REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE- RETURNS MOVED FOR. with any accuracy of the number of houses below £10 in the year 1835 within their boundaries. The Government had ordered Returns bearing on the electoral question which had been in preparation since November last, and those papers would show, he thought, everything which could be presumed to appertain to the subject. If, however, the noble Lord should think those Returns, when produced, insufficient, he could move for additional Returns. But he thought it would be useless to order a Return that could not be produced. There were 1,600 parishes in boroughs sending Members to Parliament; and to ask them what was the rating of every house thirty years ago would be a useless attempt. He could not, therefore, consent to the Returns asked for. LORD STRATHEDEN said, that after the explanation of the noble Earl, he would withdraw his Motion. LORD STRATHEDEN, in moving for certain Returns relating to the number of Voters and £10 houses in England and Wales, said, that a general impression existed that the proportion of electors to the population had of late years declined. He had no doubt that vague assertions to this effect had been made to their Lordships; but as far as he was aware there was no evidence to prove the truth of such statements. If he was not mistaken it was shown during the inquiry made upon the subject in 1860 that in some constituencies the percentage of electors to the population was much larger than at the time of the Reform Act. On another point much doubt prevailed as to whether the proportion of houses above compared with those below a £10 rental. Some Motion (by Leave of the House) withpersons believed that the proportion of the £10 houses was increasing in boroughs, whereas others were of opinion that, owing to the destruction of low-class houses for THE CATTLE DISEASE IN SCOTLAND. railways and other purposes, the proportion was diminishing. In order to clear up the THE EARL OF AIRLIE, in rising to matter, he now begged to move for Remove for a copy of a Memorial to the turns showing the proportion of voters to population in the general election of 1835 Privy Council from the Proprietors and and in the general election of 1865, and Tenant Farmers of Kincardineshire, prayshowing the proportion of houses at and Act of 29 Vict. c. 2, Clause 15, which reing for the suspension of that part of the above the value of £10 and the houses belates to the slaughter of cattle, and for a neath the value of £10 in boroughs of England and Wales during 1835 and 1865. The noble Lord then moved "That there be laid on the Table of this House Return showing the Proportion of Voters to Population in General Election of 1835 and in General Election of 1865: And also, "Return showing the Proportion of Houses at and above the Value of £10 to Houses beneath the Value of £10 in Boroughs of England and Wales during 1835 and during 1865." EARL RUSSELL said, he was afraid that the Returns, if agreed to by the House, would not furnish the information the noble Lord desired. In the first place, there were no Returns of the population for 1835. There were certain Returns for 1865 which would before long be laid on the tables of both Houses; but as to the other Return, the only Office from which it could be obtained was the Poor Law Board; but he had inquired there and had been informed that it would be quite out of the question to attempt any such Returns, because no parish could inform them drawn. MOTION FOR A PAPER. The memorial for which I move is one which Copy of the answer to that Memorial, said: I am told had been signed by a large number of men of the highest standing in the county of Kincardine, and by many of the most respectable tenant-farmers of that county. I have not seen the memorial; but I understand that the memorialists state that, under a system of cure which they have recently adopted, they have succeeded in saving 90 per cent of the cases submitted to that treatment. The memorial is signed, amongst others, by Sir Thomas Gladstone; and it is possible that your Lordships may have observed a letter from that gentleman in the morning papers of to-day, in which he states that out of fiftythree cases submitted to a particular mode of treatment, no less than forty-seven are doing well. Now, I think it is very desirable at this time that cases of this kind should be brought under your Lordships' consideration. You have recently passed an Act authorizing the indiscriminate slaughter of cattle; and I think it is right, I will take in England the counties of Cambridge, Chester, York, and Kent. In those counties I find that from the first outbreak of the disease down to the 19th of February, there have died from the disease, and been killed as diseased animals, 51,863; 7,392 have recovered, so that the average of recoveries to deaths has been 1 to 7. In Cambridgeshire, 4,656 died and were killed; 356 rècovered, and the proportion of recoveries to deaths was 1 to 13. In Cheshire, 28,480 died; 7,506 the proportion of recoveries being 1 to 11. In Yorkshire, 17,365 died, and 4.445 recovered-the proportion being 1 to 4; and in Kent, 1,362 died, 85 recovered-the proportion being 1 to 16. I will now take four Scotch counties-Forfarshire, Perthshire, Kincardineshire, and Clackmannanshire. In those counties the total number of deaths has been 12,945, and of