It is obvious that the aim of the Tory party
is to repeat, if possible, the discomfiture of Mr. Gladstone's Government, and to compel a dissolution proceeding from the Liberal side, so that the Tories may fight a battle of pure criticism, and come iu by the failure of their opponents, not by virtue of any policy of their own. Mr. Baillie Cochrane, for instance, took this line in addressing a meeting of the Hampshire Friendly Society at Ryde, Isle of Wight, on Tuesday evening. Indeed his speech was a feeble anticipation of Mr. Disraeli's apology on Thursday evening for declining to form a Government; but Mr. Cochrane concluded by saying that now that the Liberal Government had been once turned out of office, the country ought not to be satisfied till there had been a dissolution, when the very Conservative effect of the Ballot would probably appear. The Conservatives evidently intend to keep a sharp look-out for new combinations with mal- contents on the Liberal side.
