this tenure. Agrarian questions now occupy the public mind incessantly in this fine colony to the exclusion of all sound politics. A public man is valued in proportion as he is subservient to the proprietors or friendly to the tenants, not for the measures of internal improvement of intercolonial policy he may proponnd: and the intellectual and social life of this people is exhausted and frittered away by disputes and contentions detrimental to the interests of all

parties.”

come under review by the Governor General, who has, I think, exercised his judgment properly in sanctioning it. I should exhaust the patience of the House if I were to go minutely into the history of this legislation. The noble and learned Lord has alluded to it as a matter of extreme difficulty, which has existed for a great number of years. It originated, curiously enough, in a lottery which was held in London rather more than The Report of the Commissioners pre100 years ago. The lottery, which sented no exaggerated picture of the afforded a curious picture of the Colonial state of things in the island, and showed administration of the day, was held for the advantage of putting an end to it by the purpose of putting up a large por- any system of legislation which was tion, if not the largest portion, of Prince likely to meet with a reasonable amount Edward's Island in lots. In one day no of acceptance by the contending parties. fewer than 67 lots were raffled for, each I am not at all disposed to say that the lot containing 20,000 acres of land. Cer- Act is perfect. Indeed, I quite agree tain conditions were attached to each with the noble and learned Lord that it lot; but, in most cases, they had not been is open to very many charges in various complied with by those who obtained points. The main purport of the Act I them. The consequence was that pro- take to be this-It requires that a cerperty which was then lightly won was tain notice should be given to the prolightly treated. The conditions as to prietors of the intention of the Governsettling the lots with colonists were, in ment to purchase the land, and provides the main, not complied with; and in ad- that three Commissioners shall be nomidition to that, the properties were sub-nated, who are to have the power of jected to the difficulty of absenteeism. determining the price. A proprietor The result of these two evils was, that may appear by counsel and he may complaints not unnaturally sprang up in appoint a solicitor; and although he the island. The tenants who held the has no appeal from the decision of the properties found out that the owners Commissioners, yet the Supreme Court were not complying with the conditions. of Canada may remit the report of They themselves, on the other hand, the Commissioners for subsequent redeparted from their conditions with their vision. I cannot state that the Act is landlords, and either did not pay the in every respect satisfactory; but I am rent at all, or else allowed it to fall into bound to say that, in my opinion, it arrear. The ultimate result was a com- is not altogether unfavourable to the plete state of confusion and recrimina-proprietors. tions between the two parties. This went on, and about 10 years ago a tenant's league was formed in the island for the purpose of disputing the possession of the property with the descendants of those who held the original lots.

A Royal Commission was appointed to investigate the matter. The Commissioners say in their Report

"The tenantry of Prince Edward's Island share

the common sentiment of the continent which

surrounds them. The prejudice in favour of a freehold tenure, if it is one, is beyond the power of reason. The proprietors cannot change

the sentiment; the local Government have no

power to resist it; and the Imperial Government, having become weary of collecting rents and supporting evictions in Ireland, can hardly be expected to do for the landlords in Prince Edward Island what has ceased to be popular or practicable at home. It is, therefore, impera. tive upon all the parties concerned to convert

This Act does not lay down the principle of compulsory purchase for the first time. That principle waslaid down before in Prince Edward's Island, and this is a supplementary Act, which is rather in favour of the proprietors than otherwise, as it provides on the whole a fair and equitable machinery to enable them to obtain compensation for their land. My noble Friend opposite (the Earl of Kimberley), when he was Colonial Secretary, accepted an Act passed in 1872 on the subject, and also the subsequent Act passed in 1873. Those Acts embodied the principle of compulsory purchase. I think the House will admit that a very wise and proper choice has been made of the gentlemen who are nominated Commissioners, and who will give a fair consideration to the claims of the proprietors. The Home

and the public. The work had its origin in an attempt to issue a new edition of the living statutes; but soon after the work commenced a difficulty arose how to distinguish what were living from what were dead statutes. Acts that repealed others gave no difficulty, and did not require to be printed, but an immense number of Acts stood in a different position-some were virtually repealed by new Acts which covered the same area as the old ones, and others were repealed because the provisions in the new Acts were inconsistent with the

