WHOM TO "SEND FOR" NEXT.
"AFTER. us the deluge," exclaims Lord Maidstone ; "after us no Ministry," says Lord Derby. You are thrusting us out of office, he represents, by your Free-trade motions, and you are not pre- pared with any other Cabinet to replace us. It is evident that Lord Derby and Lord John Russell reciprocally think each other's resources to be exhausted. As cabinetmakers they are bankrupt, and they assume that there is no more timber in the world. Let them not be deceived : they have given the largest interpretation to Oxenstiern's apophthegm, and have shown that if you cannot make Mercuries, you can make Ministers out of any wood. Although they may be at the end of their resources, Queen Victoria is not. If it were useless to send for Lord Sohn Russell after Lord Derby,—al- though that alternation has been tried before with comparative sue- cess,—there may be other plantations to look into. Lord Derby him- self suggested an exploration in search of Ministers, and drew his Cabinet from the Quarter-Sessions. Upon the whole, the conduct of his Secretaries, &c. has justified that new source of supply,—that is to say, taking the usual standard of excellence in Ministers at the present day. The search might be carried yet further, and a Cabinet drawn from the Quarter-Sessions bench might be suc- ceeded by one drawn from the Mansionhouse bench. If the Derby and Russell alternation must come to a close, Queen Victoria might "send for" the Lord Mayor. His Lordship, indeed, might be told to take a baker's dozen of gentlemen with him and they might be introduced to their offices at once. Accustomed in some degree to public business' they would do as well to sign the papers of the subordinate clerks who govern the country as gentlemen who write in less commercial hands.
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