the balance due in March, 1806, amounted to 97,000l. though in the December of 1804, he had been called upon to make up his accounts. With respect to Mr. Steele, he was glad to learn, that the public were not likely to be a sufferer, but still it was desirable that the public should have authentic evidence of that circumstance. With respect to the case of Boyd, Benfield and Co. he understood that the claims upon the interest of the 100,000l. advanced to them were still in a course of legal proceeding. With respect to Mr. Hunt, the defalcation amounted to 93,000l. he thought it expedient that the public should know how much of that large sum had been as dividual of this nation; the time and talent | ment. In the case of general Delancey, too they consume in complaint will be devoted, unfettered and undivided to the common cause; and that it is reserved, the Petitioners presume to hope, for the House, and it is worthy the character of enlightened statesmen, to redeem at length the great name of the British empire from the disparaging imputation of sacrificing an eternal principle of justice, and a commanding maxim of legislation, to a passing expediency and to fleeting events; and praying the House, in this crisis of unprecedented emergency, to hearken to the monitory voice of those great luminaries of their councils, whose discerning patriotism has identified their cause with the security of these realms, and who have ex-yet recovered, or was considered as irrehorted the House, as they contemplate a successful resistance to our inveterate foe, to make a brave and gallant people happy in the possession, and invincible under the banners of the British constitution, by the repeal of those laws so manifestly hostile to its genuine spirit." Ordered to lie upon the table. PUBLIC DEFAULTERS.] Sir J. Newport rose, pursuant to notice, to move for an instruction to the Committee of Public Expenditure, to enquire into the balance due to the public in consequence of certain public defalcations. He admitted that, with respect to some of those defaulters, a great part, if not the whole of the money, had been recovered; but it was as certain, that with respect to many others, but a very small part had been recovered, and in some, that the whole had been irrecoverably lost. He thought that the public had a right to be put in possession of an accurate detail of what was lost, and what recovered, in each of those instances; they had, in short, a right to know the actual state of those accounts: it was but justice to the individuals, who had so far lessened the culpability of their conduct by paying up the whole of the deficiency, that the public should know that such individuals had made the best amends within their power; it was necessary too, that the public should know, what progress had been made, or was making, in the recovery of the sums due, and what was the amount of those sums which were concluded to be irrecoverably lost to the public. These were matters which he thought it became the duty of that House at any time to investigate, more especially in so advanced a period of the life of the present parlia coverable. He wished also to know, whe ther that person's pension was still conti nued to him, or whether it had been finally withdrawn? The case of the Dutch commissioners, of Mr. Villiers of the Marine Pay Office, and of Mr. Charles Barnes, called for investigation, as to each of those particulars. Mr. Chinnery's defalcation, he understood, had exceeded 80,000l. and that legal advice having been taken by the bail of Mr. Chinnery, they were considered as exonerated, because there had not been due diligence used on the part of Mr. Chinnery's superiors in office, on the first suspicion upon their parts of the defalcation. The next case had not yet been before the House, it was taken from the 12th Report of the Board of Works of Ireland, and it appeared, that between the years 1796 and 1802, when the office of Treasurer to the Board of Trade was abolished, the sum of 1,835,000l. had gone into the hands of the Treasurer, and was to that day unaccounted for. The noble lord had been frequently called on to make out his accounts, but the answer uniformly was, that the accounts were in a state of preparation. This was one of the many cases that shewed the necessity of the motion with which he should now conclude. The right hon. baronet then moved, "That it be an instruction to the Committee appointed to examine and consider what regulations and checks have been established in order to controul the several branches of the public expenditure in Great Britain and Ireland, and how far the same have been effectual; and what further measures can be adopted for reducing any part of the said expenditure, or diminishing the amount of salaries and emolu ments, without detriment to the public ser vice;-That they do examine into the pre Sir J. Newport repeated his reasons for wishing that, before the session closed, the public might be put in full possession of the most accurate details that could be made out respecting these defalcations. The motion, as originally worded, was then put and carried. sent state of account of the several balances the propriety of omitting that part of the of money which have been reported on, motion instructing the Committee, and reor have since appeared to the said Com-taining merely that part of it that emmittee to be due and owing to the public, powered them-thereby leaving the Comor which have been stated in any report mittee to its own discretion. laid before this House by the commissioners of military or naval enquiry, or by the parliamentary commissioners of enquiry, or the commissioners of imprest accounts in Ireland, to be so due and owing; and that they do, with all convenient speed, lay before the House an abstract account thereof, and of their opinions thereupon, specifying particularly the amount of the several balances originally appearing due, the sums which have been received