House of Lords, March, 15, [1850].

The Earl of Mountcashell rose, pursuant to notice, and made the following motion:-

" That there be laid before this house, a return of all the penalties imposed and levied on owners, masters, captains and others, for breaches of the act of 5th and 6th of Victoria, known by the name of the "Passengers Act," since the said act came into force; specifying the amount of fine, the year when such penalty was imposed, the period when paid, how such penalty was disposed of, the name of the ship, the name of the offender, and the offence he committed ; together with the name of the port where the party was convicted, and the officer who enforced it." He said that he had delayed making this motion at the request of the noble earl at the head of the Colonial Department who had told their lordships that they ought, to make themselves acquainted with the contents of the documents from the Colonial Office which had been laid upon their table, before they proceeded to consider the present motion. That certainly was sufficient reason for postponement, and he, following the advice of the noble earl, had done all in his power to make himself master of the information which those documents had furnished to their lordships.

But, though these statements were not without considerable effect, upon his mind, yet they by no means deterred him from proceeding with the task that he had undertaken, which was to call the attention of the house to the abuses that occurred, not occasionally but systematically, on board almost all emigrant vessels - not merely the wickedness and the profligacy for which they were notorious, but the infamous frauds that were practised with regard to the supply of provisions. He had received many letters from various quarters on these subjects, and though he intended to advert to a considerable part of those communications, yet there were some points in them on which he should purposely avoid touching. The most cursory glance, however, would at once show there was no safety or protection for female emigrants ; and indeed scarcely anything like fair play for any class of emigrants. When the poor emigrant left his home he usually proceeded to one of the outports, where his troubles really began, and where he became the victim of the most inordinate extortion.

As to young female emigrants, so soon as they were placed on board an Emigrant ship they were deprived of the least security; they were exposed to every means of corruption and profligacy, a condition which chiefly arose in consequence of no sufficient care or attention being paid to the proper selection of officers and surgeons for those vessels - more especially the surgeons, to whom much was confided. It could scarcely be too often said that those surgeons were not selected as they ought to be ; for, as their lordships must be well aware, a great deal of power and authority was intrusted to them. Having now adverted to the sufferings, the injustice, the cruelty with which the emigrants were treated on the voyage, he should merely remind their lordships, that when they landed they were usually placed under the care of the emigration agent. Now the emigration agent was naturally inclined to favour the captain and the officers of the emigration vessels, and the agents generally endeavoured to screen any misdoings on board of emigration ships.

The truth then of any case rarely became known. As to the provisions on board emigration ships nothing could be worse, and nothing which more frequently produced disease and death, but in an especial degree had they a right to complain of the supply of water. Water was supplied by pumping from barges which came alongside the vessels. Now he would mention a case that had occurred in the port of London. It was the practice of the men who worked those barges to go on shore to dinner at a certain fixed hour every day. Upon one occasion it happened that their barge sank and went to the bottom during the dinner hour, and when they raised her it was found that holes had been bored low down in her sides. which caused her to sink ; and what was the fact ? That all this time, instead of supplying pure water, as the bargemen professed to do. they were sending into the ship nothing but the dirty filthy puddle of the Thames below bridge, which flowed through the holes bored in the barge for the express purpose of letting it in. That such water would necessarily lead to disease was a truth upon which it was scarcely necessary for him to insist ; that it had done so was a fact perfectly well attested.

