14 OCTOBER 1871, Page 2

Mr. Baxter, the Secretary to the Treasury, and M.P. for

the Montrose Burghs, addressed his constituents at Arbroath on Wednesday night in a very unfortunate speech,—sore towards his many critics, contemptuous towards Franco, and in favour of a rigidly self-involved policy for England. He took credit for his savings, not only in the Navy Estimates, but in the Navy Expen- diture ; and declared that as regarded the answers he had given in Parliament as to the Megsera, " the Naval officers who directed the employment of that ship, and whose mouthpiece he [Mr. Baxter], was in the House of Commons," knew well that he Lad nothing whatever to do with the matter,—a doctrine which goes dead against the immemorial principle that subordinates can never be saddled with responsibility by a political chief.