5 SEPTEMBER 1874, Page 1

Mr. Watkin Williams has been delivering a curious speech at

Wrexham, Denbighshire, about Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli. He is a "candid friend" of his own leader, and for the nonce rather a cordial admirer of his rival, whose Church Regulation Bill he cordially approves. His objection to Mr. Gladstone is that he will do everything himself, and thus "stunts and. para- lyses his subordinates." This was one reason why there was no great man ready to take Mr. 'Gladstone's place ; he would let nobody do anything. Mr. Disraeli, on the other hand, spoke very rarely, and wished to see • what the young Statesmen were made. of, and in Mr. Williams's belief, had trusted Lord Sandon with the Education Bill in order to give him a chance. He asserted that Lord Salisbury, Lord Carnarvon, and Mr. Hardy were trying to force on an educational and clerical policy which Mr. Disraeli disliked, and prophesied that before Easter there would be a complete reconstruction of the Cabinet, "upon some other basis, probably a more enlarged, and perhaps a more liberal basis." That speech delivered on the borders of Flintshire will, we hope, reach Mr. Gladstone, for it must give him some little consolation. He did not make a blunder in giving Sir W. Harcourt the Solicitor-. Generalship. The other man would have contemned party disci- pline just as openly, and would not have given him anything like such an opportunity of putting him down. That "steam-ham- mer," no doubt, as Mr. Watkin Williams says, can crush a nut, but fluids, sour milk included, do not go to be crushed.