of buildings which stopped up Parliament | £200,000 was to be applied either to Street, even at an increased expense, would pulling down that block of buildings at once produce the desired improvement. which obstructed Parliament Street, to When the New Foreign Office was built, embanking the south side of the Thames, the street so widened, with the Abbey, or to some other of those metropolitan the Houses of Parliament, and the Foreign improvements which were now standOffice combined, would present one of the ing still for want of funds. It was finest architectural effects in the metro- no boon to the lessees to be allowed to polis. But the plan of the right hon. Gen-pay for the embankment. They did not tleman was to leave that block of build- desire it, and it was not an original plan ings standing. Parliament Street was to of Mr. Gore; but they were perfectly be unimproved, and the crossing at Bridge ready, as they had stated throughout, to Street was to be made worse than ever, follow out any arrangement which might because the traffic at Westminster Bridge be proposed by the Crown, and which was to be met by a new line of traffic upon the fullest investigation should be running at right angles with it from the pronounced to be for the public advantage. embankment; and whereas two police- Mr. Gore proposed to effect a great saving men were now needed to keep the traffic by laying a burden on the lessees. The in order at Bridge Street, four would here- lessees did not seek it, but they were perafter be needed, besides two policemen at fectly willing to submit to that burden. Westminster Bridge, to prevent the con- That was the alternative plan submitted fusion which would inevitably occur there. to the Commission by Mr. Pennethorne, But that was not all. The Commission which had been so carefully kept from the took evidence as to no less than twenty- knowledge of the House. It was received two lines of railway which were to run by the Commission as ungraciously as along the roadway and to have a terminus possible. They heard Mr. Pennethorne, about Westminster Bridge. Every one bowed him out, and never recalled him; knew that railway stations increased and and although fifty-nine other projectors created traffic, and yet one of the means of were examined before the Committee, and relieving the pressure at Westminster some of them recalled more than once, Bridge which the Committee gravely in- the same courtesy was never extended quired into was to create a terminus with- to him. The plans and estimates of the in fifty yards of it. The objection made fifty-nine projectors appeared in the apto taking away the block of buildings was pendix to the Report, but Mr. Pennethat it would be expensive. The Office thorne's plan was not placed there, and no of Works put it at £300,000, and Mr. Pen- mention was made of it. There could be nethorne estimated it at half that sum; no other reason for that than that the Combut considering that the Bill was to au- mission had entered on their duties with thorize a total expenditure of £2,000,000, a foregone conclusion, and would entersurely £300,000 was not too much for a tain nothing which militated against it. project which would be one of the most Mr. Gore's plan was not original, neither important improvements in the metropo- was Mr. Pennethorne's. The plan of a lis. Mr. Gore was prepared for that, and roadway stopping at Whitehall Stairs was prepared to remedy it; again, not was also found in the office, as recomby any plan of his own, but by an ar- mended by the Royal Commission of rangement which he found in his office 1844. It was curious to look at the under a minute of Lord Bessborough, and names of the persons on that Commission, sanctioned, if not originated, by the late and to contrast the notions which GovernSir Robert Peel. He told the lessees at ment and the public entertained in those that meeting, that as by Mr. Penne- days of the composition of a Royal Comthorne's plan the roadway could not be mission with those which seemed now to carried along the whole of the proposed prevail. On that Commission were Lord embankment, he was prepared to recomLincoln, Lord Colborne, Mr. Herries, Sir mend that the Crown should pay for the Robert Inglis, Mr. Gally Knight, Sir Charles embankment and remunerate itself by an Lemon, Mr. Milne, Mr. Gore, Sir Charles increased charge on the lessees. That Barry, and Sir Robert Smirke. Every elework had been estimated at £90,000, the ment of inquiry was carefully included in compensation to the lessees might be as that list. The Government was represented much more, or say half as much more, by Ministers of the Crown, the public by and that sum of from £100,000 to Members of Parliament, the office by Mr. which it would not be proper for them to anti- Gore and Mr. Milne; and as in those days it was felt that in all matters of metropolitan improvement taste should be combined with utility, there were placed on that Commission gentlemen such as Lord Cockburn and Sir Robert Inglis, and they were assisted by the professional experience of Sir Robert Smirke and Sir Charles Barry. Such names as these were calculat-mittee; so that the public, and not the ed to inspire confidence in the public, and were not to be compared with the homogeneous batch of paid functionaries by which the President of the Board of Works had indicated his idea of how a Royal Commission should be constituted. Against the gentlemen on the last Commission, neither he nor any one else could have anything to say individually; but if an impartial inquiry was desired, the right hon. Gentleman might just as well have gazetted seven junior clerks in his own office. In the autumn of last year both these plans, the plan of the Commission and Mr. Gore's plan, were submitted by the two offices of Woods and Works to the Treasury. On the 13th of February the Treasury wrote thus