in India, in the Colonies, and in every should be divided so as really to make part of the English-speaking world. it advantageous to the breeding of It was a source of demoralization not horses; but they had not yet been told only to young men, but to young women. what was the proper appropriation of It was a farce that they should make this Vote, or whether the system was laws against lotteries, and yet permit under revision. For his part, he would great sweepstakes on races. This was rather make the Vote larger in a year, a subject upon which he had had some and properly appropriate it, in order to experience, for, when in India, he had encourage the breeding of horses, into put down the sweepstake lotteries. stead of applying it, as at present, in a These things had grown into an enor- disadvantageous manner. mous abuse, and, in spite of great unpopularity, he had exerted his authority to put them down. In his opinion, the giving of these Plates encouraged gambling of this kind, and it was inconsistent that Parliament should support them while it condemned lotteries. MR. J. LOWTHER had no wish to take exception to hon. Members for Scotland taking part in a debate upon a question which related entirely to Ireland; for he had always maintained that every hon. Member had an absolute right to discuss every matter brought before the House of Commons without any reference to what particular part of the United Kingdom he might happen to represent. At the same time, he thought that considering the Representatives of Scotland had already challenged the principle of the Vote for Queen's Plates in connection with that part of the United Kingdom which they themselves represented, it was rather a strong course for Scotch Members to raise that identical question again in the case of the Queen's Plates for Ireland. That seemed to him to be rather infringing the salutary Rule which forbade discussion of the same question twice over. He would not weary the Committee by going over again the arguments in favour of the retention of those Plates; for he thought that it had been sufficiently shown that the voice of the Irish Representatives was entirely in their favour. For these reasons, he hoped that the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. E. Jenkins), who, he believed, was himself an advocate of the principle of Home Rule, would not persist in going to a Divi sion. MR.WHITWELL observed, that these Queen's Plates had been under discussion on many previous occasions, and he should like the Chief Secretary for Ireland to give some information with regard to them. A promise had been given on several occasions that the grant MR. J. LOWTHER observed, that the question of the distribution of these Plates was under consideration. In one instance, it having been represented that a meeting was not of a character to justify giving a Plate to it, the Plate was transferred to another meeting. The instance to which he referred was that of Londonderry, where the races were certainly not in a very flourishing condition; the Plate was transferred from there to the City of Galway, where a rising meeting was established; and it was thought that good results would be produced by giving the Plate to it. He said this to show that the money was not appropriated in any obsolete lines; and how it could be further distributed in order to encourage the breeding of horses would from time to time be considered. MR. E. JENKINS said, he would not have risen again, if it had not been that the Chief Secretary for Ireland had charged him with inconsistency_in moving the reduction of the Vote. The right hon. Gentleman had referred to him as a Home Ruler; but he denied that he belonged to that Party. He wished to point out that the sum of £218 had been allowed to Scotland in respect of these Plates; whereas it was intended to give £1,562 to Ireland, and he, therefore, thought that the Scotch Members had some right to protest against this attempt to win Ireland, or, practically, to bribe it, by giving it this sum. The Chief Secretary for Ireland had said that in pure and moral Londonderry the races were not successful, and that, in consequence of it, the Government were obliged to go to the wilds of Galway to carry out one of these amazing meetings. MR O'SHAUGHNESSY did not think that the Chief Secretary for Ireland was very much to blame for speaking of the hon Member for Dundee as a Home Ruler, for he did make some of races mainly depended for their continuance upon the Queen's Plates. A very little money was given to the country for this purpose-about £1,500 his Irish constituents believe that he was in favour of it. He rose, however, for the purpose of protesting against one expression of the hon. Membernamely, that in which he described these and the hon. Member was quite right meetings as resorts for scoundrelism. He thought that was an undue, and that he would be right in saying a very improper, expression. The Irish peasantry went to races, and behaved themselves in the most decent manner, and like Christians, and no complaint could be made against them. They freely entered into