he pressed for some definite information | Secretary of State for India would have upon the points he had named. them believe. It had been put to them by the hon. Gentleman that this improvement had been clear and undoubted; and he only said these few words by way of caution, and to express his opinion that there was really doubt whether any such improvement in the material condition of the people of India had taken place as was stated. This matter seemed to him to be one which should be carefully considered before they came to a hasty conclusion. MR. E. STANHOPE said, that he would give all the information that he had it in his power to do at present. But it was not in his power to give any definite idea of what the Commission to be appointed would do except that it would deal generally with the organization and expenditure of the Army in India. The telegram to which the hon. Member for Hackney had alluded, that the Commission would consist of the three Commanders - in - Chief, was not MR. ONSLOW would remind the Comtrue. The statement that the Home mittee that, a few years ago, evidence Government would limit the reduction was given by the Governors and Lieuin any way was also not true. The tenant Governors of India upon this Commission would enter into all ques- question of the material condition of tions connected with the organization of India. One and all of those officers the Army. There were, however, many stated it as their opinion that the maquestions affecting it which the Com-terial condition of the people of India mission in India could not properly have brought before it, and they would be reserved for inquiry in this country. So far as he was aware, all questions affecting the organization of the Army in India, which would properly fall within their cognizance, would be brought before that Commission. SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL observed, that it had been stated upon the evidence of two civilians, who had been 25 years in India, that a very great improvement had been effected in that country both in the administration and the material condition of the people. He considered that to say that the material condition of the people had been improved was begging the whole question. No doubt there had been very great changes effected in the face of the country in respect of railways and public works, and many other matters. As regarded the physical conditions, in many ways there had been very great improvement. But in respect to the material condition of the people, he must say that, having passed the greatest part of the last 35 years in India, he still considered it quite matter of doubt as to whether any improvement had taken place. They had seen it asserted that the people of India, so far from having been improved in their material condition, had been vastly impoverished. That statement he believed to be wholly exaggerated; but he thought there had not been anything like such a palpable and evident improvement in the material condition of the people as his hon. Friend the Under had vastly improved under our adminis- 3 M 2 He matter of the Army, and they ought to | last 10 years, they had been going on have an assurance that this Commission spending money upon works which made would not be a sham but a reality, and no return whatever; and they must that men would be appointed upon it fairly face the fact that they had made who thoroughly understood every phase an utterly unproductive expenditure, of the administration of India. He would and that the money spent had been lost like to say, however, a few words with just as much as if it had been bestowed regard to what had been stated as to the upon the ordinary Civil or Military explan to employ the Natives of India in penditure of the country. With regard the administration. That was a very to the Commission, if he might venture important subject; and he hoped that to express an opinion upon it, it was this before any plan was adopted it would be laid before that House, and they would be enabled to express an opinion upon it. It was a very serious thing to employ the Natives of India to a large extent in the administration, and, if done at all, it must be done in a very gradual manner. He therefore trusted that no step would be taken until the plan had been fully laid before that House. not MR. LAING wished to point out, with reference to the statement of the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India as to the expenditure upon the public works, that it had been laid down as a principle that some works were to be remunerative, and some were to be unproductive. He did not think that the Government had sufficiently realized the fact that they could never cut their Budget down so long as they spent money upon public works which were authorized by the condition of the Indian Revenues. Within the last eight or ten years there had been an expenditure of upwards of £20,000,000 sterling upon works which had been, so far, utterly unproductive. By the last official Returns, the revenues received from these so-called remunerative works had only amounted to the sum of £2,000 per annum. That was the amount of the receipts upon an outlay of £20,000,000; in other words, that expenditure had been utterly unproductive, and the receipts had been only sufficient to pay for the working expenses. It was not sufficient merely to call works productive with the vague hope that they would produce some revenue, and such a hope did not warrant them in making such an expenditure. It was not sufficient to say that the finances of India were in so flourishing a condition that they could go on spending money so long as they could borrow it in India. There ought not to be a single penny spent upon these works unless they had the assurance that they were going to get a return for their money. But, for the Mr. Onscow that they should put it in the power of the Commission to limit the expenditure of the Government of India to a certain point. It was no use telling the Commission to find an item here or there which might be cut down. They should be instructed that the Expenditure of the country was to be reduced