from, and therefore there was a necessity for the interference of parliament. He suggested, therefore, to the hon. bart. whether he ought not to separate the objects of his bill, and move, in the first instance, for a bill to regulate Greenwich Hospital; and afterwards, if it should be necessary, bring forward a motion for a bill to regulate the Naval Asylum. Sir C. Pole acceded to the suggestion of the right. hon. gent. and confined his motion to the first object. The Chancellor of the Exchequer as the question had been narrowed, should then only say, with respect to the Naval Asylum, that it would be competent to the hon. baronet to move an address to his majesty for the Regulations of the Commissioners, and to make them the subject of any further proceeding he might think necessary. But as to the remaining part of his motion, he did not think the house could agree to it, without having the charter of the hospital before it. It was as much the duty of the trustees, under the charter, to correct any abuses that might exist, as it would if an act of parliament were to pass for the purpose. But the question was, whether it would be desirable, if only a single candidate, who had been connected with the navy, should offer for an office, who might not be as well qualified as other candidates, that any peremptory order for his appointment should be enacted. He contended that there was no necessity for an act of parliament. The - hon. bart. himself had been whilst in the office of a lord of the admiralty, in a situation to correct these abuses, and if he had not done so, it was not matter of blame to him, as he had followed the course pursued by his predecessors, and if any mischief had arisen, it must have been only from inadvertency on his part. The house :he was sure would not accede to the motion, until it should have the charter of the Hospital before it. Sir John Newport contended, that every statement of the right hon. gent. shewed the necessity of the bill. As abuses existed, it was highly necessary that an act of parliament should be made to correct them. And many of the trustees would be glad to be protected against the applications of their friends by the provisions of an act of parliament. The hon. baronet appeared to him to deserve the thanks of the house and of the country, for his accurate attention to the interests of a profession to which he was an ornament; and as to the unfitness of naval men for the offices in the Hospital, he never could forget that the late lord chancellor had been in that profession. Mr. M. Montague stated, from his local and personal knowledge of an estate belonging to the Hospital, that no naval man, unless locally acquainted with the circumstances and nature of the property, could be capable of conducting or managing it for the interests of the hospital. Mr. Pole Carew contended, that either there were rules in the charter, requiring persons holding offices to be seafaring inen, or there were not; and that in either case, it would be necessary for the house to interfere, to allow qualified persons to be appointed, or to prevent persons not qualified from being appointed. Sir John Ord could not agree to the mo tion, as he thought it could neither be consistent with justice nor promote the advantages of the institution, to take it out of the hands of the trustees. Sir F. Burdett was extremely surprised at the opposition given to this bill, which was to remedy gross abuses acknowledged to be existing. All that had been said applied solely to the bill, the exceptionable parts of which, if any, might be left out. The principal object he had in rising, was to thank the hon. baronet for the course he was pursuing in spite of all obstacles. He could not suppose that the house could object to the introduction of the bill, because no negative had been given to the statement of the hon. baronet. He never had been more astonished, than at the frivolous objections which had been made to the motion. The object of.the bill was to inflict a penalty on those who should violate the provisions of the charter, and he did hope, that the house would never come to any determination that would preclude the hon. baronet from bringing forward his bill.-A division then took place, For the motion, 52. Against it, 78. Majority, 26. [MUTINY BILL.] The house resolved itself into a committee on the Mutiny Bill. Lord Castlereagh said, he would explain shortly the reasons on which he was induced to recommend the proposition he intended to submit to the house. All the reasonings and statements connected with the Army were so familiar to the house, that he would have held himself bound, in regard to the time of the house, to offer his motion without any preface, if the right hon. gent. opposite (Mr. Windham) | the prior strength of the army. From the had not, very causelessly, in his opinion, taken alarm, as if this motion contained in it a principle ruinous to the military system introduced by that right hon. gent. a short time since. To many parts of the right hon. gent.'s system he had no objection; the inducements held forth to certain descriptions of men, by the liberty to engage for limited service and by the creation of additional pensions, he highly approved of. But what he complained of was, that the right hon. gent. considered his measure as prescriptive, to be preserved without addition or alteration, contrary to what had ever happened with respect to any other measure. He