There was a grand Parliamentary skirmish on Friday week. Lord
Harlington, waking for the first time out of his listless ways, reviewed the whole course of the Session, in a speech which we have analysed and characterised elsewhere, and brought up Mr. Disraeli, who scattered epigrams. Lord Hartington, the Premier said, could criticise what had been done without fear of retaliation, for-he had done and attempted nothing. He had produced no rival measures, made no heroic struggles, done nothing but make a speech -" which had not even the excuse of being made after dinner." Mr. Disraeli declared that before the year had passed many millions of money would have been invested under the Artisans Dwellings Bill,
Alql:iined his blunder at the Mansion-House dinner about the days of eek on which he withdrew the Merchant Shipping Bill, and consulted the Cabinet on a temporary measure, and declared that he did suggest a Bill of only one clause. And it would have contained only one clause, but that the Opposition "plundered our, own Bill and presented us with the spoil,"—a beautiful epigram, and—considering that Mr. Disraeli himself was the plunderer, and threw over his colleagues to commit the theft— perhaps a trifle impudent, even for him. He laughed at accusations of giving up Bills, when Lord Harlington himself had urged their surrender as long ago as June, and denied that he had ever called the Opposition "factious." He agreed with Lord Palmerston that " faction was only another man's action," denied that he had lowered the dignity of the House, affirmed that Lord Harlington had all the, newspapers, "or at least the three parties have,"--which is a pleasant way of saying that the Standard, the Pall Mall Gazette, and the country Tory papers are non-existent nullities--and ended with a glowing eulogium on the "devotion" of his colleagues to himself. That last sentence is true. Can colleagues show devotion better than by readiness for sacrifice? They are all sacrificed in turn, and all meek as lambs under the ceremony.
