dustry did not want any protection, and there was no instance where protection had been withdrawn from any article in which either producers or consumers had suffered injury. In the present case, the agricultural labourers could not suffer; their condition could not be worse than it now was. To the good and practical tenant-farmer competition would prove only a healthy stimulus. But suppose 100,000 human beings in this country were cursed with an abundant supply of food, what then? There must be a reduction of rents till some means were found of meeting foreign competition; so that this question was a landlords' question, and nothing else. But, in his opinion, the apprehensions entertained from this measure were hypothetical and groundless. The farmers thought so too; for improvements had not stopped; farms were not thrown up, but were taken at higher rents, and land still fetched a good price. The noble Earl then pointed out the fallacies of many of the notions of the Protectionists, and the error, as well as the vices, of a system now repudiated by all the great statesmen of this country. As to meeting hostile tariffs by hostile tariffs, his conviction was that all future negotiation for commercial treaties must fail, because they would be always defeated by the mutual jealousies of the parties. The only safe course was for each country to pursue that policy which was suited to its own interests, without regarding what was done by other nations. The noble lord showed that in spite of hostile tariffs our commerce had increased even with countries the most hostile to our manufactures. The system by which human intercourse

had been obstructed was fast crumbling away, and those principles were beginning to be recog nised which placed upon a solid foundation the continuance of the inestimable blessing of peace. He urged their lordships to pass a measure that would remove a constant and fertile source of discontent, and benefit all classes, founded as it was upon a great and comprehensive view of the varying circumstances and complicated interests of this great country.

The Earl of Carnarvon opposed the Bill, insisting on the absence of any necessity for the repeal of the existing law, and disputing the doctrine of Lord Clarendon that British industry needed no protection in its competition with that of foreign nations. He contended that the wages of the agricultural labourer would be forced down by this measure to the very lowest level, and that the poor farmer— the occupier with little capitalwould be ruined. The noble earl then went over the grounds so often traversed,-the treatment of the Protectionist party by the Government; the incongruity of the arguments of the Premier with those he had once so pertinaciously maintained; the tendency of the proposed measure to derange prices, to inundate the country with foreign corn in cheap years, and to make it dependent in deficient seasons upon unfriendly nations. His lordship wound up his speech by a pointed animadversion upon the conduct of the Ministers, and the change of opinions in the other House. The public connected character with consistency, and the conduct of the Government had given a severe blow to the public morals of this country. If ever there was a Government pledged

to the principle of protection, it was that of the Duke of Wellington; and when it discovered its mistake it should not have taken advantage of its own wrong, but should have appealed to the constituency. With the view of procuring such an appeal he voted against this Bill. If the country should feel that the cry for justice and a dispassionate consideration was not heard in this House, and that patriotism was swallowed up in party attachment, he should agree with the gentlemen of the League that the House had lost its purpose of public utility.

The Earl of Malmesbury also opposed the Bill, which he said, if passed, would be passed either because their lordships placed unbounded confidence in the Ministers of the Crown, or because it was sincerely and loudly demanded by the people. The noble earl asserted the injurious effects of the reduction of duty upon foreign barilla in the kelp trade of the Hebrides, and denied that the present protection to native products operated as a burden. He put it to the right reverend prelates, who were the guardians of the temporal goods of the Church, and whose interests were different upon this question from those of their parochial clergy -some of whom had fixed incomes -that the clergy would be paid not according to the old but to the new and reduced prices of grain. The verdict of the people had been passed upon this measure at the election of 1841, and their rejection of the candidates, who had recently appealed to their suffrages in its favour, had confirmed that verdict.

The Earl of Haddington acknowledged that never, either in this or the other House of Par

liament, had he presented himself with more unfeigned reluctance or greater pain, not from any doubt or hesitation as to the conduct he had pursued or was pursuing, but from finding himself opposed to those with whom for many years it had been his pride to act. He agreed with the Earl of Carnarvon that, as a general principle, public character was connected with consistency of conduct; but, upon questions involving no religious or moral principle, he was not ashamed to avow a change of opinion. But he had never given vent in Parliament to any opinion that the agriculture of this country depended upon protection; he had thought that the landed interest would not have been injured if the Corn Law had been done away with, but for the panic which would have attended the change. The noble earl then explained the course he had recently pursued when this subject was broached in the Cabinet, and the circumstances under which this measure had been adopted by the Government; and then applied himself to answer some of the arguments of Lord Stanley, whose speech, eloquent as it was, glowed with Conservatism. Although he believed that the principle of free trade was growing in favour with the country, yet he did not think the Government should have assumed the responsibility of appealing to the country.