had no objection to limited service, and he had formerly promoted to a certain extent, engagements limited in space as well as in time. But why should limited service be in a manner enforced, to the total exclusion of unlimited service, even when the men were perfectly satisfied, and desirous to enter without limitation. On former occasions, the men for limited service were kept in separate battalions. The right hon. gent. mixed them. It was not intended to interfere with this any more than with any other part of the right hon. gent.'s arrangement. The right hon. gent. complained much of the change about to be introduced in the exclusive form of his measure: but no measure, no military system, could reasonably claim an exclusive and unalterable sanction. The right hon. gent. might hold himself discharged from all responsibility for his measure, after the alterations proposed to be introduced. All responsibility in matters of this kind, belonged properly, if not exclu'sively, to those who were bound to supply every thing that was deficient, to correct every thing that was vicious in the existing system. The house would form its judgment without any of that alarm which the right hon. gentleman felt, in his opinion without any ground. The right hon. gent. had no right to complain of this as a premature interference with his measure. The right hon. gent's, system was as prematurely and abruptly introduced to the abrogation of the Additional Force act, then growing into full efficiency. The right hon. gent.'s measure had been passed two years ago, and had been in operation twenty months; and when the returns should be examined, it would be found distinct from every other in this respect, that it made no addition to year 1803, to the present time, the army Let it be con | gent.'s plan was not speculative, and that was the permanent burthen of 450,000l. a year which it imposed on the country, in the shape of additional pensions, an incumbrance which must increase continually. These reasons, he conceived, would be fully sufficient to satisfy the committee of the propriety of not depriving such men as were inclined, of a fair option to enlist for life. He therefore moved, that a clause be introduced allowing that option. Mr. Windham spoke at considerable length against the clause, the substance of which he contended, was not only mischievous in itself, but also as it was intended to do away the system established two years since with the full approbation of the house, after long and deliberate consideration and mature discussion.-He objected to the mode in which that system was thus covertly undermined, by those who did not dare to make it the object of open attack. A clause of this only; and here he could not help expressing his satisfaction, that it was not now the object of consideration how an army was to be raised, but how a very flourishing army already in existence should be maintained. The present regular army of the line consisted of 204,000 men, and he was sorry to say, that of these, including the men enlisted under the right hon. gent.'s measure, full 70,000 were engaged for limited service. The number raised under the right hon. gent.'s measure was 26,000, and they were all for limited service. All the foreign corps were, from their origin, engaged for limited service; the garrison battalions were also limited; and the volunteers from the militia, with the exception of 6 or 7,000. It was matter of very serious consideration, to think that the 36,000 enlisted this year would all be entitled to their discharge at the same period, seven years hence. It was also very material to consider how this principle, if exclusively acted upon, would affect our peace estab-kind was rejected in 1806, because it went lishment. Supposing a peace establishment of 100,000 men, and 36,000 of these to be discharged in one year, and a war to follow in that year or the next, what would be the state of the country. He contended that the right hon. gent.'s measure would not cover its own waste, and that of the army in general. He maintained that the enlistment for life of those who, on having the option should prefer engaging for life, would not discourage others from engaging for years. He could not understand how good faith was violated, when no extension of an existing engagement for limited service was demanded or allowed, and when all that was intended was to allow a liberty of a larger engagement to those who were free and willing to make it. . to counteract the general effect of the measure; and a great part of the house had declared the same opinion since. He did not complain that this proceeding was brought forward in the shape of a Clause in the Mutiny Bill, but that it was brought forward in so late a stage, without any notice, and at a time when the Mutiny Bill must be passed with so little delay as to allow no adequate length of deliberation or discussion. It was only on this day se'nnight that an indistinct declaration of his intentions on this head was wrung from the noble lord by him; and only last night that he had seen the noble lord's motion in the form in which it was to be offered to the house. His measure had been, like the present, brought forward in the shape of a clause in the Mutiny Bill. But the nature of that measure had long before been detailed to the house, and the clause itself had been printed and circulated among the mem The right hon. gent. opposite might say, that