motion. The question was put and carried, and the committee appointed.

Mr. Martin rose, pursuant to his notice, to ask leave to bring in a bill to prevent bear-baiting, and other cruel practices. He submitted his motion, with perfect confidence of its success, to the house, because, in the interval which had elapsed since the last session of parliament and the present time, he had conversed with every alderman of the city of London, with almost every police magistrate in the various districts of the metropolis, and indeed with many magistrates in different parts of the country, and had collected from their conversation, that it was their unanimous opinion that these cruel practices ought to be put down without further delay. He had been told over and over again by them, that nothing was more conducive to crime than such sports-that they led the lower orders to gambling-that they educated them for thieves-and that they gradually trained them up to bloodshed and murder. The reason why the police could not meddle with these practices was, that they were not in general exhibited for money. He held, however, in his hand, an affiche, which was placarded throughout the town quite as publicly as any affiche would be that announced the benefit of Madame Vestris, or any other singer at the opera. That affiche, however, would bring the sports under the notice of the police, since it fixed a price upon the ticket which was required for admission to them. It announced that "Billy, the phenomenon of the canine race, and superior vermin killer," would go through his

wonderful performances on Tuesday next, and that the receipts of the pit would on that evening be presented to the distressed widow of Billy's late proprietor. It then stated, that "a dog-fight-a turnloose match with two dogs and two fresh badgers-and a drawing match," would follow this astounding spectacle; and that several dogs would then be tried at a bear, previous to their being sent out upon their travels to foreign climes. The doors were to be open at seven o'clock, the performance to begin at half-past, and the admittance to be 38. each. The whole of the sports were said to be instituted by the " express invitation of several noblemen and gentlemen of the first distinction." He expected that this declaration would secure to him the vote of the hon. and learned member for WinchelOn a former occasion that hon. member had said that he (Mr. Martin) meddled only with the sports of the poor, and turned away his eyes from those of the

sea.

* We subjoin the "affiche" to which the hon. member alluded:-" By the express invitation of several noblemen and gentlemen of distinction.-Billy, the phenomenon killer of his day, having killed nearly 4,000 of the canine race, and superior vermin rats in about seven hours, will once more go through his wonderful career of destroying a proportionate number thereof, in ten minutes, at the Westminster Pit, on Tues day, March 1, 1825. The receipts of the Pit of that evening to be presented to the distressed widow of the late C. Dew, who

was the owner of this matchless canine performer.

After which a dog-fight, a turn-loose match with two dogs and two

fresh badgers, a drawing match, and se veral bull-dogs to be tried at the bear, before their departure for foreign climes. Billy can be matched to kill 100 rats against any two dogs in England, for 100 sovereigns. Doors open at 7, commence at half-past. Admittance, 3s. each."

rich. He did no such thing, but was equally anxious to meddle with both, when he found them opposed to the dictates of humanity. The hon. and learned member had said, "Show me that the nobility take part in those sports, and I will join with all my heart in putting them down." He was sorry to say, that to his knowledge some persons of rank and name did patronise these cruel practices; and he mentioned the fact now, to secure the vote of the honourable and learned gentleman. The persons to whom he alluded, deserved to be stigmatised with severer reprobation than the poorer classes, against whom alone his bill was said to be directed. Their education ought to have given them feelings averse to cruelty and bloodshed, and to have taught them that their example would be of vast importance in propagating such feelings among their inferiors in station. He therefore trusted that the hon. and learned member for Winchelsea would redeem the pledge which he had given him, and would give his strenuous support to the bill which he now asked leave to submit to their future consideration. He could see no rational objection that could be urged against it. By the Maryle-bone Act, all bear-baiting and other barbarous sports were prohibited within that parish; and it appeared to him difficult to assign any reason why, if the parish of Mary-le-bone were to be exempt from such inhuman exhibitions, the parishes of St. George and of St. Margaret, or of any other saint, were to be disgraced and disgusted by them. It was not, however, merely bear-baiting, and sports of a similar nature, that he wished to

