When the House goes into committee, according to the formal Parliamentary phrase, the temptation to obstruct becomes indefinitely multiplied, for in committee a member can speak as often as he thinks fit on the subject--or, at least, such was his privilege before the alterations adopted in very recent years. It may be well to explain to the general reader the meaning of what takes place when the House goes into committee. When a Bill has passed through its first and second reading it is understood that the main principles of the measure have been agreed upon, and that it only remains for the House to go into committee for the purpose of considering every clause and every minute detail of the Bill before it comes up to the House again for its third and final reading. Now the House, when it goes into committee, is still just the same House of Commons as before, except that the Speaker leaves the chair and the assembly is presided over by the Chairman of Committees, who sits not in the Speaker's throne-like chair, but in an ordinary seat at the table in front of it. There is, however, the important difference that, while in the House itself, presided over by the Speaker, a member can only speak once on each motion, in the committee he can speak as often as he thinks fit, and for the obvious reason that, where mere details are under consideration, it was not thought expedient to limit the number of practical suggestions which any member might desire to offer as the discussion of each clause suggested new possibilities of improvement. By the alterations effected recently in the rules of procedure the Speaker of the House, or the Chairman of Committees, obtains a {161} certain control over members who are evidently talking against time and for the sake of wilful obstruction; but in the days of Lord John Russell's Reform Bill no such authority had been given to the presiding officer.