question now pending between the Go- | Government has taken which did not vernment of Cape Colony and this coun- exist in full force two months ago, when try as to the expenses of the late war. I the hon. Baronet the Member for Chelsea may refer to another-the position of brought his Motion forward. The right the Province of Griqualand West in hon. Gentleman says that Cape Town is relation to the Cape Colony. Again, 1,000 miles from the seat of war. Why, there is the question how the valuable it was 1,000 miles away two months ago. Acts passed by the Cape Parliament for He says the telegraph is not adequate the defence of the Colony in the last to carry on detailed communications; Session can best be carried out. In but the telegraph communication is not connection with all these measures the less adequate now than it was then. co-operation, and even the direction, of You knew that you had to send out reSir Bartle Frere are absolutely re-inforcements; that you were going to quired by the Ministers of the Cape enter on a campaign; that Sir Bartle Colony. But beyond and above all this Frere must meet his Parliament at the is the great question of the Confedera- Cape, and conduct all these transactions tion or Union of the several Colonies with reference to Confederation; and or Territories in South Africa that really for the Secretary of State for the Sir Bartle Frere was specially sent to Colonies to get up gravely now, and endeavour to promote, to which he has tell us these things-every single one of devoted singular and special attention, which was in their minds and in full and which he will be instructed at once to force two months ago, when we had the bring before the Cape Parliament when debate on the hon. Baronet the Member it commences its Session next month. for Chelsea's Motion, when the Secretary These are all matters of the gravest and of State himself told us that no man exhighest importance to the interests of cept Sir Bartle Frere, from his knowledge South Africa and this country, and are of the circumstances, whatever errors he amply sufficient to tax the energies of might have committed, could conduct any one man, even though he possess the these affairs successfully—is, I think, abilities of Sir Bartle Frere; and I will presuming too much on the patience of venture to add that if hon. Members this House. It is also, I think, calwill consult their maps, as they have culated to have a prejudicial effect on been advised to do by the noble Lord the public mind, which the Government (Lord Elcho), and bear in mind that should deplore. I venture to say that Cape Town is 1,000 miles from the seat the reason why both sides of the House of war, the extreme difficulty and delay and the country outside approve of the of any postal communication, the im- course the Government have taken is for possibility of conducting serious affairs a totally different reason from any of solely by electric telegraph, and the great those stated by the Secretary of State distance even of the nearest point of for the Colonies. The reason why the the telegraph from the seat of war, they House and the country approve of that will see that it has become absolutely course is because they believe and hope necessary for a time to divide this great that Sir Garnet Wolseley will carry out office, and give that portion of it cover- the policy of Her Majesty's Government ing the seat of war to a new head, and in a very different spirit from that in into the hands of a single person. These which it was carried out by Sir Bartle are the reasons for the course taken by Frere. It is the real cause of the satisHer Majesty's Government, and they faction with the change; and what poswill be still more fully expressed in the sible object the Secretary of State for Papers, which I hope will be in the the Colonies can have in destroying that hands of hon. Members on Thursday or expectation, that hope, and that conFriday morning. The terms of the com-viction in the public mind, by putting missions will be included in those Papers; and if any further question or discussion should arise on them the Government will be prepared to meet it.

SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: I must say that there is not one single reason among those which the right hon. Gentleman has now stated for the course the Sir Michael Hicks-Beach

the reason for the course they have pursued on a totally different basis, I cannot understand. If the country has really to take his account of the matter, they would derive small satisfaction from it. It is because they thought that the alleged reasons were not true-that the true reasons were totally different—that

the course taken by the Government has | Ireland-that Irish tenants could put given satisfaction. Therefore, I do re- that labour, skill, and capital into the gret that the Secretary of State for the land upon which the flourishing state of Colonies should have thought it right to agriculture depended, so long as insegive such reasons. It may be all very curity of tenure hung over the head of well to set up this theory for their action, the tenant. The present system was a for the sake of Lord Chelmsford or Sir premium in favour of sloth and negliBartle Frere; but it is not from that gence, and an obstacle to diligence and point of view that the change is regarded the advance of every kind of prosperity. with satisfaction, but because the people Two hundred and ninety landlords owned believed that Sir Bartle Frere was pur- one-third of the Island, and 744 owned suing-honourably and conscientiously about half; and the question was, was no doubt-a policy which the Govern- the prosperity, or the chance of a liveliment did not desire, and which the hood, of 1,000,000 homesteads to depend country did not desire. That is the upon a small battalion of 750 persons, reason they are glad to see it placed in monopolizing half the land—750, with different hands; and to tell us that it is their sisters, and their cousins, and their merely a matter of concentration of aunts, in comparison with the entire power is unsatisfactory. I think it a population of Ireland? The Land Bill great pity, when the Government come of the right hon. Gentleman the Memforward to announce a determination of ber for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) was this character, that they should not have a monument of the good intentions of had all the Papers ready and delivered the right hon. Gentleman rather than of them to the House at the time. We see the capacity of English Parties to deal that continuous Cabinet meetings have with Irish questions. If Irish tenants been held, and I cannot see why they were to continue to be subject to the should not have had these important evils of capricious eviction, to the screwPapers ready to deliver. All I can add ing up of rents beyond the point of enis, that I hope the real reasons actuating durance, to confiscation of improvements the Government in making this change in the affairs at the Cape are not the reasons which they have alleged; because if they are, I believe they will have destroyed the whole satisfaction which the country has felt.