He should come to the subject of meat. It had long been notorious that the passengers in the emigrant-vessels were supplied with a very bad description of food ; that a great deal of bad meat was received on board. those vessels, of which a remarkable instance occurred on board the barque Aden. As soon as they got out to sea the stench from the bad meat made them all so ill that they were glad to creep into any corner of the ship to escape from its dreadful influence. The passengers remonstrated, and the surgeon promised them that when they reached Plymouth, at which port they put in, the evil should be remedied ; but that promise was not fulfilled. He should read the words of the statement that had been furnished to him. "The barque Aden, with 172 passengers, paying their own expenses, left Gravesend on the 16th of last May, and arrived at Port Adelaide on the 11th September. In a statement signed by 86 passengers they say:- " Our first source of complaint and grievance arose out of the manner in which the ship was provisioned. We had good meat till we left Gravesend. but as soon as we got out to sea there arose such a stench as was quite unbearable from some flesh which was boiling in our cook's coppers. This, more than the rolling of the ship, turned us all sick and we went into every out-of-the-way place to avoid the stench. The surgeon declared it would bring on some disorder, and promised to see the Government inspector about it on arrival at Plymouth ; but he did not do so. This meat was given us on three successive days, after leaving Gravesend, and we all became so ill and hungry that we threatened to kill the cats and boil them. On the third day the stuff was left boiling in the coppers, all the passengers having agreed to allow none to be taken between decks, or even out of the cook's boiler.' " What was the inference to be derived from that and similar instances ? The obvious inference was this, - that if the laws were rendered stringent, were then properly enforced, and the offenders punished, the practices of which the country had such just right to complain would cease and disappear altogether. His impression was, that this class of offenders were very rarely punished ; and in those cases in which they were brought to justice, the punishment was always of the most lenient kind. In one case - a North-American emigration ship (the Concord) that came under his notice - the passengers on their landing made application to a magistrate, and he, as was usual in such cases, regarded the offences - as very venial. On account of one case the magistrate inflicted a penalty of 6s. 8d., and then the master of the emigrant-ship compounded with several others at the rate of 5s. a head. He would ask their lordships when they looked at the circumstances, to say what other results could be expected.

The people who went out in those vessels were necessarily very poor and ignorant ; they knew nothing of the law, and it was next to useless for them to appeal to any magistrate: for the sympathies of the magistrates were all with the captains and officers, and all against the unfortunate passengers ; whereas the feeling ought to be all the other way, for good conduct on the part of captains, officers, superintendents and surgeons, was the exception, and evil conduct the rule. He held in his hand various documents, to some of which he would call the attention of the house. One particularly which had reference to the supply of provisions. It was in these words : " I have been at a loss (knowing the great fastidiousness, and properly so, of the masters of London long-voyage ships as to the articles of beef and pork) to account for the large purchases made here from time to time (but more particularly very recently) of the most inferior and lowest priced American beef and pork to be found at this port. It now strikes me that all this bad meat, rejected by our shipmasters in this port, has been purchased by the London contractors for the May emigrant ships, particularly for Australia, now fitting out in London. In the month of November I had occasion to institute particular inquiry as to the stocks of provisions here, and learned from our most respectable dealers and brokers that it consisted of some thousands of tierces of American beef and pork ; which was, with the exception of a small quantity, perfect rubbish ; that our dealers had culled all the good nearly out of some 26,000 tierces of beef, our import; and that what then remained was such as shipmasters and owners would not take." It was thus that the emigrants were treated on their voyages to Australia. It was manifest that not sufficient care was taken in England to appoint proper emigration agents. But, after all, it was not to be denied that those who examined the provisions had rather a difficult task to perform ; for they could not open and examine all the tierces of beef or barrels of pork ; it would not improve the provisions, but rather injure them, it anything of the sort were done.

This state of things, however, sometimes led to very grievous frauds. The captains often concealed in the holds old provisions that they had left over from a previous voyage. Those provisions were generally in the very worst condition - sometimes in a state almost putrid. They were kept concealed till the vessel proceeded out to sea, and such vile food often produced sickness and death. It was found, on calculation, that as many as 1� per cent. of the passengers to Australia died on the voyage, which constituted a very large proportion. There certainly should not be so many in the short space of four months, and for that they had nothing to blame but bad food and bad water. Up to this time he had spoken only of food ; he should read a passage from a newspaper which he held in his hand, called the South Australian News. (It was objected by Earl Grey that the noble lord should confine himself to official documents.) If there were anything thing wrong in the paper the noble earl could answer it.

The passage which he proposed to read consisted chiefly of questions. to which the noble earl might give replies if he thought proper. The passage ran thus :- " We regret to observe that the passengers by two of the vessels, the Aden and John Munn, were anything but satisfied with their treatment. The commanders are charged with dereliction of duty, allowing drunkenness, gambling, and immorality to prevail, and neglecting to serve out sufficient and good provisions. The case of the latter ship, however, appears to have been the worst ; and though the captain held a meeting on the 7th of October to vindicate and exculpate his procedure, he seems to have failed in doing so. About thirty or forty of the passengers were present, some of whom justified his conduct ; and the South Australian Register in noticing the matter makes the following remarks :- " No one impugns his (Captain Pearson's) nautical skill, but did he deny that his vessel was badly provisioned, and that in port many of the passengers were provisioning themselves? Did he deny the open sale of spirits from the caddy during the voyage, even on the Sabbath day ? Did he deny the prevalence of drinking, gambling, and smoking between decks ? Did he deny the connivance at unmoral conduct? Did he discountenance the foolish and dangerous use of fire-arms by way of pastime on deck ? And is he ignorant of the fact that the ship was more than once in danger of being set on fire by such practices? Does he mean to say that, having signed the necessary certificate that the required quantity of provisions was on board, he was not to blame when the passengers were put on short allowance of water and provisions ? Does he deny the use by himself and the officers of vulgar, profane and abusive language towards the passengers ? " The Press, the public feeling of the country, public meetings, the House of Commons in short, every power in the land would compel the noble earl to alter a system which was degrading to the nation and oppressive to Her Majesty's subjects. These things were facts; they ought to be rectified, and as long as he had life he would persist till the atrocity was put a stop to.

