Punch: Punch (38.1860)

190

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. LMay 12, i860.

for Wakefield, Mr. Charlesworth and Mr. Leatham (beau-frere of
Mr. Bright) as the principals abetting and aiding in the corruption
at the last election there. Sovereigns, it is said, were carried about in
a basket, which was probably called the Wicker of Wakefield.

The last night of the debate on the Second Reading of the Reform
Bill. Lord Palmerston had announced that he would have no more
adjournments, Mr. Brand had whipped, and there was a belief that
there would be a succession of fierce divisions. In Tom Thumb, a lady
asks whether there are not ten thousand Giants drawn up in the back
garden, to which her faithful adviser diplomatically replies, “Madam,
shall I tell you what I am going to say ? I do firmly believe that there
is not one.” The Giants of Opposition to-night were equally non-
apparent, and there was not a single division. There was a debate, in
the course of which Mr. Gregory made a smart speech, showing up
the vices of American institutions, and the abandonment of politics
by the respectability of America, in consequence of the preponderance
given to the uneducated classes. Mr. Walpole thought that, bad as
the Bill was, the House was bound to go on with it, but he referred to
the allegation that Lord John Russell had drawn up the Bill with-
out consulting his colleagues, and Lord John said he hadn’t—the
truth probably being that Lord Palmerston had said to him, “Now,
mind, this is your Pigeon, Johnny, and don’t let us be bored with it.”

| Mr. Gladstone replied for the Government, defended the Bill, stated
that the returns were all right, and that it was proposed to add 200,000
to the present borough constituency of 410,000, and 150,000 to the
| present county constituency of 530,000, and that with the Universities,
j England would have 1,345,000 electors. The figures are uncommonly
unlike those of his colleagues, but Mr. Punch supposes that they are
; all right, as Mr. Gladstone says so, and hopes that the proposed
Swamping Process is now clear to everybody. Mr. Collins tried to
make a speech, but the House had had enough of it, and Collins
awoke the Passions of his hearers, who incontinently shouted him
down, and the Second Heading was carried without a division. Lord
John then said, he should not bother the House again on the

subject for a month, and fixed the attempt to go into Committee for
the 4th of June. In reply to an Irish Member^ the Irish were told
that they must wait for their Reform Bill until their betters were
served.

Friday. The Earl of Lucan, of all people, called attention to
certain defects in our military system ; but he was awfully snubbed by |
Earl de Grey and the Duke of Cambridge, and told that his
motion was so vague that it could not be understood, but so far as it
icas understood it seemed a ridiculous one to bring into the House. Lord j
Cardigan, hearing how unkindly Lord Lucan was treated, burst into
a flood of tears. Lucan as a Military Reformer is not bad. We j
suppose he will next ask for the vacant Archbishopric of York.

Lord John Russell, in reply to a lot of questions, which he had to j
answer at once, said that notwithstanding everything was going on j
well between us and Japan, the Brazilians were resisting our just j
claims, and, therefore, that he should not produce despatches from
our _ diplomatic agents at Rome, because Mr. Cobden’s expenses to
Paris were paid him, but no salary, although his Lordship entirely
disapproved of the conduct of the King of Naples, and had sent no
orders to stop the Chinese expedition. Like Falstaf, he took all their
points in his target,—thus.

Mr. Sheridan tried to get the Duty on Eire-Insurance Policies I
reduced from three Roberts to one, and failed. Sir Joseph Paxton
succeeded in getting a Committee to consider whether the awful
increase in the traffic of Loudon could not be met by embanking the
Thames. If this is not done now it never will be, it seems, for the
railway plans will prevent it. He urged that it was not a mere London
question, but a national one, seeing that thirty millions of provincials
annually infest the Metropolis. Mr. Cowper mentioned, among other
pleasant things, that the new sewer, along the Strand and Ludgate
Hill, will most probably unsettle the foundations of Somerset House
and St. Paul’s, and bring both down; so Lord Macaulay’s New
Zealander had better begin taking his drawing lessons.

THE TIVERTON SOMNAMBULIST.

hy is Lord Palmer-
ston like a weasel?
Catch a weasel asleep !
is a saying which may
well be considered to
be generally applicable
to the noble Yiscount
who presides over Her
Majesty’s Ministers.
Yet Palmerston, like
the celebrated epic
poet of antiquity, may
occasionally be sur-
prised in an oblivion
of forty winks. The
usually vigilant Pre-
mier does not know,
perhaps, that he fell
on sleep the other
evening in the House
of Commons, and was
off for some minutes as
sound as a top. More-
over he talked in his
slumber, but probably
has not the least idea
of what he said, unless
he reads the reports of
his own speeches ; for
nobody seems to have
pointed out to him the
ineptitude of the re-
marks which fell from
him on that occasion.
There is no need to
quote them; it is
enough to say, that
they expressed ap-
proval of Mr. Prederick Peel’s address for a Commission of Inquiry into the alleged
existence of corrupt practices at Berwick during the last election. Now, this inquiry, as
everybody knows, will cost the country between one and two thousand pounds, for which
there will be nothing to show but a huge Blue Book, which will merely tell us over again,
with variations in detail, the tiresome old stories about Sovereign Alley and the Man-in-
the-Moon.

To this futile end the^ evidently dormant Pam saw no objection to spend all that public
money. No wonder. He could see nothing whatever. If his eyes were open, their’sense
was shut. Had he been wide awake, or indeed awake at all, instead of fast asleep, he would

have recollected that, only a few days before, he
had declared the nation unable to afford £200,000
to avert such a disgrace as the disruption of the
British Museum, and. the banishment of the most
popular part of its contents to a barn at Brompton.
With that declaration in mind, he would have
rejected with horror the proposal to throw away
one shilling on a Board for the compilation of
another uninteresting and useless Blue Book;
but oftentimes ideas which, in our waking state,
would appear most monstrously absurd, do not
surprise us or seem the least unreasonable in a
dream. Palmerston dreamt, having been sent
to sleep by Frederick Peel.

The most singular fact, in connection with this
remarkable case of political somnambulism, is,
that the House of Commons, without hesitation,
accepted the oracle which was delivered by the
noble Lord, dozing on his legs. Mr. Frederick.
Peel’s motion was agreed to without a division.

Here is the existing House of Commons about
to destroy its own existence by passing a Reform
Bill. That act may be one of justifiable suicide;
but the vote which has ordained the Berwick
Bribery Commission indicates temporary derange-
ment. The present Parliament will soon be no
more. What will an unreformed Berwick of the
past signify to a reformed Parliament ? What;
will a new and reformed Berwick, with a six-
pounder constituency, have to do with an old
bygone Berwick of corruptionists and ten-
pounders ? if the representation were going to
remain as it is, there might be a question whether
or not Berwick ought to be disfranchised; but
what have the innocent six-pounders of that
borough done that they should suffer for the
venality of the base ten ? In voting for a super-
fluous and expensive commission at the mere nod
of the sleeping Premier, the House of Commons
has added one more instance to those curious
cases of gregarious sympathy, and subjection of
multitudes to the control of a single mind, of
which so many have been described by writers
on psychology.

a notorious character in the city.

Fleet Street .is an old offender, continually
getting taken up.