e wants of that establishment; and
next, that parliament had a right to regulate the distribution of
church property, and to determine upon the reduction of the Irish church
revenues as now established by law. He was of opinion that the house
should legislate deliberately upon so grave a question, and he trusted
that Mr. Ward would withdraw his motion, and feel satisfied with what
government had done. Mr. Ward, however, refused to withdraw his motion:
he must press, he said, for a recognition of the principle, because,
from what was passing around him, he was afraid that the present
ministers would not long continue in office. Lord Althorp then moved
the previous question, principally on the ground that, of all questions,
this was one which most required much previous inquiry and detailed
information. Mr. Hume, and Colonels Davies and Evans supported the
original resolution, declaring that the shuffling mode of proceeding
adopted by government in regard to this question, rendered it impossible
to repose confidence in ministers. After a long debate the amendment,
however, was carried by a majority of three hundred and ninety-six
against one hundred and twenty. The majority would have been still
larger, had not a considerable number of conservative members, unwilling
to wear even the appearance of tampering with the question, left the
house before the division. The subject was brought before the lords on
the 6th of June, by the Earl of Wicklow, who moved an address to his
majesty for a copy of the commission, a motion which Earl Grey said he
would not oppose. Many of the peers embraced this opportunity of stating
their objections to the commission, contending that the measures on
which ministers appeared to have resolved would end in the ruin of the
church. Concession, it was said, could not stop here; it must go on from
step to step, till nothing was left to be conceded. Earl Grey denied
that he and his colleagues looked forward to anything that could be
justly called spoliation of the church; they contemplated a great
alteration, but nothing more.

IRISH TITHE QUESTION.

In the meantime ministers had been proceeding with a bill for the
amendment of the tithe system in Ireland, founded on principles which
should extinguish tithe altogether as a payment to be demanded in kind,
and should lay the burden, directly at least, on a different class of
payers. The provisions of the intended measure were explained on the