committee stated that they had seen sufficient to satisfy them, "that with a view to serve both the interests of the church and the lasting welfare of Ireland, a permanent change of system will be required: that such a change, to be safe and satisfactory, must involve a complete extinction of tithes, including those belonging to lay impropriators, by commuting them for a charge upon land, or an exchange for or investment in land, so as effectually to secure the revenues of the church, so far as relates to tithes, and at the same time to remove all pecuniary collisions between the clergymen and the tithe-payer, which, at present, were unavoidable." On the 8th of March, the Marquis of Lansdowne in the upper house, and Mr. Stanley in the commons, moved resolutions adopting and embodying the recommendations of the report. In the lords no opposition was offered to them, but in the commons it did not pass so readily. Mr. Stanley said that as he intended to state the whole plan which government had in contemplation, with all its details, he should move for that purpose that the house should resolve itself into a committee on the report; a course which he deemed advisable, because it would put it into his power to give every explanation which might be required, and to take the opinion of the committee separately on each of the resolutions. This motion was sternly opposed by the Irish members. Mr. Brownlow led the attack, by maintaining that the report was too partial and imperfect to be made the subject of consideration in committee. He moved "that the debate be adjourned, until the committee had gone into a full inquiry into the subject of tithes, and the appropriation of church property in Ireland, and until the evidence and report of the committee came before parliament." In support of the amendment, Mr. Shiel said that the Irish members did not oppose the resolutions: they only said, Wait for the final report, and do not decide on a document resting on one-sided evidence." Catholics, he said, had been excluded from the committee, and only one out of eighteen Catholic witnesses had been examined. Was this just, or fair dealing? It was as if a jury were desired to retire on the closing of the plaintiff's case. They find their verdict; judgment is given; and then the defendant was desired to proceed with her case. If the committee had confined themselves to the recommendation of assisting the clergy, the Irish members would not have complained; but while they came with a purse of gold for the church, they also came with a rod of iron for the people. Mr. Shiel proceeded next to discuss the plan which was supposed to be unknown, in doing which he discovered the true objection of the Irish members to it, namely, that the Protestant church of Ireland was still to be preserved. Other Irish members urged the same objections; and added, that if everything else in the supposed plan were right, it was wrong to pay the arrears to the clergy, and then ask repayment by coercive measures. Lord Ebrington, who had been on the committee, and concurred in its report, now sided with the Irish members. Sir Robert Peel said that the discussion on the anticipated propositions was foreign to the question before the house.

The ques

tion was, whether the propositions should be explained now, or after the house had gone into a committee. He thought that the latter was the course most conformable to the practice of the house; and by supporting a motion to that effect, no member pledged himself in the least to the proposition of the government. Lord Althorp and Mr. Stanley complained of the course the Irish members had taken in commenting on propositions of which they knew nothing; and on a division the amendment of the Irish members was lost by an overwhelming majority.

The committee was delayed till the 13th, on which day Mr. Stanley moved a series of resolutions similar to those which had been agreed to by the lords. The first of these resolutions was, That it appears to the house that in several parts of Ireland, an organised and systematic opposition has been made to the payment of tithes, by which the law has been rendered unavailing, and many of the clergy of the established church have been reduced to great distress." Mr. Stanley entered at great length into the evidence which proved both parts of this resolution. It