He would now call attention to the conduct of the surgeons, and he believed the noble earl had by this time made himself acquainted, with the facts, and was satisfied that what he (the Earl of Mountcashel) had stated was correct. Indeed, he had rather understated than overstated the real circumstances. The blue book which had been laid on the table would amply prove all his charges, and in fact he had derived a vast deal of additional information from it. When their lordships considered how much was intrusted to the surgeon of emigrant vessels, and that it was not enough for them to be merely medical men, but men of character, he thought they would agree with him in thinking that, care should be taken in selecting proper persons for the pest. He had ascertained, however, that little or no attention had been paid at the Colonial-office to the character of the medical officers or surgeon superintendents. The Emigration Commissioners, indeed, required testimonials of competence, but after those had been produced little further inquiry took place. (" No, no!" from Earl Grey ) He asserted it - repeated that but little enquiry was made into the character of the surgeons. In that way the appointment of the madman to which he alluded the other day might be accounted for. Well, what had been the result ? Let the pages of the blue book answer. At page 19 it was stated " the surgeon of the Waverley treated one of the unmarried females improperly. The surgeon of the Lysander " was unable to maintain respect for himself or proper discipline on an board " (P. 88.) The surgeon of the Thomas Arbuthnot " treated some of the single female emigrants indecently " (P. 51.) The chief officer also had been found in the berth of one of the women. The surgeon of the William Morris was reported to be " ill suited for his office." (P. 53 ) The surgeon of the Thetis "was careless of his duty and habitually drunk " (p. 83), and much sickness prevailed on board as a natural consequence.

Next came the case of the Earl Grey (p. 117), in connexion with which the orphan girls from Belfast had got such a bad character. The surgeon was said " to have shown want of judgment and discretion." The matron was inefficient, and some of the officers, paid improper attentions to the young girls on board, while the crew appear to have had unrestricted intercourse with them. Now, here were a number of young and inexperienced girls put on board a vessel, and left to the mercy of the crew without protection or guidance. When they arrived they were branded as improper characters, and the guardians were accused of having sent out abandoned girls to the colony. Justice had not been done either to those young girls or to the guardians, who had done their best to select proper persons. Because some few women from other unions, who were no better than they should be, particularly those from Dungannon, had got into the vessel, the whole body of the Belfast girls was charged in that wholesale way, whereas out of 46 there were but four really bad, all the others having turned out to be excellent characters. To go on with the list of emigrant ships. Without dwelling on the case of the Sobraon, to which he had already called attention, he would pass to the James Gibb (p. 163), where the surgeon allowed the officers of the ship to carry on an improper intercourse with the female emigrants. At page 193 it was stated that the conduct of the captain, the surgeon, and of the matron of the Inconstant was " indiscreet," and that " the surgeon ought not to be employed again." These extracts showed that things were not carried on in precisely the way the noble earl would have the house and country to believe.