Government is not in any respect what- | portance of which he need not dwell ever responsible for this Act. It is a upon to justices of the peace, solicitors, measure which was disposed of in Canada by the decision of the Governor General, and consequently instructions from home would really be superfluous, or, rather, more than superfluous. At the same time, Mr. Childers has been placed in personal communication with Lord Dufferin, and it is quite understood that his Lordship will give whatever consideration is proper to all the representations which may be made to him on either side. The noble and learned Lord (Lord Penzance) has referred to the sum of $800,000 mentioned in the Act. If I understand rightly, the Ques-old ones. Under these circumstances, it tion of the noble and learned Lord is whether the compensation to be awarded under the Act is limited to this sum of $800,000. I do not think it is; I have no reason whatever to believe that it is The only allusion to this sum is to be found in the Preamble, and not in the enacting part of the measure. In conclusion, I will only remind the House of what I originally stated-namely, that this measure is one which has been passed by the Colonial Legislature of Prince Edward's Island, and which consequently receives the sanction, not of the Crown through the Imperial Government at home, but the sanction of the Governor General of Canada. Taking all the circumstances into consideration, I quite admit there is much to be said on both sides. I think, however, my noble Friend the Governor General of Canada has exercised a wise discretion in assenting to this measure, which I trust will not only put an end to a controversy which has raged for 15 years, but will put an end to it as much in the interest of the proprietors as to the interest of any other class of the community.

So.

soon became apparent that it was impossible for any draftsman to undertake the responsibility of saying what were old Acts that might be safely omitted from the edition, and therefore it was found necessary that, as the work of revision progressed, it should receive at the end of the Session the authoritative declaration of Parliament as to what Acts should be omitted from the new statutes. The work had been done under extremely able hands-at first under the able superintendence of Messrs. Reilly and Wood; then the task fell to Mr. Wood alone; and subsequently Mr. Rickards was associated with that gentleman in the prosecution of the work. By the labour of these gentleman 10 volumes had already been completed, and had received the sanction of Parliament by means of Bills similar to that he now presented. The number of Acts passed since the 53rd Geo. III that had been repealed or expurgated by this means were 7,000 repealed and 2,000 partially repealed statutes. Parliament had from time to time accepted these Bills upon the names of the professional draftsmen under whose care they had been prepared. Every Bill prepared by the draftsman stated the ground upon which any particular statute was declared to be repealed or partially re

Order of the Day for the Second pealed-but when the Bill was passed Reading, read.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, this was the eleventh volume of the work for the revision of the Statute Law that had been presented to Parliament, the object sought to be obtained being to expunge the dead from the living statutes-a course the im

these notes were omitted from the Act. The draftsmen had also submitted their labours to different Departments and Public Offices before presenting them to Parliament, and in that way they had insured a certain degree of accuracy which could not possibly have. been arrived at in any other way. Seven octavo volumes had been published

Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.

dealing with the statutes down to the last Session of William IV., which were equal to three ordinary quarto volumes of the statutes they were in the habit of using. The eighth volume would be published in the ensuing autumn, and the 9th early in 1876; and he expected that six more volumes would complete the Statute Law down to 1868-the period originally contemplated-which would be equal to seven quarto volumes. In addition to this there had been published yearly a chronological table and index of the statutes, giving the title of every Act passed, and stating what had become of it-whether it was living or dead; and the second part of the volume contained an index of the statutes in force. The

price of these volumes was exceedingly moderate. He did not mean to represent this work of Statute Law Revision as final or complete; but it was extremely substantial. He looked forward to the time when there would be a cheaper edition of the statutes in a still more useful form, and also that they might anticipate in a short time being able to make a division in English, Irish, and Scotch Acts, so that the statutes might be had of each country in a separate form. The perfection of the revision of the statutes would greatly facilitate their consolidation, and he proposed to lay on the Table of the House a Copy of the Papers that had been laid on the Table of the House of Commons, containing Minutes and Memoranda of the Statute Law Commission upon the subject of consolidation of the statutes and the proposals they had made. The Government, acting on the proposals, had prepared as a sample of the consolidation, seven consolidation Bills dealing with particular subjects of the law, which would be laid on the Table for consideration during the Recess, and it would be found that where any change had been made in the wording of the enactments there had been none in their spirit. They were in a sense specimen consolidation Bills, and they dealt with subjects on which there was a considerable amount of legislation-such as the administration of oaths, the issue of writs by the House of Commons, the regulation of chemical works-and where consolidation was much required.

