A letter from Lord Carnarvon to Mr. Bright, dated from
Madeira, and commenting indignantly on Mr. Bright's speech made at Birmingham on the 16th November, appeared in the papers of the 24th December, to which Mr. Bright wrote a somewhat curt answer, published last Tuesday. Lord. Carna,r- von's letter appears to us to be founded in mistake,— and to have no justification either in Mr. Bright's actual speech, or in the view generally taken of that speech by the English public. Lord Carnarvon thinks that Mr. Bright's epeech ought to have been followed instantly by his resignation of office, holding that in that speech he announced views derogatory to all monarchical forms of government, as well as to the aristocratical principle as it is embodied in the British Constitution. He also condemns Mr. Bright severely for passing over the lawlessness of Ireland with time lightest reproofa, and visiting with strong denunciations the unhappy Irish landlords. As we have elsewhere explained, we find nothing in Mr. Bright's speech which is either essentially republican in principle, essentially hostile to the House of Lords, or cruel to the Irish landowners in their present straits. Mr. Bright only preferred a popular monarchy and popular statesmen to monarchies and, statesmen acting apart from the people, and thought that the Irish farmers should have been secured against the caprices of Irish land- lords. All that is perfectly consistent with his position. Never- timeless, we wish he had seized the occasion to deliver his mind on the moral features of the present Irish situation, instead of replying to Lord Carnarvon by a rather contemptuous snub. The Ministers are all too taciturn.
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