though the ordinary recruiting under his measure was not equally productive as the ordinary recruiting before, combined with the Additional Force act, it was superior to the previous ordinary re-bers, and repeatedly discussed, long before cruiting alone. Certainly so it was; but the house was called to decide upon it. then the Additional Force act was becom- The present proceeding was like putting a ing every day more productive, when it parcel into the hands of the driver of a was repealed. The ordinary recruiting stage coach, while he was yet going on, was made more productive under the with a hint that he should suffer no one to right hon. gent's plan, by multiplying the examine its contents, but plead, against number of recruiting parties beyond mea- every call to stop, the lateness of the hour sure, and also by the threat of reduction and the necessity of his arrival at the apheld out to the 54 additional battalions, pointed minute. It was a species of unless they should complete their estab- ceeding which he supposed he must not lishment to 400 men each before six call a trick, but which, in strict legal deOne part only of the right hon. finition, he must be allowed to call a fraud, pro if a fraud was quod aliud agit, aliud simulat. | lord had said, for eighteen months, but for The clause now proposed, by gradually twelve; and during those twelve months, changing the enlistment from limited to such had been its effects, and such, above unlimited service, would go to undermine all, the manner of producing those effects, and destroy the system introduced two as might leave to the advocates of the meayears ago. The effect of the clause would sure, nothing to be required, however much be most important, and the house ought might have been expected, from the result to have the fullest notice and the fairest of any further trial. In the first quarter, opportunity of considering it in all its it had produced at the rate of 11,000 men bearings. He reminded the house, that a-year; in the second quarter, at the rate when, on a memorable occasion, some of 13,000; in the third quarter, at the propositions were made with respect to rate of 21,000; and in the fourth quarter, Catholic soldiers, to which no objection at the rate of 24,000. It was certainly no was foreseen at the time, upon its appear- little praise that it so soon equalled the ing afterwards that objections might be effect of the ordinary and extraordinary expected, the propositions were withdrawn recruiting which was in force before it; from the Mutiny Bill, and put to the sense and the manner in which it effected its of the house in a separate bill. It was purpose, was, in itself, sufficient to give it disgraceful that the present measure should a superiority over the measures which be brought forward in the present form. were now brought into comparison with it. He was glad to find that the noble lord The noble lord's boast, that his measures had so far corrected his former sentiments, had done as much, was much the same as to allow that it was material to the sort as that of gentlemen known at Astley's army to allow the liberty of engaging for and Hughes's by the name of Mr. Merrylimited service. The noble lord and his man, whose office in the piece was to refriends had formerly contended, and con- peat whatever had been done by the leadtended with great vehemence, that the ing performer, but with the omission of men who embraced the profession of arms the only circumstance which could render were equally ready to enlist for life as for the feat of any value. Should the principal a term of years. He was now compelled tumbler, for instance, throw what is called to abandon this opinion; yet could not pre- a somerset, that is to say, turn heels over vail upon himself to relinquish it altogether, head in the air, Mr. Merryman instantly but, by the most absurd of all arrange- rolled over on the floor, upon his head ments, would have part of the army on and his breech, and then looked cunningly one footing, and part on the other. Did round to the spectators, as who should say, the noble lord intend that the men en- have not I done the same thing. If the gaged for unlimited service should be kept rider at any time vaulted into the saddle in distinct bodies, and appropriated to fo- by placing his hand on the pommel, Mr. reign service. It would be easy to see Merryman climbed up by the mane or the the inconveniences that would result from tail, and triumphed in the idea of his being that course, and the impossibility, indeed, equally seated. It was the merit of his of executing it. As the numbers were to measure that it raised the men by the orbe unequal, how were they to be dis- dinary recruiting alone; while the meatributed between the two battalions? On sures with which it was compared, prothe other supposition, the discontents that cured them by means expensive and would prevail in the army, and the injuries violent, and which exhausted the sources that would be done to discipline by having of recruiting in future. The comparison men enlisted, in an inconsiderate moment, between the extraordinary measures of for unlimited service, along-side men who other administrations, and his measure, were engaged only for a term of years, was just the same as that of a man with were too striking to require elucidation. 