recoveries, 4,819-showing an average of about 1 recovery to 3 deaths. In Forfarshire, 8,292 died, and 2,971 recovered-the proportion being about 1 to 3; in Perthshire, 3,424 died, and 1,336 recovered-the proportion being 1 to 3; in Kincardineshire, 983 died, and 323 recovered-the proportion being still 1 to 3; and Clackmannanshire, 246 died, and 189 recovered- the proportion of recoveries being 2 to 3. That Report is from the commencement of the disease down to the 17th February; but if you simply look at the return for the week ending February 17 last, the discrepancy is still greater. In the four English counties I have already referred to, 4,800 died, 733 recovered I think that the recent Returns bear out the results of that observation. According to the last Return, if you take throughout the whole country, the average number of recoveries as compared with the total number of cases does not amount to more than 12 per cent. But there is nothing more remarkable than the amount to which the death-rate varies in different localities. I am afraid, in order to make myself fully understood, that I shall have to trouble your Lordships with some figures; but a matter of this kind is one which turns almost entirely upon figures and statistics. I take it that your object is to save as large a number of cattle as possible; and it be--the proportion of recoveries to deaths comes a question of figures whether it is desirable to slaughter a certain number, and what percentage of the animals attacked recover. Turning to the last Report which has been issued by the Veterinary Department of the Privy Council, I find that in the English counties the percentage of recoveries to cases has been rather more than 10 per cent-about 101 per cent. In the Metropolitan Police district the percentage of recoveries has been 4, and in Wales 12; while in Scotland it has been 20 per cent, so that here you have a margin of nearly 16 per cent between the greatest proportion and the smallest proportion of the recoveries in different districts. But the discrepancy, I say, is still more remarkable in the percentage of recoveries if you take particular districts. To show this, I will take four counties in England and four counties in Scotland. In being a little more than 1 to 7, or nearly the same as during the whole continuance of the disease. But in the four Scotch counties of Forfar, Perth, Kincardine, and Clackmannan the total deaths were 797 to 422 recoveries-the proportion of recoveries having risen from 1 to 3 to rather more than I to 2; and these figures include also many of the old cases. In Forfarshire, 408 died and 206 recovered-the proportion of recoveries being 1 in 2. Perthshire, 276 died and 136 recoveredthe proportion being 1 in 2. In Kincardineshire, 104 died and 69 recovered-the proportion being 3 in 5; and in Clackmannanshire the deaths were 7 against 11 recoveries-the proportion of recoveries being 11 to 7. In the English counties the average has not changed; but in the Scotch counties, while the average during the whole period was three deaths to each "In fact, deaths are becoming the exception wherever the owners are watchful and discover the first symptoms in time." He adds "The farmers here are almost panic-struck by the strangeness of the Bill. They were in hopes of a large number of recoveries." We recovery, during the week ending the 17th | certain cures which were alleged to have February there were only two deaths to been effected by Mr. Worms. Mr. Sieach recovery. I said the other day that monds reported that many of the cases in the county of Forfar the percentage of were not cases of cattle plague at all. recoveries now amounts to nearly 50 per Now, if they were cases of cattle plague, cent. I believe that I was within the Mr. Worms has succeeded in curing them; mark in making that statement, for my and if they were not cases of cattle plague hon. Friend the Member for the county of the local inspector had certified them as such, Forfar, who is himself a practical agricul- and under this Act they must have been turist and is thoroughly conversant with slaughtered. Surely, if the Government are that part of the country, informs me to tie up the hands of the local anthorities that in the case of milch cows the farmers by stringent rules, they are bound to furin Forfarshire now succeed in saving two nish officers who can tell when an animal out of every three. One of them writes is suffering from the cattle plague and as follows:when it is not. When I turn to another section of the Act which you have passed, I find that you have made the inspectors absolute in this matter. It is provided in that section that the certificate of an inspector to the local authorities declaring that an animal is infected shall be conclusive evidence in all Courts of Justice and In a letter from another farmer in the Law that the animal has been so infected ; same county, the writer states that if the so that by that means you leave it in the Act is put in force 2,000 cattle will be hands of these ignorant inspectors apslaughtered, with regard to which at pre- pointed by the local authorities to slaughsent there is a fair chance that from 1,800 ter wherever they think proper. to 1,900 might be saved. It is not only have heard a good deal about the recomin Kincardineshire that the provisions of mendations of the Royal Commission; but this Act are looked