[The subject then dropped.]

if that was to continue much longer, Parliament would have to solve a greater problem than that which startled them a few years ago, when the whisper of liberty reached Ireland from the other Iside of the Atlantic. He should move an Amendment to the Motion for adjournment to the effect that the adjournment be only till June 2nd, instead of

AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION IN IRE- till June 9th. He did not know whether LAND.-OBSERVATIONS.

those who were devoted to Irish legislaMR. O'DONNELL said, he was tion would present such attractions to pleased with the frank but tardy con- English Members as to induce them to duct of the front Opposition Benches, in give up the enjoyments of the country at length acting upon the policy so long in order to take part in Irish discussince advocated by the seven Irish Home sions; but he was sure that the majority Rule Members. If the Government of the popular Irish Members would be could not, within the ordinary time quite prepared to take full advantage of available for Public Business, give an any extra time that might be given to opportunity for the discussion of urgent them for the consideration of Irish BusiIrish subjects, they should reduce the ness. If the English Members absented Whitsuntide Holidays in order to afford themselves, it would only be carrying the necessary time for that purpose. out the policy they generally pursued. Much of the time of the House had They usually absented themselves from been taken up by discussions provoked the discussion of Irish Business, and by the innumerable blunders of the Go-presented themselves only when it was vernment. He rose for the purpose of calling attention to the deplorable and unendurable condition of the landed interest in Ireland. It was impossible that agriculture could be developed in

necessary to vote down Irish demands. If during the extra week, which he proposed to give for the discussion of indispensable Irish Business, the English Members absented themselves from the

Divisions, as well as the discussions, he was not sure that it would not be hailed as a long-desired improvement. If the Government were not prepared to grant them the House next week, he hoped they would grant them time for the discussion of two or three of the most pressing Irish grievances which demanded a remedy. By attempting to postpone the redress of Irish grievances -particularly the unendurable evils of the Irish tenant system-they would not succeed in avoiding or evading the energetic prosecution of those questions by the Irish Representatives in Parliament. He concluded by moving his Amendment.

Secretary provided with a mission to South Africa, he might with his blandishments tempt Cetewayo over very soon to good terms of peace; but he had no such mission, and it was not too much to expect that even amid the clash of arms the right hon. Gentleman should be able to give a little of his attention to Ireland. The Chief Secretary had an able Colleague in the Irish Attorney General, who was officially free to take only an historic interest in these great wars, and who might find some time to bestow on the Irish Land Question. He was perfectly certain that the distress in Ireland had become so great as to render an attempt by Parliament to deal with the question imperative and unavoidable. They heard from farmers, priests, and peasants alike, that the crisis was imminent, urgent, even perilous. He was speaking the

Conservative side of the House, who assured him that he had never known a season so bad for many of the Irish tenants. He told him that he had

rents from the men who really could pay, and to be lenient with those who could not, and that the agent wrote back to say that none were able to pay, and that they were all sufferers alike. That was a condition of things representative of the Land Question in at least one or two counties in Ireland, and surely it was one which ought to attract attention from the House of Commons. One or two Motions had been introduced dur ing the Session which seemed to point to some promise. There was the debate on the Motion of the hon. Meniber for Reading (Mr. Shaw Lefevre) on the