thereout, with the date of such receipts; whether any and which of the remaining balances may be considered as entirely irrecoverable, and also the progress of any measures taken towards such recovery, or the adjustment of such balances; and whether any and which of the persons, who have been deficient in their payments, continue to enjoy any place or office of trust or profit or pension under the crown." The Chancellor of the Exchequer conceived, that the powers of the Committee were already sufficient for those purposes; if not, he had no objection to the present motion. It was another question whether the Committee ought to apply itself immediately to this object, so as to supersede all other business. As to the pension of Mr. Hunt, it, had been all along withdrawn effectually, though not formally till last year. Mr. Bankes said, that the Committee had the power, and if he had thought it expedient that the state of the balance should be known before the end of the session, he would, as chairman of that Committee, have undertaken the labour: as it was, he was ready to begin the business immediately, though, perhaps, it might be better not to embrace that mass of subjects to which their attention was now directed. Mr. Long took that opportunity of explaining a circumstance which had occurred upon a former night, and which his absence had precluded him from then adverting to. An hon. baronet (sir F. Burdett) had stated, that though the principal had been paid back to the public by Mr. Steele, the interest was lost. He therefore begged leave to state, that not only the whole of the principal had been paid up, but also every shilling of the interest. The Chancellor of the Exchequer suggested CORPORAL PUNISHMENTS IN THE ARMY.] The Hon. Mr. Bennet rose to make the motion of which he had given notice respecting corporal punishments in the army. He began by observing, that he could not anticipate any serious objections to the motion which he was about to make. Returns were regularly laid before the House of the number of capital punishments inflicted, and he did not perceive that any greater inconvenience or danger was likely to result from publishing the number of punishments in the army. The punishments to which he now alluded were such as were not generally known; they were most debasing and degrading to the soldiers; and were attended with such cruelty and inhumanity that they were inflicted in secret, in holes and corners. [Hear, hear! from the ministerial benches.] He repeated it-in holes and corners; because it would not be possible to inflict so much torture and ignominy in open day, and in the face of the world, without the presence of an army to keep down the indignation of the people. The horrors of the middle passage had led to the destruction of the Slave Trade, and the horrors of the present system of military punishment, he hoped, would soon lead to its abolition. It was a mode of punishment objectionable in the first place because its infliction was arbitrary in the second, because it varied with the varying powers and feelings of the sufferer; and in the third, because it had been proved to be utterly inefficacious as an example. Its abolition would greatly conduce to the good of the service by rendering recruiting more easy, and would be of advantage to the discipline of the army by freeing soldiers from that disgrace and debasement they were at present subject to. He concluded, therefore, with moving, "That there be laid before the House à return of the number of Corporal Punish ments inflicted in the army, in the militia, and in the local militia during the last 7 years, up to January, 1812, specifying the offences, where committed, and the number of lashes inflicted respectively." Mr. C. Adams spoke against the motion. Mr. Manners Sutton conceived, that if it was the object of the hon. mover to revive the debate on the question of corpo. ral punishment, this object might be attained without acceding to the present motion. If the returns were desired merely for the purpose of examining whether there were any cases of abuse, he thought it hardly a fair proceeding; and that the only ground which could induce the House to consent to the motion was the previous production of such cases. It certainly would not be difficult to procure the returns, because under the excellent system of management introduced and adopted by the commander in chief, the most minute records were preserved. The present illustrious commander in chief had laboured incessantly to bring the discipline of the army to the highest possible state of perfection, and as speedily and generally as possible to do away corporal punishment; but such an alteration could be effected only by degrees. There was much variety of opinion on the subject, even in the army; and he believed if that whole body was consulted, whether corporal punishment should be altogether abolished, there would be as much dif ference on the subject among the men in the ranks, as among the officers who commanded them. No slur ought to be thrown on the administration of the army, without just cause. As to the effects of the punishment on the discipline of the army, what better answer could be given than to appeal to the character of that army, and the mutual attachment that prevailed between the officer and the soldier. His great objection to the revival of this discussion was, that it tended to unsettle the military mind, to lead the army to believe that there must be grievances, though to them unknown, which caused the subject to be so often agitated. He could not see how the abstract question could be elucidated or assisted by the production of these returns; and as he believed that no practical advantage could result from it, while its natural effect must be to impute remissness to the commander in chief, whose indefatigable attention to the welfare, interests and even comfort of the soldier was denied by none, he felt himself compelled to withhold his