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9,000 men voted in the preceding year, they had expressly disclaimed the idea of the increase being rendered necessary by any thing in the internal state of England or Ireland. He had then stated, as he now repeated, that it was only in relation to the colonies that the existing force was reckoned inadequate; that the diminution of the military force in 1822 had been by far too extensive; that, after a trial of three years, that experiment had completely failed, and that a greater number of troops was absolutely necessary. The same necessity still existed in fact, the number of troops in the Canadas and West Indies did not much exceed the number stationed there in 1792; while the increase of their population, and other considerations, rendered a greater military esta'blishment indispensable. Whether or not the army was too numerous, was best ascertained by observing how it was distributed. We had at present, on foot, eighty-three regiments of the line; of these, nine were stationed in Great Britain, twenty-three in Ireland, and the others are constantly employed on foreign service. Besides these nine regiments, there were also in Great Britain the dépôts of the fifty-oneregiments stationed abroad. Taking each of these dépôts at 224 men, the entire number would "be 11,424. And taking the nine regiments to contain 740 men each, they would amount to 6,660. There were, besides, six battalions of foot guards, 4,400 men, and the staff corps 300; making a total of somewhat above 22,700. If the 11,424 men composing the dépôts, and who were, for any active purpose, really non-effective, were deducted from the whole, the actual number was not only

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not too large, but was less than could be well deemed adequate to perform the services required of it. The men composing the dépôts were not available, inasmuch as they were chiefly either employed in the recruiting service, or consisted of invalided men. Although, therefore, our home force was ap parently large; yet, after the deduction of these 11,000 men,ait was trifling in comparison with the clamour raised about the existence of a standing army in times of peace. The number of regiments abroad was fifty-one: it was usual to release, every ten years, each regiment on foreign service; and, surely no person could think ten years too short a period for their continuance out of this country, due regard being paid to the health and comforts of the men. If, then, these regiments were to be removed every tenth year, it followed that there must be a disposable force for the purpose of supplying the places of the troops brought home from time to time. Taking the force thus employed for reliefs to be seven regiments, it followed that fourteen regiments were to be considered as neither at home nor abroad, inasmuch as they were constantly on their passage, or preparing for it. Deducting the dépôts of these fourteen regiments, which were to be deemed totally unavailable, continuing in Great Britain, the strength of the whole fourteen might be set down as equal to five regiments; and considering that this loss fell solely on the home force, the conclusion was, that there remain continually in this country only four regiments of the line. The reason for setting down the fourteen regiments as not exceeding the full strength of five,

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The House having divided, the numbers were, for the original motion 106; for Mr. Hobhouse's amendment 34.

Another attempt was still made by Mr. Hume to check what he termed the career of reckless expenditure, by cutting down the estimates for the civil contingencies, and, above all, the expenses of our diplomatic establishments in foreign countries. The whole cost, he said, of ambassadors and consuls for the present year, amounted to half a million, and was regularly increasing. The only effect of large salaries was, he said, to raise men above their business, and disincline, or disable, them from doing their duty; and if a vote were to be passed reducing the salaries one half, the duty would be quite as well performed. He complained of the extravagant scale of expenditure for the missions and consulates in South America, which exceeded 100,000l., and of the folly of paying three or four thousand a-year to support ministers at such courts as those of Wirtemberg, Tuscany, and Saxony, which possessed no political importance. He inveighed, in particular, against the expenses of the embassy to Paris, amounting this year to 30,000l.; thus exceeding the cost of maintaining the president, vice-president, and whole civil establishment of North America: and he could not conceive what advantage this country could de

rive from the English ambassador giving an entertainment to two thousand Parisians. He regretted that advantage had not been taken of the liberal determination of the duke of Northumberland to defray, out of his private fortune, the expenses of his mission at the coronation of the king of France, and that 10,000l. should have been spent in presenting him with a sword in return. He denounced the extravagance of keeping the great seal, &c. in silver boxes at Antigua and Dominica, in buying plate for ambassadors in Lisbon, Madrid, or Paris, and in maintaining kettle-drummers, trumpeters, and silver trumpets, for the bands attached to the royal household. He was grieved to observe that, in regard to the latter, the lace and finery of the dress were not only expensive, but did not accord with the plainness and simplicity of the English character. He preferred the plain Windsor frock; and he saw, in all this riot, the ruinous waste and extravagance of the court of Louis XIV. Mr. Croker reminded him that the dresses of these important personages, however little entitled to appear beside the Windsor frock, were so far from being an innovation of modern fashion and extravagance, that they were exactly what they had been in the reign of Henry VIII., as he might learn by consulting the pictures of that period.

