The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Michael Hicks- Beach) delivered
a speech at Richmond, in Yorkshire, on Tuesday, in which he made several important disclosures. In the first place he said, with relation to the Venezuela dispute with the United States, what, coming from the finance Minister, was of great importance, that "he was not only hopeful, but sanguine, that the clouds which had been hanging about would soon blow away, and the blue sky would appear again." Farther, he believed "there was good reason to expect a friendly arrangement of the matter." He also said that, heavy as were the Naval Estimates of last spring, those of the coming spring would be heavier. Ht spoke with great respect of the conduct of the Opposition in relation to foreign affairs, and indicated that as regards domestic questions, the Government would endeavour to arrive at sober solutions of the problems on which the Opposition were pledged to a different view from that of the Cabinet, and not to brandish their majority, but so far as possible to meet their opponents' wishes. On the subject of the proposal for a general international Arbitration Court, he spoke with great good sense and lucidity ; but with that question we have dealt sufficiently in another column. On the whole, the speech was a good speech, though certainly in its confident tone as to the growing power of England, he was, what the Westminster Gazette would call, much more " pushf al " than Mr. Chamberlain himself has ever been.
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