colleagues from the seats they occupied in the House. Lord Granville, pale, agitated, and nervous, performed the work of explaining its nature with a pain which he could not conceal. His colleagues by their countenances and attitudes seemed to show that they shared the feelings of their leader. The archbishop of Canterbury expressed his opinion with regard to the question with a dignity and moderation that did honour to his high place. He said: 'The episcopal bench intend in this crisis to do what they consider in their consciences to be wisest and best; agreeing neither with those who urge them to accept the measure as it stands, nor with those who advise them to reject it without consideration. I was glad when I heard the hope held out to us that any amendments made by your lordships would be seriously considered by the government and the House of Commons. The curse of Ireland has been the constant religious and political agitation on which the voluntary system subsists, and it is my earnest desire not to encourage another agitation of the sort in that country. Your lordships have been told, that if you give the bill a second reading, you will only show yourselves powerless as a branch of the legislature; but the men who say that are the very persons whose action would reduce you to powerlessness. I, in common with the other members of the episcopal bench, am sincerely attached to the Irish church. We have the same truths at heart, and we desire the union that exists between it and the English church to be continued, because we feel that the same blow that falls on the Irish church also falls on ourselves. Therefore, although we do not approve of the bill in its present shape, we desire that it may be fairly considered, and, if possible, so altered and amended as to be converted into a good measure.'

It was in the course of this debate that Lord Derby addressed for the last time the house in which he had long exercised unrivalled influence, and of which he had been so conspicuous an ornament. Those who most differed from his opinions could not refuse the homage of their admiration to the talents, the consistency, and the earnestness of the veteran statesman as he protested almost with his last breath against a measure which seemed to him to be certainly fraught with destruction to the highest and

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holiest interests of his country. My lords,' he said, after having lifted up against the measure the feeble remnants of a voice which once rang through that hall,—' my lords, I am an old man, and, like many of your lordships, past the allotted span of threescore years and ten. My official life is at an end, my political life is nearly closed, and in the course of nature my natural life cannot be long.' He thus concluded his denunciation of the bill: 'If it be for the last time that I have the honour of addressing your lordships, I declare that it will be to my dying day a satisfaction that I have been able to lift up my voice against the adoption of a measure the political impolicy of which is equalled only by its moral iniquity.' This was the last speech that the great earl delivered in the House of which he had so long been facile princeps. His work there was done; all that for which he had so long fought was passing away; the democratic deluge he had so long apprehended had entered. He lived to witness the passing of the bill for the disestablishment of the Irish church, but not to watch the operation of the dreaded measure. He died on the 23rd of October, in the 72d year of his age. The discussion was carried on with that ability which, on nights of great debate, generally distinguishes the oratory of the House of Lords. The division took place at three o'clock on the morning of June 19th in the very fullest house that ever assembled, there being no fewer than three hundred and twenty-five peers who recorded their votes personally, besides eighteen who paired. The two English archbishops stood near the throne, and looked on, while the division was taking place. The archbishop of Dublin, with thirteen English and two Irish bishops, voted against it. One prelate alone, the bishop of St. David's, voted in favour of it. When the numbers were reckoned, they were found to be:

Contents
Non-contents

Majority

179

146

33

So far the measure was safe; but it still had to pass through a committee, the majority of whose members regarded it with a disfavour bordering on detestation. Before the House went into committee, a preliminary

debate took place on the question of concurrent endowment, led off by Earl Grey, who strongly condemned the voluntary system, and contended that the Roman Catholics and the Presbyterians should be endowed out of the revenues which at present belonged to the Irish establishment; and in order to carry out his views, objected to the postponement of the consideration of the preamble; but though supported by the bishops of Oxford and St. David's, he withdrew his motion in deference to a very generallyexpressed opinion against it. Then the bill went into committee. It was there laboriously considered and freely amended; seldom, perhaps never, have the lords expended more pains on any measure than on this; and it must be acknowledged that the government showed every disposition to conciliate them, and even to encourage them to alter the bill with a view to its substantial improvement. On the morning of July 7th it passed through the committee, who, in the opinion of the archbishop of Canterbury, had made a good bill of it.' Others thought they had greatly injured its efficiency. Numerous amendments had. been introduced, giving, or at least designed to give, better terms to the disestablished and disendowed church, and the question of the disposal of the surplus revenues of that church was relegated to a future session. Of course it was not expected that the government and the House of Commons would accept all the amendments that had been introduced into the measure, and it was still doubtful whether the bill would be carried or lost. The changes made in the bill were so great and numerous, that it was not likely the government would accept them; and on the other hand it could hardly be supposed that the lords would have made them without intending to maintain many of them.