to a certain limit. What they wanted was to cut their coat according to their cloth. It should be stated that they must reduce their Military expenditure below a certain figure in order to suit their finances; and the Commission should be instructed to prepare a scheme by which they might get the best Army in India for the money which they could afford to pay for it. He was sure that nothing could be done if the military authorities were merely directed to cut down an item here or there. MR. C. BECKETT-DENISON would not detain the Committee many moments; but there were one or two subjects upon which he should like to take that opportunity of making a few obervations. It would be in the recollection of the Committee that during the last few years, and upon almost every occasion on which the Indian accounts had been discussed, very great stress had been laid upon the importance of reducing the expenditure upon the unproductive public works of India. He held in his hand a melancholy record showing an expenditure of £6,500,000 upon barracks in India. He believed that there was a sort of idea that a very large portion of that expenditure had been unnecessarily laid out. There were one or two items which he would quote, which would illustrate very well the way in which money had been unnecessarily and uselessly spent. In the first place, there were some barracks at Allahabad which had cost £250 for each man accommodated. 150 miles due north of these barracks, in the same Province, there were some other barracks where the expenditure was £130 per man instead of £250. There must be some reason for this enormous disparity in the cost. There were other instances of the same sort of thing. There was a sanitorium built at a place in the Upper Himalayas for a regiment of troops which cost £130,000. The sum was large, but still it might be a proper expenditure; but they found that a road had been constructed to this sanitorium-a military road of 70 miles in length-of which the cost had been £237,000, or £3,000 a-mile. He asked whether that was an expenditure which was really wise under the present circumstances of India. He thought that the reason for it was that someone in a position of authority had been enabled to enforce his ideas in the Military Council of India, and, as a consequence, money had thus been recklessly spent. In his opinion, it was this enormous source of expenditure, going on from year to year utterly unchecked, which brought India into these financial difficulties which they all so much deplored. He did not believe, either with regard to the remunerative public works of India, or the unremunerative public works, that there was any reason whatever why they should not assume that there was a very large ground for economy. He was afraid that the Commission, of which they had heard that evening, would be one to inquire into the Military expenditure, and would not inquire into the expenditure upon military buildings. It was to be feared that the expenditure on these matters would be outside the reference made to the Commission; and, if so, he saw no reason why the expenditure should go on unchecked in the future as it had in the past. There was, in the present year, a new Estimate for £500,000 on account of Public Works. No doubt it was a small sum compared to other amounts that had been spent ; but it was considerable in its way. He did hope that the Commission which was to sit in India would not be deprived of the opportunity of inquiring into every branch of the Military expenditure. It had been stated before in that House that there were but two Departments in India in which it was absolutely necessary to practise economy, and those were the Public Works and the Army in all its branches. He would remind the Committee that the expenditure upon the non-effective Army Services in India were, at the pre That was sent time, £2,000,000 a year. a scale of charge for non-effective Services which was utterly without parallel in any Army in Europe. The reason for that expenditure was in the changes that took place when India passed under the Imperial Government, and enormous claims were made for compensation by officers who retired, or were seconded, or what not. The late Lord Sandhurst pointed out that the non-effective charges for the Army in India, which in his days scarcely come up to £1,000,000, would in a few years be doubled, and his words had been verified by the result. He hoped that this point, also, would not be lost sight of by the Commission, and that the attention of the House would be seriously given to every branch of the useless and unjustifiable expenditure now going on in India. MR. MARK STEWART said, that he had heard his hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for India state the very large amount of Revenue which was derived from the opium traffic in India. In calling the attention of the Committee to this branch of the Revenue, he did so because he considered it one of the most important sources of revenue in India, and if it failed, they would be in a far worse position than they were now. But there were undoubted signs that that revenue, which was always so fluctuating and precarious, might undergo very serious diminution. China was now growing large quantities of opium in opposition to the importation from India, and a very hostile spirit had been evinced both by the Chinese Government and people against the import of Indian opium. Therefore, either by the increased cultivation of opium in China, or by the entire prohibition of the import of Indian opium into China-in both those two ways the revenue might be seriously diminished. Considering that this was the second largest source of revenue they had in India, it was but right that the country should know all the facts in discussing this question. Yet, he had observed that in almost every speech made upon this subject, there had either been no notice taken of this precarious revenue, or it had been treated slightingly as of no great moment. Having made these few observations, he would not trouble the Committee at any further length upon the subject at that time. [Third N 1803 Common Law Procedure and [COMMONS Resolved, That it appears by the Accounts laid before this House that the Ordinary Revenue of India for the year ending the 31st day of March 1878 was £51,795,866; the Revenue from Productive Public Works, including the Resolution to be reported upon day next. Mon EAST INDIA LOAN (£5,000,000) BILL. (Mr. Raikes, Mr. Edward Stanhope, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.) [BILL 197.] SECOND READING. Order for Second Reading read. Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time." (Mr. Edward Stanhope.) SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL hoped that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer would allow the debate upon this Bill to be adjourned. He begged to move that the debate be now adjourned. Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned." -(Sir George Campbell.) THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER trusted that the House would now pass the second reading of this Bill. There were various questions raised, no doubt, by the Amendments put down; but there would be plenty of opportunities when a full discussion could take place. He would remind the House of the late period of the Session at which they had now arrived, and how absolutely necessary it was to press on Bills. SIR DAVID WEDDERBURN said, he was willing to adjourn the consideration of the Amendment of which he had given Notice. MR. ONSLOW thought they had had a very fair discussion on Indian finances -a discussion which had lasted over three nights. The Mction of his hon. Judicature Acts, &c., Bill. 1804 Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy (Sir George Campbell) went into the subject of Indian Revenue in considerable detail, and he hoped that he would now allow the Government to proceed with this stage of the Bill. MR. FAWCETT remarked, that the £5,000,000 Bill had, to a certain extent, been the subject of discussion during the three nights' debate that they had had upon the Indian Budget. There might be one or two important questions raised affecting English and Indian finances in relation to the £2,000,000 Bill, and he wished to raise a distinct issue upon that. Very great demands were made at that period of the Session upon the time of private Members, and he thought that it would be fair for the Government not to press the second reading of the £2,000,000 Bill at that time. MR. E. STANHOPE would not take Bill then; but he hoped that the second the second reading of the £2,000,000 reading of the Bill now under consideration would be passed. SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL said, he would withdraw his Amendment, on the understanding that an opportunity for discussing the Bill was allowed at the next stage. Motion, by leave, withdrawn. Main Question put, and agreed to. Bill read a second time, and committed for Monday next. COMMON LAW PROCEDURE AND JUDI CATURE ACTS AMENDMENT BILL. (Mr. Waddy, Mr. Wheelhouse, Mr. Ridley,) COMMITTEE. [BILL 181.] Bill considered in Committee. (In the Committee.) MR. CALLAN objected to the Bill being taken at that late hour. There were serious objections to the Bill which would need full discussion, and he begged to notice that 40 Members were not present. Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; Committee counted, and 40 Members not being present, Mr. Speaker resumed the Chair:— House counted, and 40 Members not being present, House adjourned at a quarter after One o'clock. 1805 General National Fund Relief {JUNE 13, 1879] of Families of Soldiers), &c. 1806 HOUSE OF LORDS, Friday, 13th June, 1879. ment will be made to the family of the late Mr. W. Froude, F.R.S., of his great and gratuitous services to the Navy in investigating and determining the proper form of ships and propellers; and, whether arrangements will be made for carrying on the laboratory in which Mr. Froude conducted his investigations? MR. E. J. REED (for Mr. B. SAMUELMINUTES.]-PUBLIC BILLS-First Reading-SON) asked the First Lord of the AdInclosure Provisional Order (Matterdale Com-miralty, Whether a suitable acknowledgmon) (107); Inclosure Provisional Order (East Stainmore Common)* (108); Inclosure Provisional Order (Redmoor and Golberdon Commons)* (109); Local Government (Ireland) Provisional Orders (Killarney, &c.) (110); Local Government (Highways) Provisional Orders (Dorset, &c.) * (111); Local Government (Highways) Provisional Orders (Gloucester and Hereford) * (112); Local Government Provisional Orders (Aspull, &c.) (113); Local Government Provisional Orders (Castleton by Rochdale, &c.) * (114); Metropolis (Whitechapel and Limehouse) Improvement Scheme Amendment* (115). Second Reading Costs Taxation (House of Commons)* (99). MR. W. H. SMITH, in reply, said, he had written to the hon. Gentleman who had given Notice of the Question asking him to postpone it. He could only say, at the present moment, that he cordially reciprocated the expression of acknowledgment due to Mr. Froude for the great and eminent services he had rendered. GENERAL NATIONAL FUND FOR RE- GENERAL SHUTE asked the Secretary of State for War, Whether he will consider the desirability of a permanent general national fund being established for the relief of widows and orphans of soldiers, sailors, and marines who die in consequence of wounds and injuries received in the Services, and for increasing, under certain circumstances, the pensions awarded to men on dis charge; and, whether the Government. would recommend Her Majesty to issue a fresh Commission to the Commissioners' Patriotic Fund for the purpose of administering to a fund, such as above proposed, to take the place of those. special funds to meet cases calling for unusual sympathy? COLONEL STANLEY: Sir, in answer to the first part of the Question, I have to say that I have frequently considered whether it would be possible to establish a general national fund for the purpose named by the hon. and gallant Member; but I have never seen my way to take any practical steps in that direction without the fear of interfering prejudicially with charitable institutions which are doing their work well. With regard to the second part of the Ques |