MR. JUSTIN M CARTHY, in seconding the Amendment, said, he had not the slightest desire to interfere with the holidays of hon. Members; but he thought it would not be right that the House should separate for the Whitsun-other day with an Irish landlord on the tide Recess without some words being spoken as to the question which was most important to the Irish people. They had been occupied three hours in discussing the foreign policy of the Go-written to his agent only to press for vernment. Not a moment of that time was wasted. It was most properly given up to that great subject. He only regretted that it had not been possible to extract more clearly the genuine intentions of the Government with regard to South Africa. But that time having been occupied fairly, it was not too much to ask the House to give a few minutes' consideration to a question of the greatest importance to Ireland. Think of how little importance to Ireland, except for the loss it entailed in men and money, was this war with its doubtful glory! Let them, therefore, turn their attention to the Land Ques-"Bright Clauses" of the Land Act. tion in Ireland. He knew there was a theory that when war was going on the attention of the Government was absorbed in it, and that it was almost impossible to withdraw their attention to matters of domestic interest. But even if they accepted that ancient theory with regard to the great Leaders of the Government, it could not be held that the heads of the various Departments were equally absorbed. He could not imagine that the Chief Secretary for Ireland was passing anxious days and feverish nights turning over the maps of South Africa to find a policy for his Chief. He had very little doubt that were the Chief

Mr. O'Donnell

They had a flat denial of assistance from the Chief Secretary for Ireland, and then a liberal promise from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Now, the Irish Members would like to know before the House separated whether anything was going to be done-whether any efforts were to be made to improve the condition of the tenantry of Ireland; or whether the only contribution the Chief Secretary was about to offer was his piece of legislation for the regulation of dogs in Ireland? That Bill rather reminded him of an amusing passage in the pleasant story of Alice in Wonderland, where some one of the

mysterious personages found Alice that they intended to carry them out. weary, and tired, and gasping with Again, when a private Irish Member thirst, and said to her-"Oh, you poor had this Session presented a Bill to little girl, I know exactly what you secure fixity of tenure, it had been rewant-you want a dry biscuit." That ceived with but scant courtesy from the was the kind of contribution which the Government. How long did they think Chief Secretary had made to the settle- the Irish people would submit to have ment of the Irish Land Question. He their grievances postponed for the conappealed to the House not to go away venience of the Government? The for the Holidays until the Government patience of the Irish people was well had made some promise and given some nigh exhausted; and if Parliament did assurance with regard to the Irish Land not come forward within a reasonable Question. He hoped he would not be time with some measure of legislation met with the stereotyped excuse that calculated to relieve the depression of such an appeal was interfering with the the present state of agriculture in IreBusiness of the House. Nothing could land, scenes would arise in Ireland that be more legitimately or more urgently would be far more dangerous to the the Business of the House than that the rights of property and to the order and Government should give some assurance tranquillity which should prevail in that to the Irish peasantry which might send country than any that Ireland had been them a gleam of hope, and let them know afflicted with in her long struggle with even when Parliament was not sitting the ignorance, if not the incompetence, there, yet that some thought would be of the English Parliament. If these taken of their condition, and that some warnings were unheeded, and Parliaeffort was about to be made to improvement should plead for further delay, the their future.

Amendment proposed, to leave out "9th," in order to insert "2nd,"-(Mr. O'Donnell,)-instead thereof.

Question proposed, "That '9th' stand part of the Question.”

MR. O'CONNOR POWER supported the Amendment, and expressed a hope that some Member of the Government would answer the two able speeches that had just been delivered. When a majority of the Representatives of a nation came solemnly before the Legislature to make a proposal, it was their duty to urge the proposal in and out of season, at convenient and inconvenient times, and to select especially those occasions on which they were likely to attract the attention of the country. This was the position of the Irish Members in that House with regard to the Land Question. He complained that there had been a want of candour on the part of the Government in appointing a Committee on the subject of the Irish Land Laws the Session before last. After that Committee had been at the trouble of investigating the subject, and coming down to the House with distinct recommendations, the Government had taken no pains whatever to carry out those recommendations. They had even failed to give any satisfactory promise

consequences must be fixed on their own shoulders.

MR. SULLIVAN said, there could be no doubt that there was alarming distress amidst the agricultural interests not only of Ireland but of Great Britain, and was sure that when the case was fairly and reasonably presented to hon. Members they would feel that, however serious might be the state of matters in Afghanistan and South Africa, they ought to turn from those places to the interests of Great Britain and Ireland. An hypothetical advantage might be gained from this country making another sweep of territory in South Africa, a territory which they could not colonize, but precious land at their own door was at that moment being thrown upon the hands of landlords, because tenants were not able to cultivate it. He would neither express, nor join in expressing, any wholesale indictment against the landlords of Ireland. They fell, in his opinion, far short in many respects; but he had never failed to admit that in their errors and shortcomings they might be the creation and the creatures of circumstances, and that they possessed a great many excellent qualities which were not always remembered. When he looked at the English newspapers, what was the story which he read on every hand? It was a story of farms, untenanted and arable, to be let; but, at the same time,