Punch (66.1874)

224

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[May 30, 1874.

PUNCH’S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

in his Bill to do away with Patronage in the Scotch Church, give one year’s stipend to patrons
who care to take it, and vest the right of electing their “ meenister” in male communicants.
But, though he may not be robbing Scotch patrons of much in money, he is robbing our ‘ ‘ brither
Scots ” of their biggest Church grievance. Patronage is the only ground of difference between
the Establishment and Relief, Secession, Free-Kirk, and the Lord High Commissioner
knows how many Scottish sects besides. The Duke is bound to find a compensating griev-
ance for the one he takes away. The right of electing a meenister will do something, if only
the Duke will extend it to every male in the parochial pale. Scotland will then be safe to have
that pale boiling over, as it ought, with the “ perfervidum ingenium Scotorum ” and “ odium
theologicum ” both alight under it, and life in a Scotch parish may still be worth living.
Loan Dalhousie promised something like such a blaze, and we may live in hope that the
Duke is not going to kill Kirk quarrels north o’ Tweed, or even scotch them, as he seems to
fear he may. Let him take comfort, remembering the old couple who, having gradually
exhausted the whole cycle of sects, were sublimated, at last, into a “twa-handed Kirk” of
their own: as to which, however, the gude wife, being questioned, admitted she “ didna feel
just that sure o’ John.”

In the Commons, Colonel Egerton Leigh moved to let the cat loose on the "Wife-beating
Ruffians who not only dissemble their love for their better halves, but kick them down-stairs,
black their eyes, and “ purr,” and dance upon them in big boots—kill them, in fact, some-
times by inches, sometimes by ells. There seems too natural an association between
“purring ”—a north-country endearment, otherwise known as “putting the boots into her”
— and the cat, to keep them longer separate. That Punch has never taken the stick to Judy
it may be too much to assert in face of the show. But when he does, it is in a strictly Par-
liamentary sense, out of pure playfulness and before the public. At home he “loves, honours,
and obeys,” and does not punch, Mrs. P. And he would go all lengths, even to the ninth
tail of the cat, with Colonel Leigh, in punishing, brute fashion, the brutes who do. They
can’t be degraded, and they can be restrained, by fear of the bodily pain they are too cowardly
to endure, though not too cowardly to inflict.

Mr. Disraeli, for once, was not up to the occasion—but, like Mr. Tennyson’s Lord
Chamberlain in the Day Dream,

“ Dallied with Ms golden chain,

And smiling put the question by.”

Now the question is not one to be put by smilingly.

Punch has told, through his Cartoon, how he fears the Pnrrer will read the Premier on
wife-beating.

For the rest of the night the House was on Ships, and who says “ on ships ” says “ at
sea,” and “ at loggerheads.”

Sir E. W air in pitched into Mr. Reed, under cover of the Captain; and Mr. Reed
countered heavily on Sir E. Watkin, and told him (politely, of course,—“ arundine dulci,”)
he knew nothing of what he was talking about.

Then Admiral Elliot steered gallantly into the meUe—Punch can only say of these
naval heroes of our Parliamentary free-fights on ships and shipping as Nelson said of
Collingwood, “ Look how the gallant old. fellows take their ships into action!”—and
Mr. Bentinck rammed everything that flew the Admiralty flag,—past, present, and to come,
—and, of course, Mr. Goschen and Mr. Childers exchanged broadsides with Mr. Ward-
Hunt, and “ All went merry as a marriage-bell,” as it is sure to do when ships are of the
order of the day.

Mr. Childers tried to get a rise out of
the Chancellor op the Exchequer, d
propos of the Supplementary Estimate for
the Navy, and revenue prospects, but Sir
Stafford is not uneasy about his prospects,
and Mr. Childers took nothing by his
Motion.

Tuesday.—Lord Redesdale was quite
pathetic in his prayers to the Lords, to
keep the old name for the Court of Final
Appeal. It is true it was not the House of
Lords that decided, but the Law-Lords,
and the Court of Last Appeal will be the
Law-Lords still: but it won’t be called the
House of Lords, and “what’s not in a
name,” to my Lord Redesdale?

Lord Salisbury smoothed down the
feathers of some respectable Indian officials
which he had inadvertently ruffled by his
admission that there had been blundering
in transport arrangements at the beginning
of the Famine. Punch is quite ready to
believe everybody has done, and is doing,
his best, and mistakes or miscalculations
should not be too sharply scanned in such
an emergency.

Mr. P. Taylor moved the opening of
Museums, Libraries, and similar institu-
tions on Sundays. Mr. Allen, his brother
Member for Leicester, moved that they
should not be opened. The pro and con. of
Leicester, on this question, would probably
be echoed all over England.

Punch is all for everything that makes
against the Public-house, now the sole in-
door Sunday recreation-place of working
men and their families. The question with
him, as with most, is whether innocent
Sunday play is likely to draw on mischievous
Sunday work. On this point the working-
classes, to say nothing of the non-working,
seem as yet hopelessly divided. Till they
are of one mind, whatever Mr. Punch may
think or wish personally, publicly he must
give his vote in favour of things remaining
as they are.

Wednesday was given to Sir Robert
Anstruther and Sir John Barleycorn.
Sir Robert, by one part of his Bill, pro-
poses to put Sir John under restraint—
limiting licences to one to 700 of the
population, and prohibiting grocers from
selling less than a quart of whiskey. But,
besides this, he had clauses for introducing
the Gothenburg system into any Scotch
town that liked to try it. This would make
Town Councils the licensers and virtual
landlords of the public-houses.

But this was thought too strong, and
Mr. Cross only consented to Second Read-
ing “if all the Gothenburg clauses were
struck out.” So Sir Robert is to be allowed
partially to muzzle Sir John Barleycorn,
but not to turn the Provost and Bailies of
Kennaquhair into Licensed "Wittlers.

A curious question was raised during
the Debate. Is Scotland the “ druckenest ”
or the soberest quarter of the United King-
dom ? Figures were quoted to prove both
conclusions. “After facts,” said the wise
man, “ nothing is so fallacious as figures.”

Mr. P. J. Smyth made another of the
pre-concerted Irish Motions of the Session,
to repeal the Thirtieth of George the
Third (1793), described by Mr. Smyth as
an Act for prohibiting public meetings, but
more accurately, by the Irish Attorney-
General, as “an Act for prohibiting
assemblies claiming or exercising authority
to represent the nation ”—such an as-
sembly, in fact, as the Home-Rulers would
be glad to get together on College Green.

Mr. Butt said the Bill was an answer to
the Tunes’ challenge to Irish Members for
practical measures to redress Irish griev-