abolish; there were other practices, equally cruel, with which he thought the legislature ought to interfere. He would give them an instance of what he meant. There was a man, a Frenchman, called Majendie, whom he considered a disgrace to society. In the course of last year this man came to England, and at one of the anatomical theatres exhibited a series of experiments so atrocious as almost to shock belief. He would not trust himself to express a further opinion upon this fellow's conduct, but would merely say that he looked upon those who witnessed it without interfering to prevent it, almost in the light of criminals. This Mr. Majendie got a lady's greyhound, for which he paid the sum of ten guineas. He first of all nailed its front, and then its hind paws to the table with the bluntest spikes that he could find, giving as a reason for so doing, that the poor beast in its agonies might tear away from the spikes, if they were at all sharp and cutting. He then doubled up its long ears, and nailed them down to the same table with similar spikes. He then made a gash down the middle of its face, and proceeded to dissect the nerves on one side of it. First of all, he cut out those nerves which belong to the sight, and whilst performing that operation, said to the spectators,

"Observe, when I pass my scalpel over these nerves, the dog will shut its eyes." It did so. He then proceeded to operate upon those of taste and hearing. After he had finished those operations, he put some bitter food on the tongue of the dog, and hallooed into his ear. The dog repudiated the food, and was insen

sible to the sound. This surgical butcher, or butchering surgeonfor he deserved both names- then turned round to the spectators, and said, "I have now finished my operations on one side of this dog's head; as it costs so much money to get an animal of this description, I shall reserve the other till to-morrow. If the servant takes care of him for the night, according to the directions I have given him, I am of opinion that I shall be able to continue my operations upon him to-morrow with quite as much satisfaction to us all as I have done to-day; but if not, though he may have lost the vivacity he has shown to-day, I shall have the opportunity of cutting him up alive, and showing you the peristaltic motion of the heart and viscera." He was aware of the necessity of making some experiments on living animals; but then they should be performed in such a manner as to cause as little suffering as possible. That That was the opinion of the most eminent professors of medical science. He held in his hand the written declarations of Mr. Abernethy, of Sir Everard Home, of the professors of medicine at Cambridge and Oxford, and of several other respectable medical gentlemen, to that effect. They all, he believed, united in condemnation of such excessive and protracted cruelty as had been practised by this Frenchman. He had heard that this fellow was again coming to this country to repeat his experiment. He therefore had mentioned it to the house, in the hope that it would gain publicity, and excite against the perpetrator of such unnecessary cruelty the odium he merited. He trusted that when it

was known, the fellow would not find persons to attend his lectures, and would thus be compelled to wing his way back to his own country, to find in it a theatre for such abominable atrocities. After some further observations, he concluded by moving for leave to bring in a bill to prevent bearbaiting and other cruel practices.

Sir M. W. Ridley said, that he should oppose the motion, because he considered legislation on such paltry subjects to be quite unnecessary and uncalled for.

Mr. Martin did not conceive that this bill was upon a subject too paltry for legislative notice, or that it was so uncalled for as the hon. member represented it. All the magistrates of the metropolis called for a law to put down these practices as a nuisance: was not their call entitled to some respect from the attention of parliament ? It was not creditable to the house, -nay, more, it was discreditable to any member, to rise and say, not that he would negative the bill when it was brought in, but that he would not permit it to be canvassed at all in parliament. Would any man get up and boldly say to them, "I am such an amateur of cruelty, that I will not even allow a measure to be discussed which tends to abolish it?" Such language no man would dare to utter: and yet what has been said that evening approximated very closely to it. He was afraid that he should be defeated upon this bill; but if he was, the glory would be with him, and the disgrace with those who vanquished him. He was, however, confident that at some future period it would be passed into law. He would not say that it would meet with that success

whilst under his direction; but if the gentlemen opposite would take it up, as they had done his bill for giving counsel to prisoners accused of felony, which they had almost brought to a successful issue, he would willingly surrender it into their hands, and would rejoice at seeing them obtain that success, which, at present, he was afraid, would be denied to his efforts.

Mr. Gordon objected to the motion on the same grounds as his hon. friend the member for Newcastle.

Mr. F. Buxton did not think this subject to be so insignificant as not to deserve the notice of the house. The honourable member for Galway had conferred a very sensible benefit upon the community by his continued exertions in the cause of humanity. His bill had already produced a beneficial and extraordinary change in the manners of the lower orders, and was far from having produced that unnecessary litigation which some gentlemen had anticipated. He had an account of the prosecutions which had been instituted under it. They were 71 in number, and in 69 cases convictions had been obtained. He had heard from those who attended Smithfield-market, that a great revolution had taken place in it, owing to the exertions of the hon. member. Even those who were the first subjects of his attacks, had recently come forward to subscribe to the funds of "The Society for Preventing Cruelty to Animals."

