nature of their present titles may be. I presume the announcement implies the establishment in this country of something like the system that has been so advantageously in operation in Ireland; and, I have no doubt that, if properly devised and well carried out, it will be received with satisfaction by the House, and prove a most useful measure, not only to the landed but also to the commercial interest of the country. It is not an unusual practice to reserve the best and most important things for the last, and accordingly Her Majesty's Government, after having kept the House and the public on the tenter hooks of expectation through many long preceding paragraphs, at last come to the topic which is at present most exciting the attention of the public-namely, the subject of Parliamentary reform. I take the last paragraph in the Speech to mean that Her Majesty's Government have a Bill ready prepared upon that subject, and that it is their intention, without the least delay, to lay it on the table of the House, in order that the House and the public may have an opportunity of considering its provisions. I think that is a proper course for them to pursue, and quite consistent with the usual course of procedure. A measure of such deep importance as that properly belongs to the responsible Government of the country; the House will receive with due respect the measure which Her Majesty's Government are about to propose, and will make it the subject of their serious and anxious deliberation. When it is proposed, of course the House will have an opportunity of judging of its merits or its faults; but all I wish to do on the present occasion is, to express my opinion that any measure involving a change in the existing state of the representation is a measure which the responsible Government of the country ought to take upon itself. We are told in the Speech that the measure they are about to propose will not affect the stability of the Throne. Well, I should hardly imagine any measure proposed by Her Majesty's Government could be likely to affect the stability of the Throne or of the great institutions of the country. I am persuaded there is in this country a most devoted attachment to the monarchical system of government. I am persuaded that the great institutions of this country rest on the sincerest convictions of their utility and the deeplyrooted affections of the people. I am persuaded that when the people of this country look around them in the world, and see, on the one hand, the nations which are ruled by despotic authority, and, on the other, the nations which are ruled by a power coming from below-I mean the Republican-when, I say, the people of this country see the results of these two opposite systems, and the effects which they produce, and when they compare the condition of these countries with the happy condition in which we are fortunately placed, the attachment which, as Englishmen, they feel to those institutions under which this country has so long prospered must become every day more deeplyrooted, and they would not consent to any changes that are likely materially to affect those institutions which are the pride, the glory, and the happiness of our country. THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHE QUER: Sir, I am glad to hear that neither the noble Viscount nor any other hon. Member of the House is about to offer any opposition to the Address which has been moved and seconded to-night by my two hop. Friends with such distinguished ability. And, Sir, it would hardly have been necessary for me to rise after the noble Viscount, had it not been that I wished to show him that courtesy which is always accorded to each other by the Members of this House, and had he not made one or two observations which, if I had not risen, might have led to misconception. The noble Viscount has followed and discussed the various subjects referred to in Her Majesty's gracious Speech, and those touched upon in the Address which has been proposed in a manner more elaborate than probably it is the wish of the House that I should imitate in adverting to his remarks. He seems not to be satisfied with the composition of the Speech, though the subject matter of it meets with his approbation. Criticism, we know by experience, is easier than composition. I have, in the course of my life, heard even the composition of the noble Viscount criticised. With respect to that epithet which appears to have attracted more particularly the critical attention of the noble Viscount-that by which we describe the Danubian Principalities-I believe the epithet "Rouman" was borrowed from a despatch of the noble Viscount. Sir, the noble Viscount has referred to that passage in the Royal Speech which announces the probable termination of the system of emigration known as the free-labour scheme, which has so long excited the attention and reprobation of this country, and he thinks that is a result on which the House and the country may be congratulated. But the noble Viscount in referring to this subject also made some allusion to the conduct of the Government with respect to the ship Charles et Georges, and expressed his belief that we should not hesitate to place on the table of the House the papers that will be necessary to illustrate the course taken by the Government with respect to it. The noble Viscount is under no mistake on that head. I will take a very early opportunity of laying the papers on the table of the House; but I may be permitted to say, as so much has appeared in the newspapers of a very unauthorized character, accompanied with garbled extracts from the official documents connected with other countries, that I shall lay these papers on the table with the full conviction that they will prove that the advisers of Her Majesty have done their duty to their Sovereign and their country in respect to that question. As the noble Viscount has alluded to treaties under which he seems to think we were bound to come forward at a moment of emergency in support of our ancient Ally, Portugal, I may be permitted to inform the noble Viscount that no question under those treaties was ever raised, that no appeal in consequence of those treaties ever was made to Her Majesty's Government, and that when it was recently demanded of the Prime Minister of Portugal in the Parliament of his own country why he had not made that appeal to the English Government he declared, among other good reasons why he did not, that it was