Sir William Harcourt made an attack on the Liberal Unionists
in his speech at Reading on Wednesday, of which the most remarkable feature was perhaps the following assertion :—"The party was dwindling down to its true proportions, and it was nothing but a petty cabal, animated chiefly by hostility to Mr. Gladstone." A man who would say that of a party of which Lord Hartington is the head ; which includes Sir Henry James one of the most loyal, and eloquently loyal, of Mr. Gladstone's followers, as its chief lawyer in the Commons ; Lord Selborne, the ex-Chancellor, as its chief lawyer in the Lords ; which owes its main intellectual strength to writers like Professor Dicey ; and whose chief supporters in the Press have been Mr. Gladstone's most cordial and enthusiastic personal adherents, would say anything, however absurdly false, to get a cheer, The real truth is, we believe, that even though Mr. Chamberlain cannot be accounted a personal adherent of Mr. Gladstone's, the Liberal Unionists, as a party, are taken from Mr. Gladstone's heartiest friends, and would have preferred to oppose any com- bination of leaders rather than to oppose him. But Sir William Harcourt has so accustomed himself to joke, that he is probably not to be taken seriously, even when a joke is imperceptible.
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