On Friday week, Lord Fortescne asked a remarkable ques- tion.
He inquired of the Government, in the House of Lords, whether they would consider the practicability of introducing into the Agricultural Holdings Bill some provision for alleviat- ing the gieat hardship suffered by the family of any clergyman, "if he died while occupying his glebe, as many clergymen had latterly found themselves reluctantly compelled to do." Amidst shouts of laughter, Lord Carlingford replied that he believed he understood Lord Fortescue's drift,— i.e., we suppose, that the excellent though ungrammatical Earl had intended to indicate the reluctance with which the clergyman had undertaken to farm his own glebe, not, as his words said, the reluctance with which he found himself compelled to die,—but that it was impossible to introduce into a Bill intended to give tenants compensation for their improvements, provisions for alleviating the difficulties of freeholders,—which, of course, all clergymen are in relation to their own glebe lands, when they cultivate those lands themselves. So poor Lord Fortescne was "reluct- antly compelled " to take nothing but the shout of laughter for his pains.
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