater detestation and horror than himself; but he was persuaded that until all the potentates of the earth became converts to that beautiful religion which the hon. Gentleman professed, war would never cease, nor would the lion lie down with the lamb. If, notwithstanding our endeavours to preserve peace, we were dragged into war, we had but one course to pursue-to prosecute hostilities In line 27, after the words "years or," to inwith all the vigour and energy of which sert the words "if he shall have then attained the we were capable, carrying fire and de-age of sixty." struction into every port of the enemy. These were his sentiments, and he believed, that if these fortifications were erected, they would prove an imperishable VOL. CLXVII. [THIRD SERIES.] House resumed. Resolution to be reported To-morrow. TRANSFER OF LAND BILL. [BILL NO. 101.] COMMITTEE. On the Motion of the SOLICITOR Clauses 39 to 45 were struck out. THE SOLICITOR GENERAL proposed to grant a superannuation allowance to the registrar on his attainment to the age of sixty years, or on his being in the service of the Government for a period of twenty years. Amendment proposed, MR. AUGUSTUS SMITH proposed to amend the clause by the insertion of the words "sixty-five instead of "sixty" years. 2 T Order for Committee read. THE LORD ADVOCATE moved "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair." MR. CRAUFURD said, he should oppose the Motion, unless an assurance were given that a clause should be introduced into the Bill giving the power of appeal. THE LORD ADVOCATE hoped that his hon. Friend would not object to the House going into Committee on the ground he had mentioned. The object of the Bill was to assimilate the law affecting the removal of the poor from England to Scotland, and from Scotland to Ireland, to the existing state of the law with respect to poor removal from England to Ireland. If an appeal was thought right in one case, it ought to exist in the other also. SIR JOHN OGILVY hoped the mittee would be postponed years in several parishes shall render a person irremovable. Clause agreed to; as were also Clauses 2 to 7 inclusive. House resumed. Committee report Progress; to sit again on Thursday. SHEEP (IRELAND) BILL-[BILL No. 161.] COMMITTEE. Order for Committee read. MR. HENNESSY moved a clause giving Bill reported; as amended, to be considered on Wednesday. JURIES BILL-[BILL NO. 172.] CONSIDERATION. Order for Consideration read. MR. DEEDES moved the following clause, to follow the first clause:— "All managing clerks to attorneys, solicitors, and proctors actually practising, all subordinate officers in gaols and houses of correction, and all constables, shall be and are hereby absolutely freed and exempted from being returned and from serving upon any juries or inquests whatsoever, and shall not be inserted in the lists to be prepared by Com-virtue of the principal Act or of this Act. And to amend Schedule accordingly." Clause 1 (Warrant of Removal to Scotland to be signed by Two Justices or a Magistrate, and to England or Ireland by the Sheriff or Two Justices). SIR FREDERICK HEYGATE moved an Amendment to the effect that no child who had arrived at five years of age, and should remain in the country ten years, should be liable to removal. THE LORD ADVOCATE objected to the Amendment. Amendment negatived. SIR HERVEY BRUCE moved the introduction of words providing that a residence of five years in one parish or of ten Clause brought up, and read 1°; 2°; amended, and added. Bill to be read 3° on Wednesday. House adjourned at half after HOUSE OF LORDS, MINUTES. PUBLIC BILLS.-1a Game Law Amend- 2 Naval and Victualling Stores; Salmon Fisheries (Scotland); Lunacy (Scotland); Consolidated Fund (£10,000,000). 3 Bleaching and Dyeing Works Act Amend. ment. UNITED STATES-THE CIVIL WAR. LORD BROUGHAM said, he was sorry to find that he had been somewhat misunderstood in what he had stated the previous evening with regard to the unhappy civil war that was raging in America—a civil war that had already lasted longer than |