27 FEBRUARY 1886, Page 1

Mr. Gladstone's decision was the more noteworthy because the Secretary

for Ireland, who once wrote an admirable Life of Cobden, stoutly opposed the Bill, arguing that the desolateness of Irish towns was due to the decline of the population ; that houses were not like land, because "Nature had fixed no limit for houses ;" that the tenant could not be said, even in Ireland, to have created the subject-matter of the house; that a man turned out of one house could get another, there being, even in Dublin, only too many unfilled houses ; and that building leases were granted cheap in consideration of the very right of re-entry which it was proposed to take away. It was all of no use ; Mr. Morley was only scolded by the Irish, quietly abandoned by his leader, and left to consider whether, in the earlier part of his speech, he had not been too opti- mist. He had said that although "political economy was in exile—permanent or temporary—common-sense still survived." Is he quite so sure of that now ? We certainly are no but incline to believe that the new House, in a delirium of philan- thropy, is disposed to set aside both as antiquated. We fully expect, before the Session ends, to see all schoolboys invested with right of action against their schoolmasters if they do not get on in the world. They are the majority, the schoolmasters are partly responsible, and not to get on is a "hardship." Some of the new men would legislate down the Almighty if they could, for allowing the poor to have toothache.