The other error, of making several entrances to the House instead of one, did not admit of so easy a remedy, and during forty years the country has been paying the salary of messengers to guard entrances which ought never to have existed.
The earliest question on which the Opposition took issue with the Government was on a manifest departure from convenient Parliamentary usage, which had been the result of long experience.
The Continental legislative chambers are circular a method convenient for seeing and hearing. The seats in the House of Commons, on the contrary, are arranged for two parties, who sit face to face. But in the Victorian chamber the seats were arranged for three parties, though Responsible Government contemplates only two; there was no bar, though a bar might at any moment be necessary for the examination of witnesses or prisoners; and instead of one entrance there were four.
Under Responsible Government those entrusted with the conduct of public affairs, who must maintain a constant majority in the House, ought to have a reasonable means of estimating the number of their supporters present, which was ascertained by their position in the House. The present practice of cross benches might result in establishing a Pretorian band ready to make a majority for either party for an adequate consideration. The Government in reply offered to establish a bar, and to consider the other objections, and the motion was defeated; but after a little while all the arrangements which the Opposition objected to were silently amended as far as it was practicable.
The most important work done in the session was the establishment of a municipal system for the towns of the colony, carried through the House by Captain Clarke,[1] and a system of assisted emigration with a Chief Commissioner resident in London. This office was undertaken by Mr. Childers and developed in time into an office, entitled Agent-General with certain diplomatic functions, which has since been imitated by all the Australian colonies. Mr. Childers's retirement was a serious blow to the prestige of the Govern-
- ↑ Now Lieutenant-General Sir Andrew Clarke.