the sport, and took great pleasure in the amusement. The hon. Gentleman evidently took his idea of race-meetings from some which were held near Glasgow, or, perhaps, some of the London races. He did not suppose that he had had a large experience in those matters; but when he came down to the Committee, and described those meetings as resorts for scoundrelism, he thought it would be wise to make himself better informed first. MAJOR NOLAN did not think that the epithet applied to Galway by the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. E. Jenkins) was entirely justified, although he was sorry to say that the county was very much poorer in some parts than in others. The hon. Member, however well he might speak upon political questions within his knowledge, was extremely ignorant on many facts connected with Ireland. Speaking about these races in Ireland, he had alleged that a good deal of gambling took place there. No doubt, a certain amount of gambling took place in Ireland; but the extraordinary part was that it was only in connection with English races. Almost the same number of people betted in Dublin and Ireland as did so in London and Glasgow; but this betting took place on the English races, and was in no way affected by the Queen's Plates. In connection with the effect of, the Queen's Plates upon the breeding of horses, he might say that a gentleman who knew a good deal about these matters had recently told him that horses were very often bred in Ireland and sent out of the country for racing purposes, and then returned again for breeding; and, were there no races in Ireland, gentlemen would not keep their horses there. Thus it was that the races held tended to keep up a proper stock of horses in Ireland, and those Mr. O'Shaughnessy in saying that only £200 was spent in SIR PATRICK O'BRIEN observed, that the question of the distribution of the Queen's Plates in Ireland had been raised in that House on several previous occasions. At the present time very small sums were raced for, and he did not think that the management of the grant for Queen's Plates was conducted in the best manner. It seemed to him that if the sum of £1,500 was divided and allocated to the four Provinces, to be raced for in alternate years, while they would increase the amusement of the people, the stakes might be made so considerable as to encourage improvement in the breed of horses. At the present moment, such small sums as £100 were not a sufficiently strong consideration to induce a man to breed horses for a particular race; whereas, if the money were divided in the way he had suggested, and the races run alternately in the four Provinces, he believed an inducement would be held out to the breeders of horses. SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL said, that, before the Vote was agreed to, he wished to refer to two officers in the Household of the Lord Lieutenant of whom no mention had been made that evening he meant the two " gentlemen at large." There was evidently great extravagance in connection with maintenance of the Vice-regal establishment in Ireland, arising especially from the number of officers who were attached to the personal Staff of the Viceroy, including, as they did, a private secretary, several aides-decamp, a steward of the household, a gentleman in waiting, a master of the horse, a gentleman usher, a chamberlain, besides the two gentlemen at large." Now, Her Majesty had a great Viceroy in another part of Her Dominions, and he had some knowledge of the establishments which were kept up by him. In the case of the Viceroyalty in India, with which he was acquainted, the Representative of the Sovereign had a far more important charge committed to him than the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; but the former, nevertheless, had only one private secretary, one military secretary-who had separate functions to perform-and three or four aidesde-camp. He could see no good reason, therefore, why, in addition to the various other officers which he had mentioned, the Lord Lieutenant should be furnished with two "gentlemen at large;" and he should, therefore, move the reduction of the Vote by the sum of £258-the amount of their salaries. the Lord Lieutenant at Dublin Castle. It appeared that on the Staff of the Viceroy of India there were only eight aides-de-camp, while there were 11 on that of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. He saw no good reason why that large number should be maintained on the Irish establishment; and he felt perfectly satisfied that if the Lord Lieutenant himself were consulted in the matter, he would say that eight aides-de-camp would be sufficient for all the purposes for which such officers were required. To have a greater number was to waste the public money, and to withdraw officers unnecessarily from the discharge of their regimental duties, to the disadvantage of the Service; for it was a complete mistake that the regiments of the Army were now over-officered. The real state of the case was the very reverse. The number of officers were far too few, and he feared that such