upon with consterna- I do not recollect that the Royal Commistion, but in Forfarshire, Aberdeenshire, sioners distinctly in so many words do reand all the adjoining counties the greatest commend the slaughter of animals. On alarm and terror have been spread. And the contrary, I find in the evidence given who can wonder at it? It is not the mere before the Commission a great deal that value of the animals destroyed, but the goes against the indiscriminate slaughter of whole machinery of farming will be thrown cattle. I find that Professor Gertach, who out of gear. If the animals were destroyed was examined in Austria, only recomwhere is the manure to come from? And, mended slaughtering when the disease is if the farmer cannot get manure, how is confined to a small space. In France, a he to go on cultivating the land at all? I discretionary power is given to the prefects have never opposed the principle of extir- to slaughter. In Austria slaughter is only pating the disease by slaughter when it resorted to while the plague is confined can be done at a proper time and in a pro- within narrow limits. After it has spread per way. When the disease first breaks beyond a certain range, it is considered out, and you have only ten or fifteen centres that all attempts to extirpate the disease of infection to deal with, by all means do by destroying the animals is hopeless, and all you can to extirpate the disease; but that the only remedy is rigid isolation. when it has ravaged a county from end to Under all these circumstances, I think it end-and in some counties at this moment very difficult to acquit the Government of there is hardly a single sound beast-it is blame for the course they have taken in the height of folly to apply the same iron regard to the Bill that was passed the other rule as in cases in which the disease is only day. We were told by Members of the just appearing. And let me remind your Government again and again that the Bill Lordships that it is not only the animals had been hastily drawn up, and that it had affected by the disease that you run the been prepared in a great hurry. But I risk of extirpating by this summary pro- want to know why it was prepared in a ceeding. Let me call your attention to hurry? The cattle plague was nothing what occurred the other day at Montrose. new. We had had the cattle plague in the Professor Simonds, the Government in-country for seven months; and the evispector, went down there to report upon dence given to the Royal Commissioners The Earl of Airlie Third Reading-National Debt Reduction* [4]; EXCHANGE IN JAPAN.-QUESTION. had been before us for three months. | Report-Cattle Diseases (Ireland) [37]. Surely in the time that had happened since Considered as amended-Jamaica Government [17]. then the Government might have framed a measure worthy of being presented to Parliament when it met. I do hope that the Government will, at all events, consider it their duty to institute an inquiry in those districts where the disease appears to be just making its appearance. They ought to send persons down to ascertain first if the cases reported as cases of disease are really cases of cattle plague; and they should not allow this indiscriminate slaughter to go on without at all events giving us good reason to hope that it is absolutely required. The noble Earl concluded by moving an Address for- " 'Copy of a Memorial to the Privy Council from the Proprietors and Tenant Farmers of Kincardineshire, praying for the Suspension of that Part of the Act of 29th Vict. Cap. 2. Clause 15, which relates to the Slaughter of Cattle; and for a Copy of the Answer to that Memorial."(The Earl of Airlie.) EARL GRANVILLE said, he did not think it necessary that he should now enter into discussion on a point which had been decided only a few days ago by a very large majority of their Lordships. He did not think it would lead to any practical purpose to go into the question, but he had no objection whatever to the production of the correspondence for which the noble Earl had moved. Motion agreed to. LORD STANLEY said, he would beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether his attention has been called to statements made in the London and China Telegraph of the 5th instant in reference to the Exchange question in Japan; and to ask him to produce a Copy of the Report made by Mr. Arbuthnot, of the Treasury, on the operation of the present system of appropriating the profits arising out of the Exchange; and whether any sums had been carried to the credit of the Public Accounts, out of the profit arising from the difference between the current value of the Japanese Ichibon and the rate at which it is supplied to the Naval, Military, and Civil Services? THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHE QUER said, in reply, that the literal answer to the noble Lord's question was very easily given. His attention had been called to the statement made in the London and China Telegraph upon this subject, and there was no objection whatever to produce the Report made by Mr. Arbuthnot; and, in point of fact, it was on those Reports that he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) advised the House to rely mainly, in order to obtain a true knowledge of this very difficult and intricate subject. And lastly, he had to state that no sum had been carried to the credit of the public accounts, out