Mr. W. H. Smith, at the meeting of the House
of Commons on Wednesday, referred with great emotion to the death of Mr. Bright, and asked the House to delay the expression of its feeling on the subject till yesterday, when Mr. Gladstone, who was then on his way back from his elder brother's funeral, could be present, a course in which Mr. John Morley cordially concurred, not without recognising the good feeling of Mr. W. H. Smith's suggestion. We were compelled to go to press before we could see any report of Mr. Gladstone's speech yesterday, and must therefore reserve our notice of it till next week ; but in the House of Lords on Thursday, Lord Salisbury paid a most impressive tribute to the great qualities of Mr. Bright, of whom he said that " he was the greatest master of English oratory that this generation,—I may perhaps say, several generations,—has produced. I have met men who have heard Pitt and Fox, and in whose judgment their eloquence at its best was inferior to the finest efforts of John Bright. At a time when much speaking has depressed, has almost exterminated eloquence, he maintained that robust, powerful, and vigorous style, in which he gave fitting expression to the burning and noble thoughts he desired to utter." Lord Salisbury has described in that sentence Mr. Bright's special power with something of Mr. Bright's own terse and dignified eloquence.
