NOTES ON PARLIAMENT.

Press, Volume IV, Issue 489, 24 May 1864, Page 3

NOTES ON PARLIAMENT.

[From the Home Neics."]

THE INStTBAJJCE OFFICE DELtTSIOX.

Mr. Gladstone has made one of those splendid orations in Parliament which stand out conspicuously from the ordinary line of the debates, and literally strike home to the intelligence of the whole country. The subject was extremely unpromising on the surface. A speech upon insurance offices suggested little hope of being decorated with flowers of rhetoric, and the listener who was not directly interested in the matter anticipated the driest statement of dreary facts and figures. Yet Mr. Gladstone held his hearers in the spell of his eloquence for considerably above two hours, during which time a pin might be be heard to drop on the floor of the House. Many of those who were present, declare that it was the greatest triumph of parliamentary oratory that has been heard inside the walls of St. Stephen's within the memory of the present generation. However that may be, there is no doubt that it invested a very dull theme with the deepest interest, and presented in the most lucid and logical array such a mass of curious and startling details as was never before collected on the subject. The speech drew its charm from two distinct sources—the exposure of the unsoundness of many of the offices, clubs, and societies which at present carry on the business of insurance ; and the development of a plaa now proposed to be carried into effect, under the auspices of Government, for enabling poor people to enjoy all the advantages of insurance without incurring any of the risks by wliich it has been hitherto attended. Tha amount of good which is expected to flow from this speech is incalculable ; and not the least important is the extinction of many of the establishments to whose unsafe condition Mr.. Gladstone directed attention. o quality in this speech was more remarkable than the courage displayed in grappling with a great abuse, which the commerciaJ-xircles. and the general public, had long felt that legislation had never effectually reached before. TOtTTnfG. That is to say canvassing in the lobby. We may cay of it, as Dunning said of the power of the Crown, " It has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished." Let nobody be surprised if the House should some night pass a resolution, " That canvassing votes in the lobby is an infringement of the privileges of Parliament; and that the sergeant-at-arms be ordered to stop it forthwith." Indeed, such a bore and annoyance has this sort of lobby-rolling become that, vm!es3 some such resolution be passed, Mr. Speaker must either order the lobby to be cleared of etrangere or open some back way through which members may escape from their pestilent persecutors.