appointments as those of which he was speaking were kept up mainly in order that the authorities at the Horse Guards might have a large amount of patronage at their disposal. THE CHAIRMAN pointed out that he could not put the Amendment of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, as there was a Motion for the reduction of the Vote already before the Committee. MR. J. LOWTHER said, that, as a matter of fact, the salaries of only four aides-de-camp instead of 11, as the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Leitrim (Major O'Beirne) seemed to suppose, were defrayed out of the Estimates. It was all very well, he might add, to criticize the number of officers on the Staff of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, as the Member for Kircaldy (Sir George Campbell) had done; but the real question was whether it was or was not expedient to maintain the Office of Viceroy in that country? answer was in the affirmative, it was absolutely necessary that the Viceregal Court should be kept up with becoming state. He did not believe that the people of Ireland wished to see the Office of Lord Lieutenant abolished, nor did he think they would like to see its dignity impaired. If the MR. MITCHELL HENRY said, it was quite clear that some hon. Members who objected to the expenditure on the establishment of the Lord Lietenant of Ireland were opposed to the con tinuance of the Vice-regal Office itself. | part, he should certainly vote against Now, the question of abolishing or re- the proposed reduction. taining the Office was one which had been frequently raised; and, no doubt, people entertained different opinions. upon it, both in this country and in Ireland. His own belief was, however, that the great majority of the Irish people were decidedly in favour of continuing the Office, and upon this ground among others-that, so long as it continued to exist, it furnished tangible and distinct evidence of the differences by which the two countries were separated. He should, indeed, regard the abolition of the Office as a great disaster for Ireland, and it seemed to him a most extraordinary thing that any hon. Member should object to the small sum of £285 for the salaries of two officers whose services were required to keep up the dignity of the Representative of the Sovereign. The two "gentlemen at large" were, he thought, very cheap at the price, seeing that they had to be constantly at the beck and call of the Lord Lieutenant. Those who opposed the Vote that evening appeared to him to forget that the functions of the Irish Viceroy were very different from those which the Governor General of India had to discharge. One of the most important duties of the Lord Lieutenant, with the two "gentlemen at large" and his aides-de-camp, was to keep up to a proper standard the social amenities of the Irish capital, and to see that young ladies attending the balls at Dublin Castle were duly provided with partners. Now, in India, although it might be deemed desirable that the Viceroy should do everything in his power to influence favourably to us the male portion of the population, he did not believe there was much hope that we could produce an impression on the female portion of it, or that we should gain much by doing so. Everyone, moreover, was aware that, great as was the influence of the ladies in England, it was doubly great in Ireland; and it was, therefore, in his opinion, most desirable that the most eligible men should be selected by the Lord Lieutenant to fulfil those functions, which, hitherto, whether under Whig or Tory Governments, had been performed with much credit to themselves and satisfaction to the country, by those officers whose salaries it was now sought to cut off. For his own Mr. Mitchell Henry Question put, and negatived. Original Question again proposed. MAJOR O'BEIRNE said, he would now move the reduction of the Vote by the sum of £328, the salaries of two aides-de-camp to the Lord Lieutenant. He urged in support of the reduction the trifling nature of the duties, such as occasionally attending the Vice-regal receptions for an hour or two, which those officers had to perform. Their position was very different from that of aides-decamp in India, who had very arduous duties imposed upon them. But the great objection, in his opinion, to the employment of so many officers as aides-de-camp in Ireland was that they were, in consequence, withdrawn from their regiments, which, as he had already stated, were, as matters now stood, under-officered. Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £5,524, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1880, for the Salaries of the Officers and Attendants of the House hold of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and other Expenses.”