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    a first-rate London club . Tbese convents were useful in teaching and in charity ; and if the proposed inspection were legalized they would all be broken up , and the nuns would go to the Continent . Sergeant Mubphy said the same , and pointed out how vague and fictitious were the accusations made against convents . Names were rarely given , and in one case iu the north of England where the names were g iven , the calumniator , a parson , had been convicted of libel . Mr . Newdeg-ate , Mr . Feewen , and Mr . C . Berkeley retorted with statements of " cases" of discontented nuns ; especially the case of the Miss Macarthys of Cork , who , as had been proved in court , had been morally forced to assign to a convent their interest in the ir father ' s will .

    Mr . FAGAif rejoined , that from personal acquaintance he knew that those ladies were willing to give their property for pious purposes ; and Lord Claude Hamilton sneeringly wondered that this " explanation" not offered while the press was full of the details of the case . Mr . C . Berkeley ( who approved of the bill ) , having alluded , without mentioning names , to his not bei n g allowed to see Miss Talbot , —Lord Edward Howard ( that lady ' s husband ) said that he knew from the lady herself that she had " had no wish to see " Mr . Berkeley , and tliat she had been " completely happy" while in the convent . Lord Edward indignantly added : " It is disgraceful to bring my private affairs thus before the House . "

    Lord John Russell expressed regret at the introduction of the question ; it was unnecessary . Was not the law of habeas corpus sufficient to meet the case ? The evidence supporting the reports of cases of seclusion by physical force was in all cases slight and unsatisfactory . The moral restraint of vows to which young persons unfi tted for convents had been persuaded did exist , and that was an evil ; but the inspection proposed would be no remedy . If the system were really as bad as had been said , Roman Catholics themselves

    would condemn it . "Do not tell me that the Roman Catholics are naturally dead to feelings of political freedom . Do not tell me , beyond all , that they are so destitute of common affection , more especially to the females among them who require protection , that if such a system existed no Homan Gatholic gentleman would staad up in this House and denounce such a system . " ( Cheers . ) After referring with respectful praise to the " pious intentions" " practical services to the human race " of the nuns , Lord John expressed , with much warmth , his objections to a bill that would cause among Roman Catholics a sense of insult leading to indignation and resentment .

    Mr . Lucas thtmked the Premier for his " generous and able speech . " The only proof for the exceptional legislation proposed were " cock-and-a-bull stories . " For instance , one case was that of n young lady who ran away from a convent where she was being taught . Ran away from school ! Did that require legislation ? Mr . DitUMMOND disapproved of the bill because it would be inefficacious . His speech was full of anecdotes illustrativo of conventual evils , but his cases were anonymous , ami none of his statements new . Mr . Wjiixe-SIDE made one point , by showing that Leopold the Great of Tuscany , a very wise and popular sovereign in a Catltolic country , had provided for convent inspections ; but Mr . Chambers' bill was narrow , and would be inefficient . The I louse divided , and leave to bring in the bill was given by a majority of 138 to 115 . TRANSPORTATION . Tin ' s subject was largely ti'eated , on Tuesday evening , in the House of Lords in debate , by Lord GitKY , Lord Ahkkdeun , the Karl of Chicuuhtku , the Earl of Dmtijy , the . Skohetaiiy for the Colonies , and Lord Campbell . The immediate subject was quite new . Sir John Pakington " announced" the intended stoppage of transportation to Van Dicmen ' s Land , naming no date ; but the present Government have actually stopped it . The only other convict colony is Western Australia , capable of receiving but 500 . Ami the Falkland Inlands , or Hue . h desolate places , arc unsuitable ; it being desirable that the convicts should be reformed through

    absorption into a new society . Therefore the Government has arranged to keep the convicts for n few years in the reformatory prisons , and then , instead of l > eing exiled as heretofore , they will , if reformed , be liberated at home . ( Transportation , however , is not to be quite abolished ; it is restricted . ) This proceeding is objected to on many grounds . It is n sudden alteration . It is an unusual assumption of Government authority : Parliament alone having had , in general , the power to make mieh alteration . The convicts accumulating at home will be embarrassing in detention , nnd injurious to th « community when discharged , as has lxsen felt in franco . It is injudicious to pass " sentences" of transportation when no transportation is carried out . The commutation of the aontenco ia ulso contrary to

