The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1883-04-17 00:00:00

13nriset Countil exprpos.

DORCHESTER, APRIL 17t,b, 183.

Lord Randolph Churchill is unanubbable, or
he would have been snubbed out of public life
long ago. The party manifesto in favour of Sir
Stafford Northoote's leadership has snuffed out
Lord Randolph's immediate pretensions to be
regarded as an authority in the counsels of Con.
servatism. But he bears it with the greatest
nonchalance and imperturbability. His speech
at the Inter-University Debate at London
University College the other night upon the
County Franchise Bill well displayed the
political cynicism which he mistakes for inde-
pendence. Conservatives, as well as Liberals,
according to him, are insincere with regard
to the County Franchise. Both parties alike
are apathetic on the subject. He believed,
however, that the measure would result in a
numerical benefit to Conservatism. And there is
no reason to doubt that the member for Wood
stock would be quite ready, if he got the chance
of imitating the tactics of Lord Derby and Mr.
Disraeli, in "dishing the Whigs' by the exten-
sion of household suffrages to the counties.

The presentation of Freedom of the City,
sooompanied with • costly gold or silver box, is
another illustration of the gift-loving character
of London City. At the presentation to Lords
Wolseley and Alcester the other day, Mr.
Childers expressed the hope that impending
changes would not deprive the citizens of this
opportunity of expressing their appreciation of
great services. And, certainly, it may be con
ceded ths', upon the whole, the Carporation
have conferred the distinction with discretion
and good taste, though sometimes rather late in
the day. The praises of the Egyptian campaign
have been sung with wearisome iteration.
Whatever a mans stomach may be for adulation,
the two new Lords must be sick of IL But the
City Banquet was well.timed in their interests,
corning salt did just before the more substantial
question of pensions was to come before the
House of Commons. The pension follows almost
as a matter of course after the peerage. But
both pensions and peerages are more easily won
than formerly, and it would give a House of
Commons a more real hold upon the strings of
the public purse if the order were reversed, and
if the pension were voted before the peerages
were conferred.

The supporters of the Mewed Wife's Situ
Bill are more hopeful this year than ever. The
votes in the House of Lords last yew were so
nearly equal that a few voices would turn the
Kale. Two or three of the opponents of the
measure are dead, and the Prince of Wales is
actively canvassing for new supporters of the
Bill about to be Introduced. It is not impro-
bable that the influence of the Royal Family in
this matter may effect the desired change in the
law. It is a good consequence of the excellent
constitutional training of the Prince of Wales
that he knows precisely the kind of Parlismen•
tary topics in which he may safely and
advantageously interfere.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is to have the
unusual honour of a oomplimentary dinner from
his old schoolfellows of Birmingham. The
King Edward's Grammar School there has
trained not a few bishops, and two of the h sad-
masters in succession, Jenne and James Prince
Lee, to the Bench—Jenne to Peterborough and
Lee to Manchester. But Benson $ rise has been
the most rapid and continuous, and now that
he has reached the Primacy it must be said that
he is already displaying those qualities of
prudence and determination to hold his own,
without which a Primate is only a big doll—a
puppet in the hands of ecclesiastical wire-pullers.
In Archbishop Benson'. reply to the zealots who
memorialised him to pronounce against the
Affirmation Bill, the Archbishop showed his
sense. He was not going to be what Mr.
Beresford Hope is—the mere clerical repreeent,
ative, a personage who, like a clerical tailor,
rather exaggerates their costumes, and fattens
himself by feeding their prejudices. Such a
rble may suit Mr. Hope; it is unbecoming the
Primate, and he had the sagacity to see the
snare.