The Right Hon. Stephen Cave's speech on the Ministerial side
at the Dolphin meeting was rather a lively one for Mr. Cave, who is not known to fame as a brilliant speaker. He indulged in caustic sneers at the chaos of Opposition leaders who "jostled together in the most open and undisguised manner ; " he described Mr. Gladstone's present part as depicted by anticipation 150 years ago in Pope's " Dunciad,"—
" Though long my party built on me their hopes For writing pamphlets and for roasting Popes ;" and he painted Lord Hartington as very loth to go the lengths of many of his followers ; indeed, he recommended him to take warning by the legend of the old monk of St. Dunstan's, who learnt the charm which compelled a broomstick to bring him beer, but not the charm to make it stop when he had had enough, and who thus became the victim of his own ingenuity. He described the Fugitive-Slave Circular as an unquestionable blunder, "but a blunder so palpable, that no one can imagine it was anything but a blunder ;" and thought the Liberals quite right to make the most of it, as success in politics, like war, means the art of making fewer blunders than your opponents. The speech was a good brassy party speech, of a type common enough indeed, but even more essential for the purpose of keeping up the organisation of party, than either brass bands, or what the French call the " Breteesh hooray."
