The personal controversy between Mr. Cobden and Mr. Delane has
terminated at last without any acknowledgment by the Times of having misrepresented Mr. Cobden's and Mr. Bright's meaning in accusing them of wishing for "spoliation." This is a discreditable ending. Mr. Cobden has lost his temper and the Times has lost respect. Mr. Cobden, owing to his silly practice of not reading the Times, has obviously never known till the very last moment how strong a case he really had against it, and lost his temper for a fractional part of the real provocation. Possibly the editor of the Times was equally unconscious how very strong some of the charges were for which he was inventing an impossible construction ; but he might at least have said go, instead of merely" withdrawing from the personal part of the -controversy," to strike again from behind the veil of the anony- mous.
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