to the President of the Board of Works "The question at issue between the departments of Woods and Works turns upon the degree of importance which may be attached to the plan for continuing the public roadway along the whole line of the proposed embankment, or to the alternative plan of commencing the public road from a point below the Crown property at Whitehall." right hon. Gentieman, might be the judges in this matter. Had not the public as much faith in Mr. Gore as in his right hon. Friend? It was evident that the Government had, because it declined to judge between them. And now he hoped the House would ask why the alternative plan of Mr. Pennethorne was entirely suppressed, and why they were forced either to take the plan embodied in the Bill or none at all. The subsequent proceedings increased in interest. It was known that a correspondence on the subject had taken place, and accordingly notice of motion was given for its production. The First Commissioner declined to produce it, and gave as his reason that it was too voluminous. That was to say, upon a project which was to cost £2,000,000, and on which a blue-book was about to be published, that correspondence, forming, perhaps, the most important part of the case, was not worth the expense of a few pounds to print. Then came the Committee, which the First Commissioner wished to nominate himself. The right hon. GenIn those words the Treasury stated the tleman (Mr. Bouverie) objected, requiring real question at issue. It was not, as that the Committee should be judicial, the right hon. Gentleman the First Com- and that, as so many private interests were missioner, for his own purposes, had un-involved, it should be nominated by the fairly represented it, a question between Committee of Selection. At last a comthe public and the lessees, but between promise was effected, the First Commistwo departments of the Government, one sioner nominating seven members, while of them presided over by the First Com-five were nominated by the Committee of missioner, new in his office, representing Selection. Hitherto the Crown lessecs only the Government of the day, with its had been neutral, but now they were comnecessities and its devices; the other under pelled to come more prominently forward. the charge of a public servant of great On a Bill of that nature the Crown had experience, representing the interests both no power of appearing before the Comof the public and the Crown, and by his mittee, because it had a power of veto duty under obligation to defend both from before the third reading in the Lords. the mischievous assaults of a temporary Nor had the general public any power of official who might be bidding for the sup- appearing by petition or otherwise. Howport of Parliamentary followers or influ- ever pernicious the Bill might be, and ential journalists. These two rival plans however injurious to public rights, the of rival functionaries were submitted to public had no means of petitioning or apthe Treasury, and what did they say about pearing against it, except through some them? The Treasury declined to adjudi- private individual, whose interests were cate between them, aud, in the same letter affected. The Crown lessees were therefrom which he had already quoted, said-fore compelled to appear, representing the "My Lords feel that these are questions upon Crown and the public as well as them selves they did not, as had been stated, | hon. Member for Coventry had been the proput themselves voluntarily forward; the jector of the old scheme, and that the hon. rules of Parliament forced them to appear, Member for Finsbury took a lively interest that being the only way to secure a hear- in it also. Having given that sketch of ing and get justice done to the public. the proceedings upon this question for the Accordingly, they appeared by petition, last three years, he would next appeal to and the first act of their counsel was once the House and to the First Commissioner, more to ask for the correspondence which in what respect had the Duke of Buccleuch they said was absolutely necessary to the committed any offence against the public proper conduct of the inquiry. The answer interest? On the part of the public, and given by the Chairman was, not that the for the satisfaction of the public, they had correspondence was too voluminous, but a right to an answer. His right hon. that it was not relevant to the inquiry, Friend had heard those charges; he knew and would only divert the minds of the they had been widely disseminated; he Committee from the true subject before had admitted that he had been in correthem. Could any one understand how spondence with the parties who were such an answer could be given by any making them, and therefore they had a gentleman capable, as his right hon. Friend right to know from him-did he believe was, of knowing what was the relevancy these charges to be true, or did he not of correspondence to an inquiry? How know them to be entirely false? He asked ever, the Committee, like the House of the question, not as a matter of courtesy, Commons, ignorant of the nature of the but on behalf of the public as a matter of correspondence, were again satisfied by the strict right. Was it not evident that the assurance given, and the correspondence Duke of Buccleuch did not take the iniwas not moved for. In the course of tiative either in supporting or in opposing Mr. Gore's examination, however, it was any plan? Two plans were presented to elicited that he had sent in a report to the him, emanating from two Government Treasury, and then it could no longer be departments. The First Commissioner of withheld. The report was given in; but Works was opposed by the First Comit was not until the Committee had sat for missioner of Woods, and the First Comseveral days that they had ever heard of missioner of Woods was attempted to be Mr. Pennethorne's