assent from the motion. Mr. Abercromby said, he thought nothing could be farther from a slur on the army than the present motion. On the contrary, if such an account were annually laid on the table, it would, according to the hon. and learned gentleman's account of the attention of the commander in chief to the army, redound more to his honour than any thing that could be done by concealment. Nothing also would be so likely to give a new tone of feeling to of ficers in general, as the consciousness that the legislature would review their proceedings. He should, therefore, vote for the motion. Mr. W. Smith expressed himself to be of the same opinion. The refusal to grant the paper moved for, shewed that some abuses did exist; he thought, therefore, it ought to be produced; and in voting for that production, he disclaimed any intention of censuring the commander in chief, or the military system of which he was at the head. Six F. Burdett declared, that when the right hon. and learned gentleman announced his intention to oppose the motion, he had expected to hear rather more cogent reasons for his so doing. He had talked indeed of the necessity of producing some grave case as a foundation for this motion, but he seemed to forget that many such cases had been already brought before the consideration of the House. He had himself on a former occasion stated the instance of several men who had died at Gibraltar in consequence of flogging, as declared by the surgeon in the first instance, although he was afterwards induced to alter the return to" died of fever," and he had also stated, that several officers who had refused to join in that barbarous proceeding, had been dismissed the service, although on their return to this country they were re-instated on the representations of a distinguished officer (lord Hutchinson) to the Commander in Chief. He had recently seen in the public prints, many statements of suicide committed, in order to avoid this dreadful punishment, and that those men who had attempted suicide ineffectually, had actually received additional punishment for the attempt. To these statements he was inclined to give credit, because they could not be made, if false, without danger to the publishers. the compliments so often paid to the officers of the army, he believed, and he was not inclined to flatter any man, particu larly in that House, that like the rest of their countrymen, they were not deficient in humanity, but it was the frequency of these spectacles of horror and suffering that necessarily familiarised them to such scenes, and gradually extinguished all the livelier sympathies of their nature. He had once mentioned to the House the case of a man of 70, who was condemned for some trivial offence to be flogged. He pleaded that he had been 50 years in the service, he pleaded too the excellence of his general character, and that it was not the pain but the shame, and the shame only, that alarmed him. In spite of every remonstrance however-notwithstanding his age and his long and meritorious service he was flogged. In the Isle of Wight, no long time ago, a boy of 16 was sentenced to the same punishment, and he pleaded his youth in mitigation. But neither the feebleness of age, nor the indiscretion of tender years availed against the supposed necessity of making military examples by the application of the disgraceful lash; for example surely was the only object, as it could not be said to be improvement. To him it appeared astonishing that men having the forms and feelings of their species could hear with indifference and coolness, the recital of such atrocious cruelties. The situation of the English soldier was at this moment scandalously unprotected; no coroner's inquest sat upon his remains, he was confined where no friend could approach him, to whom he might relate his tale of woe, or from whom he might receive the consolation of a sympathising concern. He had lately heard of the case of a man named Tork, who being ordered to be flogged, his wife set out from Yorkshire to visit him, and on her arrival at the quarters of the regiment, she met his body carried by his comrades to the grave, he having died in consequence of the severity of his punishment. Was the House then to be told that there existed no grounds for instituting any enquiry? The right hon. and learned gentleman seemed to think, that it was a kind of indecorous proceed ing for the House of Commons to interfere at all with what might be said to fall under the exercise of the royal prerogative. This was a doctrine about the unconstitutional nature of which it was not necessary to say any thing; but he would ask whether the crown could carry into effect any one of the articles of war, or keep alive the army or its discipline without the previous consent and sanction of that House? What then was it but a most flimsy pretence, a weak and miserable subterfuge, to talk of the slur or the implied censure which the motion conveyed with respect to those who had entrusted to them the management of the army? The right hon. and learned gentleman had bestowed abundant panegyric on the conduct of the Commander in Chief, and supposing it all to be perfectly applicable and well merited, it was at the same time altogether beside the present question. He had no doubt that the Commander in Chief, as well as other military men, were possessed of humane sentiments, but habit in time got the better of those tender feelings; and if it did not entirely eradicate them, imperceptibly blunted and subdued them.