WANTED—A "POPULAR DEMONSTRATION."
"THE Old Man of the Sea," says the figurative Courier, "is still upon our backs. The Reform Act has indeed staggered him, but it has not shaken him off; and the two last general elections have shown us how he has tightened his grasp again." The "Old Man," as the reader has guessed, is Toryism personified ; and the necessity of "shaking him off is enforced by the sensible remark of our contemporary, that " neither our Reform, nor our half Reform, no, nor our infinitesimal prescriptions of Reform, are to be sanctioned by the Old Man that clings to our shoulders." Alas! it is too true. But how are we to get relief from the burden; What stout efforts, what athletic strugglings, do the Whig Ministers recommend ? Let us glai:ce at their list of
nostrums--A complicated Franchise for the Few.
Disfranchisement for the Many. Open Voting with Intimidation. Consolidation of the Irish Church Establi-hment.
Continuation of Slavery. Corn-laws with wheat at 65s. a quarter. Coercion of Canada, with augmented Army Estimates.
An enhanced Civil List.
Patronage of Pensioners. Military Flogging. Supremacy of the Landed interest.
Jobbing everywhere.
Are these the watchwords, the rally-cries, to enable the friends of " Reform" to rise again triumphant over prostrate Toryism ? The indignant journalist calls for " a popular demonstration," to
convince "our enemies that We will be no longer trifled with."
Well—we have seen the Ministerial programme. With it upon then banners, cannot Whigs and Whig-Radicals go forth, conquer-
ing and to conquer? Are the people of this country so stupidly ungrateful as not to rise en masse in favour of the men who are pledged to all that is implied in the catalogue ? But if our suggestion he repudiated, as proceeding from a quarter not over fond of Whigs and Whiggery, listen to the Morning Chronicle, jubilant on the glorious majority of nineteen- " After gaining a victory, the next consideration is how to turn it to the best advantage. We have given the Tories a heavy fall ; and the question is, whether we should not repeat the blow while they are in a position so conve- nient to receive it. Let us hope that their defeat upon the Church question will be followed as speedily as possible by another still ,nore humiliating upon that of Municipal Reform. Since beating is to their taste, we advise Ministers to give them enough of the amusement, and allow them as little pause as possible between the strokes. The Municipal Bill cannot be intro- duced too soon."
Really, " the Municipal Bill" had quite slipped from our me- mory. But the Votes of the session bear some few traces of a thing called " Irish Corporation Reform," about which in former sessions the Whig officials and followers have whined and wriggled. By all means let there be a "popular demonstration" in its favour :
"Dear me, Sirs, 'tin just the thing,"
Only it happens, rather unluckily, that this " Municipal Bill "was introduced on the 5th of December—just six months ago, and read a second time on the 2d of February last. It caused no sort of excitement on either of those occasions, and it is to be feared, would scarcely produce a " demonstration " now, It would boot little to add it to our Whig programme; which, were a general election to take place, would most unquestionably produce a " popular demonstration "—whether for or against the Whigs and Radicals, will appear in due time.
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