Sir John Lubbock also made a remarkable speech at the
same meeting of the Bromley Liberal Association, of which he has accepted the office of president for the ensuing year. He remarked that Lord Salisbury and the Con- servatives, in their horror of " pulpit eloquence," had emulated Billingsgate, 'whose style of oratory was even less fit for the public service, as well as less edifying, than that of the pulpit. He contrasted Lord Salisbury's fierce denun- ciations of the Irish Land Act with the strong support of it by the Conservative candidate for Derry, who had publicly advo- cated its further extension, and he asked if it were quite decent for vehement partisans of Lord Salisbury to come forward with such unqualified repudiation of his most emphatic declarations. He criticised severely the lavish expenditure of the Conserva- tive Government, and remarked that Sir Stafford Northcote, in spite of his professed desire to diminish the National Debt, had only reduced it by 22,000,000—from £776,000,000 to £774,000,000—and he urged the great importance of husbanding the resources of a great country in time of prosperity. A long purse was as useful as a large army. Indeed, a long purse would sometimes make the difference between ruin and positive gain, as in the case of the richest of the shareholders in the City of Glasgow Bank, who, while their poorer associates were ruined, had paid all the calls, and now were said to own assets which had suddenly so risen in value as to secure them a large profit, after recouping them for their losses. He strongly opposed any concession to the cry for a repeal of the Union with Ireland, and concluded a very able address by discharging another mitrailleuse into the already well-riddled fallacies of Fair-trade.
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