of some comprehensive treatment of the problem of local taxation, and not to interpose any legislative difficulty in the way of the reform of a system which practically all the commissioners agreed in holding to be characterised by much confusion and anomaly. In these circumstances an understanding was arrived at between the Front Benches that if a limit of four years were introduced into the Agricultural Rates Act, 1896, etc., Continuance Bill, it should be allowed to go through with a very modest amount of debate. This understanding was carried out. The bill was read a second time on July 29, after a debate of a comparatively friendly character, in which two Liberal members-Mr. Strachey (Somerset, E.) and Mr. L. White (Buckrose, E. Riding, Yorks)-dissociated themselves from the attitude of the Opposition towards the measure, and Sir H. Fowler (Wolverhampton, E.) held the Government pledged to submit within a reasonable time a comprehensive treatment of the whole subject. A hostile amendment, which had formed the starting point of the debate, was defeated by 251 to 133.

The most considerable achievement of the Government in the legislative field was, without doubt, the passage of the Factory and Workshop Acts Amendment Bill, with which was combined a bill consolidating the law on those subjects. These measures, as already recorded, had been sent, after second reading, to the Grand Committee on Trade. They had been considered there with great care and with a commendable freedom from party spirit, and, speaking generally, there could be no question that the code of factory law, as brought before the House of Commons (Aug. 12) at the report stage, constituted a substantial advance and improvement in several directions upon the legislative standard previously attained. Unfortu

nately, however, even in this case a certain want of strength of purpose on the part of the Government resulted in a serious reduction of the credit which would otherwise have been due to them in this department of social reform. This remark, perhaps, hardly applies with justice to the acquiescence of the Government in the defeat by 163 to 141 of an amendment which the Home Secretary had supported, altering back from noon to one o'clock (as in the original bill) the hour fixed by the Grand Committee for the ending of work by young persons and women in textile factories on Saturdays, if they began at 6 A.M. The best opinion certainly seemed to be that, as Mr. Ritchie had maintained, the hour of half-holiday closing should be settled by agreement between employers and employed. But the question was probably not, on the whole, of sufficient importance to call for any extraordinary exercise of Ministerial authority in order to secure the concurrence of Parliament in the Ministerial judgment.

Where the Governmental want of backbone was shown to a degree which caused deep annoyance among their supporters was in their treatment of the question of laundries. In its

original form the bill contained a clause extending in several important ways the control exercised by the Home Office over the working of steam laundries. The necessity for this extension of control had been fully established by the reports of lady factory inspectors, which showed that the industry was one that was rapidly increasing, employing steadily growing numbers of women and young persons, and doing so under conditions calling for supervision and regulation quite as loudly as other industries over which the Factory Acts had already established full control. In the Grand Committee the Home Secretary accepted from Mr. W. Redmond an amendment entirely excluding laundries connected with reformatory, religious, and charitable institutions from the operation of the laundries clause. And the bill returned to the House with that exemption. A strong and widespread feeling, however, had been expressed that the alteration to which Mr. Ritchie had agreed involved an unworthy concession to unreasonable religious prejudice. Notice was given of various amendments proposing the simple rescission of Mr. Redmond's amendment.. That, perhaps, might have been difficult to justify, but a practical compromise was offered by an amendment standing in the name of Mr. Talbot (Oxford University), the effect of which would have been to empower the Home Secretary to modify, instead of dispensing with, the requirements of the act in regard to reformatory laundries in any cases where he was satisfied that discipline would be impaired by ordinary inspection. An arrangement of this character which in principle received the support of Mr. Fitzalan Hope (Brightside, Sheffield), nephew of the Duke of Norfolk, on the part of English Roman Catholics, would have been cordially welcomed as satisfactory-as appeared from speeches made by the Bishops of Winchester and Rochester in the House of Lords (Aug. 15) -by those responsible for great reformatory institutions belonging to the Church of England. These facts were very relevant to the defence offered by Mr. Ritchie for the action which he took on the report stage in the House of Commons (Aug. 13)-that he had been urged by the authorities of many institutions in this country that laundry inspection would damage their discipline. Deferring to this and Irish pressure Mr. Ritchie adhered to the necessity of exempting the reformatory laundries, and then felt constrained, by the anomaly of placing fresh restrictions on commercial laundries alone, to move the entire omission of the new regulations in that regard, thus leaving the commercial laundry industry under the law of 1895, which had been abundantly proved to be inadequate. Mr. Balfour in the Commons and Lord James of Hereford in the House of Lords met the reproaches of those who condemned the sacrifice of the interests of a large and increasing class of persons needing protection with the assertion that the sacrifice was necessary in order to save the rest of