Mr. Alderman Bridges supported the bill, and gave his concurrence to the statements of the hon. member for Galway.

Mr. Butterworth hoped that the hon. member for Galway would

extend the powers of his bill to the savage, abominable, and unchristian practice of prize-fighting, which had led in many recent instances to the loss of life.

The gallery was then cleared for a division, when there appeared for the motion, 41; against it, 29; majority, 12.

The house having resolved itself into a committee of supply, the further consideration of the navy estimates was proceeded with; and the various resolutions were agreed to without any division.

Sir Joseph Yorke observed, that the salary of the private secretary of the first lord had been raised from 300l. to 510l. a year. He should be glad to ask his hon. and gallant friends who sat around him what was the reason of this increase. While he was on this subject he must observe, that though he considered such an increase of salary to be not very consistent with that economy which had been so often recommended by the house to be observed in all branches of the public service, and which principle of economy had already reduced the board of seven lords of the admiralty to a board of five, he should not have suggested such a question had he not happened to have made a speech, unfortunately, on the motion of his hon. friend the member for Newcastle, in consequence of which that very reduction was effected. A gallant friend whom he (Sir J. Yorke) did did not now see in his place, maintained on that occasion that the two lay or civil lords, as they were called, were perhaps the most efficient members in the constitution of that board-a position which he (Sir J. Yorke) at the time warmly contested, and had in fact answered

by

by supporting the motion of the hon. member (Sir M. W. Ridley.) Now, he was sorry for the part he had taken on that occasion, seeing that the whole saving effected under the late Lord Londonderry's administration in the admiralty department amounted to 2,000l. And really when millions were thrown away with profusion in the expenditure of this great and powerful country, he thought such a saving might as well be returned. This was all the saving that had been effected in the establishments of the public offices. He believed the fact to be so; for could any hon. gentleman inform him of any reductions in the number or the salaries of the commissioners of the revenue, customs, excise, or navy? It appeared to him that the parties who had been losers by such a paltry saving, might as well be reinstated in its amount.

Mr. Hume perfectly concurred in the force of the observations just made by the gallant admiral, seeing that all this time millions were thrown away, as he had truly said, upon building ships to rot; and the yearly estimate for dockyards, &c. was from 180,000l. to 190,000l. By a variety of estimates which he held in his hand, it appeared that the charges for similar services in the several years 1825, 1824, 1823, 1822, had been all far greater than those of the year 1817; and yet it would be difficult to assign any reason for this great increase of expense at such a time as the present. They were, in fact, proceeding, in regard to all of them, at a most extravagant rate. Since 1811, up to the present period, the expense to the country for dockyards and wharfs (and it was as to these items and public works that

the growing extravagance he spoke of principally required to be checked) amounted to the sum of 4,862,000l., which, coupled with the amount of some of the estimates this day laid on their table (1,678,000l.), made the total cost of such works in a few years no less than 6,540,000l. Every body knew that we had managed to carry on a war, at a time, too, that our navy was in a much more efficient condition than at present, without one shilling of all this expense. The fact was, that the costly works in question appeared to be managed without any system or order; for he found that for one and the same work, the estimates showed a charge in one year of 600,000l., in the next of 500,000l., in the next of 800,000l., and so on backwards and forwards, without any sort of rule or principle. There must be something rotten and illdirected in such a state of expenses. Since the year 1815 only, no less than 23,000,000l. had been paid by the country for the building and repairs of ships: and, looking to such facts as these, he could not but feel that the scale of our expenditure in these branches was much higher than it should be.

Sir George Cockburn observed, that it was but the other night that the hon. gent. (Mr. Hume) had taken occasion to say that he wanted to observe more ships fitted out for sea. Now that that was the case, and the wish so expressed was fulfilled, the hon. gentleman was exceedingly dissatisfied with government for what they had done. As to what the hon. gentleman had said about there having been little or nothing of these expenses in time of war, he must surely be aware that