Sensible people are soapy with all this folly, that Mr.
Cross, though horribly afraid of the Sabbatarians, whose influence he- exaggerates as an infidel exaggerates the influence of a Catho- lic priest, has been badgered into a promise to provide a remedy. It is a very weak one. The Home Secretary is to be invested by statute with the power to remit the penalties under the Act, a power which is quite useless for the future, as he cannot pledge himself for all time to. the directors of the Aquarium to help them to break the law. That would be a revival of the Dispensing Power in a new form, aggravated by suspicions of favouritism. The law ought to be altered, and would be by a vote of seven to one, if Members had the courage of their convictions; but if Mr. Cross is too timid for this, why not pass an Act forbidding the recovery of penalties, unless the Attorney-General has assented to the prosecution? Or if even that is too much—and we have Scotland to think of—let the municipal authorities alone have the right to prosecute. They, even if they are rigid, will give notice, and not jump upon unsuspecting people to plunder them.
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