IMPERTINENCE AS A PARLIAMENTARY WEAPON.
cspi ilcapsporoy, the knot of young men of forty or there-
abouts whom Lord Palmerston, in default of a following, puts into office and protects as if they belonged to him, have amidst many differences one quality in common. They all know the value of insolence as a weapon in political warfare—all affect, even when personally simple people, the hauteur which lies very near the root of the character of their chief. All entertain the conviction that the ability to snub can be made a social breast- plate, and that an offhand address compounded of quickness and impertinence suggests in its victims a sense of reserved power abiding in the assailant. When the House sneers at Mr. Layard, he tells members to answer instead of interrupting him, and keep silence till he has done. When an inconvenient question is asked of Mr. Cowper, he taunts the House with its inability to control 'expenditure, or build anything which is not ugly, and bids his opponents to let him alone, for the department will go on a great deal better unassisted than if they persist in interfering. Mr. Lowe's regular practice when assailed was to describe his assailant as a rather unscrupulous fool, leading a knot of persons who either knew nothing about the matter or had a sinister motive in pressing their own view. There is no doubt a certain effectiveness in this style, as well as a certain justification for employing it. English- men of the better class when excited are often brusque, and politi- cal impertinence, particularly if it is clever impertinence, usually suggests at once courage, and frankness, and earnestness in the -matter under discussion. It implies, too, when used by an official, special knowledge, the existence of a quantity of facts with which the speaker is familiar, which are essential to the question, and which his opponent knows nothing whatever about. Lord Pal- merston almost always makes this the basis of his impertinence,— a weapon he uses with real still,—talks of Mr. Cobden's ignorance of"politics," or refuses to give up his informants, because if ha did " he should soon know as little of the matter in hand as the honourable member." The average English mind, too—and the mind of the collective House of Commons is simply the average English mind a little puffed with prosperity—does not easily distinguish be- tween wit and impertinence, has, indeed, invented a word—" chaff," which is quite peculiar to itself, and which expresses the perfect com- bination of the two. The to quoque always strikes a cabman or the gallery of the Victoria as witty, and so it does the House of Com- mons, which receives Mr. Osborne's admiration of Mr. Layard "in his new capacity as an advocate for common decency" with roars of hearty laughter. The victim, too, is very apt, unless a very ready as well as a very strong man, to quail and feel himself beaten, at all events for the time. Most men are cowards when isolated, and the laughter around—laughter at the victim as well as the joke - in- spires a sense of isolation. We remember one almost perfect instance of this confusion. Mr. Darby Grijfiths, with his usual in- quisitiveness, one night asked the Foreign Secretary if it were true, as the newspapers said, that Victor Emanuel had crossed his fron- tier for an interview with the Emperor. Lord John Russell, with- out rising, turned his head and roared at the top of his voice, " No." The reply hal not a trace of wit, but the impertinence was so near it that the House bubbled over with noisy pleasure, and 'was better tempered for the whole remainder of the evening. If
there is any real wit behind it or any real power accompanying it, impertinence must, with a mixed audience, be allowed to be effec- tive. Nor is it easy to say what other weapon a Minister would find so easy to his hand. Real wit is a better defence, but then every statesman cannot have real wit, and since the days of Sir Robert Peel it has been rather a scarce quality among officials. His followers were not witty, though there is humour in Mr. Gladstone, and a sort of sharpness in the Duke of Newcastle. Impassibility is an equally, good defence, but it does not tell much in debate except when exhibited by a very great man indeed, and officials want a form of retort which the country can read next day. Some weapon they must use to keep off the bores, and the people with private in- terests, and the men with crotchets, and the members of the Darby Griffiths stamp who otherwise would worry them to death, and most of whom when smashed with an argument say, "The right honour- able gentleman has stated precisely what I wanted to elicit," and sit down as radiant as if they had been applauded. A Minister to be useful must be dangerous, and if he can only be so by being impertinent he cannot be said to be very blameable. A porcupine is not a nice beast, but still one does not condemn his use of his quills as in any way immoral, and if members will tease people like Sir Charles Wood or Mr. Layard, why they know what to expect.
Though very useful, however, on occasion, and once in a twelve- month justifiable, we do not recommend members who hope one day to be classed among " rising men " to imitate the tone of Lord Palmerston's gullies. In the long run it does not pay. The House when snubbed en masse often laughs, but it never quite likes the snubber, and is apt to believe for the future that he is deficient in that power of understanding its moods and ways which is the secret of permanent Parliamentary power. One of the drawbacks to Mr. Gladstone's success, one of the many boulders which he will overleap, but which make his ascent so toilsome, is that slight attitude of scorn alike for opponents and friends which, though in him it is not impertinence, irritates so deeply the younger men of the House. Smaller men, at all events, should use the weapon with great reluctance, for it is almost sure to wound themselves at least as sharply as their opponents. Making personal enemies is a stupid amusement for any politician, and impertinence out of season makes enemies of whole classes. The weapon is so handy, too, that it is sure to be employed on the wrong opponent, and at the worst possible time. Mr. Lowe, for example, would in all proba- bility have escaped the vote of last week if his style had not been so spoilt by a habit of epigrammatic arrogance in addressing inspec- tors. He found that they yielded not only to him but to the really discreditable style employed by Mr. Lingen—who often writes as if he had a birch in his hand and an inspector ready " hoisted; "—so he reprimanded Lord Robert Cecil, who leads a faction if not a party, like an unruly opponent in a hustings crowd, and missed a point, the demand for the original reports, conceding which would have saved him. His speech after his retirement was no answer, for he had sent reports back for mutilation, if he had not mutilated them, and a chief must accept the blunders of his subordinates as he profits by their assistance, but if he had shown half the temper, and tact, and indeed feeling, on the first occasion which he displayed on the second fifty members would have walked out. Mr. Layard lost half his success on Tuesday by his arrogant snub to the House for jeering him a little, and will one day bring down a personal vote by the pertinacious im- pertinence with which he insists that the action of this country in the East is no business of the House of Commons. It is a very tempting thing, no doubt, when one knows a good deal about a recondite subject to prove to all interlocutors that they are silly ignoramuses, but when the ultimate decision rests with them it is not very expedient. Lord Palmerston's little speech about Mr. Cobden's diplomatic knowledge has cost him two or three divisions already, and but for the odd conviction of the public that there is in Continental politics some arcanum to which the Premier alone has the key, would have cost him many more. One object of men who mean to be statesmen is no doubt to make themselves formidable, but to make themselves attractive is at least as important a one. Of all the men to whom Lord Palmerston givesa chance, which one has gained anything approach- ing a following, or is the centre of the hopes, or regards, or even good wishes of any section of politicians ? Not one ; and among the many reasons which secure them their isolation is the habitual and most injudicious use of a weapon which their chief only Imes when he is beaten, or when the aristocratic thread which runs through his character has been roughly twitched.
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