system which, upon an emergency, gave very efficient
results. During the last few weeks it had been seen
how the machinery worked. A larger force had been
prepared for embarkation than the Duke of Wellington
had taken with him to Waterloo, showing that the
different departments could work harmoniously together;
and he looked, he said, with great alarm at a motion
which pledged the house to put this machinery
immediately out of gear, in order to introduce another
which might possess a greater degree of theoretical
perfection. He therefore hoped Mr. Hume would not
press his motion.—After some further discussion in
which Lord Seymour, Sir J. Pakington, Mr. Ellice, and
Lord John Russell took part, the motion was withdrawn.

On Friday, March 3, Lord JOHN RUSSELL gave his
reason for Postponing the Bill for Amending the
Representation of the People, the second reading of which had
been fixed for the 13th of March. When that subject
was recommended to the attention of Parliament by her
Majesty at the opening of the session, it was still uncertain
whether we were to be involved in hostilities; but
in the existing state of our foreign relations, it was
impossible for the government to ask the house to give
their attention to such a measure, consistently with the
two objects which at present were of paramount importance,
that of obtaining the supplies necessary for the
public service, and that of obtaining the ways and
means by which the state might be enabled to defray
the additional expenditure entailed by the imminence
of war. The negotiations for peace had unfortunately
led to no result, and the governments of England and
France had therefore signified to the Emperor of Russia
that they would consider the continued occupation of
the Principalities beyond a certain fixed period as a
declaration of war. An answer would reach this
country in about twenty-five days from the despatch of
the messengers at the end of last month, and therefore
there was every probability that towards the close of
the present month it would be the duty of the Ministers
of the Crown to bring down a message to Parliament
declaring, in the usual terms, that all relations with the
government of Russia were broken off. He entertained
the hope that when the day he should now name
arrived, the state of affairs might be such as would
enable the house to consider the subject, though
that was uncertain. In the meantime the bills for
Scotland and Ireland would be matured and brought
in. The day on which he should now propose to
proceed with the measure was that immediately following
the Easter holidays, Thursday, the 27th April. Lord
John Russell's statement was heard with breathless
attention by a full house, and called forth a good deal
of comment.—Sir J. PAKINGTON did not object to the
postponement of the bill, but objected to a course of
conduct by which the country had been excited and misled.
The explanation of the noble lord was humiliating and
discreditable to her Majesty's government; if the bill
ought not to be persevered in, it ought not to have been
introduced.—Mr. HUME thought it was not acting fairly
to throw doubts on the sincere intentions of her Majesty's
government in reference to this question. Such a
course was neither generous nor practical, nor likely to
find support. He certainly agreed with Sir J. Pakington
in thinking that the bill ought not to have been
introduced if it were not to be persevered with, but he should
never think so basely of the motives and purposes of the
noble lord as had been insinuated.—Sir G. GREY could
not give credit to the opposition for patriotism in the
course they had pursued. It was true the supplies had
been voted, but they got up night after night to depreciate
the government, and endeavour to weaken it at a
moment when union and energy were of the highest
importance.—Mr. DISRAELI thought that Lord J.
Russell ought, at the opening of the session, to have
made a frank confession that the existing state of affairs
did not admit of a consideration of the subject of
Parliamentary reform. It was unfortunate that the
country should have a minister who was continually
laying siege to its institutions, and one, too, who, though
unable to pass his measures, still remained in office.
Mr. Disraeli threw out prognostications of disaster in
the approaching war, intermingling criticisms on the
ministerial reform measure, its proposers, and
supporters. The present government, he said, had been
formed on four bases of political action, all of which had
been falsified—the extension of free trade, the
maintenance of peace, the encouragement of public education,
and the concession of a great measure of Parliamentary
reform.—Lord J. RUSSELL defended the course taken
by ministers, and challenged the opposition, if they
were not satisfied, to bring forward a vote of want of
confidence. The proposal of a measure of organic
change in a time of foreign war was by no means new
or unprecedented. Lord Somers having proposed the
Act of Union with Scotland during the war of the
Spanish succession, and Mr. Pitt that of union with
Ireland during the heats of the French revolutionary
struggles. He utterly denied the right of Sir J. Shelley
to speak in the name of the Reformers of England, nor
would his conduct in the slightest degree depend upon
questions asked of him or taunts addressed to him by
the hon. baronet. He thought an extension of the
constituent body, and the consequent strengthening of
our representative constitution, objects of great public
consequence, and he was confirmed in this by the
conduct of the people during the revolutionary
disturbance of 1848.

On Monday, March 6, the CHANCELLOR of the
EXCHEQUER brought forward the Budget. In making
the financial statement of the year, he said that ministers
had been induced to select this early day in order that
foreign nations might be aware of the promptitude with
which parliament was prepared to find the ways and means
for carrying on the struggle in which we were about to
be embarked, and also that the house might be enabled
fully to consider them, as war entailed the disagreeable
consequence of increased expenditure. The estimate of
the revenue made last April was £52,990,000, the account
now presented showed an actual produce of £54,025.000;
giving an improvement of £1,035,000. The expenditure
provided for during last session had not reached its
utmost limits; the estimate was £52,183,000, the actual
expenditure, though swelled by demands connected with
the pending military operations, was only £51,171,000,
being £1,012,000 less than estimated. So far as might
be judged from the eleven months of the financial year
which had now elapsed, the actual surplus to be declared
when the account was struck on the 5th April would be
£2,854,000. The total amount of reductions of customs
duties made during last session which were to come into
immediate effect, was £1,483,000. The total produce of
the customs during the past year was £20,600,000,
showing an increase of £204,000 over the preceding year.
The reduction of the tea duties had given the consumer
a relief of £950,000; the estimated loss was £366,000,
the actual loss £375,000. The estimated produce of the
excise had been £14,640,000; the actual produce was
£15,170,000. The estimated loss upon stamps during
the half-year in which the reduction was to take effect,
was £37,000 but, instead of falling off, the receipt had
actually improved to the extent of £36,000. Having
stated the effect of the reductions, he proceeded to state
the result of the measures adopted for the extension
and augmentation of certain taxes during the last
session. First, as regarded the Irish income-tax, the
estimated yield was £460,000, the actual yield £480,000;
so that the result of the measure had fully answered the
expectations with which the tax was imposed. With
regard to the extension downwards of the income-tax in
Great Britain to persons with incomes of £100 a year,
he could state that it would yield at least as much as he
had calculated upon—£250,000. The augmentation of
the spirit-duty in Scotland had been estimated to yield
£218,000; the actual produce might be stated at
£209,000, a diminution attributable to the strong
religious feeling which had sprung up there against the
consumption of spirits. The increase of the same duty in
Ireland would yield £213,000, instead of £198,000 at
which it had been estimated. As regarded the succession
duty he saw no reason to depart from the
conjectural computations he had formed last year, but the
effect of the postponement which had taken place would
not permit him to take its produce, even for the year
1854-1855, at more than £500,000. The whole facts he
had stated showed that the finances of the country were
on a sound and solid footing. The estimate of the