Sir W. Lawson moved the second reading of the Permissive
Bill on Wednesday, in a speech of the usual kind about the evils of intemperance, and the necessity of removing temptation from the people. The debate would have been feeble, but for the very powerful speech of Mr. Henley, the main argument of which, that drunkenness is not promoted by public-houses, we have discussed elsewhere. He further contended, as we have always done, that to banish all but reckless men from the trade directly tends to demoralization, and that if licences depended on rate- payers' votes, the publicans' interest would be to debauch the ratepayers. He might have added that the safest place for illicit distillation is not a hut on a mountain, but a house in a great city, and that it goes on even now in London. No division was taken on the second reading, the House rising too soon ; but a motion for adjournment in order to hear Irish opinion was defeated by 369 to 15, which would appear to be decisive. The House is thoroughly bored with the waste of time over this bad Bill, which is not a Bill for restraining the sale of liquor, but only for restraining the sale of liquor to men too poor to store it.
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