"W. B."
PEntiars there has been no precedent for the number of exposures to which the present Government has been subjected within the short term of its existence. Some of its attempts to pass off counterfeits have been made openly before the public. It has palmed itself off upon the constituencies as Protectionist while it palmed itself off upon Parliament as Free-trade, disclaiming Pro- tection • it professed to resist Democracy, which now it concili- ates; its Chancellor of the Exchequer is found to be passing off the compositions of Whig and French writers and speakers as his own ; and now a mapber of its Government is accused, with a strong prim& faeie case, of being an instigating party in a whole- sale bribery, no contradiction being offered to that charge. This last accusation would not be so serious if it were not for the context. Major Beresford has never been regarded as a discreet man, and a certain amount of party zeal was to be expected from one of his blood; but there never was a ease in which a Govern- ment was pledged. to maintain greater purity of conduct than in the last election. The Ministry held an economical doctrine which it now confesses to be opposed to the general sense of the country ; it had consented to subject that doctrine to the test of a general election ; the doctrine was one affecting the material welfare of the people, and not involving any political principle ; and under such circumstances, it most especially behoved the party holding that doctrine to make a genuine appeal to the country. But in spite of that duty, we find Major Beresford, an active mem- ber of the Government and a distinguished Protectionist, endea- vouring to place one of his own party in Parliament in lieu of the opposite party, by bribery and corruption, or at the best by a trick. Had this been successful, and had the device been more general, it would have resulted in falsifying the whole erection, to the de, cision of which Ministers had professedly deferred. It is fortu- nate that the crime was not possible on such a scale. But, how- ever partial may have been the attempt and the result, the animus was the same. The person who sent Mr. Frail's agent to Derby was bent upon falsifying the general election by the decision of which Government had agreed to abide; and if Major Beresford is"W. B.," he is chargeable with that attempt at falsification.
It adds nothing to the criminality of such an act that it is lu- dicrous in its incidents; that one of its agents is named by the laughable surname of "Frail"; that another agent was taken up like a common swindler; that the letters themselves naïvely went begging for a discreet person, and recommending another as "up to all the schemes" ot an election. But although the incidents add nothing to the criminality, their ludicrous and paltry nature adds very materially to the disgracing effect of the whole transac- tion. It was an ugly act done in a ridiculous manner; and for a Government ruling this great empire, it is a double degradation that one of its accredited servants should be an accomplice in a national crime, and while thus engaged in his complicity should behave ridiculously. The odious offence with which Mr. Beresford is charged is not singular in his person. Although others may not have com- mitted the fault of being detected, it is notorious that many are not less culpable than himself; so that nothing can be predicated from these peccadilloes of the individual character, and Mr. Beres- ford must be acquitted of any stigma to mark him out from his fellows as less of a gentleman. But that acquittal is accorded at the expense of charging the turpitude upon his class generally. In the case of misdemeanour, that which ceases to be a disgrace to the individual, because it is done in a class, becomes a disgrace to the class ; and the precise manner in which this misconduct is fixed upon a member of the Government, and of the Conservative party, fixes the charge upon all of the class who do not join in repu- diating it.
The opportunity, indeed, offers itself to the present Government, of compensating for the offence which it appears to have committed by one of its number. If it has by its representative committed one of the grossest offences upon the law of election and upon political honour, it may atone for that misconduct by the perfect faith of its disclosures, and by an example of self-purification. It is some step towards that atonement when the Government ab- stains from resisting the inquiry into the Derby affair. Mr. Wort- ley, as an amicus curife, tentatively threw out hints by favour of which an inquiry might have been resisted. There was some show of reason in refusing a separate inquiry into an election matter when the election itself would become the subject of inquiry before the same.spedes of committee. But, as we have seen, the cause is so flagrant in its incidents that it is practically removed from the general category of election inquiries ; and the Government, we think, exercised a very sound discretion, as well as took a much higher ground, by waiving the evasive course which Mr. Wortley suggested. It is to be hoped that that better course will be carried out by furnishing every facility to the Committee. We ought to know all about it—all that the Government can furnish about Morgan, Mr. Flewker, Mr. Frail, and W. B.; everything. It is possible' as the practised lawyer Sir Alexander Cockburn remarks, that the appearances may be explained. Not, of course, by recrimination—that would be no answer; but it is possible that "W. B." may not be William Beresford, and that the romance of real life may disclose a new plot of complication. We will not say it is possible that W. B. may have had some ingenious indirect purpose of protecting free.. dam of election, although Protection does take strange views as to the attainment of an object. But should W. B. prove to be Wil- liam Beresford, and should William Beresford be convicted of the charge now made against him, then his friends and colleagues will have the opportunity of showing a great example in the process of purification, by recognizing the truth which the public at large will inevitably recognize—that a person implicated as W. B. ap- pears to be is, ipso facto, disqualified from the public service in a political capacity.
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