Punch: Punch (78.1880)

264

PIJNCB, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, [June 5, is**

a judicial question affecting one who outrages its feelings and insults
its beliefs, and that Mr. Gladstone had taken the right course in
referring the question to a Select Committee.

Sir H. Wolff’s Resolution was negatived by 289 to 214. The
debate was adjourned for further consideration of the terms of
reference.

Tuesday [Lords).—Petitions against the appointment of Lord
Ripon, a Roman Catholic, as Governor-General of India, and Lord
Kenmare (also a Roman Catholic) as Lord Chamberlain. Lord
Oranhore and Browne thinks that the gold key and the keys of
St. Peter have no business on the same coat. Of course that high
Protestant champion presented the petition.

[Commons.)—“ How about Hogging in the Army P ” asks Mr. J.
Cowen, (whom Punch congratulates on his recovery from the effects
of the too affectionate squeeze of his Tyne-side constituents).

Mr. Childers said they stood by Lord Hartington’s last year’s
opinion, but, before turning the cat out of the Provost-Marshal’s kit,
they must be provided with a substitute for the obnoxious animal.

Rampant cheering from the Opposition, exultant over every case
in which the Government finds a stumbling-block in one of its
inherited difficulties.

Mr. R. Power in a facetious speech Moved the Adjournment over
the Derby Day; and Sir Wilfrid Lawson also in a facetious speech
opposed the Motion.

The irrepressible Chaplin preached a sermon on the text, “All
on the Downs.” Half the horses that would start to-morrow,
including the favourite, would carry Liberal colours.

Mr. Childers said the only effect of not adjourning would be to
keep the Speaker—infelix Theseus /—and the Clerks at the table with
nothing to do but dream of the Derby from 12 to 4, and Sir Wil-
frid was defeated by 285 to 115.

The reference to the Bradlaugh Committee was enlarged, and then
the House, gladly dropping that unsavoury subject, bore joyously
away to the Cape.

Mr. Fowler deprecated disarmament and harsh treatment of the
hitherto loyal Basutos.

Mr. Gladstone, in furtherance of Mr. Grant Duff’s Monday
explanations, made the best case he could for the Basuto disarma-
ment, which would be followed by a measure creating a Native
Militia, for the acceptance by Government of theirpredecessors’ policy
in the Transvaal—which he had never, even in the heyday of
Midlothian eloquence, promised to reverse—and for the non-recall
of Sir Bartle Frere, now engaged iu a special and all-important
task — confederation. When that was settled, the Government
would have to consider his position generally, and their duty in
relation to him. Sir Bartle was a high-minded man, and rather
than keep his place with a rope round his neck, would, in all pro-
bability, save the Government further trouble by resigning, (or so
Punch reads between Mr. Gladstone’s rather exuberant lines).

Rather than let the House come to the Deceased 'Wife’s Sister,
whom some Hon. Members appear to regard with only less horror
than Mr. Brajdlahgh, Hon. Members were condemned to listen—
no, not to listen, but to empty the benches—for several hours weari-
some waste of wind over Land Titles and Transfer. After they had
swallowed a long and strong dose of Gregory’s mixture, lasting for a
good hour, Colonel Marins—who has the makings of an excellent
Obstructive—took up the running with Mr. Beresford Hope. At
last, even the Colonel’s discursiveness and Hope’s vagaries being
exhausted, the Motion was withdrawn, and the House received a
thin sprinkling of Members to hear Earl Percy move the appoint-
ment of a Select Committee to inquire into Prehistoric Monuments,
with a viewto a satisfactory Ancient Monuments Bill, (as if the subject
had not been threshed out thoroughly already by Sir John Lubbock,
his Select Committee, and the Society of Antiquaries.)

Poor Sir John, whose Bill has been already eleven times before the
House, was not there to rise a gallop on his pre-historic hobby;
but the Motion served the purpose^of stopping the way against the
Deceased Wife’s Sister, who was finally knocked into the middle
of who knows what week, by the Kitchen Committee—of all the
Wife’s Sister’s many foes! Thus, by dint of talking against time
till half-past twelve, the Deceased Wife’s Sister was put on the shelf
—and Colonel Makins and Mr. A. B. Hope made happy !