He declined entering into the details of the measure, which had been most ably done by Lord Clarendon, who had dealt more generously with the Government than Lord Normanby. The Bill would, in his opinion, ensure more steady prices than the present law, and the apprehensions respecting an exorbitant

foreign supply at one time, and a parsimonious one at another, were at variance with past experience. After passing lightly over the other topics which arose out of the question, the noble earl declared he should witness with great alarm the throwing out of this Bill, because he was persuaded that a new Parliament would bring an overwhelming majority in favour of free trade, and their lordships would lose the opportunity of a graceful concession to public feeling.

The Earl of Hardwicke addressed the House against the Bill. He considered the party with whom he acted were protecting the poor against the overbearing influence of the manufacturers; and he quoted an American newspaper to show that the principle of protection was considered in that country as essentially democratical, and its abolition would inflict injury upon the lower classes. The noble earl pointed out how much, under a protective system, the country had prospered in agriculture, commerce, shipping, and revenue, which, notwithstanding a reduction of taxation, had kept pace with the national expenditure, whilst the people had had cheaper bread than they would have had under free trade. In replying to the speech of Lord Brougham, his lordship charged that noble and learned lord with having advocated the sliding-scale, to which he declared last night he had always been opposed, and referred to a speech he had made, in 1827, in favour of the scale, which, owing to the enormous number of speeches he had made during his life, he had very excusably forgotten. They (the Protectionists)

were said to be jealous of their rents, and they were very properly so, for a great political economist had said that the consequence of a reduction of rents one-fourth would be disastrous to all the productive classes of the kingdom. The noble lord concluded by urging upon their lordships that it was their imperative duty, from a regard to the poorer classes of this country as well as to their own honour, to let this great question go to the people of England.

Earl Grey addressed the House in support of the measure in a long and able speech. After paying a high compliment to Lord Stanley's speech, he observed that the real aim of all Corn Laws was to secure what was called a remunerating price for corn-in other words, to raise the price of food to the people by artificially restricting the supply. Such being, as he conceived, the real object, it was incumbent on the opponents of this Bill to prove that that object was a good and desirable one. This, however, the noble lords on the other side had evaded to do. The principal argument which they had put forward was that of the danger of being dependent upon foreign nations for subsistence. This theory had been satisfactorily disposed of by Lord Brougham, who had shown that, during the height of our struggle with France, Napoleon was unable to exclude the corn of the Continent from our ports. Lord Brougham had also shown that the existing Corn Laws could not be considered as laying on the consumer a tax of less than 10,000,000 a year, which was double the amount of the Income Tax and double the Malt Tax. This tax was one not for the benefit of the State, but for the benefit

the imaginary benefit-of a class. Lord Grey proceeded to show from the instances of the years 1833, 1834, 1835, as contrasted with 1839, 1840, 1841, that in the former period, when wheat was low in price, trade prospered, wages were high, and the condition of the working classes was favourable; while in the latter period, concurrently with high prices, trade declined, wages sunk, and numbers of the working population were out of employ. A noble lord had referred to Poland as affording an example of cheap corn with low wages. But in Poland wages were kept down by misgovernment, by restrictions on industry, and by a system of qualified slavery. In his (Lord Grey's) view Corn Laws inflicted a double disadvantage on the labourer; while they enhanced the price of food, they depressed the rate of wages. If this supposition were true, no consideration ought to restrain them as a Christian Legislature from sweeping away these restrictions. He referred to the rise which had taken place in rent, and to the spirit with which improvements were prosecuted, as a proof that the agriculturists as a class entertained no real fears on the subject. He instanced also the cases of wool, of live stock, of flax and rape-seed, the reduction of duties on which had called forth so much alarm, to show the futility of similar apprehensions as regarded corn. He expected that under the proposed Bill the price of wheat would be lower, but not greatly lower than the average of the last dozen years, while the fluctuations would be reduced within narrow limits. He had no fear of land being thrown out of cultivation, and he believed that

