SELECT COMMITTED VR N^ RRT- RM,,, / I 28 February 1838. Mr Richard Gould. 4102. You passed them by altogether ?— We passed them bv altogether 4103. Was the book which you had of the valuation of former~ juries a guide to you in any way as to your proceedings?— It was certainly a very great guide 4104. When you came into a street in which you found they had valued only two or three houses, or had not valued any, how did you proceed then?— I think we adhered to the former mode as much as possible. If we came into a street where we did not find any house valued, and we saw a house that ought to be valued, we valued it. We were rational men, and we exercised a sound, dis- criminating judgment, and we gave the poor the benefit of that local Act of' Par- liament. 4105. Then the Committee is to understand that whenever you came into a street with a number of poor tenements, between 5/. and 10/. in value, you always construed the Act of Parliament in a very liberal way ?— We did, in the most liberal way. 4106. Mr. Serjeant Jackson.] How did you construe the Act of Parliament without reading it ?— Almost every person in Cork knows that there is a local Act of Parliament excepting houses let to poor lodgers ; but very few persons read the Act of Parliament itself. I do not know whether I ever read that Act of Par- liament. 4107. You were understood to say that you did not set a value upon the houses according to their real value, but that you discriminated, and you made a difference in regard to houses in more central parts of the town and those upon the outskirts ?— Certainly; we commenced in the middle of the town, and we valued a house there at 301., and we kept up that scale; and when we came to Patrick- street we found that the scale was too high, and that the valuation there was on too high a scale. We kept up that scale in the middle of the town, in the business part of the town ; then when we went to the outskirts, we adopted a different mode. 4108. In adopting that different course in the outskirts, you did it with a view to follow out the spirit of this Act of Parliament ?— Certainly. 4109. Considering it your duty, then, to follow out the spirit of the Act of Parliament, how was it possible for you to follow out the spirit of it, without knowing what the Act of Parliament was?— We knew the substance of it. We got full directions from the grand jury, and we adhered to those directions reli- giously and conscientiously." There were very few houses in the principal streets that we did not value. ... 4110. Did you omit from the valuation any houses which were in your judg- ment of the value of 10/., that were not occupied by poor lodgers ?— I do not think we did. r . , n! nr. vmi mn^ irlpr now that vou valued every house that was of the value 0.46.