A WROXG WrTHOCT A ItEMEDY. The rules of both Houses of Parliament to enforce order in debates, awl generally to inaint;ii;i the honor and dignity of Parliament, are xcry strin-ent. It is Uiila.vi'iil {"or a member of one House to speak disivsp<>ctful!y of the other House, nor is any member ali.>«-ol to use words against the coinlu-t :Hi.l character of his own House. Great care is also taken to prevent unseemly personal alternations. No one in debate may cull a iue:nber by hi* name. Tm-put-.ttions of bad motive-?, misrepresentations of language, accusations of falsehood and deceit, and contemptuous and insulting language, are also strictly forbidden under penalties. But, though the Houses are so careful of tTie rig-'.ts, privileges, and character oftlieir own members, it is observable that they have taken no care in these rules of the frights, and privileges, and characters of strangers ; for, whilst not-a whisper against the character of a member may be uttered in Parliament, members may say what they please about strangers outside; call them, from thehighest to the lowest, rogues, thieves, liars, trators, or by any opprobrious term thet the dictionary recognises or the imagination can invent. Said strangers have no remedy. They cannot go to the courts of law, for privilege of Parliament slops the way. If they were to bring the slanderer to book by comments in the newspaper, they would bo hauled up to the bar of the J louse, and perhaps imprisoned. In short, your High Court of Parliament takes no thought of the characters of strangers. This might do very well when Parliament sat with closed doors ; but now, when any slander uttered is, in less than 21- hours, sent upon the wings of a million newspapers to the remotest parts of the globe, the case is altered, and the said High Court of Parliament ought to do one of two things—either to prevent by stringent rules and orders slanderous attacks upon strangers in the same manner as it forbids all imputations upon the diameters of its own members, or else allow the slandered to clear himself by appeal to law. KOETIUCK —o>'E FOR 1115 SOB. Some tow nights ago Mr. Roebuck made a somewhat rude and unprovoked assault upon Mr. Kinglake. The lion, and learned gentleman took no notice of the insult at the moment, but quietly bided his time. At last a time came, and thus Mr. Kir.giake paid the debt with interest thereupon. " The hon. mem her for Shciliukl," said Mr. X., "has so serene a confidence in the accuracy of his own judgment that he does Tery frequently, in this House, state a very foolish proposition with a degree of solemnity which gives it, for the moment, something like judicial importance." Loud laughter and significant cheers followed this hit. A DEBUT. Th debutant is Mr. Shaw Lefevre, nephew of Lord Eversley the late Speaker, and son of Sir John Shaw Lefcvre, X.C.13., who holds in the House of Lords the high and honourable oiliee of Clerk in Parliament. Mr. Shaw Lefcvre came into the House, just before it assembled, as member for Heading, in place of Mr. Serjeant Pigott, when that learned gentleman left the House to take his seat upon the Bench. Mr. Lefevre is, by profession, a barrister, and he inaugurated his career in Parliament by the delivery of a set speech. Jls spoke upon the question of the Confederate yes scls, and, no doubt, from a brief, the facts of which were probably got from that famous international lawyer, Mr. iLverett, of the United States, who came over some months ago to act as adviser to the embassy, and sat under the gallery. But what if this were so ? All speakers must get their facts from somebody, unLss, indeed (as Earl Jiussell said of Lord Derby, and as Sheridan said of some one else many years ago), they imagine thorn ; and the question is not so niueh how or where speakers get their facts, as how they handle them. At pre. sent there is no promise tliat Mr. Lefevre will ever be an orator; but he has a good voice, a prepossessing personal appearance, self-possession, an easy llow of language, and the power of arrangement and of keeping his subject, as it is said, well in hand—no mean qualifications, these, in a youthful aspirant; and if they do not augur oratoriui fame, they certainly foreshadow a possibly useful Parliamentary career. TO3ITEAIT3 IX A DEBATE. "Whenever we have an exciting debate in the House of Commons, individnal traits come out with special force. Take the discussion on the Birkenhead ironclads as an example. Mr Seymour .Fitzgerald begins. He is a bright, fresh-complexioncd gentleman who always looks as though he had just stepped freni yacht, nioor,«or breezy downs, and was redolent of fresh air. The Cnder-Secretary for Foreign Affairs in the last Derby Administration, lie ranks at least as high as the member with the pronounced beard and the lion-like front who now fills the oilice and confronts him on the Ministerial bench. A vigorous, ready speaker, with a case which, if not irrefutable, at all events is very diflicult to meet and to upset, Mr Fitzgerald doos his party full credit, and sits down amid encouraging cheers with a most - warlike peroration. Tlw evening is far advanced. Sir Koundell Palmer ia the champion selected to do battle for the Government, and a most ana powerful champion he always shows himself. Next after the Chancellor of the .Exchequer, the AttorneyGeneral is certainly the Minister who carries the heaviest metal as an orator, and his value to the Government throughout the recent discussions on international law has been inestimable. His pale, thoughtful, earnest face lights up as his arguments begin to tell, and he gradually warms to his work and makes his points with a force of manner of which you would hardly have thought him capable. The style is rather too involved. The sentences are often too long and complicated, and are weakened by over-much of parenthesis and reservation. Mr. Horsfall, who follows him, speaks quietly and plainly, as becomes the British merchant-representative, who knows what he wants to say, and says it without more toJo. Then, on the same (the Opposition) side, upon the front bench below the gangway, a tall rather ungainly figure rises, and, with bitter invective, declaims against the new power asserted by the Government to suspend the rights of individuals and to dispense with laws. Some men have the power of saying cutting things in a pleasant, genial manner, -which, almost takes the sting from out of them. But Lord Robert Cecil has not this happy knack, nor, apparently, does he care to cultivate it. All he says which is likely to damage or to wound comes with double force by reason of his emphasis and his manner. There is no lurking smile, no «limpse of humour, no good nature in his blows, which make a man who is knocked down by them get up, shake himself, and say, " Well, he's not a bad fellow, after all." As he speaks, Lord Robert has a habit of taking half a step in advance, as if his backers were prompting him to '" go in and win." He retreats, but not to the same position, and occasionally, by the time ho is in his peroration, finds that lie is halfway across the lloor on his way to the Ministerial bench, very much as though he had determined to grapple with somebody. Just opposite, on the corresponding Ministerial bench below the gangway, a member has been watching and waiting his opportunity, bobbing up and down when he thought there was an end of the philippic, and using those other little arts which members think lawful aud expedient when they have a strong desire to catch the Speaker's eve. A tall man, with rugged face and disdainful of well-trimmed locks, but keen of eye and confident in manner, dashing into his subject with a quickness and impetuosity which make you desire to know more of him. It is Mr. W. E. Foster, the crack shot of the Commons, and (the more the pity, some will say .) the most ardent Federalist there. He springs with alacrity —in the spirit only, of course—upon Lord Robert Cecil, asks how we should like it ourselves if our commerce were preyed upon by American Alabainas, taunts the Opposition with a wish to urge the Government into war, and with a fear to submit a definite vote of censure, and generally proves "himself an awkward antagonist. But a mightier man than he is also watching his opportunity, aud when Mr. ITorster sits down, Sir Hugh Cairns, the ex-Solicitor-Ocueral in. Lord Derby's last Government, the Attorney-General in that which is to come, and the