-The right hon. gentleman talked of no case having been made out, but he would assert on the contrary, that there was a profusion of evidence which he himself was prepared to produce, in proof of all he had stated, and all of which concurred to establish one conclusion, that the punishment was inhuman, had been often inhumanly exercised, and was at once repugnant to the dictates of reason, justice, and humanity. The right hon. and learned gentleman, however, treated all this with levity, and betrayed an indifference of manner, and coldness of feeling-that seemed to him utterly inconsistent with a due sense or correct com. prehension of the infernal nature of the infliction. He seemed to treat the subject as a boy might be expected to treat the whipping of a puppy dog. He himself looked at it in another light, and in its real colours. He saw it unite a degree of torture, with a still greater degree of ignominy and shame, which it was scarcely possible to imagine that human beings could have devised, except from the motive of imitating the supposed torments of the damned. Was it remembered that the instrument of torture was the cat-of-ninetails, that when the wretched victim was fixed to the halberts in order to have the flesh torn from his bones, each separate lash inflicted nine stripes, every one of which was capable of drawing blood from the body! But in his opinion, horribleas the punishment was in point of the bodily torture which it created, its effects upon the moral feelings of shame and honourable pride, were still more grievous and deplorable. It was the disgrace which never could be obliterated, that in his mind formed the most important part of the evil. And for what offences was this torment, was this irrecoverable degradation frequently inflicted? He had heard of one case, in which a man was sentenced to be flogged for having married. Thus arbitrary was the power of these military tribunals, thus capricious was its exercise. But the right hon. and learned gentleman was positive that no abuses had taken place. Why then refuse the returns, if it were only to establish a fact so pleasing to the country and to the army, and so truly honourable to those on whom the right hon. gentleman had bestowed his eulogium? His belief however was, that there had been great abuse, that there were still great abuses, and that great abuses would continue, so long as such a system of punishment was endured. It was a system unworthy of the English nation and of the English soldier, and a system which he believed would not be allowed to prevail in any other country. The right hon. and learned gentleman had admitted, that the production of the return could do no harm, would be productive of no inconvenience, and his only objection was the very courtly and unparliamentary pretence, that it might not be agreeable to the feelings of those who happened to be high in rank and office. As to the opinion that this mode of military punishment had no injurious effects on the recruiting service, he would ask gentlemen to knock at their own hearts, and imagine themselves in the situation of spectators of this dreadful spectacle, and then to say, would this or would it not damp their inclinations to enter upon a course of life in which they would be exposed to the liability of suffering the same infliction. He knew well, for he had been frequently applied to without however possessing the means of affording relief, by persons who had deserted merely from the terror of this punishment, and who felt the most ardent desire of returning to their ranks, if they could have been secure from this dreadful evil. He believed that the soldiers could not be left longer in such a state; and he thought that the people of the country had been too indifferent hitherto on this subject; and now, with shame he must confess it, that it was with some justice that the punishment about which the country was so indifferent when confined to the regular army, had fallen upon the whole nation in all the classes in which they were liable to be called on for military service. A noble lord had said upon a former debate, that he thought it almost impossible that a man could die of receiving 240 lashes. He, however, remembered to have read a speech of Baron Maseres, attorney-general of Canada, on the trial of some officers who had sentenced a soldier of the name of M'Donald to receive 200 lashes, who after receiving 170 of them, was carried to the hospital, where after lingering for four days he died. In that speech the attorney-general for Canada stated, "that when a man had been guilty in France of the murder of one of its sovereigns, (Ravaillac for the murder of Henry the fourth) the Council deliberated on a punishment adequate to the enormity of the crime. They even encouraged propositions to be made to them for that purpose; and among others, a butcher proposed to flay the man alive, and keep him in that state three days before he should die. This proposal appeared to the council too barbarous even for so heinous a crime, and they contented themselves with breaking the regicide on the wheel, and keeping him two days on the rack. Now the officers of this regiment had, for an offence comparatively trivial, inflicted a more cruel death than the council of France could bear to hear of, even for the murder of a sovereign, and more barbarous than even the butcher could propose; for he had only thought of keeping a man three days in torture, while those officers had flayed the man, and kept him four days in agony before he died." Such had been the feelings of a crown lawyer formerly, on such a punishment; but now crown lawyers and other lawyers and members of parliament could speak of it with levity, and two hundred lashes. as it seemed, were thought nothing at all of in the present state of our army. It was known, however, that deaths had since taken place in consequence of such punishment, and that many suicides had occurred from the apprehension of them. There was also published in a provincial paper an instance of a serjeant in a veteran battalion, of the name of Gill, who cut his own throat merely to avoid the pain of being obliged to witness a number of those punishments. He recollected to have read some time ago in the public papers, an article under the title "Resolute Insensibility," where it was stated that a young man, in order to obtain his discharge from the militia, pretended to |