VICTORIAN PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3142, 23 July 1881, Page 4

VICTORIAN PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES.

' Civis,' in the Otago Witness, has the following:—

Pure models are always to be sought after and carefully treasured. On that account my readers -will excuse me for giving a few examples from the recent Parliamentary debates in Victoria of what I might call interlocutory eloquence: Mr Dow : The hon. member used to talk about shipping the Governor home. Sir Bryan O'Loughlen : 1 never did. Mr Burrowe3 : That was an Age report. Mr Dow : It was not likely that the hon. member for Borroondara would take office with men whom he had said he would not touch with a forty-feet pole. Mr Murray Smith : I never said any such thine. The saying was invented for me by the Age. Mr Dow: The Hon. member for West Rouke was sent to the House fen months ago by honest working men to represent liberal principles, and then he quietly walked across the floor of the House and sold the men like bullocks, without giving them a chanceSir Bryan O'Lougblen : It is false; the selling is on that side. Mr Longmore : Hear, hear. Mr Dow : And what would tho Minister of Public Worts of the New Government (referring to Mr M'Kean) say to a dissolution ? Mr M'Kean: Tho hon. member has tittered the greatest untruth heeverutteiecl in his life, if be refers to me in the capacity of the next Minister of Public "Works. Mr Dow: I believe Mr Longmore was once asked if ho ever supported a party of which he was not a Minister, and he replied, •' Of course I never support a party of which I am not a Minister, because a party in which I was not a Minister could not have been a proper one.' —(Laughter.) Mr Longmore: It is a pure invention and falsehood. Mr K'Kean : Stop your personalties. Mr Longmore : The hon. member is telling a series of most deliberate lies with reference to me, and I ask the Speaker to keep him in order. The Speaker said the hon. member for Bipon and Hampden (Mr Longmore) would have to withdraw the words 'deliberate lies.' Mr Longmore : I withdraw the words in respect to the House, but they are perfectly true. The Speaker : The hon. member for Kara Kara is bound to accept the hon. member for Eipon and Hampden's denial. Mr Dow : I never dreamt of not withdrawing the remark, and withdraw it at once.— (Hear, hear.) Mr M'Kean : Withdraw what you said about me, too.—(Laughter.) Mr Woods : And withdraw your speech. Mr Bent: And yourself.—(Laughter.) Mr Dow : I know it is not advisable to pursue this style of speaking because no style is so objectionable as that which is based on truth. Mr M'Kean : Mr Speaker, the hon. member by stating that his style of speaking is based on truth again repeats his offensive remarks. So far as lam concerned, his style is untrue. Mr Dow : It is very unfortunate that hon. members should go on in this way.—(Laughter.) The whole scene is ludicrous enough, but the air of injured innocence with which we can imagine the offending member making the last remark is refreshing indeed. But in the same debate I find another and still more alluring model. An hon member calls music, as well as poetry, to the aid of his eloquence. Mr Hall said Sir Bryan O'Loghlen's motion would never had been carried if the Government had not gone with it. If the Assembly were a palace of truth, in which every man expressed his real feelings, then the true object of the motion would be revealed by the hon member opposite, who, with their eyes fixed on the Treasury bench would be heard saying—[here the hon member burst forth into a song]-— " Oh, what must It be to be there." (Prolonged laughter and cries of " Encore, encore.") Mr Bent : I don't think he would take as a singer, Mr Speaker.—(Renewed laughter.) Surely here is a wide field for imitation in our own humdrum Assembly, and I humbly commend it to hon members who find the present session unspeakably dreary. Music, when soft, voices die, Vibrates in the memory ; Odnurn, when sweet violets sicken, Live wi-hin the senpe they quicken. If only Sir George Grey could render some of his rhapsodies into verse, and then into song, how the House would ring with plaudits and encores. Surely among those eightyocld members there is at least one who could imitate this excellent example set by a namesake of the Premier in a sister colony.