OTTOMAN PORTE, &c.-RESOLUTION. LORD CAMPBELL, in rising to call the attention of the House to the Identic Note of Austria, the German Empire, and Russia to the Ottoman Porte of 20th October, 1874; to the reply of the Ottoman Porte of 23rd October, 1874; and to the Correspondence recently presented on the subject; and to move to resolve

"That this House concurs with Her Majesty's Government as to the illegality of the demand addressed to the Ottoman Porte by the Three Powers, Austria, the German Empire, and

Russia, in their identic note of 20th October
1874;
And—

"That this House regrets that no effectual measures seem to have been taken to prevent or to retard the definitive conclusion of a treaty between Austro-Hungary and the Danubian Principalities,”

said: My Lords,-Just before Easter the noble Earl the Secretary of State told the House that the Papers, which form in some degree the subject of my Notice, would in a few weeks be on the Table. Last Monday, for the first time, they were in the hands of Members. The conception of the noble Earl, as to the period involved in a few weeks, seems to be drawn from an age in which longevity went further than it does even at present. No doubt, when men lived 150 years, a few weeks was a correct description of the interval between Easter and the Dog Days, as at that time there may have appeared to be only a few hours in a fortnight, or a few minutes in a day. What renders the delay a little more remarkable is, that the last despatch is dated January 20th, so that on the face of it there is not any reason why the whole book, which is less than 30 pages, should not have appeared in February or March. However, I do not wish to criticize the noble Earl upon the point, but merely to excuse myself for being forced to address the House at what I know appears an inconvenient moment. It is no great fault-perhaps it is a kind of merit-in a Secretary of State, who seems born for higher things, to fall into the habits. Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a." and traditions of the office he presides (The Lord Chancellor.)

over. And these are well known to be,

of censure-to the effect that, unless there is something unexplained, something in the background, the Government ought to have done more to prevent or to retard the definitive conclusion of a Commercial Treaty between Austria and Roumania, when they viewed it as

tion to support this Resolution. Indeed, the point is so important that here I should desire to bring a short and easy train of reasoning under the judgment of the House, which may perhaps be calculated to force the gravity of the transaction home to minds which have not previously considered it. The principle of the three Powers, whose union has been so often serious to Europe, from the anarchy of Poland, at the end of the last century, down to the extinction of Cracow in 1847, is that the Vassal Principalities of Turkey shall negotiate Commercial Treaties, independently of the Empire in which they are incorporated. A congeries of minute arguments has been heaped up to show that trade requires the arrangement. But the noble Earl the Secretary of State has justly pointed out that the question is not commercial, but political. It is not a question of what tends to im

either to avert debates, or, if they must occur, to bring them on, when men have to perform the thankless operation of beating iron cold, or by the lateness of the Session bring the ashes of their mind in contact with the rising floods of Parliamentary indifference. My Lords, whatever may be thought on other ques-regretable. I readily admit my obligations, the House, I am convinced, will favour my decision of adding Resolutions to the Notice. A noble Duke upon the other side, who has long engaged the deference of all who belong in any way to Scotland (the Duke of Buccleuch), has quite recently laid down that if you want debate you must have Resolutions. It would also have been arrogant on my part to expect any of your Lordships to listen to an exposition of the Papers which could not lead to a result. Beyond that, it seems to me that when any one has taken up a subject of this character the House has a right to ask that he should point out some mode by which their judgment may be felt, by which their power may be usefully exerted with regard to it; although he does so at considerable risk, and although the House has a complete discretion of adopting his proposal or rejecting it. The practical effect at which these Resolutions aim may be uncovered in a mo-portation, as if revenue was the single ment. It is to localize and to restrict object of societies, but of what the Law an infraction of the Treaties of 1856, of Nations interdicts and sanctions. acquired by the blood and consecrated Now, the Law of Nations indicates disby the honour of Great Britain-an in- tinctly that the power to negotiate Comfraction which the noble Earl the Se-mercial Treaties is the power to negotiate cretary of State condemns, but which, as regards the conduct of one Power, at least, he has not succeeded in averting. My Lords, I need not dwell at all upon the former Resolution, since it is one of approbation and concurrence as regards the Government. It seems to be a just and proper tribute to their resistance of the Identic Note which the three Powers addressed to the Ottoman Porte on the 20th of October. As to the nature of that demand, Her Majesty's Government offered, as you may see in all of their despatches, an unqualified opinion. They deserve the greater credit because none of the other Western Powers were so placed as to hold decided or effective language on the subject. It is true, indeed, that Austria, as the Papers show, evidently doubted the legality, but was not on that account less forward in her action. With regard to the second Resolution, it is one of admonition, not