plan or of Mr. Gore's snuffed out by the First Commissioner of report. It was not till the Committee had Works. In that civil war, for which the come to their main conclusion, and had Duke of Buccleuch furnished the ground almost finished their Report, that they be- of battle, he was compelled to take a part. came aware of the real nature of the cor- He had no alternative. He preferred respondence and of the expectation of the the plan which he felt was best for the Treasury that the alternative plan would public interest, and the Committee of the be laid before Parliament. No sooner did House of Commons, after a careful, lathe Committee hear the conclusive evi-borious, and conscientious inquiry, endence of Mr. Pennethorne, and peruse the report of Mr. Gore, than, without waiting to hear the counsel on the same side, they came at once to a resolution in favour of Mr. Pennethorne's plan by a majority of Let the House contrast the seven to four. He saw the names of the proceedings of the First Commissioner Committee commented on a good deal out with those of the Duke of Buccleuch, and of doors. In the majority were Sir John then say on which side was the undue Shelley, Lord Robert Montagu, Mr. Craw-influence. The First Commissioner had ford, Lord Harry Vane, Mr. Ker Seymer, for three years been working assiduously Mr. Garnett, and Sir William Jolliffe; and at his project-first, through the Comin the minority were Sir Morton Peto, Sir mittee of 1860-a favourable Committee, Joseph Paxton, Colonel Knox, and Mr. Pol-nominated by himself; then, through a lard-Urquhart. He would not say anything to hurt the feelings of any of his hon. Friends; but certainly, if the Committee of Selection had had the nomination of the Committee, the names of Sir Morton Peto and Sir Joseph Paxton would not have appeared upon it, because he had always understood that the dorsed his judgment. But it was said the Duke of Buccleuch was too strong for his right hon. Friend and the Committee; he overbore them by the exercise of undue influence. Royal Commission in 1861-a favourable Commission, nominated by himself; and that year by a Bill prepared under his own direction. He had enjoyed the advantage of the most eminent counsel, a large choice of witnesses, unusual facilities (of which he had not been slow to avail himself) for producing or suppressing evidence, absolute command of public money for his expenses, the whole influence of the Government, the support of one popular and powerful organ of the 'press, and lastly the nomination of the Committee with himself as Chairman. Now, contrast with that the conduct and position of the Duke of Buccleuch. For two years, while the right hon. Gentleman was active, he was passive. At the outset he might, if he had chosen, have invited the Crown lessees to meet and organize an opposition to the scheme of the right hon. Gentleman. He might, through his friends in that House, have given a very different complexion to the Committee of 1860. He might have secured the appointment of at least one independent Member upon the Commission of 1861. He might have opposed the second reading of the Bill, on the ground that Mr. Pennethorne's plan was burked. He might have insisted on an earlier production of the correspondence. He might have obtained support for the Motion of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Bouverie), that the Committee of that year should not be nominated by the First Commissioner, with himself as Chairman. The Duke of Buccleuch did none of these things. He made no stir. He used no political or personal influence of any kind whatever. When the Committee of that House was named-a Committee which was no respecter of persons, before whom the peasant and the peer met as equals then the noble Duke presented himself in the same attitude as the poorest inhabitant of Westminster who could afford to fee counsel. The Duke of Buccleuch petitioned, as an humble petitioner, for that justice which, in this land of liberty, was as open to the poor as to the rich, and was not open to the poor to the exclusion of the rich. He appealed for justice before a tribunal nominated and presided over by his opponent, and therefore not unduly favourable to him, and he got a verdict so favourable to himself, and so condemnatory to his opponents, that they were compelled to resort to practices hitherto unknown in the history of Parliament to cover their confusion and defeat; and, not content with assailing and insulting the petitioners against the Bill, they insulted the House of Commons itself, by charging its Committee with the new crime of cringing servility to a duke. There was not a man of education and understanding in that House, or a man out of it, who did not know that there was not a Member of the Committee who would condescend for a moment to ask whether the persons before him were peers or paupers. And now, had not the House begun to perceive why the Duke of Buccleuch's name had been brought so prominently before them, when he was only one of a body of lessees, whose property was as valuable to them as his was to him; and who were ready to avowor any one of them ought to be ashamed if they did not avow-that they were as deserving of obloquy and odium as he was? The reason was very obvious. If the Bill had been defeated by the opposition of a body of unknown or obscure individuals, it would have been said to have fallen on its own merits; but by selecting a duke whose new mansion stood conspicuously open to the remark-at least, suggesting the idea that its owner must be in opposition to the people, by exaggerating his power and blackening his character, a new and false issue was raised, and a cry got up against ducal influence. It was made a question of public rights against aristocratic usurpation. Extraneous matter was brought in, and new and false versions of old stories were got up, with