'Doing unto all men as ye would they should do unto you.'"
Mr. Spooner was proceeding to express the reasons which induced him to support the amendment in preference to the proposition of the government; but the interruptions in the House were so frequent that it was impossible to follow the chain of his arguments. Mr. P. Borthwick followed on the same side amid still greater interruptions. Lord G. Bentinck condemned the proposition of the government as vicious in principle, and likely to be deeply injurious, not only to agriculture, but to all the great interests of the country. He contended that the rate of wages would fall with the price of corn, and that the working classes would be better off with undiminished wages and wheat at 70s, per quarter, than with corn at 45s, and reduced means of procuring it. The apprehension of famine was altogether a mistake. The crop was more than an average one in some parts of the country; in Scotland particularly, there was a positive repletion, and the potato murrain was by no means so extensive as it had been represented!
The House divided at twenty minutes to three o'clock. The numbers were for the motion
| Ayes | 337 |
| Noes | 240 |
| ——— | |
| Majority against it | 97 |
The House then resolved itself pro forma into comittee. The chairman was ordered to report progress, and to ask leave to sit again on Monday.
