GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. 





preceding Government. The various truck 



that have been pa ed make it illegal to give food 



remuneration for labor, or to pm- 

 >r materials for work if they are reckoned 

 as a iv ward for labor, or to deduct the price of food 

 or otlier articles supplied from wages, or of t'>ols 

 given to the workman to keep, or in home imiustries 

 i;i wool. silk. etc.. to make any deduction from the 

 contract price: but when the workman acqu; 

 his wages may be paid to his wife or for du> 

 subscriptions: and it is legal for the workman to 

 contract how his wages >hali be expended, unl' 

 is for goods or materials: moreover, deduction- 

 yond tlie actual loss may be deducted from v 

 for spoiled work or materials, and fines imposed for 

 lateness or absence or misconduct, but women or 

 children may be fined only to the extent of the 

 employers' damage. A c>.nciliation-in-disputes act 

 gives expression to a public sentiment against in- 

 dustrial war without providing any effective m< 

 for preventing or settling disputes. The boards of 

 conciliation and arbitration created by a former 

 act if mediation has failed and the parties to a 

 dispute agree to submit to arbitration may act as 

 arbitrators, or may appoint arbitrators. The arbi- 

 trators shall have power to examine witnesses un- 

 der oath, and call for the production of documents, 

 but employers can not be required to produce their 

 books, nor officers of trade unions their records. If 

 the agreement to arbitrate is enforcible in law. the 

 award of the arbitrators is binding and enforcible. 



Among the minor measures that became law was 

 one altering the law restricting the use of locomo- 

 tives on highways so as to permit the development 

 and enjoyment of automobile carriages, which have 

 hitherto been practically debarred from the use of 

 English roads by the regulations intended for heavy 

 traction engines and the like. A majority \\a- 

 found in the House of Commons for a bill requir- 

 ing foreign and colonial meat, cheese, butter, and 

 other agricultural produce to be labeled, so that it 

 shall not be sold for English, and the question was 

 afterward referred to a select committee. The 

 House passed a unanimous resolution in favor of 

 the increased employment of discharged soldiers by 

 the Government. A bill to enable the army au- 

 thorities to bring battalions up to the war strength 

 when required for service in the field, the system 

 of linked battalions, the attempted territorial or- 

 ganization, and all other devices having failed, 

 was the reserve forces bill, which provided that 

 when a warlike expedition is contemplated men 

 belonging to the first class of the army res 

 may be called out during the first year after their 

 discharge for permanent service, thus prolonging 

 the seven years' service to eight if the ordinary 

 exigencies of the army require it. The bill was 

 not pressed when military expert opinion was 

 found to be divided regarding the utility of such a 

 makeshift. 



Lord Cranborne's benefices bill, based on the 

 recommendations of a royal commission, is in- 

 tended to put an end to the scandals arising from 

 the abuse of Church patronage, such as the traffic 

 in livings, the sale of a<: y auction, and 



the presentation through venality, caprice, or nepo- 

 tism of grossly immoral or incompetent incumbents. 

 The bill gives to the bishop power, on the prayer of 

 any of the parishioners, to refuse institution on any 

 one of various grounds involving incapacity or mis- 

 conduct. The presentee or the patron may appeal 

 to the arehbisl: 1 by a judge of the High 



Court, and their decision shall be final. The bishop 

 may. after an investigation through commissioners, 

 inhibit an incumbent who is unwilling or through 

 his own fault unfit or incompetent to discharge the 

 cure of souls, and may then appoint a curate, to be 



paid out of the proceeds of the living. Some of the 

 grounds on which a bishop may condemn an incum- 

 bent <av evil report concerning his moral conduct. 

 pecuniary embarrassments, ana E f duty in 



any previous employment. This bill, though 

 fully prepared and supported by publi> 

 wa> thrown out. owing to pressure of bus 

 The same fate overtook Sir John Lubbock's early- 

 closing bill providing that the local authorities 

 should be empowered to close the shops at a certain 

 hour when two thirds of the shopkeepers of the 

 district agreed upon the hour. This nieasu 

 the principle of which the House of Common - 

 sented in a unanimous resolution in IS'.i:;. \vas sup- 

 ported by the clergy, the medical profession, and 

 the trade councils of all the principal towns. The 

 deceased wile's sister bill, which for the first time 

 had been passed in all its stages by the House of 

 Lords, obtaining moderate majorities, was wrecked 

 at last in the House of Commons, not becau-e it 

 would not command a majority, but because the 

 minority would offer an energetic resistance and 

 demand" facilities for discussion that the ministers 

 could not afford. Sir Alfred Hickman obtained an 

 opportunity to argue at some length his bill to pro- 

 vide workingmen with freehold dwellings by a grant 

 of assistance out of the public funds. His pr< 

 tion. which was described by Radical members as 

 the first step of the Tory democracy toward social- 

 ism, and as the thin end of the wedge for the na- 

 tionalization of the land, was to empower local 

 authorities to make to workingmen. clerks, and 

 others earning not more than 3 a week a maxi- 

 mum advance of 150, to be secured by a termi- 

 nable annuity for the purchase or building of a 

 dwelling, the borrower being required to raise one 

 fourth of the purchase money or to provide the 

 site. The Lord Chancellor brought in a bill to 

 give power to the judges of the High Court to for- 

 bid the publication of indecent evidence, such as is 

 likely to be prejudicial to public morality. 



The Government promised an inquiry into the 

 circumstances of Dr. Jameson's filibustering expe- 

 dition into the Transvaal Republic, but Mr. Cham- 

 berlain insisted that it should not be instituted 

 until after the trial of the prisoners whom the 

 South African Republic had delivered up to be 

 dealt with by British justice. A few days before 

 the House of Commons rose a select committee 

 was appointed. The determination of the Gov- 

 ernment to proceed on a larger scale with the 

 forward policy in Uganda was vigorously resisted 

 by the Radicals. A resolution authorizing the 

 expenditure of 2.000,000 on a railroad from 

 Mombasa to the Victoria Nyanza was carried by a 

 vote of 255 to 75. The Egyptian advance up the 

 Nile was the subject of a spirited controversy. A 

 motion to adjourn, that was made by Mr. Labou- 

 chere to afford an opportunity to attack the min- 

 istry on this question, was defeated by 268 against 

 126 votes. The ordering of Indian troops to Sua- 

 kim raised a still more serious question, for many 

 Ministerialists were surprised when it was learned 

 that Lord George Hamilton, after he had previous- 

 ly refused to charge India with any part of the cost 

 of two native regiments borrowed to serve at Mom- 

 had now decided, against the vigorous protest, 

 of the Indian Government, to require the Indian 

 treasury to provide the pay and all the ordinary 

 expenses of the Suakim contingent. The mean in- 

 justice of requiring the Indian Government to bear 

 the full charges of all British troop- sent to India for 

 any extraordinary emergency and of its own t: 



when borrowed for an imperial emergency 

 caused the Radicals to inquire derisively : Who are 

 the little Englanders now :" An amendment to Lord 

 George Hamilton's motion imposing the charge on 