no country would derive so much advantage from the change as Ireland. Lord Stanley had depicted the injurious effects which would arise to the Colonies from free trade; but, so far from agreeing with that opinion, he (Lord Grey) believed that it would prove the surest method of binding our Colonies to us. The colonial po

licy, which he deemed the wisest, was that of maintaining the mutual dependence of the Colonies and the mother country. It was commercial jealousy which had lost us our settlements in North America. Against Lord Stanley's predictions of ruin to the interests of Canada, he cited the report of a debate in the Canadian House of Assembly, where the language of the principal speakers was in favour of free trade, and where they had carried the repeal of the before-existing duty on American corn by a majority of 45 to 27. After stating his reasons for believing that a fixed duty, although he had deemed it a desirable measure in 1842, would now be impracticable, Earl Grey adverted to the Anti-CornLaw League, the existence of which he fully admitted to be a great evil, at the same time disclaiming the intention of throwing any blame upon the leaders of that body, especially upon Mr. Cobden, on whose conduct and mode of carrying on his opposition to the Corn Laws he pronounced a high eulogium. His great objection to the Bill was that it retained "the rag of protection" for a term of years, which might occasion the continuance of the League, whose power might be turned to other and more dangerous purposes. Adverting to Lord Stanley's description of the proper duty of the House of Peers as a check

upon hasty and ill-considered legislation, Earl Grey took a rapid glance at the progress which freetrade opinions had made in the country since the time of Adam Smith, and proceeded to notice its effect on Parliament itself. During the last few years, though there was a nominal majority against it, no man who had looked at the proceedings of the other House of Parliament could have failed to find symptoms of the rapid approach of the period at which the principle would be fully adopted. Its opponents spoke in such terms that they evidently considered themselves beaten, and that this result could not be much longer delayed; till at last they saw Her Majesty's Ministers, who had so long been the ablest advocates of protection, coming forward and manfully avowing a complete change of opinion. They made that avowal, and he gave them full credit for making it with perfect sincerity and honesty; in fact, he knew of no reason why it should be otherwise; and when he found those supporting it, who, under other circumstances, would be the most forward to resist such a measure as the present, he derived from that circumstance the strongest possible reasons in favour of the course, which he had no doubt that the House of Lords would pursue when they came to vote upon this most important question. It was well known that the Ministers of the Crown did hold views respecting the Corn Laws in the years 1839 and 1841, which were not in accordance with those opinions under the influence of which the present measure was brought under the notice of Parliament; but no man in his senses could doubt that that expression of

opinion which they now heard from the responsible advisers of the Sovereign was perfectly sincere. Every one knew that in adopting the opinions which they now put forward they were making a great sacrifice, and doing that which afforded the strongest possible proof of the necessity which existed for passing the measure.

Lord Ashburton opposed the Bill, remarking on the singular coincidence that the Earl of Ripon, who proposed the present Bill, should be the same individual who brought a Bill into the House of Commons many years back, intending to fix the price of wheat at the high price of 80s. He brought in the first corn Bill of the present series, and now he moved the last. Had the ports been opened last autumn, Lord Ashburton did not see that there would have been any difficulty in closing them again. A similar occurrence took place in the time of Mr. Huskisson. In 1825, when corn reached 72s. a quarter, that able Minister let in the bonded corn at a duty of 10s. At that time there were 400,000 quarters in bond; and Mr. Huskisson let in that quantity in three parts, at intervals of three months, and thus prevented the approaching distress. How different from this cautious policy were the measures of the present Government! To show the probable extent of the competition likely to arise under free trade in corn, Lord Ashburton referred to the evidence given by Mr. Bamfield before a Committee of the Lords, and remarked that at once as much as 6,000,000 quarters might come in, or nearly one-third of a whole year's consumption. Under such circumstances it would be impossible to tell how low the price of corn might fall. The