of the profits arising from the difference between the current value of the Japanese Ichibon, and the rate at which it was supplied to the Naval, Military, and Civil Services. But he thought he ought to add some words of explanation, because otherwise the answer he had given would Lord who had given his attention to the be hardly any answer, except to the noble subject. By the tenth article of the Treaty with Japan there was a stipulation that all foreign coin should pass in that country at its corresponding weight in Japanese coin. Either from the orders of the Government or the prejudices of the people, it was found that the dollars in which our officers were paid did not obtain currency in Japan, and that they were totally unavailable as an instrument of ordinary exchange for the purpose of subsistence. On that discovery were informed that the scale of salaries was originally fixed in Japan somewhat low, considering the expense of living, and that there had since been a considerable rise in prices, so that although this lucrative system of official exchange had an irregular and accidental origin, its practical effect had been to prevent a general demand for an increase of salary. Mr. Arbuthnot thought the proper course would be to establish a mint in Japan in concurrence with the authorities of that country. But that was not the work of a day. TREATY BETWEEN FRANCE AND MR W. EWART said, he wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether the subjects of the State of Monaco, having been admitted by the French Government to the same privileges of trade and shipping as the people of France, British subjects are not. also, under existing Treaties, deemed to be entitled to the same privileges ? MR. LAYARD, in reply, said, it was a communication took place with the Japanese Government, and an arrangement was made by that Government to the effect that the dollar should stand at a certain fixed value to the Ichibon. The effect of that exchange was of very considerable advantage to the Civil Service, because its fixed value was higher than the current rate of exchange. The principle of the exchange was that it should be at a rate simply that would cover the cost of coinage, and be equivalent to the weight of metal, so that in principle it was entirely in conformity with the article of the treaty on which the arrangement was framed. When this fact came to the knowledge of the Government at home the matter was examined into by the late Mr. Arbuthnot, of the Treasury, and he need not inform the House that he was a most valuable civil servant, and besides his other excellencies he was a perfect master of the currency question. Mr. Arbuthnot investigated the matter, and in consequence the Treasury made a communication to the Foreign Office to the effect that the practice ought to be abandoned, and it was abandoned accordingly. A great deal of correspond-true that by a recent arrangement the inence, however, took place between Mr. habitants of the small principality of MoArbuthnot and Sir Rutherford Alcock be- naco had been admitted by France to the fore the conclusion was definitively arrived same privileges of trade and shipping as at, but when it was done the Foreign Office the people of that country. When that gave effect to it. However, when that arrangement was entered into, Her Mawas done it appeared that the Japanese jesty's Government thought it right to Government decidedly objected to the alter-state to the French Government that they ation. They represented their objection could not accept it as a precedent, and if to it strongly to Sir Rutherford Alcock, any other Power under "the most favoured and he on his own responsibility altered Nation" Clause insisted upon having the the arrangement, in consequence of his en- same rights and privileges as French subtertaining so strong an impression of the jects, Her Majesty's Government would impolicy of adhering to it. It became known also insist upon them. Considering, howin course of time at home that in October, ever, the smallness of the State of Monaco, 1864, Sir Rutherford Alcock had reverted and its peculiar geographical position, Her to the old system of exchange. After he Majesty's Government did not at present had done so the matter was again taken consider it necessary to take any step. in hand by Mr. Arbuthnot, who at the We had no "most favoured Nation time of his death was about to make another Clause with respect to navigation; but he Report upon the subject. The Japanese might add that no Power which had one merchants entertained two different views had thought fit to communicate with the with regard to the subject-one party was French Government on the subject of this favourable to it and the other was opposed treaty. to it; but it was impossible then to perfectly explain it. It appeared, however, there was no course open to Her Majesty's Government but either to continue matters as they were or to allow them to continue at the present rate of exchange, giving the credit of the exchange to the public accounts. There was this difficulty, however, in taking that course. They The Chancellor of the Exchequer RAILWAY BRIDGES IN THE METRO- MR. O'BEIRNE said, he would beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade, Whether his attention has been called to the danger to the horse traffic of the Metropolis which arises from the exposed state |