Lord Hartington made much the best speech which he has
as yet delivered in this election campaign at Darwen last Satur- day. He declared that all Liberals ought to be bound by Mr. Gladstone's programme, and ought not to be compelled to go beyond it. He was not going to raise a howl about the word "expropriation." He would consider the arguments to be brought for expropriating an owner, where the public good was at stake, as cheerfully in relation to the Land Question or the Allotment Question as he would in relation to any other great public question ; but he would not commit himself beforehand to a great extension of the area in which " expropriation " is to be sanctioned by the State without sifting carefully all the arguments in favour of it, and all the arguments against it. For that purpose,—the purpose of carefully discussing these argu- ments,--he declared emphatically that all sections of Liberals should combine, and that Mr. Goschen would be as useful for examining them from one point of view as Mr. Chamberlain would be for considering them from another. "You want the authority of Mr. Gladstone. You want all the energy, all the quick sympathy with the wants and wishes of the people, of Mr. Chamberlain. You want the industry, the grasp of detail, possessed by Sir Charles Dilke. And also, I will venture to add, you want the co-operation, the knowledge of political economy, and the sound critical ability, of Mr. Goschen."
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