Mr. Canning was surprised, beyond all intelligible expression of surprise, at the proposition of Mr. Hume to withdraw our representatives from the smaller continental courts, on the ground of these courts being of no political importance. The expense of these embassies had in fact been reduced;

but the reduction had not proceeded from any so ungenerous, and improvident view. Such a proposition was in truth a declaration admitting that three or four of the larger courts were to dispose of the interests of the smaller ones, and that in these latter it was scarcely worth while to maintain those representatives of the British Crown, whose presence, however, was really of so much moment to their welfare. It never could be the policy of this country, at any period, so to discountenance those minor states, as to aid in preventing them from raising their heads, on occasion, among the other European governments. He by no means pretended to say that he was in a condition to predict the time or the states which would one day exemplify the better policy of our not neglecting them: but the House must feel convinced, that the period might very possibly arrive, some day or other, when these now minor states might rise into and manifest themselves as states of much greater power and importance.

The objections to the consular estimates appeared to him equally extraordinary; as the plan, which gave occasion to them, instead of being a measure of the government, was a child begotten by Mr. Hume himself. It had been determined by parliament to do away with the whole consular system, and place it on a new footing; to abolish all fees, and substitute fixed salaries in their place. This was the plan adopted, to which he had been no party; and it was rather hard in Mr. Hume now to turn round upon him for endeavouring to give effect to a system, in the introduction of which he himself had been so potent an instrument.

The burthens, to which the trade of the country had been subject in the shape of fees to consuls, was between 65,000l. and 70,000l.; and the House had determined no longer to take this sum from the pockets of individual merchants, trading to ports where British consuls were stationed, but to throw the charge upon the public generally. On the old system, 61,000l. were annually paid by government, and the various companies; whereas, under the new arrangement, the yearly charges for these consuls were not more than 50,000l., and 11,000l. to the Levant consuls. He looked upon the total allowance for such services, however, as being 79,000l.; from which deducting 30,000l. voted in the civil list, there remained only 49,000l., to be voted as consuls' salaries. This was the amount called for; but the relief given by it to the merchants was 61,000l. In regard to the consulates in the new states of South America, it was impossible already to lay down a fixed scale, or adopt a precise estimate. This year there had been a saving to a considerable extent; but it was impossible to say what the expenses for the year might be, for no European mission furnished any standard by which to compare them. It was most difficult to form any trust-worthy scale of the cost of such establishments in states where the prices of particular commodities were very unequal, and most of them in nearly an inverse ratio from those of Europe-where a man, for instance, might buy a horse for a dollar, but would be obliged to pay about two guineas for shoeing him. In the expenses, again, of the old diplomatic establishments, the scale voted by parliament in 1816, had been uni

formly adhered to: and, although of renewing the furniture, amounted to between 23,000l. and 24,000l. This was too much: but to make the house, at least in the French sense of the word, weather-tight, Mr. Wyatt had been restrained by orders from home, to an expenditure of 12,000l. instead of 17,000l. on the building; and to about one half of his estimate for the renewal of the furniture. The whole of these expenses, therefore, which went to swell the item of the present year, did not fall to be considered as lasting and regular elements in the annual average of the embassy; and, in respect to the general expenses of the embassy, he could state, on the most unquestionable authority, that lord Granville, the ambassador, actually expended yearly, at least double the amount of the salary, out of his private fortune.