the bill. But the Archbishop of Canterbury, who a few weeks before, in addressing some friends of voluntary schools, had spoken of the Government as "not very brave," bluntly intimated his inability to accept the defence thus put forward.

The surrender on the laundry question to Mr. W. Redmond, it may be remarked, was contrasted, not unnaturally, with the high tone maintained by Mr. Balfour and Mr. Chamberlain in their reference to the conduct of the Irish Nationalists in Parliament at a Unionist demonstration at Blenheim (Aug. 10). Parliament, the First Lord said, in a somewhat halting cross between an epigram and a pun, would not sacrifice our Empire to the Boers or our Constitution to the bores. The Colonial Secretary, on the same occasion, used language which gave much satisfaction in some Unionist quarters, as pointing to the need of redressing the over-representation of Ireland, proved to exist by the results of the census taken in April.* The nation, said Mr. Chamberlain, would expect the Mother of Parliaments to know how to defend herself against the attacks of men who, through our liberality, came to us in numbers altogether disproportionate to the wealth, the intelligence and the population which they represented. The laundry incident, it was thought, was but a doubtful illustration of the firm temper thus avowed.

As to Ireland itself, the Government, not for the first time. during its existence, sustained a defeat in the House of Lords (July 18) at the hands of the Irish Peers and those who sympathised with them in thinking that the Unionist Government ought to have introduced material modifications, in the interests of justice to the landlords, into the administration of the Land Acts. A somewhat agreeable incident in the House of Commons, though unpleasantly provoked, was the debate raised (Aug. 15) by Mr. J. Redmond (Waterford) with regard to an article in the Globe making very offensive imputations against the Nationalist Members. Mr. Balfour and Mr. Asquith both expressed, in emphatic terms, their conviction that the Members in question were entirely clear of any charge of personal corruption. The editor and publisher of the Globe were ordered to appear on the following day and make apology, and were reprimanded by the Speaker. On the very last day of the session (Aug. 17) the Chief Secretary for Ireland secured compliments of a kind very rarely offered by the Nationalist Members to the occupant of his post, with reference to declarations which he made as to the misconduct of an Irish sergeant of police named Sheridan. He frankly and sorrowfully admitted that this man had been instrumental in procuring the conviction of innocent men in three cases. A searching investigation had been held, Sheridan had been dismissed from the force, and reparation had been made to the persons wronged. Approval was expressed of Mr. Wyndham's tone and action by several Nationalist Members.

*For census figures, see under "Geography," in Retrospect of Science, in Part II. of this volume.