his belief that no casus fœderis had arisen. When the papers are placed upon the table it will be seen, and, I believe, accepted by the House, that the proper advice was given by the Government to our ancient Ally, that all the good offices which, considering the relations that subsist between Portugal and this country, might have been expected of us were exercised in the right quarter in her behalf, and that terms were obtained which might have been accepted by Portugal with honour to herself and with satisfaction to Europe. The reason why those terms, unfortunately, were not accepted will appear in these papers; but I believe it will be the opinion of the House, and also of the country, when the subject is calmly and completely investigated, that the conduct of Her Majesty's Government in that respect was such as became a British Ministry towards an an cient Ally. I have no wish to avoid the topics on which the noble Viscount has commented, but, as those remarks really lead to little controversy, I should be wasting the time of the House if I entered upon a discussion scarcely provoked by anything that has fallen from the noble Viscount. The noble Viscount says Her Majesty's Government have kept for the last paragraph of the Speech the most important and most pressing subject which it contains. That it is one of the most important no one can doubt, and it is as pressing as the House in its wisdom will consider any subject to be which demands its calm consideration. But when the noble Viscount expects that, without the least delay, the measure for the amended representation of the people shall be laid upon the table, I beg to state that the noble Viscount is perfectly right in supposing that the measure in question is prepared, and that it is the duty of Her Majesty's Government to introduce it at a period when it can receive ample deliberation, and when Parliament will have time to comprehend the nature and purport of all its details. But the noble Viscount cannot expect, or if he does indulge so unreasonable an expectation he will be disappointed in supposing, that Her Majesty's Government will bring forward that measure before the urgent business of the country can be put in a proper frame, and before my right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty can bring forward that subject which he admits is not second in importance to any that can occupy our attention. At the proper time, and giving to the House the most ample opportunity to consider its merits, I shall be prepared on the part of the Government to introduce that measure to their consideration. Sir, the noble Viscount has touched upon a subject which I believe at this moment engages the anxious attention of Parliament and the country even more than the one upon which I have just ventured to remark, and that is the state of our relations with foreign Powers, and the state of the relations existing between two of our principal Allies. The noble Viscount has talked of the probability of a war, which he himself describes as one that may be general. Now, Sir, for my own part, I have no wish to conceal from the House that, in the opinion of Iler Majesty's Government, the state of affairs abroad is critical at the present moment. If I attempted to conceal that opinion it would be in vain, because in these days of rapid communication few men, who are well instructed in public affairs, are ignorant that events have occurred or are threatened, which may in a brief space of time bring about a very critical state of affairs. But if the noble Viscount expects that I can entirely agree with him in the opinion that a war between two great Powers a war which may involve the whole of Europe-is a matter of probability, I must say that I should hesitate before I accepted that description of the present emergency. That the state of affairs is critical I admit, but at the same time it is not a state of affairs that makes me believe that the maintenance of peace is by any means hopeless. Sir, the House is well aware-because hourly and daily something occurs which impresses the fact upon its knowledge-that there exists at this moment great jealousy and distrust between France and Austria. Sir, Her Majesty's Government, under the present state of affairs, have taken that course which they believed, was the one most conducive to maintain peace and remove that jealousy and that distrust between two great Powers who are the Allies of Her Majesty. We have frankly communicated to France and Austria our views of their relative position in Italy, which has led to this unfortunate jealousy and misconception between these two great Powers. We are as much alive to the unsatisfactory condition of parts of Italy as the noble Viscount himself, or any of his late colleagues can be. We have before discussed in this House the subject of Italy, and high authorities on all sides, and representing all parties in this House, have expressed their opinions, and upon some points in respect to it all are agreed. Sir, I think the House will agree with the noble Viscount, whose observations I listened to with complete satisfaction, when he deprecated any conduct on the part of any Power that would disturb those important treaties which are the guarantees and title deeds of European order. The noble Viscount spoke so explicitly on that head that no misconception of his opinions can ibly prevail. But the noble Viscount serves-and all men of sense must him that the state of Central unsatisfactory as it is, is all, connected with the the validity of which hes, like all sensible men, to uphold. The present Government have long been conscious, and I am bound to say their predecessors were equally aware, of that unsatisfactory state of Central Italy. But let me ask the House calmly to remember what is the cause of that unsatisfactory state? What is one of the principal causes that have created at least externally, among Foreign Powers, a dissatisfaction with respect to its condition? It is that Central Italy is occupied by the armies of Foreign Powers. It is because Central Italy is occupied by the armed force of two of the great military empires of Europe. And let the House recollect what are the Powers in question that occupy Central Italy. They are this very empire of France and this very empire of Austria, between whom so much mistrust has arisen, and from whose jealousy so much danger to the peace of Europe is apprehended. What, then, has been the course taken by Her