NEWS OF THE WEEK.
Horraevasetuxo is the business of Easter : politics sink to a recreation, or to the mere indulgence of an incorrigible habit. The business of the Sovereign People is to go to fairs, exhibitions, museums, theatres, and other spectacles, and to take their sons and daughters to the same ; and the work has on the whole been conscientiously performed. But, as the Irishman cannot enjoy a day of pleasure without a fight, so your hardened politician can only perform the duties of the season in some political form. Thus we see inveterate offenders in the Free-trade line assembling at Wakefield, professedly to honour Mr. Cobden for having been elected by them as Member for the West Riding, but in reality to steal a little speechmaking. Mr. Cobden was in fine feather ; having fairly moulted his anti-mili- tary plumes so far as so thorough a civilian can. The most novel part of his speech relates to the proper management of the Colonies. We are not satisfied, indeed, that he quite understands the subject ; but of course so practical a man will master it before he undertakes to handle it in Parliament; and he will be a valuable ally to Sir William Molesworth. But the leader of the League could not help going back to old associations : among the Free-traders of the North he got back to his accustomed strain, and fell to rating the farmers. "Out of sight out of mind "—he quite forgot, we suppose, that of late he has been "the farmers' friend "; for he not only told them some home truths, as friends may do, but he spoke of them and their "whining" in a slighting disparaging tone. He makes light of their distress, and insists that we are enjoying great " prosperity,"—meaning good trade in certain manufactures with low prices of provisions. But low prices and deficient crops are a disastrous form of prosperity for the farmers. It is not politic to estrange a class really in want of true friends.
For see how that want appears at the agricultural meetings this week. Scarcely one is held without the manifestation of soreness at the part taken by the Protectionist leaders. The farmers are directly at issue with the political gentlemen who patronize them : they mistrust Mr. Disraeli's local-taxation tub to the whale, and call for the repeal of the Malt-tax, which the genteel Protectionists deprecate.
' The work of the election-candidate ceases only with his election, and Easter shines no holyday to him : Mr. Roebuck has been expounding his views to the electors of Sheffield ; which is the more necessary since he is a man of principles, and principles are too apt to be forgotten. It has been observed with some exultation among the consciously unstable, that Mr. Roebuck's tone is altered—is more moderate and conservative than it used to be in 1832 and some subsequent years : Possibly; we do not use the same tones when we speak in a riot and in a quiet conclave. The times are not only calmer, but there is a striking increase in the demand for a little reasonableness ; and, with the wholly altered circumstances of the time, men's tones must alter. According to the blind dogma of,poli- tical "consistency," we might to organize a special constabulary every lbth of April because we did so last year. We see no change in Mr. Roebuck's principles ; any more than the pole-star changes, or the aim of the steadfast helmsman, because he handles the tiller so as to stem the shifting assault of the winds and waves.
