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the risk and peril which the country suffered at the hands of the Board of Health, the latter being determined to get all it could into its own hands. It was originally proposed to ratify the whole of the provisional orders. Circumstances were afterward brought to the knowledge of Lord Seymour, who concluded that the borough of Hastings ought not to be included in its full extent. The great majority of the electors resided in the East Ward; it was therefore evident which party would have the greatest pull upon the representatives. The decision was ratified by two Divisions, but on the third reading the county members were in the field and succeeded in beating the Government. Hastings then triumphed, but in what? — in obtaining an engine to oppress St. Leonards. On the part of St. Leonards there was an antipathy to the Bill as strong as any love which could exist for it in Hastings. Nothing could be more dissimilar than the aspect of the two towns. Hastings was confined within surrounding cliffs, was of great antiquity and abounded in narrow thoroughfares. Many of its houses were very old and of an inferior description. It was quite true that it had large houses in the front, but these might be deficient of drainage. St. Leonards had wide ​road​s and most of its houses were first-class. It was built in 1828, and in 1832 it obtained its present Improvement Act. Under this Act gratuitous Commissioners were elected, and there were employed a clerk and surveyor at a total cost of £55. This organization had drained the town, supplied it with water, and worked to the satisfaction of the ratepayers. He would show their lordships that the reports of the bad state of St. Leonards were not founded on fact. When the Local Act was obtained for St. Leonards, it was as patent as now that there was a another Local Act in the borough, yet no opposition arose on this ground [Both Acts were passed in the same session — 2nd of William IV., 1832. See Local History for that year, chapters VII & VIII.] But now it was asked that St. Leonards should be handed over to the Board of Health because Hastings wished it to be so. The six councillors to be elected in the West Ward might be chosen without the limits of St. Leonards; therefore not only were the inhabitants of that town to be governed by the twelve gentleman who appeared in the plan of the district to ride in pink, but there was also a possibility for every one of the Council to be elected from parts of the borough exclusive of St. Leonards. Be the case as it might, St. Leonards was left in an inevitable and miserable minority. The gentleman who opened this case had implied that Mr. James Burton had consulted his own private interest to the injury of the public. This was a most unfounded misrepresentation. The Board of Health did not pretend to repeal the St. Leonards Improvement Act, but kept it alive with exceptions. If their lordships will examine that the Act they would find that the exceptions formed a very large part of it, and that nearly every clause was struck out. In this way the Board of Health -