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In regard to the conduct of foreign affairs, and in particular the line taken by the Government in the Far East, some discussion arose in the Commons (July 26) on the Foreign Office vote, when Sir Charles Dilke (Forest of Dean, Gloucester) contended in effect that while we had been forced to acknowledge the preferential rights of Russia in Manchuria and of Germany in Shan-tung, we had abandoned our own in the Yang-tsze Valley. In reply, Lord Cranborne, dealing with the AngloGerman Agreement, observed that there was no limit to the application of the clause in it stating that the contracting parties would "direct their policy towards maintaining undiminished the territorial condition of the Chinese Empire," but that the open-door" clause was limited to the ports, littoral, and rivers of China and those parts of the country where the contracting Powers had influence. If, therefore, the German Government held that they had no influence in Manchuria, the latter clause did not, in their case, apply to that region. Incidentally Lord Cranborne mentioned that Japan had adhered to the AngloGerman Agreement. On the other hand, the Manchurian Agreement between Russia and China had not been signed, owing to the friendly representations of the British Government and to the support which had been given to patriotic Chinamen. Respecting the concession which the Russians claimed to have secured at Tien-tsin, it had been agreed that the question of the right to the disputed ground should be reserved for future settlement, and that nothing should be done in the meantime to prejudice the matter, and, although on more than one occasion the Russian military authorities had not shown as great a regard for that agreement as we had a right to expect, the Russian Government had always received our representations in a very different spirit. As to the landing of foreign troops at Shanghai (which had caused some anxiety in England), Ministers were given to understand that the occupation would only be a temporary one. The British troops on the spot were actually more than the equivalent of all the foreign forces put together. Nearly everything was settled with respect to the indemnity. His Majesty's Government had agreed to the raising of the maritime Customs to an effective 5 per cent. ad valorem, and in return for this concession the river approaches on the Peiho and Yang-tsze were to be facilitated. Certain Powers had suggested that the Customs duties should be raised to 10 per cent., but to that the Government could not agree unless further and material commercial facilities were given to British trade. While the Government did not favour an aggressive policy, they were fully alive to the necessity of protecting our merchants, and they kept our treaty rights always in view. Sir E. Grey (Berwick, Northumberland) feared that the Powers were imposing on China the maximum fine that she could pay, which seemed to him a mistake, as it would leave no means of exacting reparation by indemnity in future years. He could

not but consider the Anglo-German Agreement a one-sided one, from which Germany derived most profit. With Russia he held that an understanding was vital, and he urged the Government to impress upon that Power the importance of being frank and open. The legitimate aims of Russia could be satisfied without danger to this country; but if we could not convince Russia that her expansion must not injure British interests very unsatisfactory consequences might follow.

In the House of Lords (Aug. 6) the Foreign Secretary made the last of his series of statements as to the course of events in China, and was able to report much more definite movement than at any former date since he took up office. The negotiations, he said, had of late proceeded more rapidly, and the Government were able to regard that progress without dissatisfaction. While we had been ready to meet other Powers upon matters of comparatively secondary importance, there were points on which it had seemed inexpedient to make any concession. We could not allow the credit of this country to be used for the purpose of securing debts due to other Powers, nor could we be a party to any arrangement under which the commerce of this country would be taxed beyond the limits at present laid down by our treaty rights in order to raise the money necessary for the indemnities. There had, however, been a general acceptance of our proposals on these points, and there was a general agreement also with regard to the rate of interest, the sinking fund arrangements, and the revenues which were to be ear-marked for the service of the indemnity loan bonds. The number of foreign troops in China was being steadily reduced, and before long it would be brought down to the "provisional total" of 13,000, of whom about 4,100 could be British troops. The eventual strength of the force would probably be an aggregate of 1,800 men for the guards of the different Legations, with some 3,000 more men for the occupation of certain important positions between Pekin and the coast. Referring to the Anglo-German Agreement, Lord Lansdowne observed that, in the disclaimer of any desire to seek territorial advantages and the assertion of the intention of the Powers to maintain the territorial condition of China, the words of the agreement were entirely unqualified and unlimited; so that its provisions, in the view of his Majesty's Government, most unquestionably extended to Manchuria. He hoped it might be possible to arrive at a comprehensive settlement of any difficulties that had arisen with Russia. All we wanted of Russia in Manchuria was that our treaty rights should be respected, and that Russia should not use the preponderance which belonged to her to our detriment or to the detriment of the Powers with whom we were associated.

On the whole, the effect of these Ministerial statements was to strengthen the doubts entertained in this country, and expressed by Sir C. Dilke and Sir E. Grey, as to the value, from