1 MAY 1880, Page 3

The Merchant Taylors conferred the freedom of the Company on

Wednesday, on Lord Cranbrook and Sir Stafford Northcote, both of whom appeared to think that those who, being dead, yet speak, should speak chiefly to give utterance to the words "Never say die." That at least was very nearly all they had to say. Both were very oonfideut that the Liberals on coming into office would follow faithfully in the track of their predecessors, whom they had so strongly censured,— wherein we have no doubt that the Tories will find themselves completely wrong. Lord Craubrook was not very clear in his metaphors. He declared that though the Conservatives had been displaced from power by a wave which carried everything before it, "we must not forget that the deep sea below has remained very much undisturbed." What is the deep sea below the electoral wave ? And whatever it may be, if it was undis- turbed in 1880, was it or was it not undisturbed in 1874, when the Liberals were displaced ? If it was not undisturbed then, how did Lord Cranbrook know this ? And if it was undis- turbed then, what did Lord Cranbrook thou infer from its being undisturbed?