Punch (66.1874)

246

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[June 13, 1874.

PUNCH’S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

iants refreshed, back to
their places press
Their Lordships, from
the Whitsuntide Re-
cess.

Lo ! . doubters dumb,
spinners of costs
aghast,

Cairns’s three Land
Bills, three times
read, have passed!

How, the Lords’ Scylla harking in their rear,

Charyhdis of the Commons they’ve to clear !

“ Facit exsultatio versum.” And why should not “ exsultatio ” make its
Verse, as well as “ indignatio ” ?

Lord Sandhurst finds that Short Service means not only short, but weak,
service—that it gives us, in fact, children in arms, instead of men-at-arms,
till the Line threatens to become a mathematical line, length without breadth
—of shoulder—or depth—of chest, for soldiers’ work. By way of remedy, he
proposed to feed the Line from the Militia, recruiting for the latter only, and
letting the Militiamen volunteer for the Line.

Lord Pembroke (Under-Secretary-at-War, recalling the Sidney Herbert
of other days) asked for time. The Government were looking into the
Recruiting question, but couldn’t be expected to have seen to the bottom of it
in three months.

Lord Cardwell doubted if Lord Sandhurst’s plan might not spoil the
Militia without improving the Army.

The Duke of Cambridge spoke some plain sense. Recruiting is a question
of the Labour market. The recruiting-sergeant cannot bid against the em-
ployer. Change is the worst thing for the soldier—it worries him. The
Recruit likes to know what he is to expect. Officers don’t like short service,
because it gives them one hundred and fifty raw recruits in a regiment at once,
instead of twenty or thirty—makes their machine harder to keep in perfect
working order.

The Duke of Buccleuch said Scotch recruits liked looking forward to a
pension. Whereat the House laughed. But how much good is not thrift at
the bottom of, and what gives Sawney his pull over Pat and John so much as
his eye to the main chance ?

In the Commons, after Mr. . O’Donnell, the unseated for Galway, had
appeared, and disappeared on being politely informed by the Speaker that he
had no business there, we had an awful scene • France at the Bar of the
House-yFRANCE pulled up—France solemnly admonished—France saying
something awfully like “ Admonition be bothered!” and doing something
awfully like taking a sight at the Speaker.

France is an inventor of explosives. It can hardly be necessary to tell
readers of history that. In a letter to See John Hay, Chairman of a late
explosive Committee, France exploded, blew up Sir John, and charged
Government officials, en masse with turning their own explosives to profit, and
putting the extinguisher on all besides.

France apologised by the mild mouth of Mr. Forsyth, Q.C., but, as

France often does, made matters worse by the explana-
tion. So the bar was pulled out for France, and France
was pulled up to the bar; had to “toe the line” (as
sailors call it) ; was solemnly told by the Speaker to
consider himself admonished; considered himself
admonished accordingly, and did not appear to be a bit
the worse for it.

Honourable Members seemed much amused, and
France did not seem at all impressed. Probably he
will say, as the navvy said when his wife pitched into
him, “ It amuses them, and it don’t hurt me.”

Punch, for his part, would suggest that there is one
explosive which the House of Commons ought never to
play with, and that is hrutum fulmen. Farces are out
of place on the floor of the House; and the Speaker
and Mr. Disraeli decidedly out of place in farce-parts.

Mr. Torrens McCullagh moved an Address praying
the Queen that no Regimental Officer of three years’
standing may be removed from active service, in peace,
without the option of a Court-Martial. Of course there
was a grievance at the back of the Motion, of which the
House knew nothing; but the Judge Advocate-General
and Secretary-of-War were of opinion that Courts of
Inquiry might often be preferable to Courts-Martial,
and the House agreed with them by 91 to 31, though
Sir H. Havelock, from experience of eighteen years’
staff service, supported the Motion.

A good stroke of business was done in Committee of
Supply (all but the Education Estimates are now voted) ;
the Bill repealing the Statutes that prohibit Revenue
Officers from voting at Elections was passed through
Committee, and progress was made with the Juries Bill.

Tuesday.—Lord Selkirk moved my Lords against
Second Reading of the Scotch Kirk Patronage Bill. To
throw it out would be selling the Kirk with a
vengeance (argued the Duke of Argyll). Established
Churches are more liberal than dis-Established—so
true liberality should strengthen Establishments, and
this Bill will give new life to the Kirk. Perhaps the
“ Congregation” would have been a better constituency
than the “communicants.” The Bill was confiscation and
dis-establishment in the eyes of Lord Seafield and Lord
Lauderdale (not a name of pleasant historical associa-
tion to Scotch Kirk men ; they will be apt to remember
the Lauderdale who put the boots on the wrong legs,
under Charles the Second). Lords Airlie and Cam-
perdown were for widening the constituency to al
Ratepayers. Lord Napier and Ettrick was for giving
Lairds at least a vote. (Punch agrees, when, they are
Kirk-goers. A man should have some voice in deter-
mining the doctrinal douche he will sit under.)

Lord High Commissioner Rosslyn, hot from the
General Assembly, reported the Kirk in favour of the
Bill, which was read a Second Time.

To-morrow you’ll call me early, call me early, John,
d’ye hear ?

For to-morrow is the Derby Day, of all days in the year—
Of all days in the year, John, the do-nothingest, out-
ingest day—•

And of course the House will adjourn for it, that M.P.’s
may get away.

Only under protest—said stout Sir Wilfrid—and he
protested, pleasantly. It is astonishing how pleasant Sir
Wilfrid can be when he dismounts from his hobby—
Alcohol. So, after getting some genuine laughs, he took
his facer of 243 to 69 like a man, and sat down smiling be-
fore a smiling House, which, however, soon smiled on the
wrong side of its mouth, when Mr. Anderson brought up
a large dish of cold Humble Pie, and proposed that as the
Government had admitted its own wrong in the escape of
the Alabama, and compensated American citizens who
had suffered thereby, it was bound to compensate its
own subjects who had suffered from the same pest.

The House did not need Mr. Bourke’s elaborate
reason for thrusting the obnoxious dish from under its
nose ; nor was it more disposed for the Irish hot potato—
the dismissal of Father O’Keeffe, and the Callan
Schools—with which Mr. Cartwright “removed” Mr.
Anderson’s cold humble pie.

Mr. Cartwright made out a strong case for charging
the National Board with knocking under to Cardinal
Cullen ; and Lord E. Fitzmaurice strengthened what
was but too strong already. But Sir M. Hicks Beach
deprecated the stirring of an unsavoury mess; and for
various reasons—but mainly because everybody felt that