Punch (67.1874)

July 18, 1874.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

21

PUNCH'S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

heat and manifold, 0 Ancestors,
was the wisdom of that old saw
of yours touching messes. The
more you stir them, the more
they revenge themselves on the
olfactories. On this ancient
and quiet principle, Lokd
Carnarvon (on Monday,
July 6,) declined to rake up

the administrative scandals of the Straits Settlements before 1873. They had a Governor, of
whom, by a slight alteration of a familiar epitaph on a wife by a husband, might he said—

“ As a Colonial Governor he was—what ?

Think of all a Colonial Governor should not be, and he was that.”

But he is recalled—and why,

“ On the rough rack of this rude House
Stretch him out longer ? ”

Lokd Chelmsford is much exercised about the exhausting studies of the Naval Cadets,
and the difficulty of competitive examination-papers, those chevaux de frise with which the
cockpit is now fenced about, worse than ever it used to be by hardships, bullying, and
practical jokes, in the days of Petek Simple and Frederic Thesiger. That the Competitive
System has been pushed to Chinese extravagance in the Britannia as elsewhere there can be
little doubt. Wishing to avoid jobbery and nepotism, John Bull has overleaped himself,
and fallen on the other side, into the Doctrinairism of the Nostrum-mongers, who have ridden
their Examination hobby, with reins of red tape, usque ad ahsurdum. Government has
appointed a Commission to look into the matter as regards the Naval Cadets. (As far as they
are concerned one may say cadit, not cadet qucestio. But pray, my Lords, while your Lordships
are about it, had you not better go a little further, and inquire into the whole subject of Com-
petitive Examination—its mischiefs, its abuses, and its absurdities—leaving on one side for
the moment its advantages, of which we have heard usque ad nauseam f All depends on how
the principle is worked; and, from all we can learn, it is by no means clear that, as it is, it
is worked wisely, or to a good result.)

Kirk Patronage Abolition in the Commons. Nobody in Scotland seems to want Kirk
Patronage—Patrons no more than Congregations—then why the dickens should Mk. Glad-
stone back Baxter in opposing the Bill P Baxter is a Scotchman, and Punch presumes
a Presbyterian—probably a Dissenter from the Kirk, who hates to be robbed of his grievance,
and to see the tap-root of his pet schism cut right across. But what can W. E. Gladstone
have to do with it ? He is neither a Member of the Kirk, nor a Seceder, neither Laigh Kirk,
nor Free Kirk, Burgher, nor Anti-Burgher, except in so far as by peculiar mental constitu-
tion he is a zealot for all Churches, and a hot partizan of all Schismatics. Why can’t he let
the canny Scots settle their Kirk matters as they do their Land matters, and their School
matters, and their Burgh matters, “their aingate,” like wise men? Or if he does interfere,
why must he interfere against a-Bill to which the official voice of the Kirk speaking through
its General Assembly has agreed, and to which the MacCallum Moke has deigned to apply
his master-hand? But what red rag is to bull, that Church Bill—even when Church is

spelt Kirk—is to W. E. G. Has not this
and the Public Worship Regulation Bill
together recalled the Homeric hero from
his sulks and his studies, awaking our
Achilles (see Cartoon) once more to the joy
of battle on the plains of windy Troy!

As far as we can see, W. E. G. opposes
the Bill because it will put Established
Kirk on too good a footing as compared
with Free. It will cut away from her
breast the scarlet letter, P for Patronage,
without putting her in the pillory first,
and without giving her immaculate sister,
Free Kirk, the privilege of pointing the
finger of scorn at her, in a properly edify-
ing and aggravating manner. After all,
we are not studious to understand W. E.
G.’s line on this matter. On questions
into which Churches enter he is sure to take
a line of his own. At least, he may plead
he had the mitis sapientia of Professor
Playfair with him on this occasion.

The Right Hon. B. Hector welcomed
the Right Hon. W. E. Achilles back to
the field. He had missed him, he said, and
found the battle not half so lively in his
absence.

Tuesday.—Intoxicating Liquors in the
Lords. In the general prevalence of mental
obfuscation which seems to accompany
this unhappy measure, their Lordships were
much exercised in mind about the defining
and dealing with “populous places,”
opening hours, local discretion, and bond
fide travellers. In wandering among these
Apices Juris, Lord Harrowby got ham-
pered, Lord Beauchamp bothered, and
Lord Aberdare ambiguous. The end was
the passage of the Bill through Committee
without alterations, and, with that keen
sense of relief which attends what the old
proverb calls “a good riddance of bad
rubbish.”

A night with the Lawyers over the Land
Titles and Transfer Bills in the Commons.

Goldsmid assailed the Bills with flouts:

Denied that costs they’d cheapen.

Jackson thought they’d swell costs, and
doubts

Would merely serve to deepen.

Morgan found warning e’en for fools
In Westbury's futile fumbling :

Compulsion’s and Permission’s stools
Gave Goldney text for grumbling.

But Ball and Londonderry Law,

Unlike their brother moles, in

The measures monstrous merits saw,

And hole-pickers picked holes in.

While caustic Karslake praised the Bills,

In style some thought sarcastic ;

With his sharp “shooters” bowled down
Hill’s,

And Bowyer gave a drastic :

James on the Bills his powders tried
Of lowering operation:

Corbett their good or harm denied
In squirely estimation.

Kathbone was grieved they should exempt
Estates above three hundred :

Harcourt baptised them with contempt,

And ’gainst Land Tenure thundered.

Whitwell and Sherlock hoped to Act
To see the Bills proceeding ;

Goldsmid from his Amendment backed,

And Bills passed Second Reading.

Wednesday. — Church - Rates Abolition
(Scotland) moved by Maclaren, elicited
some difference of opinion among Scotch
Members—as sure a sign of unripeness in
law-making for Scotland as disagreement
of Irish Members is of ripeness for legisla-
tion on Ireland. Maclaren, like a canny