While this question was still in suspense, the lords again displayed that spirit of exaggerated conservatism which they had manifested on so many occasions, and which tended to put them more and more out of harmony with the spirit of the age and the demands of the country. Earl Russell had introduced a bill for legalising life-peerages. It had passed through committee, and was brought forward for the third reading. Lord Malmesbury thereupon moved an amendment, that it should be read a third time that day three

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months, which was carried by a majority of twenty-nine. The rejection of this measure coming at such a crisis tended to increase the unpopularity of the peers, and to aggravate the gravity of the situation by cutting off all hope of such a strengthening of the liberal element in the House of Lords as might enable the government to carry its measures without serious mutilation.

The third reading of the Irish-church bill came before the House of Lords on the 12th of July. Lord Clancarty proposed that it should be read a third time that day three months, but withdrew his motion at the instance of Lord Derby, who urged that it would be better to throw on the House of Commons the responsibility of rejecting the 'reasonable amendments' which their lordships had made in the bill. Some important changes were effected in it. A motion of Lord Devon's, setting aside an amendment in virtue of which the Irish bishops were to retain their seats in the House during their lives, was carried by 108 to 82 votes. A proviso proposed by Lord Stanhope, the object of which was to purchase residences and glebe-houses for the archbishops, bishops, and clergy of the Roman-Catholic church and for the ministers of the Presbyterian body, was supported by Lords Houghton, Russell, and Westbury; but though opposed on behalf of the Catholics by Lord Granard, and on behalf of the government by Lord Granville, it was carried by 121 to 114. The bill then passed; Lord Redesdale handing in a protest from Lord Derby.

While the struggle was going on in the House of Lords the liberal party out of doors remained judiciously quiet, only intimating their wish that the bill should pass unchanged in very measured language; but no sooner was the struggle in the upper House over than they began to agitate the country strongly in favour of the bill as it originally stood. At Manchester the executive committee of the National Reform Union held a meeting under the presidency of Mr. George Wilson, the veteran chairman of the Anti-Corn-law League, at which it was resolved that all the branches of the union should be invited to meet for the purpose of passing resolutions and sending up petitions against the amendments made by the House of Lords. At Bradford an open-air meeting, said to have been attended

by between 10,000 and 15,000 persons, was called by the mayor in compliance with a requisition presented to him. Large and important meetings were held at Leeds, Sheffield, Edinburgh, and a great number of other towns in all parts of the kingdom.

On the evening of the 15th of July Mr. Gladstone explained the course which the government proposed to take with respect to the lords' amendments. He stated that he

The

intended to restore the preamble to its original form, and retain the date that was first fixed for bringing the bill into operation. With regard to the third amendment, relating to annuities to curates, he should propose to agree to some modification. The fourth, which related to a tax on ecclesiastical incomes, he should propose to disagree with. The fifth, which had been inserted for the protection of annuitants, he should propose to accept with amendments. The sixth, which related to the fourteen years' commutation, as it might be called, he should propose to disagree with; but he should bring forward an addition to the clause as amended by the House of Lords, the nature of which he should explain at the proper time. seventh, which reserved the conditions of payments for the glebe-houses, &c., he should move to disagree with. The tenth, which related to the disposal of the residuary surplus dependent on the preamble, he should also move to disagree with; but he should propose to insert words which would secure to parliament the control over the surplus in the interval of its being realised. Lastly, he should move that the clause providing for what was called 'concurrent endowment' should be struck out. He afterwards explained that in disagreeing with the amendment relating to the Ulster glebes, he should propose to agree to an amendment offering 500,000l. to the church body in lieu of all private benefactions; and he explained the nature of the proviso he intended to move in order to secure to parliament a control over the surplus during the interval of its being realised. There were three divisions in the course of the evening, in all of which the government proposals were sustained by large majorities. Other motions made by Mr. Gladstone were adopted without a division, with the exception of a few modifications, which he consented to make in compliance with the representations of Sir R.