Punch (70.1876)

April 22, 1876.] PUNCH, OR, THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 153

PUNCH'S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

ey for the Holidays !

Monday. April 10 [Com-
mons).—"How does a Naval
Captain decline to receive an
Admiralty reprimand ? "

Sib, Robert Peel has been
much exercised by this knotty
problem, since the World
announced that Captain Welch had ventured on
what Dante would have called this " Gran
rifiuto."

Me. Warp Hunt declared that there was no
authority for this strange piece of news, except
the. World, which he described as a " quasi-comic "
paper. We have Sharspeaee's authority that'' all
the World's a stage," but we have yet to learn
that the staple of its performances is comic, or even
" quasi-comic," whatever that may mean. But
the World's announcement may well have per-
plexed graver heads than Sir Robebt Peel's. A
man may decline to receive a present, but hardly
a slap in the face or a kick on the opposite ex-
tremity of his person. That sort of thing is not usually preceded by the opportunity
of such an option as includes the possibility of refusal. A cuff or kick may be returned,
but scarcely refused. For a Naval Captain to decline receiving an Admiralty repri-
mand, would seem to be very like reprimanding the Admiralty: and that, as Me.
Waeb Hunt explained, would " in a Captain" be the "flat blasphemy" called
insubordination. A Captain, reprimanded, may ask for a court-martial.
" Had Captain Welch asked for a court-martial ? " asked Sib Robebt.
" No," said Mr. Warp Hpnt.

A few minutes after, Mr. Anpebson said he had in his pocket a note written by
Captain Welch to him, stating that he had asked for a court-martial.

Mr. Waep Hpnt declared that no such letter had "reached the Admiralty."

Now "Admiralty" is an " amphibologous " term. It means a Building, and it
means a Board. It may have "reached " the one, but not yet got as far as the other.
At any rate, the contradiction should be explained. It does not look pretty as it
stands.

Mb. Fawcett gave notice that on the first day after the Easter recess he will ask
Mb. Disbaeli whether he will give him a day for discussion of the Address to the
Crown, before the issue of the Proclamation under the Royal Titles Bill.

Her Majesty's faithful Commons have a Constitutional right to audience of Heb
Majesty. Punch hopes Mr. Disraeli will not refuse such audience, even to the
so-called Minority which wishes to put on record its final protest against the
Brummagem title of " Empress." But there is still a fortnight, at least, between us
and the Proclamation. Between the Proclamation and the assumption of a title
which every day is becoming more and more unacceptable to the sound sense and
educated opinion of Great Britain there is the still larger interval filled by Her
Majesty's excellent judgment and trained experience of the strength of feeling that
couples Loyalty and Liberty in the hearts of her subjects.

Then Mr. Anperson opened his battery of heavy guns against the conduct of
Government as regards the collision of the Alberta and the Mistletoe.

The Andersonian artillery took a wide range—blazing away at everybody
concerned in the unfortunate accident—the Prince of Leinlngen, Cabtaln Welch,
Genebal Ponsonby (the indiscreet letter-writer to the Maequis oe Exeteb), the
Coroner, Foreman, and most members of the first Jury, Baeon Beamwell, the
Abmibalty, and,.finally, Mb. Hetwoop, who had had the audacity to declare himself
satisfied.

In short, it is clear to Me. Anpebson that some-
body ought to have suffered, besides Captain
Welch who has been reprimanded, and John
Bell who has had to pay the compensations.

It would be impossible for the most hard-
mouthed patriot that ever " heckled" a Minister
on a case affording a grand opening for cheap
clap-trap, to have discharged the dutv more dis-
agreeably, or with more apparent relish, than the
rasping Member for Glasgow. And it would be
impossible for any Minister, directly and offen-
sively attacked, to have received the fire of his
bitter and boisterous assailant more meekly, and to
have returned it more feebly, than Mb.Wabb Hunt.

Of course, the Admiralty have bungled. It
is their way. But the Queen's yacht will not in
future run at fifteen knots an hour through the
Solent, or any other waters where small sailing
craft lie thick, and ply frequent. Let John Bull
put that in his pipe, and smoke it, as Ms returns
from all that has been done, and left undone,
said, and left unsaid, in the unfortunate case of
the Alberta and Mistletoe. As for Mb. Heywoop,
who is base enough to be satisfied, and mean-
spirited enough to hope that " bye-gones will
be bye-gones," we leave him to the scorn of Me.
Anpebson.

Me. S. Lloyp did a good work in calling
attention to the grievances of the Marines—
those step-children of the services, whose high
pride it is always to do their duty, and whose hard
fate it is always to fall between the two stools of
the Army ana Navy, to both of which, and yet
neither of which, they seem to belong, if we may
judge by the proportion of kicks to halfpence in
their allowance.

Everybody who spoke admitted the grievances
of this gallant corps ; and Me. A. Egeeton, for
the Admiralty, declared that the Board was most
anxious to put both promotion and retirement in
the Marines on a more satisfactory footing, but did
not like to apply a merely temporary remedy.
Let them only make the remedy as long-lived as
the grievance has been, and 'twill serve.

Then the House went into Committee on Naval
Estimates, and Mb. Shaw Lefevee showed the
usual zeal of ex-Officials of the Admiralty in
calling attention to desertions in the Navy, the
difficulties connected with the training of boys for
the Navy, and the urgency of establishing links
between the Navy and the Merchant Service.

Mb. Warp Hunt was as grateful for Mb. Shaw
Lefevee's suggestions as obliged Officials always
are to obliging ex-Officials, and pointed out all
the difficulties in the way of improvement in the
usual cheerful official style.

It is remarkable how much cleverer your ex-
Official usually is in seeing and stating difficulties
than your Official in removing them.

Tuesday {Morning Sitting).—Notices of Motion
for after-Easter sittings—^ms^-Paschal eggs, with
more or less prospect of hatching.

But Sib Staffobp Noethcote decidedly de-
clined to be dragged into the Suez Canal by Sib
H. D. Wolff. Then St. Stephen's School broke
up for the Easter holidays, Me. Disbaeli giving
notice to his young friends that the business of the
School would recommence on Monday, April 24. _

We leave boys, Ushers, and Headmaster to their
holiday tasks and amusements, with the wish that
the coming two-thirds of the Session may be more
prolific of good work than the first third has been!

For one who claims such exceptional powers of
education as the present Head of the School,
Punch cannot say that he will carry down to
Hughenden the crop of laurels and testimonials
which had probably been anticipated by his
admirers.

Light Blue for Ever!

The boat in which Cambridge rowed to Mort-
lake and victory was built by " Swapple anp
Winship." To commemorate the success of their
craft, the style of the firm should for the future be
altered to "Savapple anb Winning Ship."

VOL. LXX.

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