Majesty's Government under these circumstances? We have impressed upon our Ally the Emperor of the French, and upon our Ally the Emperor of Austria, and we have not limited our representation to those two great Powers, but have impressed upon the Courts of Turin, of Berlin, and of St. Petersburg our opinion, that the state of Italy is no doubt unsatisfactory, and that it is highly expedient that measures should be taken to remove those long existing causes of public discontent and those circumstances which at all times are calculated to disturb the general peace. But we have equally and firmly expressed our opinion that these great and beneficial results cannot be obtained by attempting to subvert the established order that has been secured by the public treaties to which the noble Viscount has referred, but rather by using the influence of the States most interested in the condition of Italy to improve the condition of Central Italy itself. While we have done this-while we have endeavoured, both with regard to France and Austria, to remove the mistrust that has unfortunately arisen between those two great Powers-while we have sought to allay the suspicions that have been unhappily excited while we have placed before them every consideration that could be urged for maintaining that general peace which has been so long preserved, and which has been, upon the whole, so beneficial to the cause of humanity and civilization-while we have done this we have equally impressed upon those two great Powers the duty that devolves upon them of entering, not into hostile rivalry for the military command of Italy, but into that more generous emulation of seeking to advance its interests and improve its condition. We have pointed out to France and Austria that their peculiar positionthe one being an essentially Italian Power, and the other a Power in military possession of the ancient capital of Italy, and lying in geographical contiguity to Italy-while Austria and France are the two favourite children of the Church-makes it the primary duty of these two Powers to hold counsel together, and see whether by their united influence a course of policy cannot be urged upon the Princes of Central Italy which shall lead to the removal of those abuses and that misgovernment which a general and universal opinion has pronounced intolerable. We have shrunk from joining in those efforts ourselves, not from any wish to avoid responsibility or the fiulfilment of the high duties which must devolve at a critical moment in the affairs of Europe on all great Powers, but we have felt that England being a Protestant State, her obtrusiveness on such an occasion might be misinterpreted, and that it would be better that France and Austria should join and exercise their united in fluences to obtain those results which England is equally anxious to see realized as themselves. The same feeling, no doubt, has also influenced Prussia and Russia, both States which hold no communion with the See of Rome. But while we have refrained from obtrusively thrusting ourselves forward-while we have used every persuasion to induce France and Austria to combine together and unite their influence for the great object, the improvement of the Italian Government we have also told them that if the result of their deliberations be that it would, in their opinion, be of importance that the other great signatories of the treaties of 1815 should combine with them for ulterior and ultimate purposes-if, for example, some new arrangement of the territory of Central Italy should be deemed by France and Austria necessary and expedient-we would assist them to the utmost with our counsel and influence to bring about such a result, and we would call upon the other signatories of the great treaties of 1815 to join and aid in that object. I believe that the course which Her Majesty's Government has taken in respect of this grave matter, is one which, when fairly understood and discussed, would be approved by the House of Commons. It is a course which counsels and would secure peace; but it would secure peace by a policy which would ameliorate the condition of Italy, and advance the general civilization of mankind. We cannot believe, and no sensible man can believe, that the improvement or regeneration of Italy can ever be secured by making it once more the battle field of contending armies. Sir, the course which we are recommending appears to me to be so sound, so moderate, but at the same time one which so recommends itself to all judicious men, that I do not, and cannot, despair of its ultimately proving to be the course which will be adopted by the great Powers to whom we have proposed it. And therefore, although I admit that the condition of affairs is critical, I will not yet agree with the noble Viscount, that war— and, perhaps, European war-is a matter now of probability. I may, perhaps, have misunderstood the noble Viscount, or the word may have escaped inadvertently from his lips; but it is a word of great import, and it escaped from lips which, on these subjects, have just weight on public opinion; and, therefore, the House will excuse me for making this comment upon the expression. I have already said we made representations to the Court of Turin, in the same sense and with the same frankness and fulness which characterized our representations both to France and Austria. The position of Sardinia is one which necessarily and naturally commands sympathy in a free Parliament; and there is no state in Italy which the English feelings have more clustered round than the Kingdom of Sardinia, especially during the last few years. We have all hoped that Sardinia may be the means by which the improvement of Italy, morally and materially, in public liberty, as well as in other respects, may be effected; and I do not relinquish-I will not readily relinquish hopes which seemed so well founded, and which were so encouraging to every generous spirit. But I would impress on that interesting State, that patience in her career is as necessary and as valuable a virtue as all that energy and all that enterprise which she has shown; and that by maintaining order, by maintaining her publie liberty, by becoming experienced in the practice of public liberty, in which every year she is advancing more and more, she is more certain of obtaining her ultimate end-namely, the advancement and eleva- | of this country; which the nation, as Her Majesty has most truly and most graciously |