Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman was the chief speaker at a conversazione
held at the National Liberal Club on Wednesday. In domestic affairs, he compared the patient advance of the House of,Commons through the mazes bf the London Govern- ment Bill to that of a band of African explorers through the gloomy labyrinths of a tropical forest. He applauded the en- thusiasm displayed by the London Members, and admitted that the Bill, when they emerged into daylight, would be found to have lost the greater number of those objectionable pro- visions of which they complained so much when it was first introduced. After an allusion to the Sinking Fund in Sir William Harcourt's style, Sir Henry said this was a Parlia- ment of small things ; for larger things and greater success he looked to the Liberal party outside the House. He depre- cated belief in the rumours of a speedy dissolution, but declared that whether it came early or late, Liberals were not afraid of it. "They must not be too sanguine," he added, "and need not be too rash ; but one thing they could do,— they could go on expressing by their actions the leading tenets of their political faith." Sir Henry is developing a faculty for the impressive expression of political truisms which rather disappoints us. Surely there never was a time when the Liberal party was less in need of being cautioned against being sanguine.
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