Lord Rosebery, in his speech, chose for special eulogy Mr.
Gladstone's courage and sympathy. As to his courage,— which sometimes amounts to rashness,—there can be no two opinions ; but one may certainly say with truth that Mr. Gladstone is more courageous in resisting sifted and carefully considered opinion as well as in giving his sympathy to the half-instinctive and indiscriminate bias of popular feeling, than
he is in stemming popular opinion and supporting reasoned and deliberate judgment. Lord Rosebery dwelt on the anxiety of the Liberal Party for a crowd of legislative reforms which would, he feared, be suffocating to the Government, and com- pared its probable situation next January to that of Marie Antoinette on her first accouchement, when such a crowd filled the chamber that the Queen had more to fear from suffocation than she had from the pains of childbirth. He ventured to insist that there must be some curb put on the impatient enthusiasm of Liberal Members if the Government were not to be suffocated by too much zeal. It would be impossible for forty-eight omnibuses all abreast to pass the Griffin which now marks the former site of Temple Bar.
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