Mr. Balfour answered that he thought before the Dissolution they
would have an opportunity of discussing the question, but added :—" I do not admit that every parliament has to discuss the programme which is to be laid before its successor, nor has that ever been accepted as the Constitutional principle." It was a preposterous demand in view of the fact that "an inquiry is going on." Mr. Balfour met the ironic cheers that this statement elicited with a somewhat bitter retort as to the happy intuition by Which his friends had reached "the heart of the truth" without inquiry, and declaring that the demand for a discussion was a mere "party move," refused it. Sir John Gorst replied that those who held to the old fiscal principles of the party were denounced as traitors and rebels, and they asked for a discussion in order to clear the situation.•This sharp affair of outposts seems to point to an early Dissolution.
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