without restriction upon everything. In the early spring, and again within the last few days, I felt bound to look through all the chapters upon Treaties in Vattel. He is still the recognized authority of Europe, and I first learnt to refer to him from Lord Palmerston himself. Nowhere does he sanction the distinction which the three Powers have affected to establish. Nowhere does he view Commercial Treaties as legitimate, unless they are the exercise of a general negotiating faculty. Wheaton, whose treatise is received on the other side of the Atlantic, has a passage which ought not to be passed over, because it solves the question by deduction. It is

and I could give the page to noble Lords-to the effect that the validity of treaties ceases when either of the contracting parties forfeits independence. What follows? That their validity will not begin until dependence has been

abrogated. We learn, therefore, from | ment bound the country; that it was Vattel, that to negotiate Commercial free to linger in repose; that policy Treaties is to negotiate all treaties, and from Wheaton, that the vassal principalities must throw off their dependence, before any contract can bind or regulate their conduct. Every one is thus led to see-without too much mental effortthat the arrangements proposed by the three Powers would be a large and a decided movement in the path of separation. But although untenable in principle, they might still be no more than the assertion of an heretical and unproductive theory, if the communities in question were not imbued with any separative tendency. Here facts come in to enlighten us. We know-and the noble Earl, the Secretary of State, himself has reprimanded the aspirations of the Roumanian Government for a nationality they would be incapable of holding against the Powers on their frontier. We know the restless movements of the Servian principality from the time when, in 1863, the withdrawal of the Turkish garrison was urged upon our Government. The scheme of the three Powers is not then a barren declaration, but a living torch, addressed to an inflammable material, which rushes forward to accept it. The next link is one the House can easily appreciate. When the Danubian Principalities are severed from the Empire which controls them, Commercial Treaties would be themselves a constant pretext for occupation by the neighbouring authorities. They have merely to allege that a stipulation has been violated, and send an army to the Danube to promote the execution of it. But all those who call to mind the campaign of Catherine II. against Turkey, or the campaigns of 1828-9, or that of 1853, will be agreed that the Danubian Principalities are the route to Constantinople, in a strategic sense, as distinctly as Herat is thought by eminent authorities to be the gate of India. No sooner, therefore, are they occupied than the guarantee of April 15th, 1856, which engages you by arms to support Ottoman integrity, begins to force itself upon you. And here, let me remark, that the moment would not be similar to that of 1854, when my noble Friend the noble Earl on the cross-benches (Earl Grey) came down to this House, and gave all the arguments against going to war, explaining, as he did, that no engage

alone sufficed to govern its decision. In spite of my noble Friend the war occurred. It culminated in the guarantee I have alluded to. The question would not now be one of prudence, but of faith. Great Britain would be compelled to take up arms or sacrifice her honour. And while this great debate was agitating Parliament, millions of British capital, the fortunes of many men who have promoted the development of Ottoman resources, would be in utter insecurity. The whole chain is now before the House. Under these circumstances, it was evidently a British object, if you could, to divert Austria from an application of the principle the three Powers had laid down, and which is fraught with danger to this country. So long as Austria refrained, the principle of which the Ottoman authorities had exposed the character, might never have been executed, and even speedily renounced. Here, then, we are bound to ask my Lords, has the Secretary of State done what could be done for so legitimate a purpose; has he pointed out to Austria the many grounds on which the final step might be retarded; has he shown that at the best it was a question between commercial and political advantages of which the latter far outweighed the former; above all has he given prominence to the very guarantee I have alluded to of April 15th, 1856, which binds Austria with Great Britain and with France in the defence of Ottoman integrity? The position in which Austria stood as defined by that compact was remarkable and gave the noble Earl a locus standi for remonstrance-although friendly-which could not possibly escape him. Austria had the strongest interest in avoiding whatever tended to endanger the stability she might be called on to defend. She had besides the strongest obligation to avoid it. When a Power undertakes by force of arms to guard a system from infraction, no one would deny that she is equitably bound to abstain from measures which, positively are, or demonstrably tend to be, one. If any one was under an engagement to protect an edifice from fire, you would not say he was at liberty to act, from time to time, as an incendiary within it. A mass of arguments beyond my power to convey, beyond the patience of the