It is very wrong that an extravagant person who ruins
half Regent Street and then fails should go to prison. It is veiy right that an artisan or labourer whose wife has bought useless dresses -on credit should go to prison. That is the English notion of justice, so last year we had 186,000 male adults sent to prison for short terms, to be maintained at public expense. Mr. Baas thinks that foolish, and on Tuesday proposed to do away with -the system ; but Mr. Lopez thought it wise, arguing that without it County Courts would have no vitality, and the poor no credit. As to the County Courts, the less business they have the better, the object of Courts not being to encourage, but to repress liti- gation, while as as to credit, it would not be affected in any bad way. The shopkeeper would give it as he gives it now, because -it is his interest, and the tallyman would be ruined, an he ought to be. Sir H. James, formerly an advocate of imprisonment, -showed this in the most convincing way—proving that a work- man paid 50 per cent, for credit ending in arrest—but Mr. Cross -would not accept the Bill, and it was lost by 215 to 72. Note, workmen, your two special Rills, for lengthening the hours of polling and for abolishing the imprisonment of the poor, are both summarily smashed in one night's debate by the Tory House you have sent up.
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