NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE week has been full of rumours as to the immediate reconstruction of the Cabinet, and the retirement of the First Lord of the Treasury to the House of Lords. But there is certainly no truth in these rumours. Mr. W. H. Smith remains where he is, and it will probably depend wholly on the improvement or failure of his health in the Long Vacation, whether he will go to the House of Lords at present or not. It is hoped that he will meet Parliament, which is to be summoned for a new Session,—it is to be prorogued, not adjourned, in August,—in the middle of November, as leader of the Lower House, and that he will continue in that position till the present Parliament has run out. The wild rumour that Lord Randolph Churchill was to succeed him and to lead the Lower House, cannot of course at any time have had any foundation. It would be as rational to give the leadership of the House to Flibbertigibbet himself. Lord Randolph Churchill's cleverness is immense, but it has been never displayed quite so impressively as in the resources he has shown for defeating his own ambitious plans. Even since he embairassed, or supposed that he had embarrassed the Government by his sudden resignation, he has tried to trip it up again on the subject of the Parnell Commission, and has deserted ostenta- tiously his own friends.
