NARRATIVE OF PARLIAMENT AND POLITICS.

BOTH Houses of Parliament re-assembled on Tuesday,
the 23rd inst.

In the HOUSE OF LORDS the LORD CHANCELLOR
communicated a letter from Admiral Dundas, acknowledging
the resolutions of thanks to himself and the
officers and men of the Black Sea Fleet.

The Earl of ELLENBOROUGH gave notice that on
Thursday next he should move for a Return of the
Number of Troops sent out to the Crimea, distinguishing
the infantry, cavalry, and sailors, and also the
number of killed, wounded, sick, and otherwise
disabled.

Earl GREY gave notice that on Thursday next he
should ask a question of Her Majesty's Government
respecting the Orders sent out to the Commander-in-Chief
at the Cape of Good Hope to send home the 12th
and 91st Regiments.

The Duke of RICHMOND moved for a copy of the
order Granting Medals to the Army in the Crimea. He
called attention to the omission of the troops engaged at
Balaklava. When your lordships (said the Duke) consider
the terms of the despatch in which the battle of Balaklava
was commmunicated by Lord Raglan, who must be
regarded as a pretty good judge of what took place, you
must acknowledge that the conduct of the Scotch
Highlanders in resisting the attack of a vast numerically
greater body of Russians was worthy to be deemed a
victory; and although overmatched by numbers, as they
ultimately were, it was impossible that greater bravery
could be displayed. Your lordships ought never to forget,
the country can never forget, the splendid conduct
of the Light Cavalry under the command of my noble
friend, whom I am happy to see in his place, when
making a charge in pursuance of orders, which I
venture to say it was utterly impossible to carry out.
When they found these men, hemmed in as they were
by infantry, swept from the field by a continuous discharge
of grapeshot, and attacked by an overwhelming
force of cavalry, still retiring in full and complete order,
surely no man could say that the battle of Balaklava was
not worthy of being deemed a victory. Did not the
enemy attempt to turn your flank? Did they not
attempt to raise the siege of Sebastopol? And was it
not owing to the gallant bearing and heroic conduct of
the soldiers at the battle of Balaklava that the siege of
Sebastopol was not raised? Would this country then,
when appealed to, say, that the men so engaged, though
not the strongest in the conflict, were not worthy of a
reward of merit? I know that I must live to a very
late period before I shall ever again have to speak of such
actions as those to which I have now alluded. I wish
to ask my noble friend (the Duke of Newcastle) upon
what ground it is that he has not given this clasp to the
men engaged at the battle of Balaklava? I wish also to
ask him, whether it is not the intention of the Government
to give a copy of the medal to the sailors who
landed, and who shared in the dangers and participated
in the victories of the army? I wish to know why,
when undergoing the same dangers, and discharging
equally onerous duties, there should be one rule
applied to the soldier, and another to the sailor? It is not
necessary for me to state the great value which both
soldiers and sailors attach to the possession of medals
commemorative of the actions in which they have
distinguished themselves. It is admitted that they do
estimate the possession of those medals most highly. Of
what use is a vote of thanks by Parliament to a soldier?
He might possibly read a paper signed by the Lord
Chancellor, and which may do all very well so long as
the man remains in his regiment, or in his ship
unwounded; but when he becomes a sufferer, and goes
back to his village no longer able to serve his country,
what then has he to show that he was present in the
action in which he has received his disabling wounds?
That, then, was the object of a medal. It does what no
vote of thanks can do. When the veteran warrior
returns to his domestic hearth, his bosom glows with
pride as he displays in his breast a token that he, too,
has done some service to his country. I must also
express my regret that medals are not to be given to the
representatives of those who fell in action. I do not
think there is any good reason for such a rule. Formerly,
the objection to the rule scarcely existed, because the
conferring of medals and rewards was so long delayed
that it would have been attended with great difficulty to
find out the persons to whom the medals should be
awarded. But no such difficulty is to be encountered
now. The mode of distributing the fund, supported by
Her Majesty and which has done such vast credit to the
people of England for the manner in which they have
subscribed to it, affords ample means of finding out the
representatives of those who have fallen in the Crimea.
Meritorious as the raising of that fund undoubtedly is,
still I could have wished that it had been a compulsory
tax on the people at large. I wish it in justice to the
good, liberal, and generous portion of that people; for
it is well known that the peacemongers, be they few or
be they many, have made that cry an excuse not to
subscribe at all. Means, then, being found to ascertain who
are the proper recipients of the fund thus raised, the same
means may be used to discover persons to whom should
be given the rewards of honour and of merit. I apologise
for bringing this subject before the house, but it is a subject
on which I feel most deeply. I am most anxious that
justice should be done to our army in the Crimea, for
in no period of our history can any instance be quoted
where gratitude to our military force was more justly
due. The bravery of our men under dangers of every
kind has been almost unexampled, and the privations
they have had to undergo must be admitted by every
one to be of no ordinary character. Well, my lords, for
what is it, after all, that I am now making any appeal
to Her Majesty's ministers? Were any man to come
into this house at the present moment, he would suppose
that I was asking for a large grant of public money
with which to reward those brave and heroic men whose
cause I now plead; but, my lords, all I ask is, that
those men, when they return to their country, may go
to their homes and cheer their domestic hearths by
displaying to their kindred and friends some lasting
token of a nation's gratitude for the services they have
rendered and the sufferings they have endured.—The
Duke of NEWCASTLE said, Considering the interesting
nature of the subject which my noble friend has brought
under the notice of your lordships, I am confident that
your lordships will feel that he has no need of apologising
for engaging the attention of the house, but that, on the
contrary, every one must feel the greatest interest in a
question which involves the honourable reward of those
gallant men who have fought the battles of their