induced ministers to acquiesce in a clause which would
subject to forfeiture arms borne by persons in processions,
&c., forbidden by the bill itself.

On the 11th, Earl GRANVILLE moved the second
reading of the Railway Audit Bill, and after recapitulating
the details of the measure alluded to the bill
prepared by certain shareholders of the North-Western
Railway, to which the government could not give their
support, because it would not secure a continuous and
independent audit. Lord STANLEY would not oppose the
second reading of the bill if the government would
promise not to press it forward too rapidly. He had been
requested to take charge of the other audit bill, to which
Lord Granville had alluded, and though he was little
versed in railway matters himself, he hoped the house
would not object to have the bill printed; and trusted
that though the government bill might be read a second
time, yet its rival would receive a due share of consideration.
Lord MONTEAGLE again expressed his satisfaction
that the government had taken this question up, and
hoped the house would remember the immense amount
of property sunk in railways, as well as the fact that the
accounts of those companies had got into such confusion
that no confidence was placed in them. Public
confidence could only be restored by an independent audit,
and as he could not support the government bill in all
its parts, he thought the better course would be to send
both bills to a select committee, which could take the
evidence of gentlemen connected with railways and
conversant with financial matters. Lord GRANVILLE undertook
not to hurry the bill on without affording due time
for consideration; and it was read a second time.

On the14th Earl Grey moved the second reading of
the Convict Prison Bill. The system which the
government designed to follow as regards the graver
class of criminals was explained by him to include a
preliminary imprisonment in this country, in which separate
confinement (for a term not exceeding eighteen months),
education, industrial instruction, and various species of
corrective discipline were to be employed successively
or altogether for the purpose of reforming the convicts.
The principal alterations contemplated by the government
were that penal labour, which had always formed
part of the sentence of transportation, should be effected
where it could be more clearly superintended by the
government, as at Gibraltar or Malta; and that penal
labour should be preceded by a period of separate
imprisonment. They also proposed that the convicts
sentenced to transportation should be removed from this
country, not in a penal condition, but with conditional
pardons—as exiles, instead of convicts under sentence.
Lord Grey further entered into details, to show the useful
purposes which the convicts had been made to serve
in New South Wales. Various contrivances were now
to be added to increase their utility, and protect the
colonists from danger or expense. Free emigration was
also to be encouraged, so as to avoid the danger of having
the settlement swamped with a criminal population.
For this purpose the legislative grants for emigration
would be available, as also to transmit their wives and
families to such convicts as should deserve that privilege.
The bill was read a second time.

The Greek Question was again brought forward on
the 15th. Lord Stanley said that there were facts on
which he required direct information. He had understood
that, from the period of the acceptance of French
mediation, hostilities should cease, and that reprisals
had been confined to Greek vessels of war, yet that
limitation had been set at nought. After referring to
several public papers, his lordship complained that Lord
Palmerston's despatch to Mr. Wyse of the 8th of
February, which ought to have contained instructions
to cease hostilities, was silent on the point, and the
British fleet was consequently placed in an unworthy
situation. It had been altogether unnecessary to
blockade and capture. France and Russia expected
that, on the mediation of the former, hostilities should
immediately cease, and, though the necessary instructions
had been left out of the packet, that so trifling a
circumstance should not endanger the peace of the
world. We were bound to protect the Ionian Islands,
and, with France and Russia, to guarantee the
independence of Greece. It was the more necessary to
ensure a good understanding with France and Russia
respecting Greece, as on the good understanding with
those powers depended the peace of the world.—The
Marquis of LANSDOWNE, after admitting that the noble
lord had confined himself to facts, replied that, on the
5th of February, though the French ambassador stated
that he was not authorised by his government to make
an offer on the subject of the affairs of Greece in form,
yet that a private letter, dated the 5th of February, was
sent by Lord Palmerston to Mr. Wyse, directing him to
discontinue the then existing state of things. On the
7th, the French government made a formal offer, and
instructions were instantly sent in duplicate, viâ Naples
and viâ Marseilles, on the l5th and 16th of February,
to Mr. Wyse, and were carried out by him on the 1st of
March. Even before those instructions the blockade
had been discontinued by Sir W. Parker. The reprisals
had been limited to a sufficient sum to cover the demand
made on the Greek government.

On Monday the 18th, Lord BROUGHAM called attention
to the constitution of the House of Lords and the
Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as Courts of
Appeal from the Decisions of our Colonial Tribunals,
and quoted a number of statistics to show their inadequacy
to these duties. He praised the education now
given at the East India College at Haileybury, and
impressed upon the government the importance of selecting
highly qualified judges for our colonial possessions,
strongly condemning the paltry salaries of judicial
functionaries there, and the miserable policy which, by
paying them insufficiently, and refusing them retiring
pensions, prevented the best lawyers from accepting
these appointments. He concluded by moving a series
of resolutions in accordance with his speech. The
resolutions were laid upon the table and ordered to be
printed.

A little Personal Sparring, between Lords Brougham
and Stanley, amused the house on the 21st. Lord
BROUGHAM, in referring to the contemplated exhibition
in 1851 of the works of all nations, alluded to the
circumstance of his having been designated by Lord
Stanley at the Lord Mayor's dinner on the previous
evening, as his "volatile friend." "Volatile," said
Lord Brougham, "means flighty; but I, to answer a
speech made in my presence in the House of Lords,
have never flown to the House of Mayors."—Lord
STANLEY was sorry he had occasioned disquietude to
his noble and learned and very grave and discreet
friend; but he had been "somewhat volatile." "In
point of acuteness, activity, rapidity, and pungency, sal
volatile is nothing when compared with my noble and
learned friend. You may put a stopper of glass or
leather on that etherial essence; but I defy any human
power, even that of my noble and learned friend
himself, to put any stopper, either of glass, or leather, or
any other material, over the activity, ingenuity, and
pungency of his mind. Volatile his wit and readiness
of humour are, but acrimonious or offensive never; that
I shall at all times be prepared to deny. I hope the
long friendship between us will not be disturbed for a
single moment by the expression I used. I will form a
more correct estimate of his character: I will look on
him, not as one of those great, rapid, and energetic
men, who take part in any and every question—and
come in with such velocity that they seem not many
questions but one continuous question; but as a man of
a grave, serious, plodding, and rather slow and heavy
nature—not hasty in taking up a subject, nor in laying
it down—nor in expressing his opinion upon it—unless
he had previously considered it in every light and in
every bearing. If my noble and learned friend will put
himself under my tuition—and, considering the
constancy with which he favours us with his company on
this side of the house—I may perhaps venture to give
him one hint: it is, that when my noble and learned
friend favours us with his sincere opinions he should not
give them so much an air of irony, and that when he
wants to promote an object like the Exhibition of 1851
he should not throw out a sarcasm that is calculated to
deter people from supporting it—to make them think
that they are great fools if they suffer themselves to be
deluded by it. He should separate that which is serious
from that which is ironical. And if his real desire was,