We have, at present, great numbers of charity schools established in this nation, where the children of the poor receive an education disproportioned to their birth.  This has often no other consequences than to make them unfit for their stations, by placing them, in their own opinion, above the drudgery of daily labour; a notion which is too much indulged, as idleness, cooperating with vanity, can hardly fail to gain the ascendant, and which sometimes prompts them to support themselves by practices not only useless, but pernicious to society.  This evil, sir, cannot be better obviated than by allotting a reasonable proportion out of every school to the service of the sea, in which, by entering early, they cannot fail to become proficients; and where their attainments, which, at present, too frequently produce laziness and dishonesty, might enable them to excel, and entitle them to promotion.

Mr. WINNINGTON replied:—­Sir, notwithstanding the confidence with which some gentlemen have proposed this amendment, and the easiness with which others have consented to it, I declare, without hesitation, that I oppose it now, and intend to oppose it whenever it shall be offered, because it will defeat all the other provisions which shall be made in the bill.

I will venture to say, sir, that if every man, who has, by whatever tenure, the right of voting, shall be exempted from the necessity of contributing to the publick safety by his personal service, every man qualified for the sea will by some means acquire a vote.

Sir, a very small part of those who give their votes in this nation for representatives in senate, enjoy that right as the appendage of a freehold; to live in some towns, and to be born only in others, gives the unalienable privilege of voting.  Any gentleman, to secure his own interest, or obstruct the publick service, may, by dividing a small piece of barren ground among a hundred sailors, exalt them all to freeholders, and exempt them from the influence of this law.

However, sir, I am not less a friend to the freeholders than those who propose the exception in their favour, but, in my opinion, the great interest of the freeholders is the preservation of their freeholds, which can only be secured by a vigorous exertion of the power of the nation, in the war which is now declared against the Spaniards.

Mr. BARRINGTON spoke next:—­Sir, by the observations which I have opportunities of making at the place which I have the honour to represent, I am convinced of the influence that this law will have upon all the boroughs along the coasts.  There, most of the voters are, in one sense or other, sir, seafaring men, being, almost all of them, owners of vessels, and in some degree acquainted with navigation; they may, therefore, be hurried away at the choice of an officious or oppressive magistrate, who may, by partiality and injustice, obtain a majority, contrary to the general inclination of the people, and determine the election by his own authority.