The conduct of some of the officers had been equally bad. It would be sees on reference to the blue book that the chief officer of the Thomas Arbuthnot and the second mate of the General Palmer had behaved improperly to the female passengers (p. 51, p. 88 ). On board the Earl Grey the first and second mates were said to have paid improper personal attentions to some of the Irish orphan girls," and the cook was said to have taken liberties with some of them." On board the James Gibb the officers and seamen were reported to have been guilty of similar conduct. He begged the attention of the noble lord to a statement at page 125. It was if the most important character, and demanded the most serious consideration. It was stated that six of the females who went out in the ship Manchester to Port Phillip were hired on board the moment they arrived by notorious brothel keepers. Was it for such purposes as those we sent out virtuous women so our colonies ? Would Government deal with these facts or not ? He called their attention to it, and the country would expect them to find a remedy. If any of their lordships turned to page 188 they might see the details of the " flogging " inflicted on four girls on board the Ramilies. He knew how difficult it was to manage emigrant vessels, and how hard to control violent and ill tempered women, but such a proceeding as that was disgraceful to those concerned in it. He believed these evils could not be remedied by the present Passengers Act. It was defective and imperfect, and could never insure adequate control over the surgeon and officers ; but it was the duty of the Government to amend it, and the country would look to the noble earl opposite, on whom the responsibility rested, for a measure to put an end to such a system as that he had described. These facts were recent. They were all to be found in the last three books laid on the table and entitled " papers relative to emigration to the Australian colonies." But if they went further back they would find just the same state of things. Ten years ago just as great atrocities had been perpetrated.

On this point he begged to read an extract from a letter to himself which afforded a striking instance of profligacy : " In 1841 I sailed from London in the preliminary expedition for the settlement of Nelson, New Zealand, in the capacity of surveyor and engineer far that settlement. Our party comprised nearly 80 picked men, most of them married. Their wives did not accompany them, as it was the professed intention of our employers that a careful selection of a suitable site should be made, which might probably occupy us for some months after our arrival at New Zealand. On our departure the directors of the New Zealand Company assured the men that the safety, comfort, and welfare of their wives should be most religiously cared for, and one of them, Mr. Ross Mangles, especially pledged himself to the exercise of such care on their behalf. About six months later, in 1841, the women embarked in a ship called the Lloyds ; on her arrival at Nelson a complaint was made to the New Zealand Company's agent, that shortly after sailing the captain and his crew had frequented the women's apartments, and during the voyage had lived in debauchery with a considerable number, to the great grievance and discomfort of those who remained faithful to their husbands, and also that the great mortality amongst the children during the passage was attributable to the gross neglect both on the part of the doctor and of the adulterous mothers. The case was investigated, the charges fully substantiated, and reported by the agent to the directors of the New Zealand Company.

The second vessel which sailed from London for Nelson was the Mary Anne, carrying out a large number of cabin and steerage emigrants, amongst the former, a son of the director of the company, in the capacity of emigration agent to the settlement. A highly respectable cabin passenger (now residing in England) informed me on his arrival at Nelson that the ship had been a floating brothel during the passage. In the instance of this ship no investigation took place, but I may state one case of peculiar depravity. The first mate of the Mary Anne had seduced and got with child a girl scarcely fifteen years of age a daughter of a cabin passenger. He had also cohabited with the wife of another passenger (recently married), and with other women, and at Nelson he left the ship, and continued to live in open adultery with the married woman." These were melancholy statements, and showed the continuance of evils which they must all deplore. And what must the result be? That the well disposed portion of the community would refrain from tempting such risks, that they would not trust themselves on the ocean, and that in future our only emigrants would be the very sweepings of the streets - the thieves, prostitutes, and vagabonds of England.

A letter had been addressed to Mr. Sidney Herbert, in relation to his plan for sending out distressed needlewomen to Australia, from which he would read an extract. With every respect for the motives of that gentleman, he feared that unless something was done to alter the present system, those poor women would be of no service to the colony, and ninety-nine out of every 100 would end by going on the streets of Sydney. The writer of the letter to which he referred said, " I have only time to observe, that if yon are about to depend on Government aid and the present Government machinery for the care and distribution of your emigrants in Australia, God help the poor women! Had I time or space I would prove the flagrant want of common sense display displayed by the emigration officials, and the utter absence of all proper means for protecting and distributing female emigrant, as shown in the course of 1848 and 1849. If you have nothing better to depend upon than the present Government machinery, the principal result of your charity will be to increase the numbers of unfortunates who already crowd Australian seaports." Again, he said, " the mere shovelling out of distressed degraded women will never do - the people who rejected cargoes of our convicts will not accept cargoes of our strumpets." The author of that letter was well known, and he (Lord Mountcashell) placed reliance on his statements. Bad as was the case of many poor women in London, he would not advise them to venture their persons on board an emigrant ship to Australia, till better regulations for their protection had been adopted. The noble lord concluded with the motion already given, and stated that he would not press another motion which stood in his name for an address to her Majesty for a copy of the proceedings in the case of the Sobraon.

