whether the payments were due to Holland or to Russia, but to one or other they were, in his opinion, due. If his vote were to imply a decided opinion that the money was not due to Russia, he would not give it. The right hon. gentleman assented--and it was an important admission--to the opinion he had formerly expressed, that the obligation of this country arose out of mixed considerations. His impression was, that there was a doubtful claim on this country, arising out of the convention of 1815; but he had admitted that there might be other considerations, independently of the convention, which would justify Ministers in promising to pay the money to Russia; that if they could show him that the payment of this money would enable them to maintain the peace of Europe, and to bring the pending negotiations to a satisfactory conclusion, he was prepared to give them his support. But why did the Ministers press a vote, when they were unable to give the House satisfaction upon these points? It was clear, from the right hon. gentleman's admission, that this question depended on mixed considerations; but he objected to being called upon to confirm the arrangement until he was satisfied, by the production of documents, of the extent of each of these mixed considerations. The negotiations were not complete, and they were, perhaps, the most important for the honour of England, for the independence of small states, and for the general tranquillity of Europe, in which this country was ever engaged. The right hon. gentleman said that the Government which preceded the present determined on the separation of Belgium from Holland. Here again he was incorrect. The former Ministers were called upon to interfere as mediators. In compliance with the Treaty of 1815, the King of Holland applied to the great Powers for counsel. England at once told him that she was not prepared to assist him in re-establishing by force his authority over Belgium; but when the late Ministers left office it had never been decided that Belgium must, of necessity, be transferred from the dominion of the House of Nassau. He had even some recollection that the present Prime Minister had been taunted in the Belgic Chamber of Deputies for having expressed a hope which pervaded almost every British mind, that Belgium might be established as a separate kingdom under the authority of a prince of that illustrious family. That alone was sufficient to prove that the complete independence of Belgium of the House of Orange was not decided upon when the present Ministers entered office. But further, at the very time when he and his colleagues resigned office, an hon. gentleman (Sir J. C. Hobhouse) had a notice of a motion in the book, the object of which was to compel the Government to explain their supposed conduct in favouring, not the separation of Belgium from Holland, but the King of Holland against his revolted subjects. But to return to the ground on which he objected to being pledged to