    law . And , above all , the Government should not have abolished transportation until they had provided a substitute . On the other hand , it was stated that at Milbank and Portland additional accommodation was being provided ; that the liberated convicts would be reformed men ; that under Colonel Jebb ' s system they would , with use to themselves and saving to the country , be kept at work , which could be done now , as free labour being valuable through its scarcity , is not afraid of the competition ; and that the Government

    would carry on transportation where possible—in Western Australia , for instance;—the cause of the recent change being our own repeated promises , and the wishes of the people of Van Diemen ' s Land . This led to the colonial view of the question . Lord Grey thought the people of Van Diemen ' s Land were satisfied with the promise of discontinuance , and would wait for the performance ; we might send this year ' s convicts there , or to Western Australia . There was no injury to a colony when the freemen outnumbered the convicts ; convictism had created Australia ; the feeling against it

    there was but popular clamour ; and , at any rate , are we to grant everything asked by colonies ? " The Government speakers , and even Lord Derby ( who supported Lord Grey in objection to the manner of the late change ) , took a different view . The feeling in the colonies was almost universal against convictism ; that very evening , forty-two petitions from Van Diemen ' s Land were brought before the Commons , praying for the cessation of transportation . It was not good policy to oppose their demands , made , too , on one very strong ground , among others—that convict labour made free labour scarce , by repelling voluntary immigrants . In ' 51 , Van DiemenJs Land had 13 , 000 convicts to 18 , 000 freemen , but now , through the emigration of people to the eold fields , the free settlers were but 9000 to the Lj " _ _ _ * ¦ ¦¦ 4 *

    * convicts remaining almost undiminished . The discussion then turned on transportation , as a secondary punishment . Lords Geey and Campbzxl asserted that it had peculiar terrors fo r offenders , the Chief Justice stating that he had witnessed the " deep agony" in the faces of people he had sentenced to transportation . This was natural . The excitable and illiterate criminal felt severely the solitude of the wilds of Australia . As to the " gold , " criminals were too impulsive and unreflecting to think of that ; and if they did think , they saw ( in general ) an interval of five or seven years—in the best cases , of three years and a half—between them and the diggings ; one year to be spent in gloomy Pentonville , and another in rigid , monotonous work at Portland , where there was *? no recreation but the occasional use of serious books . " As

    a reformatory punishment , transportation , as at present carried out , was better than any other . At the above prisons the convict was kept two years , the hope being held out with go od effect , of freedom after exile . At home , the released convict could hardly ever regain an honest livelihood , while in the colonies he did so with ease . Forty-eight thousand transported persons were now living as free and good citizens in Australia ; at home , these persons would , when discharged , have continued pests of society . Lord Aberdeen admitted that transportation was " valuable , " but very unequal ; worse than death to the sensitive , but nothing to the

    bold . Also the prospect of " crossing the sea" was no longer terrible when so many were crossing it , freely . In the case of the French formats , the- evils of liberating convicts at home arose from the want of discipline and reformation in the prisons of France ; while none but the best convicts would bo liberated here . On the same side it was urged that religious education could be given more easily in homo prisons than abroad ; that the " agony" seen by Lord Campbell might have been

    partly at the prospect of the home and heaviest purt of the punishment ; that it was evidenced by experienced persons that the lower class of criminals had no < lread of transportation , which was feared only by old men uml old women , by " respectable criminals" ( oddly so called ) , and by receivers of stolen goods . The absurdity of sending criminals to a land of gold was shown b y a late return ; in nine months , 1413 convicts ha « l absconded to tlu : diggings .

    Tim formal matters of debate were a motion by Lord Grey for an address to the Crown , disapproving of any chungc until Parliament should decide , and a long amendment by Lord CiiicincB'J'Kn , advising the restriction of transportation to grave crimes and a i ' v . w colonies , ami the increase of the means of secondary punishment at lionie . On a division , there appeared for the motion 117 , for the amendment 54 . Lord Guky was therefore defeated by u majority of 17 , although Hupjmrtcd by Lord Dukmy , who anxiously avoided uny display of party feeling , jis did all the speakers but Lord Camj'jjkll who waw blamed by the Lord CjiantiKi / Loit for not being " calm and dispawsionate . " IMl'BOVKM ' ICNT OK LAND IN IKELANi ) . Since 1847 , an uct , enabling the Irish Hoard of

