Punch: Punch (101.1891)

12

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[July 18, 1891.

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

EXTRACTED FROM THE DIARY OF TOBY, M.P.

House of Commons, July lith, 1891.—Things going on here much
as usual. Rapidly winding up Session amid familiar surroundings.
Old Morality in seat of Leader of the House; Mr. Or. opposite ;

Speaker in Chair; Sergeant-at-Arms on
guard by the door; and WINDBAG Sexton
on his feet.
Brings back to my mind the first time I

even mild in its expression ; but from time to time, more particu-
larly when he spoke, there flashed from beneath his dark and bushy
eyebrows a pair of eyes that shone like stars. This was the Mr. G.
of those days, whose highest Ministerial office, as yet, had been the
Under-Secretary, hp for the Colonies, held for a few months six
years earlier.

Big House on this first night, as Houses were counted then, when
the number of Members was considerably less. First business
was to choose Speaker. Shaw-Lefeyre (not the Member for
Bradford, but a forbear) had been Speaker , ,;.„ y ,y, -
in last Parliament; re-elected now, Peel,

saw House. Wasn't in the House then ; a ■ who, by the lifting of a finger, could have
mere puppy, which, indeed, some say I put his own nominee in the Chair, graci-

remain to this day. The date was August
the 19th, 1841, and from seat where Strangers
were admitted in the old House (the tem-
porary building occupied whilst Barry was
erecting this lofty pile) I looked on at the
opening of the first Session of the Four-
teenth Parliament of the then United King-
dom of Great Britain and Ireland, appointed
to meet at Westminster in the fifth year of
the Reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria.

Remember it as if it were yesterday. It
was Melbourne's Ministry; but he of course
sat in another place. On the Treasury
Bench, distinctly visible under his hat, was
Johnny Russell, Colonial Secretary and
Leader of the House of Commons. At a
safe distance from him sat Pah, then in the
prime of life, and at the time holding the

ouslv consenting.

Of all who filled the House on that night,
only two have seats in the present Parlia-
ment—Mr. G., and the humble person
who, by favour of the Electors of Bark-
shire, is permitted to per\ these lines.
(Christopher Talbot, then represented
Glamorganshire, but he just failed to live
into this Jubilee time.) Yet, when I look
round on the Benches now, I see a score of
men who bear the names, and are, in
many cases, descendants, of Members who
sat in the Parliament that will ever have
a place in history, if only because it was
born in the same year, almost in the
same month, as Mr. Punch. There was
a Thomas Dyke Acland, representing
Devonshire ; there were two Heneages,

post of Foreign Minister, in which he was one representing Devizes, and the other,
able to make a remarkably large number | Edward, sitting for Grimsby, as Edward
Dizzy, lbii. 0£ pe0ple uncomfortable. There was Sir , Heneage sits to-day for the same borough. Yv. E. 0., I860.

George Grey, Chancellor of the Duchy, whilst a sturdily built j There was a Borthwick, Member for Evesham. There was a Philip
gentleman, then known as the Right Hon. Thomas Babbington , Stanhope, Member for Hertford. Stansfeld sat for Huddersfield,
Macaulay, was Secretary for War; Henry Labouchere (not the and Marjoribanks for Hythe, a Lawson for Enaresborough, a
Sage of Queen Anne's Gate) was President of the Board of Beckett for Leeds, a Childers for Malton, a Manners for Newark -
Trade, and Master of the Mint; whilst Francis Baring was upon-Trent, having a certain William Ewart Gladstone for
Chancellor of the Exchequer, all untroubled by the necessity of | colleague. He was the Lord John, well known to students of
constructing a Budget since he knew he would never be called on i poetry, who now wears a Ducal coronet.

to bring one in. Of course there was a Smith, Vernon by Christian name,

On the Front Bench opposite was Sir Robert Peel with James

" The Sphinx is Silent,'7 1876.

Graham at his right elbow. In modest retirement at the end of the
Bench sat a young man, of full height, and good figure, with a mass
of black hair crowning a large, well-shaped head. Remember
noticing how carefully the hair was parted down the middle, in a
fashion then unusual with men. His face was pleasant to look upon,

*' The Colossus of Words," 1879.

Member for Northampton ; a Houldswoth representing Nottingham-
shire, a Maclean for Oxford, a Harcourt for Oxfordshire—nay,
in this happy Parliament there were two Harcourts, Granville
Harcourt Vernon sitting for East Retford. A Vivian sat for