Earl Grey said, that the noble earl might have said enough in his speech to induce their lordships to grant the returns he demanded, but he had certainly proved to the house that he had no grounds whatever for the sweeping charges he made against the manner is which the Australian emigration was conducted. The noble earl had founded his case on two points the first with regard to the quality of the provisions served to emigrants to Australia ; the second with respect to the general character and conduct of the superintendents and surgeons of emigrant ships. Now, as to any ease of abuse regarding the supply of provisions he (Earl Grey) had intreated the noble earl to mention any individual instance, but he had been unable to do so. If the noble earl had named any particular case, he (Earl Grey) was convinced he could have answered it from the documents on the table. But the noble earl could produce no case except a report in a newspaper which arrived overland from India, before any official intelligence could reach the Government.- [ The Earl of Mountcashell interposed. There was one case is the last blue book.] The noble earl undoubtedly had referred to one case where a complaint had been made, but then it appeared that the provisions were reported to be good ; and so far it was the reverse of an, argument in his favour. It appeared that 36 out of 260 emigrants had in one case made a complaint that the provisions served between Gravesend and Plymouth were bad. That was not a Government ship. In making that remark he was bound injustice to the respectable body of ship owners to say he did not believe that circumstance made any difference. He had seen the notices which were put up on board all emigrant ships, that if any emigrant had any complaint to make there was an officer at Plymouth who would afford immediate redress. There was also an agent of the charterers, who would attend to any complaint. So far every care was taken to secure attention to any case of neglect. In the present instance it seemed the ship had rolled very much in going round, from Gravesend. Some of the passengers were very sick. They did not know what a sea life was, and were, he dared say, very much discontented with their dinners, and the result was that they mistook the cause of their disordered stomachs and laid it all on the food. ( "Hear, hear " and a laugh:) The noble earl had brought forward a sweeping and general assertion that the provisions of emigrant ships were of bad quality.

Against it he (Earl Grey) would oppose the official report and the result of a deliberate inquiry: - To show their lordships how the able and energetic emigration - officer at Sydney, " Mr. Merewether, conducted his business ; he would refer them to his report on the ship Harbinger, where the conduct of the captain, officers, and crew, as well as of the surgeon and matron, was examined into and reported upon. That was only a specimen of the way in which these reports were made, and if there was any ground for complaint, there was ample opportunity for making it, as every ship was carefully examined by the agent as soon as she arrived. It has been said that the emigrant were overawed by the presence of the officers of the ship, but the fact was that the agent went into the caddy ; and none of the officers were present when the emigrants were examined except the surgeon (" Hear, hear" from Lord Mountcashell) whose control was at an end when the ship arrived. (Lord Mountcashell - No ! no.! He exercises it as long as they are on board.) Well, they might land next day. The result of all these enquiries was that there was scarcely an instance of provisions of bad quality. Undoubtedly the charterers of a ship might accidental get a bad cask of meat or beer ; but could their lordships be always certain that bad meat might not appear on their own tables on some occasion ? He could only meet general assertions like those of the noble lord by general denials, but he challenged him to bring forward specific cases where bad provisions had been supplied. Next came the case of the surgeons. The noble earl stated the medical officers and superintendents habitually misconducted themselves. [The Earl of Mountcashell : I never said so.] Well, he certainly said that good conduct on their part was the exception. Now he had the curiosity, or rather had felt it to be his duty, to have returns prepared from all the ships which. had sailed with emigrants to New South Wales since 1847, and to have an analysis of the conduct of the surgeons. He had the result in his hand. The number of emigrant-ships to Port Phillip and South Australia, of which reports had been received, was 124 ; of the 124 surgeons of those ships, 70 were highly commended ; there was no complaint of 28 ; 4 had a qualified commendation; 6 were described as having been inefficient, 2 of them from ill-health ; 5 were censured for decided inefficiency and misuse of their authority, and 1 were declared positively bad. He conceived that this was no unsatisfactory result, when it was considered how many surgeons were employed, and often under unforeseen circumstances, at very short notice., (Hear, hear.)

