The political action out of doors has not excited any
keen hopes and fears by its critical character. The substitution of Mr. Wil- liam Owen Stanley for Sir John Jervis in the representation of Chester will not shake the empire ; nor will the defeat of Mr. C. E. Egerton, of the Tatton Park branch—the A nteros of Alderley in the mythology of Cheshire—cause weeping and wailing and gnash- ing of teeth from the Upper St. Lawrence to the parts beyond the Ganges. Neither do the vehement revolutionary epics and philippics of Mr. Ferrand against the "blood-dripping cotton" used in Man- chester, horrify the peaceful million ; nor his threats that the farmers will take ship and burn or drown the slave-begotten bales on their voyage across the Atlantic. The fact,. indeed, that Mr. .Ferrand and Mr. George Frederick Young get up a meeting for their tremendous Wool-gathering League immediately after the regular agricultural dinner at Exeter,—naively exposing their dis- owned condition, excluded, from the body of the Protectionists,— does provoke a smile it reminds people of the timid birds that venture upon the ground to pick up. the crumbs after a dreadful human picnic party,-fluttering, screaming bravely. and flying away at a rustle.
The great aggregate meeting finally to protest against Mr. Gor- ham and the lay supremacy of the Privy Council in matters of ec- clesiastical discipline and doctrine, was hardly a success. The concourse was too large for St. Martin's Hall, and it was obliged to seek a chapel of ease at the Freemasons' ; but it was manifestly not a popular demonstration. It included many clergymen, but very few dignitaries ; few distinguished laymen ; Dr. Posey was there as a leader, with some advocates of Puseyite revivals ; also Dr. Binney, a leading Dissenter—perhaps as a pleased spectator. The meeting, in short, received neither countenance nor support from the public at large. Much desire was expressed for emanci- pation from State thraldom; much fear lest that wish should make • clergymen set an example of giving up endowments. The stones of the volcano fell back into itself.