Wednesday.—The House was on the Hill and the Grand Stand,
taking and laying the odds, lunching, fizzing, and generally employ-
ing itself in the manner most unbecoming Collective Wisdom. But
there are still cakes and ale, Sir Wilfrid, and will be, when you
are reduced to your pure elements of dust, air, and water. Yesterday
all these elements, save the last, were to be had in abundance, and
of the best quality, on Epsom Downs.

Thursday [Lords).—Punch takes off his hat to the Lord Chancellor.
Lord Selborne has buried the Burials’ question. In an excellent
speech he introduced an exceUent Bill, laying for ever, let us hope,
this troublesome and ugly ghost of Odium Theologicum in grave-
clothes. When this Bill becomes law, as it surely will, and thu
sooner the better, the dead may sleep in silence, or with such “ Chris-

tian and orderly religious service ” at the grave as their friends may
think fit. Would not “ orderly and religious ” have sufficed ?

(Commons.) — Whalley’s perturbed spirit will be relieved to hear
that Lord Ripon, so far as Mr. Gladstone can find out, is not a
Jesuit. (But—“ quis custodiet custodes ? ”—asks the unquiet ghost
of the late M.P. for Peterborough, “Who will assure me that
Mr. Gladstone isn’t one ? ”)

Mr. Gladstone won’t promise Mr. Mitchell-Henry that he shall
have a new House of Commons built for him and his seatless fellows,
right off. (It is true the present House is absurdly inconvenient;
that it only seats a little more than 309 of its normal 658, and that
rich as it is in mediaeval heraldry and oak panelling it is alike poor
in acoustics and accommodation. Still a new House will cost a great
deal. And we are so poor!) And those other fellows were so
reckless!

Serjeant Simon and Dr. Cameron wanted to limit the privilege by
which an early hat is allowed to do duty for an absent head.
Mr. Walter wanted a new House, more suited to the Times; but
Mr. Gladstone and Sir W. Barttelot thought that when the rush
of green hands had subsided there would be room for the Collective
Wisdom. It shrinks wonderfully with wear and tear.

Mr. Shaav-Lefevre reassured anxious Members about the com-
position of the Atalanta Committee, and the searching sweep of
its inquiry.

Sir W. Harcourt—whom Punch congratulates on the agility he
has shown in availing himself of the Derby life-buoy—brought in
the first instalment of Game Law Reform, in his Bill giving the occu-
pier the concurrent and inalienable right to kill ground-game. No-
body seemed disposed to stand up for landlords’ rights in “fur,”
though Mr. Chaplin characteristically thought that the effect of the
measure would very likely be to increase the number of rabbits.
But how will it be when we come to landlords’ rights in “feather?”

THE WINK OF THE AYES AND THE TIP
OF THE NOES.

t. R. POWER, the other j
day was kind enough to j
give the House of Com-
mons a tip for the Derby.
His “selection” ran se-
cond. _ This was not very
surprising, as “ the De-
vil” usually gets a good
place at Epsom during-
the Summer Meeting. But
the proceeding may form
a precedent, in which case
we may expect to find in
the Notice Paper a string j
of queries like the fol-
lowing

Questions.

Mr. P. Taylor. To ask. j
the Secretary of State for i
War if he is able, without |
injury to the requirements- |
of the public service, to.
give the straight tip about,
the Royal Military Steeple
Chase.

Lord Henry Lennox.
To ask the Chief Secretary
for Ireland if he knows of any Celtic player good enough to win the
Lawn-Tennis Championship at Wimbledon.

Mr. Samuel Morley. To ask the Under-Secretary of State for
Foreign Affairs a question about certain entries for the Grand
Prize at the Paris Races. .

Mr. Jacob, Bright. To ask the Vice-President of the Council
whether he can give any information to the House as to the probable
form of the Elevens in the coming Eton and Harrow match. _

Sir Thomas Chambers. To ask the First Lord of the Admiralty
if he would object to- the appointment of a Royal Commission to
inquire into the feasibility of improving the arrangements as to
course and time of starting of the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race.

And Sir Wilfrid Lawson. To ask the Secretary of State tor
India whether he can recommend anything in his stable as really
safe for a place in the Leger.

Culpa Nostra.—Punch has been too quick to acknowledge a mistake and
accept a correction. It was to the Authoress of Adam Bede, after all, that a
Cross Matrimonial was awarded, on the 5th ult. at St. George s, Hanover
Square.