The case of the Ramilies, relied upon by the noble earl, seemed to him by no means of that weight which the noble earl imagined. No doubt it was very wrong to beat women at all but the circumstances, as given in the report of the surgeon, showed that the four women in question were most violent and unmanageable persons, who bad committed the most unprovoked assaults upon the complaining party, Anne Shepherd, and whom it had been considered essential to punish corporally, the punishment being, not a flogging, as was represented, but a few strokes on the shoulder, administered in presence of the matron. It war an error in judgment, certainly, but no, the monstrous crime that the noble earl described. The noble earl made a complaint of the conduct of a particular surgeon, Dr. Douglass, on the representation of a person who had never seen either Dr. Douglass or his ship ; but the report of the committee in Australia who investigated that gentleman's conduct decided that he had performed his duty in a very efficient manner. It appeared that the very persons who had complained against him, some orphan girls from Belfast had by their own conduct in the colony fully justified these statements of his respecting then which had occasioned their ill will towards him. The conduct of these young women, he might observe, afforded another illustration of the inexpediency, as a general principle, of sending out this class of emigrants from towns. (Hear, hear.) He could not but express the decided opinion that complaints such as those made by the noble earl, however unfounded, were highly disadvantageous to the national interest, which was deeply concerned in the extension of emigration. (Hear.) No person was justified in throwing discredit upon the manner in which emigration was conducted, unless he had real facts to go upon. That the noble lord had no real facts upon which to found his so sweeping charges could be confirmed by his noble friend near him, from the most unsuspected of evidence - the letters which the emigrants themselves sent over, on their arrival to their friends, expressive of their entire satisfaction with the treatment they had received on board. When it was considered that no fewer than 30,000 emigrants went over to Australia in the last year alone, it was quite conceivable that a certain number of them, from their own fault of temper, from dissatisfaction with the voyage, or from some other circumstance referable altogether to themselves, might be disposed to make complaints, but there could be no sort of doubt that the rule was emphatically satisfaction on the part of the emigrants with their whole treatment on the voyage. (Hear, hear.) The best proof of the excellence of their treatment was that the mortality upon the voyage of three or four months only just exceeded 1� per cent. ; and this, in relation not merely to adult emigrants, but to young and even infant emigrants, though it was well known that nothing was so trying to young children as a long sea voyage. If ships went out for these long voyages with the provisions described by the noble earl, of bad food and putrid water, the mortality on board would inevitably be dreadful. He trusted that these statements of the noble earl, utterly unfounded in fact as they were, would not discourage persons who contemplated emigration from fulfilling their intentions, for they might rely upon it that it they took their passage in ships chartered by respectable persons they would be perfectly well treated. (Hear, hear.)

Lord Monteagle said he had for 13 years closely applied his attention to this subject, and he could, of his own knowledge, give the most unqualified commendation of the conduct, as a role, of the officers engaged in carrying emigration from Great Britain into effect. The noble earl having confined himself to Australia, he was to prepared to state, that of all the infinite letters he had seen from emigrants to Australia - letters written after their arrival, and therefore manifestly without any restraint upon the writers - there was not one which did not fully bear out the statement of his noble friend as to the attention and kindness paid to emigrants on shipboard (hear hear) ; and the full confirmation of this written testimony was the fact that almost every emigrant took the earliest occasion to transmit to his friends at home the money to pay their passage out to the colonies in the very ships which had conveyed themselves thither. (Hear, hear.) If any case of misconduct could actually be shown against the officers of any emigrant ship, it would be doing the best possible service to the general body of emigrant officers and to the public to substantiate it ; but, on the other hand, nothing could be more inexpedient and mischievous to the national interest than for a member of Parliament, in his irresponsible position, to make sweeping charges such as these the noble earl thought proper to advance against a body of men not present to defend themselves. (Hear, hear )

The noble lord referred to the report of the Colonization Committee in proof of the admirable manner in which private shipowners treated emigrant passengers. It was very hard that his noble friend, who had especially distinguished himself by his efforts to secure the comfort of emigrant passengers, the very author of those stringent provisions in their favour which characterised the late Passengers Act, should be charged with indifference on the subject (Hear, hear.) Their lordships might rely upon it that were the noble earl's charges at all founded on fact, Australia, whose very existence depended neon the supply of emigrants, would long since have poured in complaints in corroboration ; but all the complaint of Australia, and he heartily wished his noble friend would make increased efforts to remove it, was that not half enough emigrants came out. (Hear, hear.)

Lord Lanesborough bore testimony to the good conduct, as a rule, of the surgeons of emigrant-ships.

The Earl of Mountcashell having replied,

Earl Grey said, there was no objection to the production of the papers ; only they could not be laid on the table for a year, as it would be necessary to send to the colonies for some of them.

Returns ordered.

SG & SGTL Vol 7, p. 188 ; 13 July 1850.

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