On Thursday in Committee Mr. G. H. Moore moved to
reduce the two years' imprisonment to which persons are liable for carrying arms without licence to one year, but was defeated by 302 to 31; and another amendment, removing the power given by the Bill to examine witnesses, even when no person has been accused, by 161 to 16; but a third, substituting the Queen's Bench for the Attorney- General as the authority empowered to change the venue, was accepted by Government. The most serious discussion, how- ever, was upon the Press clause, which was opposed by Mr. Stavely Hill and Mr. Maguire as unjust to printers and oppressive to writers ; but upheld by The O'Donoglme in a very hot speech, in which he characterized the seditious writers as a knot of scribblers ; and by Sir R. Palmer, who held it unjust to punish the perpe- trators and not the instigators of crime. (That is a poor argu- ment, we try the perpetrators, and the instigators are only asking for trial.) Mr. Synan's amendment, however, confining the right of seizure to papers advising agrarian outrage, was negatived by 330 to 13. Finally, an amendment by Mr. Bouverie, striking out sedition from the list of causes of seizure, was lost by 265 to 19; but on Friday, too late for detailed notice, an amendment allow- ing one "warning" was accepted.
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