same time to make good any deficiency of revenue which
may be occasioned by such an alteration in the rates of the existing
duties." In moving this resolution the chancellor of the exchequer said
that he proposed a penny rate, because he had been convinced by the
arguments and evidence of the committee that the latter expedient would
involve less loss to the revenue than a twopenny postage, which had been
recommended by the committee. After some observations from Mr. Goulburn
and Sir Kobert Peel, both of whom intimated further hostility to such a
change, the resolution was agreed to without a division. On the 12th of
July, when the order of the day was read for receiving the report of
a committee on the postage-acts, Mr. Goulburn rose for the purpose of
proposing a series of resolutions to be substituted for the report.
These resolutions were:--"That with a deficiency of revenue during
the three years ending on the 5th day of April, 1840, of not less than
L8,860,987, it is not expedient to adopt any measure for reducing the
rates of postage on inland letters to an uniform rate of one penny,
thereby incurring the risk of a great present loss to the revenue, at a
period of the session so advanced, that it is scarcely possible to
give to the details of such a measure, and to the important financial
considerations connected with it, that deliberate attention which they
ought to receive from parliament." This amendment was opposed by the
chancellor of the exchequer, and supported by Sir Kobert Peel. After
a few words from Messrs. P. Thomson and Warburton in favour of the
proposition, the original question was carried by a majority of two
hundred and fifteen against one hundred and thirteen. The report was
then brought up and read; and on the question that the resolution
agreed to by the committee be read a second time, Sir R. Peel moved an
amendment to omit such part of the resolution as pledged the house to
supply any deficiency of the revenue occasioned by the reduction. This
amendment, however, was rejected, and the report agreed to; and on the
18th of July Mr. S. Rice brought in a bill, intituled, "An act for
the further regulation of the duties on postage until the 5th day of
October, 1840." This bill was read a second time without a division, and
by the 29th of July it passed the commons.

The second reading was moved by Lord Melbourne in the house of lords on
the 5th of August; on which occasion the Duke of Wellington