the total cost of the embassy at
Paris amounted this year to 30,000l.,
it was fallacious to assume this as
the
of its annual expense,
average
because the increase which appeared
this year was but temporary, and
dependent entirely on specific
causes. The hotel of our embassy
in Paris was our own property;
and we were the only power, ex-
cepting Russia, which possessed an
hotel: to have parted with it would
have been both inconvenient and
impolitic: for, although it was per-
fectly true that Great Britain was
under no necessity of resorting to
any secondary means for sustaining
that influence in European politics
to which her grandeur, her power,
and her policy, so indisputably and
absolutely entitled her, yet, consi-
dering that but one other power
possessed an hotel in Paris of this
sort (and, of all capitals, it was
most important for us to possess
such a house in Paris), and con-
sidering that that other power was
Russia, he could not help feeling
that it was quite necessary the
British ambassador should be thus
accommodated. But the hotel
went into disrepair: five or six
years ago large annual sums had
begun to be necessarily expended
in requisite repairs and improve-
ments, and, in 1824, 5,000l. had
been voted for these purposes. It
was thought better to put it at
once into a good condition; and a
professional person, Mr. Wyatt,
had been sent over to report to the
Treasury what was necessary to
be done. His estimate of the re-
quisite repairs, and of the expense

Mr. Baring regretted the adoption of the new principle upon which government now appointed consuls, prohibiting them from engaging in trade, and allowing them fixed salaries for discharging the specific duties assigned to them. He preferred the old system of such appointments, by which the principal merchant of a trading port, such as Amsterdam in Holland, was the consul. Such an individual was surely much better qualified to sustain the state and hospitality necessary to be maintained among those with whom consuls were frequently associating, than a consul, not a merchant, with a salary of perhaps not more than 600l. a year.

but the reduction had not proceeded from any so ungenerous, and improvident view. Such a proposition was in truth a declaration admitting that three or four of the larger courts were to dispose of the interests of the smaller ones, and that in these latter it was scarcely worth while to maintain those representatives of the British Crown, whose presence, however, was really of so much moment to their welfare. It never could be the policy of this country, at any period, so to discountenance those minor states, as to aid in preventing them from raising their heads, on occasion, among the other European governments. He by no means pretended to say that he was in a condition to predict the time or the states which would one day exemplify the better policy of our not neglecting them: but the House must feel convinced, that the period might very possibly arrive, some day or other, when these now minor states might rise into and manifest themselves as states of much greater power and importance.co

The objections to the consular estimates appeared to him equally extraordinary; as the plan, which gave occasion to them, instead of being a measure of the government, was a child begotten by Mr. Hume himself. It had been determined by parliament to do away with the whole consular system, and place it on a new footing; to abolish all fees, and substitute fixed salaries in their place. This was the plan adopted, to which he had been no party; and it was rather hard in Mr. Hume now to turn round upon him for endeavouring to give effect to a system, in the introduction of which he himself had been so potent an instrument.

The burthens, to which the trade of the country had been subject in the shape of fees to consuls, was between 65,000l. and 70,000l.; and the House had determined no longer to take this sum from the pockets of individual merchants, trading to ports where British consuls were stationed, but to throw the charge upon the public generally. On the old system, 61,000l. were annually paid by government, and the various companies; whereas, under the new arrangement, the yearly charges for these consuls were not more than 50,0007., and 11,000l. to the Levant consuls. He looked upon the total allowance for such services, however, as being 79,000l.; from which deducting 30,000l. voted in the civil list, there remained only 49,000l., to be voted as consuls' salaries. This was the amount called for; but the relief given by it to the merchants was 61,000l. In regard to the consulates in the new states of South America, it was impossible already to lay down a fixed scale, or adopt a precise estimate. This year there had been a saving to a considerable extent; but it was impossible to say what the expenses for the year might be, for no European mission furnished any standard by which to compare them. It was most difficult to form any trust-worthy scale of the cost of such establishments in states where the prices of particular commodities were very unequal, and most of them in nearly an inverse ratio from those of Europe-where a man, for instance, might buy a horse for a dollar, but would be obliged to pay about two guineas for shoeing him. In the expenses, again, of the old diplomatic establishments, the scale liament in 181

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