It is announced that Lord. Derby has invited Lord Hartington
to stay at Knowsley, on the occasion of his political visit to Lancashire, at the end of next week. This invitation is under- stood to mean that Lord Derby now identifies himself with
Lord Hartington's political party, and lends it the full weight of his authority. And no doubt such an accession
to the Liberal party is an event. The Sta,nleys have always vibrated, to some extent, between the great parties in the State, and the transition of one of them from one party to the other usually indicates a certain turn in the tide of public opinion. The present Lord Derby, indeed, has always been a genuinely Liberal Conservative, so that his transforma- tion into a probably Conservative kind of Liberal is not great. At the same time, it is most important, not only on account of his rank, authority, and influence, but because his singularly Sober and lucid mind always moves cautiously, and always in the direction of what he believes to be the stable conviction of thinking men. Lancashire, we may hope, in spite of Mr. Cross, is now lost to the Tory Democrats.
