Sir Wilfrid Lawson, speaking last week at the dinner of
the Camberlazd and Westmoreland Agricultural Society, said it was easy to keep off party politics just now, because there really were no strict party questions on which the House of Common felt strongly. It was the practice, he said, in summoning Liberals to a division, to "earnestly request" the members' attendance, even if it were very doubtful whether the business would or would not come on,—" If there was one dash under the word earnestly,' it meant you ought to come. If there were two, it meant you should come. If there were three, it meant you must come. If there were four, it meant come, or stay away at your peril'" But last Session there had been no summonses with four dashes, and only one with three,—on Mr. Clare Sewell Read's motion, on which, as it turned out, the lewder of Opposition, and the leader of the Home, and Mr. Read himself, dwelt together in such complete unity that it was a good and joyful thing to see it. All this is true, no doubt, but it hardly shows that it is easy just now to keep out of political controversy. The strict party issues are few, but the issues which are not strictly party issues are very bitter. We doubt if even those party divisions the summonses to which are adorned with four dashes under earnestly," are half as earnestly discussed and passionately eared about as that Russo-Turkish war to which all political discussions now seem to lead.
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