Punch (70.1876)

June 24, 1876.] PUNCH, OB, THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 253

PUNCH'S ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

ere Punch asked what is ^^Parliamentary
Privilege par excellence, lie would say the
Privilege of every Member who has a turn for
making himself ridiculous to try and induce
the House to follow his example. For latest
illustration, see the discussion on Privilege
raised by Sin W. Fraser [Monday, June 12), all about a letter from
the Secretary of the Political Committee of the Reform Club, calling
Mr. Ripley over the coals for some too free and independent votes
of his, and threatening that, if he chose thus to throw over the
Party, the Party would bring the Party's big Club down, sharp,
over his knuckles.

This is scarcely the stuff for our Collective Wisdom" to waste its time on, even though it give the Premier a peg for ten minutes of
solemn chaff, or lead up to a smart sparring-bout between the lively Londonderry Chicken and the phlegmatic Devonshire Pet—a heavy
weight, with whom the Chicken, however quick on his pins and sharp in his hitting, has, as yet, no chance.

To be sure the House was glad of any excuse for diversion, feeling that it had before it the dreary job of flogging the dead horse of
the Appellate Jurisdiction Bill, which not even the combined " persuaders " of Disraeli, Vebnon Harcourt, and Henry James together
can galvanise into the ghost of a gallop.

The debate on the Second Reading of the University Bill was a little livelier, thanks to the hopeless antagonism of its friends and
foes. The Bill nominates Commissioners to readjust the nexus of cash payments between rich Colleges and a poor University, with a
view to see how far the transfusion of that life-blood of learning—as of most things—£ s. d., from the veins of the one to the other may
be carried, so as to strengthen the University without fatally depleting the Colleges.

Mr. Osborne Morgan wants to have the Commissioners' hands more tightly tied by the Bill.

Mr. Clieeord— Fellow of New College—owning New College the greatest abuse of the University, and himself the greatest abuse of
New College—wants to have the Commissioners' hands made stronger for their work of reformation.

Lord F. Hervey, on High Conservative considerations, would not have a penny transferred from the Colleges to the University..

The Right Honourable Robert Lowe maintains that the sole good done by Oxford is the making a provision for those non-resident
youths, the only hard-working sons of Alma Mater, whom Lord Salisbury has christened "idle fellows," and that every farthing handed
over from the Colleges to the University, will be money perverted from the maintenance of industry to the support of laziness. The
University is nothing but a noun of multitude meaning the lot of Colleges whose funds are best employed as sinews of war for hard-headed
young men in their first battle of life. Hang research—look out for results—and when found, make a Fellow of. To endow research
would be, in most cases, to.find snug berths for some of the grossest humbugs of the age—to cumber the High with perambulators, and

VOL. T.TT, B Pj

*