Conservative Lord Chancellor of the future, rises, and, disdainiuin? smaller ~ at once fastens on the worthy legal opponent who has spoken in defence of Ministers. Sir Hugh lias much of the Irish dash and abandon, t-ijK'd down and refined by professional traininrr, an 1 ho has, besides, the logical and the statesmanlike mi:; 1, which enables a man to deal with ijreat i)ri!!,-;j,.',-j in - t sound and statesmanlike way. It is long *i:iee tiio strangers in the gsllery have listened to a more eloquent and a more brilliant harangue on ■what now appears to be a great Constitutional question. It is not rhetoric alone, but brilliant rhetoric joined to cogent and sustained argument, acting on the reason as strongly as on the feelings of those who listen to it. On a back bench behind Mr. Disraeli and his followers sits a wellfavored member, with a, frontal developnent which would deli "lit the phrenologist, and on his rising you see at once that lie is high in the respect of the- House, and is a man whose, words have weight wherever they are heard and read. Mr. Walpole, as all know— unhappily, as his party think—seceded from Lord Derby's Government on the subject of the Conservative Reform Bill, along with Mr. Henley, who now sits by hi:n. But his sincerity and uninipeached character place him above the level of ordinary politicians, and give him authority beyond the narrow circle of party. lie now goes dead against the Government, praises the speech of Sir Huge Cairns as an oratoral effort which has been rarely surpassed in our day, and is more earnest and impressive tlwm even he 13 nont to be in deprecating the seizure of the rams and the apparent desire of the Government to introduce, of their own authority, a new clause into the Enlistment Act. At this moment the Opposition seem triumphant. Bat latet anrjttis. Mr. Tom Baring rises in their very midst, and pours in a storm ofriietoric.il shot and shell which flies through their ranks and docs infinite execution. He is an J American merchant. He acts as financial agent for the Federal Government. His sympathies and interests are all bound up with the cause of the North. But that does not matter. He stands the Government in good stead, blames the leaders of Opposition for hounding on a war with the Northern States, and [ thanks Karl Russell for averting it. No wonder Mr. Seymour Fitzgerald looks askance at him in his reply, and tries to be severe. But the game is up; the Conservatives were in a clear majority, but after this some of them hurry out to avoid the division, and the chief ministerial teller, Mr Brand, announces, amid great cheering, a ministerial majority of 25. It is not much : but it is enough. A STOEM. Whenever Mr. Bernal Osbsnie is seen early in the House, perched, up on the edge of the horizon, nervous and restles?, and holding papers in his hand, a row may be expected. He is like one of those clouds which sailors call "storm-breeders." The storms, though, which lie breeds are seldom very mischievous in the end. They arc like thunder without lightning —noisy, but innocuous. The honorable member got up one of these temporary, noisy, furious, and, as some folks thought, dangerous—likely, indeed, to bo destructive of the Government and of the Parliament itself ; but from the first there was no danger. The case was this :—Ever since Parliament met there had been a cry from the Conservative benches for certain papers on the Danish war. Lord Robert Cecil flr&t made the demand, and almost every night since it had been reiterated in every note of the gamut. " Papers ! pnpers! Mr. Under-Secretary Layard when shall we have these paper 3?" To all this there was but one answer. " The papers have to be sorted, edited, printed, corrected —in short, are not ready." Well, on this occasion, Lord Robert again lifted up the cry for papers, and again the same answer was given. Whereupon Mr. Disraeli, on motion made that the House resolve itself into committee of supply, rose, and dilated at length,-in his usual forcible, sarcastic manner, upon the subject of these papers, and was so eloquent and caustic that the House got into quite a red heat of excitement. Nor was this excitement allayed, but rather increased, by the Chancellor of the Exchequer's sarcastic speech. " The right honorable gentleman," he said, " everybody knows, is a great master of political fireworks, and has no difficulty in producing at a moment's notice any amount of display." Loud cheers and laughtor followed this sally, but it, did not, of course, damp down the excitement. After the Chancellor came Lord Robert Cecil, who, as his, wont is, added- fuel to the flame, evidently rejoicing in the blaze ; and then Mr. Osborne rushed into the fray in so towering a passion that he could hardly speak coherently, and so disappointed that these papers were not forthcoming, that he moved, " That the consideration of the navy estimates be postponed to this day three weeks."