    Works to lend Government money to landlords and tenants for well-executed improvements , has been ia operation . It has worked well . l , 50 O , OOOZ . has been laid out on improvements , properly executed under the inspection of Government officers ; and in many cases tenant , farmers have been helped to make useful works by small loans , judiciously granted . The loans to tenants were in no case made without the consent of the landlord ,, a consent freely given in the great majority of cases . The repayments of the money are spread over a period of twenty-two years . A « pw bill , continuing this system , was introduced by Lord Derby's Irish Attorney-General , and has been promoted by the present Ministry . The money lent under the former act came from a parliamentary grant of 2 , 000 , 000 ? .,

    but , under the present act , the advance of loans by private capitalists is encouraged , Government supervising the improvements , and registering the loan as a first charge on the land improved . The bill places all authority in the hands of the Board of Works , They may lend money to tenants for proper works , without the consent of the landlord , but as they have always hitherto required the concurrence of the landlord , and as it is the interest of the landlord that real improvements ( and none other will the Board sanction ) should , be made , there i * no likelihood of the " rights of property" being infringed . The purposed bill simply constitutes the Board of Works as a medium between private capitalists and needy landholders , and as an arbiter between landlords and tenants disputing as to the necessity or advisability of proposed farm works .

    In the House of Lords , on Monday , the bill was discussed , on the motion that the House do go into a committee . Some objections were made to it ; namely , that a tenant for life could , by effecting an improvement , place upon the holding a debt that might outlast his own interest ; that the bill injured proprietorial rights , and crippled tenant energy , by vesting too much power in the Commissioners of Works , irresponsible and removable officers , who , besides , had " scandalously wasted" former monies ; that it gave to tenants rights not in their contracts , and that it thus resembled the Tenant-Right bills ; that it considered mortgagees as

    owners ; authorized the making of improvements without the consent of the landlord ; and that altogether it was exceptional legislation , of a kind justifiable in the famine year of 1847 , but not necessary now . To these objections it was replied , that it was absurd to suppose a tenant could have any interest in laying out even borrowed money on improving land that he would , leave in a few years ; and that even if he did , his successor would come in for the results of the improvements , as well as incur a liability for the debt . As to authorizing a tenant for life to put on the estate a debt that mieht fall on the reversioner , many acts of

    Parliament had already sanctioned that principle . The former act was now in force for six years , and had worked well , without any injury to proprietors , and with the effect of stimulating the tenantry to improvements , rather than " crippling their energies . " Tlio Board of Works' management of the matter had given great satisfaction in Ireland . Instead of this bill being a Tenant-Kight measure , it courted the co-operation of the landlord ; and its character was evidenced by the marvellous fact , that the Irish representatives of all denominations had unanimously approved of it . That it was exceptional legislation regarding Ireland , was

    admitted ; but it was required , for Irish landholder * had not the capital which English owners and occupiers had . Finally , the act of 1847 ( admittedly beneficial ) was introduced not alone for the timely purpose of giving relief to the poor ( other acts , such a « the Labour ltato act and Labouchere ' s letter , provided for that want ) , but- for affording , by public grant , a means to landholders to make permanent / improvements ; but at nil events , if the present bill " infringed on the rights of property , " the act of 1847 , to which no one objected , did the same , for its principles were identical with thotto of the present proposition .

    The defenders of the bill were the Duke of Nmv-OAflTLic and Lord Canning , on the part of the present Ministry ; and the Earl of Eglinton and Lord T ) Kninr on the part of the latex Cabinet . The ex-Premier mastered the debate ; he slated the facts , and put tho arguments with clearness nnd force . Tho opposition to the bill was curiously composed of two Whigs " not in the Cabinet" — Lord Claniuoahdts and Lord MoN'i'KAaLJi ; of two extreme Irish Tories— -Lord

    Luc an and Lord GlkngalIj ; and of ono " Independent" peer Lord Bkaumont . The variety of its composition did not prevent the opposition being rather obstinate . In committee they divided four times against Hcparitto clauses . On the first division ( on iKmtponing the bill ) they were beaten by 36 to 8 ; on the second , relative to the ownership of mortgagees ( several peers having left tho house ) , by 1 . 4 to 0 ; on the third , regarding tho discretion of tho Board of Works to act

    Untitled Article

    460 THE LEADER . [ Samtbbat , _

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 14, 1853, page 460, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1986/page/4/