100,000l. capital, with a man having He would come now to the statements, as 40,000l. a-year. The former could exset forth on a paper printed by consent at ceed the other for a period, even of a the close of the last session, and arranged couple of years, by 10,000l. a-year; but, in opposite columns for the greater conveat the end of that time, the capitalist nience of comparison. The noble lord would be in gaol, while the other would denied him the credit of making any ad- be jogging on at the same undiminished dition to the army. It was a credit that rate of 40,000l. a-year. His measure had he had never claimed. His measure had been but twelve months in force, when its been in full operation, not, as the noble produce equalled that of the prior ordinary many men, how many more will be produced by a number so much greater: but they forgot the condition, that the parties must have enough to work upon, and that, without that, they could only second battalions, let it be remembered, to which allusion had been made, were created by the preceding administration. With a full establishment of officers, and no men, they could not be left a burthen on the country. It was hard to oblige the officers to complete the numbers to a certain amount: but it was a hardship that was necessary; and when the increase was called for, it was inevitable to allow the regiments to send out their parties. The permission given to the Irish militia to volunteer, and the competition between the regiments, each seeking to get its share, was another cause of the multiplication of recruiting parties; and in all those cases the government had nothing to do with the matter. With respect to the desertions, the number had decreased under his measure. Without troubling the house with figures, he would generally say, that from the commencement of the year 1805, to the introduction of the late system in the middle of 1806; whether the trial were made by quarterly periods or half yearly; whether in G. Britain alone, in Ireland alone, or in G. Britain and Ireland taken together; whether by head quarters recruiting, or district recruiting, or by the two combined, in whatever way the com recruiting and the additional force act to- | gether, during the six months that they were most productive. When the noble lord talked of 36,000 men from the militia, it should never be lost sight of that many of these were enlisted into the militia as sub-pull against one another. The fifty-four stitutes, costing, at times, 60 or 70 guineas, to which was to be added, the further bounty for entering into the line. As to the reflection on the number of boys inintroduced under his measure, he knew not on what the idea was founded. The system of limited service had apparently no more tendency to get boys instead of men, than other systems had to get boys instead of girls. If there was any such tendency, it would be the highest recommendation of the measure, as it could proceed from nothing but the greater readiness with which parents would part with their children, when there was a hope of their return, than when they considered the service as carrying them away for ever. On this topic of boys, he should be glad to know if what he had heard was true, that in certain militia regiments, some of them not far from the place in which he was speaking, there were not only numerous boys received, but paid also in a way different from what they were in the army, that is to say, placed upon full pay. As to the increased allowances from Chelsea, that was a measure which stood on its own grounds, and required to be adopted on the bare considerations of justice and humanity. An attempt was made to account for the suc-parison was; the regular recruiting had cess of the late system by the increased number of recruiting parties, and an insinuation conveyed at the same time that they were encreased for the purpose. The multiplication of recruiting parties arose, not from the government, nor from any desire to promote the execution of his measure; it proceeded from a quarter decidedly adverse to his measure. It was gradually declined; that after the introduction of that system it had gradually increased, and that since the noble lord came into office, it had again gradually declined. In the last half year of the last system, the ordinary recruiting alone had beat the ordinary recruiting of the corresponding period in the preceding year, with the Additional Force Bill into the besides well known, that the multiplica- bargain. The former exceeded 11,000 tion of recruiting parties beyond a certain men, while the latter only rose to someproportion, diminished, instead of increas- thing above 10,000. This new proposiing the number of recruits; the competition would not get a man more for the tion so excited was not of that sort by army, but on the contrary, would go to which, as sometimes happens, production keep many men out of it. On this head, was increased, but that of which the only some deference was due to the authority effect was, .to add to one what was taken of himself and his friends on the subject, from another. Nothing could betray more as the measure which the clause meant to a want of correctness in thinking, than the affect originated with them, and as they mistake that prevailed in this respect. had distinctly declared, and shown by The persons who urged this topic fell to their conduct, that they thought that such work like school boys, and said, if so a clause would destroy the effect of the many recruiting parties will produce so measure. The military plan which he had |