the view of exciting a prejudice against the noble Duke. Thus, one candid writer reminded the public of a tow-path at Richmond, in order to fix on the noble Duke a responsibility that attached to his grandfather. Another denounced the monopoly of a harbour at Granton, which the Duke had been so wicked as to make on his own property, and out of his own funds, and to which the public had flocked in such numbers as to show that it was a great public benefit. That harbour had cost more than £250,000, which sum might, indeed, return to his Grace's heirs, but was lost to him. They had raked up an old story about Montagu House, to show that the Duke of Buccleuch sold his political influence for a new lease of a house. Ought political and personal matters to be imported into the matter? Was it not disgraceful that they should have been imported into it? Who had done it? Who had instigated it? Who was responsible for it? But what must that cause be which required to be propped by such means? He had made a statement of what was done by the Duke of Buccleuch in regard to the Bill. He had done so as a public man, speaking to those who were engaged in conducting a public inquiry; but he should not feel that he had discharged his duty fearlessly and honestly Commission and the Committee were oneif he did not go one step further. He side. The Treasury, taking a fair and would state what he knew from personal impartial view of the question, said that knowledge of the character and conduct the House should have the alternative of the Duke of Buccleuch since his Grace plan before them. The House and the came before the world. That character Committee called for the correspondence. and that conduct ought to have protected Neither the one nor the other got it. him from those insults. It did so happen This being so, he could not but think that during a long political struggle he that the right hon. Gentleman had acted had ample opportunities of observing the unfairly towards the House, disingeDuke of Buccleuch's conduct. He did nuously towards the Committee, and inso with certainly no prejudice in fa- juriously to the public interests. vour of his Grace, who, during the time MR. COWPER said, he did not think to which he referred, was on the un- this an occasion on which he could permit popular side. He was bound to state himself to follow the right hon. Gentlethe conviction forced on his mind during man through the personalities on which the heat of that political warfare-a con- he had spent so much time, and he altoviction which, within the last twenty gether declined to enter into any disyears, he had frequently given expression cussion on the private character of the to in private when the character of great Duke of Buccleuch, which was not, he landed proprietors was the subject of con- was happy to say, the question before the versation. He had formed a high stan-House. He begged to assure the right dard of the duties that devolved upon hon. Gentleman that he had no right to great proprietors, and he now for the call him an opponent of the Duke of Bucfirst time in public declared what he had cleuch. He could not follow the right often stated in private-that the present hon. Gentleman in the soaring flights of Duke of Buccleuch approached as near to imagination and fancy in which he had that standard as any man living. Bring- panegyrized that noble Duke, but he had ing an active energy to whatever he un- the greatest respect for him. He believed dertook, and undertaking what he believed him to be a good landlord and highwould be generally beneficial, spirited as spirited gentleman, and an honest and he was rich, and the unostentatious pro- straightforward man. He thought his moter of good works, an earnest but high- Grace's evidence before the Committee did minded politician, a man combining ac- him credit. He made no disguises; he tive business habits with a love of all said he came to stand up for his rights. manly sports, his private life without a But when he was put forward as a man stain, his public character without a blot- who had been ill-treated-when an hon. he did in his heart believe that the Duke Member thought it chivalrous and couraof Buccleuch presented to his countrymen, geous to come to the assistance of that as near as any man living, an example of ill-treated Duke-he must take the liberty all that could render one of the richest in of expressing his opinion that the noble the land an ornament to the peerage and Duke got ample justice at the hands of an honour to the country. Had the Duke the Committee. If the evidence was of Buccleuch had fair play? Had the sifted, and the divisions were examined, House of Commons had fair play? Had they would be found not to betoken the the Committee had fair play when the slightest want of indulgence towards his correspondence had not been laid before Grace. He had never attacked the noble them? It was only after they had Duke; but he said now he was very been kept in the dark as to the real sorry his Grace should be put in such character of the question they had to a position that his interests were in opjudge, that they allowed themselves to position to those of the public. He was be surprised into the resolution which sorry his Grace had not adopted the brought upon them all those charges of course which he thought he should have weakness and vacillation which could taken had he been placed in a similar never have been made if the case had position. He thought that under such been properly brought before the Com- circumstances he should have submitted to mittee. The First Commissioner threw the little inconvenience of a public road himself into the matter before he was near his house rather than have insisted warm in his office. He determined that on privacy and endeavoured to stop so the public should have no voice. The great, so urgent a public convenience as |