—(Major O' Beirne.) SIR JOSEPH M'KENNA opposed the reduction of the Vote, and expressed a hope that hon. Members would refrain from nibbling, as they had been doing that evening, at the establishment of the Lord Lieutenant. He could not help thinking that it was scarcely worthy of his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Leitrim (Major O'Beirne) to take the mode which he had just done of endeavouring to prove how much better he understood the matter of Staff appointments than the authorities at the Horse Guards, though, perhaps, he did. He hoped, however, he would abstain from nibbling any further at the small Vote under the consideration of the Committee. MR. STACPOOLE was one of those who regretted exceedingly that the Office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland was not abolished, and that one of the Royal Princes did not take up his residence in Ireland instead. But, so long as the Viceroyalty was maintained, he did not see how the services of such officers as those whose salaries it was now sought to strike out of the Estimates could properly be dispensed with. As to the argument that officers were kept away from their regiments by being appointed aides-de-camp, and that the Army consequently suffered, he could only say that it was an argument which was equally applicable to the case of a general officer who had an aide-de-camp. It seemed to him, he must confess, to be scarcely worthy of Irish Members especially to quibble about so paltry an item in a Vote which was itself very small. MR. O'CONNOR POWER said, notwithstanding what had fallen from the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down (Mr. Stacpoole), he felt more disposed to be influenced by the arguments of his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Leitrim (Major O'Beirne) than by those which he had urged. The hon. Member for Youghal (Sir Joseph M Kenna), he might add, deprecated what he termed nibbling at the Vote; but if some hon. Member did not commence in that way, Votes would never be reduced at all. If hon. Members were dissatisfied with the very small reduction now proposed, it would be easy to meet that objection by moving a larger reduction. If they were not disposed to cut off a shilling, there was no reason why their wishes should not be consulted by asking the Committee to reduce the Vote by hundreds or thousands. He entirely deprecated, however, the attempt to silence those who desired to criticize the Vote, by the allegation that they were merely nibbling at the establishment of the Lord Lieutenant in Ireland. His own opinion was that it was an establishment which required to be nibbled at very much; and if a Member of that House wished to do his duty, he must not rest content with cutting it only down, but must direct his attention to other Royal and semi-Royal establishments with a similar object-for there were very many of them in whose case it would be well to have the expenditure very much diminished. He hoped, therefore, the hon. and gallant Member for Leitrim (Major O'Beirne) would press his Amendments to a Division. It was, he contended, perfectly absurd that the public money should be frittered away in order to enable certain young gentle man in Dublin to make love to the ladies, as if Irish gentlemen could not and would not make themselves amiable to the fair sex without any such adventitious advantages. MR. BRUEN happened to know. several gentlemen who occupied the position of aide-de-camp in Ireland, and could bear testimony to the fact that some of them were officers of Militia regiments, who had during a great part of the year no regimental duties to perform. It could not fairly be argued, therefore, that their regiments suffered from their attendance at the Vice-regal Court. MR. MITCHELL HENRY thought the argument of the hon. Member for Mayo (Mr. O'Connor Power) was scarcely a logical one. He seemed to assume that Irish Members wanted to reduce the Vote; but he (Mr. Mitchell Henry), at all events, must beg to enter a most distinct protest against any such reduction. In his opinion, the Office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, as long as it was kept up at all, should be maintained with proper state, because the person who occupied it was the Representative of the Sovereign. He had no wish, therefore, even to nibble at the establishment in question. He believed that the longer we could uphold our Constitution under a Crowned Head, the better would it be for all parts of the United Kingdom. He had no sympathy whatever with Republicanism in any shape or form; and he did not, therefore, agree with his hon. Friend in the expediency of commencing the nibbling process which he appeared to approve. He declined to nibble at the Vote, because he desired to see it passed to the full amount. Entertaining those views, he could not go into the Lobby with his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Leitrim (Major O'Beirne), who, he might observe, did not seem to be very well informed on the subject; for he evidently was ignorant of the fact that many of the officers attached to the Staff of the Lord Lieutenant did not belong to the regular Army at all, but to the Militia. That being so, their services could not be lost to the Army, as he would lead the Committee to suppose. MR. STACPOOLE pointed out that out of the 11 or 12 aides-de-camp in Ireland only 4 were paid, and that their pay amounted to only 10s. 6d. a-day |