was quite clear from the evidence that a system of opposition had been established in Ireland to the payment of tithes, which could not be overcome by ordinary means. Every plan had been adopted by which the operations of the law might be traversed. Tithe-proctors and processservants were violently assailed; impediments were interposed to prevent the seizure and sale of cattle; and, in a word, every system of determined and organised opposition was manifested that could be displayed by a whole population acting as one man against the payment of a claim legally due. Having proved the truth of the first resolution, Mr. Stanley proceeded to the second, which provided means of relief. It read thus :-"That, in order to afford relief to the distress, it is expedient that his majesty should be empowered, upon the application of the lord-lieutenant, or other chief governor or governors of Ireland, to direct that there be issued from the consolidated fund such sums as may be required for this purpose. That the sums so issued shall be distributed by the lord-lieutenant, or other chief governor or governors of Ireland, by and with the advice of the privy-council, in advances proportioned to the incomes of the incumbents of benefices wherein the tithes, or tithe composition lawfully due may have been withheld, according to a scale diminishing as the incomes of such incumbents increase." To this resolution Mr. Stanley said that he did not anticipate any objection, inasmuch as it was from no fault of the clergy that the resistance, and the consequent distress had arisen. He then proceeded to the third resolution, which provided for the reimbursement of the sums advanced :—“ That, for the more effectual vindication of the authority of the law, and as a security for the repayment of the sums to be advanced, his majesty may be empowered to levy, under the authority of an act to be passed for this purpose, the amount of arrears for the tithes or tithe-composition of the whole or any part of the year 1831, without prejudice to the claims of the clergy for any arrear which may be due for a longer period; reserving, in the first instance, the amount of such advances, and paying over the remaining balance to the legal claimants." The last resolution pledged the house to an alteration of the existing tithe system on some principle of commutation, though Mr. Stanley said he was not prepared to state the nature of the change. Those who dissented from the resolutions consisted chiefly of the Irish members, and, singular enough, their opposition was chiefly confined to the last resolution. This was, it was said, to introduce a change of system, but it implied that the tithe was still to be a fund available to the established church. It was said to be unjust to demand extraordinary powers for the execution of a law acknowledged to be bad and mischievous, and that every renewed attempt to recover tithes by coercion would only hasten the ruin of the church establishment in Ireland. Some adjustment must be made by which the church property should be applied to the support of the three prominent sects in Ireland, instead of its being bestowed exclusively on one, which only comprehended about a third of the population. It was admitted at the same time that it was right to relieve the clergy who were suffering; but it was asserted that the resolutions held out no hope of any substantial amendment of the existing state of things. Mr. Shiel argued that the last resolution did not pledge the house not to appropriate church property as it might deem fit, and insinuated that this was what the ministry meant, though they could not venture to speak it out plainly. Sir Robert Peel supported the plan of the ministry, for, although hostile, he said, on general principles, to pledges that the house would do something at a future period, he thought that the interests of religion and the Protestant church required that the present case should be made an exception. As to the proposal to delay the question till the committee should have given a full report, he deemed it unnecessary and mischievous. If the spirit of combination was to be checked, it should be so at once; it would be true mercy to check it as soon as possible, for any delay would only add wings to its already rapid progress. The first resolution was agreed to finally without a division. On the second, Mr. Hunt divided the house, as he did not think the distress of the

clergy in Ireland was such as to warrant money being taken out of the pockets of the people of this country for their relief. He was, however, only supported by eleven members, while eighty-six voted for the resolution. The third then passed without a division, and an amendment on the fourth was negatived without being put to the vote, so that the whole were carried. The bill was brought in to be read a second time on the 6th of April, when the Irish opposition pressed for a delay on the ground that it was inconsistent with sound policy to carry through this coercive measure before introducing the other measure for the change or extinction of tithes; that if the arrangements regarding the latter were complicated and required delay, that was the best reason for delaying the former, and that Mr. Stanley, the Irish secretary, ought to take advantage of the Easter recess, then approaching, to pay a visit to Ireland. Ministers resisted all delay, however, and the second reading was carried by a majority of one hundred and nineteen against twenty-one. It was read a third time, without much discussion, on the 16th of April; and in the house of lords, where the resolutions had been agreed to, the bill was passed without opposition.

The tithe-committees still continued their investigations, and on the 25th of June Mr. Stanley stated to the house of commons the measures which ministers intended to recommend for the final settlement of the questions connected with tithes. Three bills were to be introduced: the first, to make the composition act permanent and compulsory, and to render it at the same time more equitable and effective in some of its details; the second, constituting the bishop and beneficed clergy of each diocese into a corporation for the purpose of receiving the tithes for the whole body, and dividing them for their common benefit in the proportion to which the respective parties would be entitled: and the third, providing for a commutation of the tithe on the same principle as the land-tax redemption in England, or the redemption of quit-rents in Irelandthat is, that the party liable to the charge might redeem it, and the money thus paid for redemption would go to fund as a provision for the clergy in the proportions to which they were at present entitled. Mr. Stanley explained the principles of these three bills at great length; but stated that it was not intended to carry all of them through the house at so late a period of the session. And this, he continued, was not necessary, as the first and second were independent of the third. He moved therefore for leave to bring in a bill for making the tithe-composition act compulsory, and the composition permanent, and another for establishing the ecclesiastical corporations. Subsequently the latter of these was delayed, and the composition bill only pressed on. The motion for this was opposed by Mr. J. Grattan, who moved as an amendment the following resolutions:-"That it is essential to the peace of Ireland that the system of tithes in that country should be extinguished, not in name only, but in substance, and unequivocally: That in coming to this resolution we recognise the rights of persons having vested interests, and declare that it is the duty of parliament to provide for those persons by making them a just compensation: That we also recognise the liability of property in Ireland to contribute to a fund for supporting and promoting religion and charity; but that such may and ought to be quite different in the mode of collection, and much lighter in effect than that raised by the system of tithes: That we are also of opinion that the mode of levying and the application of such fund and its distribution ought to be left to the decision of a reformed parliament." As the session was drawing near to a close, the opposition seemed to entertain hopes of rendering the measure abortive by mere opposition. Ministers were first compelled to adjourn the debate from the 3rd of July to the 10th, and on the 10th it was found necessary to adjourn it again to the 13th. On that day, after stern opposition from the Irish members, and especially Mr. O'Connell, who descanted in his usual strain on the "insulting contempt with which all Irish affairs were treated," a division took place on Mr. Grattan's resolutions, which were rejected by a large majority, and then the bill passed the

