Mr. Goschen described Lord Beaconsfield's foreign policy as catering to
the deep-seated Cravings of our national vanity. The Government told the 'nation that the "voice of England had spoken," and the nation was so pleased to know that the voice of England had spoken, that they did not wait to ask what the voice of England had said. The country had been kept on a total-abstinence diet as regarded its vanity, and like the crew of a total-abstinence vessel at the first port it touched, they rushed to the nearest drinking-shop, and got drunk on the adulterated tap of Jingo alcohol. The Govern- ment gloried in the result, but they did not glory in it every- where. They kept their bluster for the House of Lords, and kept their blarney for the House of Commons. In the Lords, the Marquis of Salisbury donned the plumed helmet; while in the Commons, Sir Stafford Northcote put on the Quaker's hat. The policy of the Government had been a policy of sensation for the masses, dressed up in different fashions for different audiences much as occasion required.
