The morning journals give great space to the report of
"an important meeting" at Manchester on Thursday night, under the designation of a social soirée, "at which was put forth," by Mr. Cobden, says the re- porter of the Times, "a sort of manifesto indicating the policy which he and his friends are disposed to take on the leading questions likely to come before Parliament in the approaching session." The gathering was one of the leading members of the committees in South Lancashire and Manchester having the charge of the registry : Mr. George Wil- son took the chair ; and Mr. Milner Gibson and Mr. Bright were speakers as well as Mr. Cobden. We do not find that the meet- ing was the occasion for the marked declaration of policy which the headings and descriptive paragraphs of the reports announce ; but the speeches were of course indicative, and from such speakers they are doubtless politically interesting and important. Mr. Milner Gibson expressly !reserved any condemnation of the modified House-tax, which is said to be the Ministerial substitute for the abandoned Window-tax—he "pronounced no opinion on it till he saw the measure." Both Mr. Gibson and Mr. Bright made special onslaughts upon the panic about Papal aggression; and Mr. Ykight seemed to make a well-appreciated point when he stated that all the most widely-circulated local papers in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and the adjacent counties of the East and North, have refused to give any countenance to the cry, and in many instances have boldly and resolutely opposed it. Mr. Cobden repeated this point, by a reference in whieh he called the agitation "sectional " ; and he marked the difficulty and incongruity of legislation on the subject, by a prominent statement of the qualification for a spiritual war with the alleged aggressor, of our House of Commons—containing its forty or fifty Roman Catholics, (and more of them coming from Ireland,) an Independent or two, three or four Unitarians, a Quaker, and the prospect of a Jew ! But the most inte- resting feature of Mr. Cobden's speech was a personal justification at its Close.
• Dwelling on the importance of an independent party in the House of Commons, who will resolve to do something and to have something accom- plished, disregarding present parties and existing combinations, he can- honed his constituents against a hasty judging of their representatives for particular votes.
"I have set myself the task of accomplishing certain things, and among them the one most dear to my heart is the advocacy of a more peaceful and conciliatory policy in the intercourse of nations—I would especially say, the intercourse between this country and weaker nations. If you want to wound my principles most acutely, it will be to show me England violating the principle of conciliatory and humane policy when it has to deal with a weak power, which is like a child in its grasp. I look upon inhumanity, rudeness, or violence on the part of England towards a powerless state like Greece, With additional resentment, just as I should regard that man as a coward as well as a despot who molested and ill-used a child. Feeling, then, that my principles were violated in the case of Lord Palmerston in the Greek af- fair, I voted against him on that occasion, and I should do so again if ten thousand seats in Parliament depended on the issue of my vote. (Loud cheers.) Now gentlemen, let me give one word of advice to those in Ilan- chaster or elsewhere who take up a hasty conclusion against some of our Members, with whom you generally agree, and in whose judg- ment and sagacity you have some confidence, to beware how you take aide against them, merely because you see in certain public prints a certain line of policy argued. Give them credit for being wary— they have a better opportunity of sifting public men than you have. A man must be a fool if he does not know better after being in Parliament seven or eight years, and sitting in Committee with nearly all the Members, and hearing their motives when they are disclosed, not on the public arena, but when they are chatted over by their own friends in private. Depend upon it, your Members will have rather better opportunities than you will have of judging of the conduct of public men. And if you happen to think that Lord Palmerston, although he did try to maintain a fixed duty long after Lord Aberdeen had become the advocate of total repeal and untaxed bread—if, notwithstanding certain other symptoms I could mention that Lora Palmerston is not the champion of liberty that you suppose--if, I say, notwithstanding you have an impression in favour of Lord Palmerston, and if your Members come to a different conclusion, why, give them credit for the same honesty of purpose and intelligence with yourselves and bear in mind that they have better opportunity of forming an opinion than yourselves. I have no desire to stand out singularly in my votes. As was well expressed by Mr. Bright, it is a very unpleasant thing to do so ; audit would be far more agree- able to make companionship with those men on the Treasury-benches, instead of treading on their toes, and poking them in the ribs, and making them un- comfortable. Is it any satisfaction to me, do you think, that Lord Palmer- ston's organ, the Globe, has denounced me, over and over again, as a dis- appointed demagogue, and hurled language at me which no other journal— the Times, for instance—has ever levelled at me? I know perfectly well, that on the Manchester Exchange, and the Leeds Exchange, and the Liverpool Exchange, where the Globe paper is taken, that being a Wing paper, when persons see it speak in such terms of the Member for the West Riding, they are apt to think there must be a great deal in it, and that the Member must be making himself especially ridiculous in the House of Commons. I am not a disappointed demagogue ; if ever there was anybody who ought to be satisfied with his public career, it is I. (Dark's-
elastic cheering.) I thank you for giving me the only response
which could relieve me from the imputation of great egotism in saying so. I must confess, that in regard to fiscal matters, I am bound to say I believe the Opposition party would do quite as much in the way of retrenchment as the Whigs. I am not sure that they would not do more. I believe Sir James Graham, for instance, would show less subserviency to the Duke of Welling- ton in military arrangements, than Lord John Russell or Lord Palmerston. I believe in Colonial policy, while Sir Robert Peel resolutely refused to add another acre to our Tropical possessions, the present Government are taking possession in Asia, as well as Africa, of tracts of Tropical territory which, I believe, notwithstanding anything that may be said to the contrary by the Manchester Association, arc only calculated to entail additional expense upon us, instead of benefiting us, as a free trading community. And I fear that next session we shall be placed in a still worse dilemma. If we are to believe the reports that Lord John Russell, instead of being the champion of re- ligious liberty, is going to embark in a crusade against religious freedom, I shall then find myself still further alienated from the present party. But this I say—if I cannot say that I have at least the liberty of voting in the House of Commons for something different to that which now exists—if I cannot hope to see some change and some reform—at least if I am not al- lowed the free advocacy of my own opinions for some distinct .principle dif- ferent from that which is now the rule of conduct with Wing and Tory— why am Ito be sitting up till twelve o'clock every night in the House of Commons ? This "disappointed demagogue" wants no public employment ; if I did I might have had it before now. I want no favour, and, as my friend Bright says, no title. I want nothing that any Government or any party can give me; and if I am in the House of Commons stall, it is to give my feeble aid to the advancement of certain questions on which I have strong convictions. Deprive me of that power—tell me I am not to do this because it is likely to destroy a Government with which at the present moment I can have no sympathy—I say, then, the sooner I return to printing calicoes, or something more profitable than sitting up in the House of Commonserught after night in that way, the better both for me and my friends."
The officers of the Palace Court have been awarded compensation for their abolished places : the award has given them annuities of from 40/. to 601. a year.
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