second reading without opposition, and the house went into committee. Mr. Stanley in opening the ministerial propositions had adverted to the payment of church-cess and church-rates by Catholics, and expressed an opinion that they might be got rid of by a proper application of the first-fruits. Mr. Shiel moved that "the committee should be instructed to recite in the preamble of the bill, that the tithe composition should be extended, with the view to the levying of first-fruits according to their real value, and to such future appropriation of them to the purposes of religion, education, and charity, as, after making a due provision for the maintenance of the church, should to parliament seem proper." Mr. Shiel said that the preamble already set forth that the bill was to effect a commutation. The government, however, ought not to stop there: they had declared that they intended to relieve the people from the church-rate, by levying their firstfruits to their full extent, and it was their object to ascertain the full amount of tithes through Ireland in order to tax the church. The committee, also, had reported that the people ought to be relieved in this particular: whereföre then was it not set forth in the preamble? They should be embodied in the bill, and the legislature should give an earnest of their determination to rescue the Irish nation from the most odious imposition in the annals of ecclesiastical taxation, the erection of temples with which the people had no concern. Mr. Stanley, in reply, admitted that he agreed in the principle that the fund arising from the first-fruits should be made available for the repair and erection of churches. When asked, however, "Why not say in the preamble of this bill that there should be an abolition of church-cess and rates for the future?" he said he was not prepared to go to that extent. If he consented to the introduction of these words into the preamble, he should be doubtless told that church-rates were abolished, and that the people of Ireland so understood it. He did not wish, he said, to declare that to be the object of the bill which was not its object, however it might be likely to be effected by the passing of the bill. On a division Mr. Shiel's motion was rejected by seventy-nine to eighteen. The bill now proceeded without further delay, and was passed by the commons and the lords. On the second reading in the upper house the Duke of Wellington expressed a wish that it should pass unanimously, he believing it to be the commencement of a series of measures which had the pacification of Ireland for their object.

FINANCIAL STATEMENTS.

As the reform bill and the management of Ireland were the great business of this session, matters of trade did not occupy much attention in parliament. The chancellor of the exchequer made his financial statements on the 27th of July, when it appeared that in the quarter of the year ending on the 5th of January, there had been a deficiency of £700,000, making the revenue of that quarter fall short of the estimate by no less a sum than £1,200,000; ministers having calculated on a surplus of £500,000. The revenue in the year 1830, the chancellor of the exchequer said, was £50,056,616, while the expenditure was £47,142,943, leaving a surplus of £2,913,673. The expenditure of 1831 ending in 1832 was within £19,664 of that of 1830; but this equality did not proceed from an equality of votes in the two years, because in the latter year there arose, from the reduction of four per cents., a saving of £777,443. After entering into minute particulars of the receipts and expenditure, with the savings which government had effected, the chancellor of the exchequer said, that upon the whole there was a decrease of income in 1831, as compared with 1830, of £3,682,176. From this, if the surplus, which would have accrued if the income had been equal to the expenditure in that year, that was £2,933,319, were deducted, there would be an excess of expenditure in 1881 over the income amounting to £698,857. The state of the revenue, therefore, in the commencement of 1832, was, that instead of having a surplus of £2,913,673, as in the commencement of 1831, the expenditure of 1831 being £19,646 below that of