The Press.
London, England, 1853-09-10 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

THE CABINET CARD PARTY.
I private oparhnent at the Foreign Cifflea. The four Ministers who asseralskd eto
hastily to settle the Turkish question,for the eleventh and last time of settlement
seta discovered, playing al cards, and waiting for despatches.
Lord AsURDZIN : Shuffle, Clarendon.
Lord CLARENDON : You are always making me shuffle. (Cards
dealt.) It's Pahnerston's lead.
Lord PAuficarcroa (aside) : I wish it was. (Plays.) There, my
Lords, like the princess in the story, I am perpetually dropping
diamonds. (Billy.) By the way, Aberdeen, they are very fond of
diamonds in Russia, if you happen to know such a place.
Lord ABERDEEN (sulkily): The muckle dell tak Roosha, and all her
concerns. (Plays.)
Lord JOHN Resam : Don't, don't ! That's a very wicked way of
talking. (Plays.) I've followed your lead, Palmerston. (Lord Claren-
don plays.)
Lord PALMERSTON : And won the trick. It's a way people have
who do as I bid them. If somebody I know had trumped Menschikotf's
ultimatum with Dundas's broadside, as I advised, we four should not
be sitting in a back office the first week in September, instead of
shooting partridges. However, we won't talk of that, or the Premier
will get revoking, to the great damage of Clarendon's peace of mind.
Lord ABERDEEN : I wish ye'd just play. Dinna talk so, man.
lord PAtmeawros : While I'm talking I'm playing, as has been
found out once or twice iu the House and elsewhere, my dear Aberdeen.
Nobody wastes fewer words than her MAjesty's present Home Secre
tary, but holding your tongue is not always the best proof of wisdom.
Lord Ct.mumooN : Very good prima fade evidence of it, though, if
you have nothing to say.
Lord PALMERSTON : Experto crede. I may, Aberdeen, I have
presentiment that despatches of a particularly disagreeable character
are on their way. It's your play.
Lord ABERDEEN : They canna weer be more disagreeable than your
interlocutions, my Lord Palmerston.
Lord PALMERSTON : Don't put yourself out. There now, see,
you've lost the trick, with the best card in your hand—a manifest
judgment upon you for your ill temper. You never see me put out.
Lord ABERDEEN (spitefully) : Not since Christmas twelvemonth.
Lord PALMERSTON (laughing): Very good—very good indeed. Who
says the old gentleman's memory is failing? Christmas had a
February after it, too—hadn't it, Russell?
Lord JOHN ItUBSELL : Never mind. You played the deuce?
Lord PALMERSTON : I did, though I ought not to say so. That's
lost. John, you are a very steady player, and stick to the rules, but
you have no dash in you. I have some notion that you think you play
constitutionally, and as Lord Somers would have done in a similar
emergency ; but your long-whist ideas won't do.
Lord Jonx RussEtt. (lfended): If I lose, I have at least the con-
solation of knowing that I have adhered to those maxims which
have tended
Lord PALMERSTON : I know. All right. That's ours. Do you
know, Aberdeen, that I think it would be an excellent plan to send
Clarendon to St. Petersburg, to see what ho can do in this matter?
Cobden would give him a note to the Emperor, I dare say. It would
look as if we were in earnest when we send ono of the cleverest men
in England to negotiate.
Lord CLARENDHN (muck pleased): Oh, I'm guru I--(fn the excess
of kis eon.limion and gratification revokes.)
Lord AsEsnxxx (grimly) : Are ye clean daft' Havn't ye a club ?
And air ye sic an eediot as not to see what ho means ? Wha's to do
your wark while ye're gaun. Is the linen of the Foreign Office to be
given to the hizzies of the Home Office to wash—ye born natural?
Lord PALMERSTON (carelessly): Oh! as to that—any little matter
that the clerks did not see their way in, I would put right with the
greatest pleasure. Don't study my interest.
Lord ABERDEEN : 'Deed I shan't. Wo understand. But the
climate o Roosha wadna agree with Clarendon—he's na that strong.
Lord PALMsiterroN : Well—l don't know. He was sent to pester
the Spaniards, being of the Boring Don family, and you know—
" With the addition of a light pelisse,
Madrid's and Mosoow's chines are of a piece."
Lord JOHN Resszu.: There is this objection to parting with
Clarendon. I should be expected to go back to the Foreign Office,
and this lam not anxious to do. I speak French very well, and with
a very pure accent, but I cannot understand what is said to me in
reply, which rather impedes discussion.
Lord PALMERSTON: My dear Russell, it would be impossible to
spare you from the work which you discharge soi admirably. Ah! you
took that trick from them very cleverly—very neat finesse, indeed.
No—but I think an arrangement might be made. If Aberdeen does
not go out at once, he must go before Parliament meets, of course.

Lord MAMMIES: I just see na " of course " in the matter.
Lord PALMERSTON: Yes, my dear fellow, you must go.
Lord Jolts Russutt: Why, yes, he must go, that's certain.
Lord CLARENDON: Certainly, he must go ; no help for it.
Lord PALMERSTON: Well, then,—supposing—l merely put it hypo-
thetically—that Aberdeen goes to—to—to bed, we'll say, and Clarendon
to Russia,—l should be very happy to hand my work over to anybody
—George Grey, if he is well enough ; or your brother, Clarendon,
what would he say to it? or Bright, if you like. Well, then give
Benjamin Hall his peerage (Lord Badger, isn't it?), and let him be
Clarendon's nominal successor—he's quite competent to fold and en-
dorse letters.

q X

t... 1

Lord JOHN RUSSELL: And the real work to be done by —?
Lord PALMERSTON : Myself, of course, as—a—a—Premier. (Rus-
sell, I'm leading up to the Queen.) For, to that it must come, unless
you are determined to smash the Coalition.
Lord ABERDEEN (dashes down his cards, having just assured himself
that if he goes on he loses the rub): But I'll hear of na sic a thing, and
I'll see the hale Meenistry at the de'il before I'll consent.
Lord PALMERSTON: Very well, my dear fellow, very well. It isn't
worth being in a rage about. If we don't settle it, the country will
settle it for us, and I, for one, can quite afford to wait. Take up your
cards—l thought you never showed your hand if you could help it.
Lord ABERDEEN (petulantly): No, I'll not play. I dinna like to be
fashed with impairtinencies. (Leaves the table.)
Lord PALMERSTON : Just as you like. Russell and Clarendon, let's
go the odd man.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL: Thank you, I'm the odd man of the Cabinet
already. Let's play fright. (He takes up the cards, when a knock is heard.
Messenger enters, with despatches from Russia, and the fright becomes
earnest.)

THE MINISTERIAL FOUR.
They meet—a partie carrie—
But none of them will swear
They meet with an intention
Of playing " on the square."

A CLASSICAL INTERPRETATION.
THE present Foreign Secretary, and the three ex Secs., at their
pleasant little junta a quatre, on the "modification question," drew
up t. draft minute to which they attached their initials. Lord PAL•
mEas•roN signed last, and the signatures then stood thus—A. C. J. R. P.
The " Civis Burnam's," not forgetting his classical powers of adaptation,
was heard to observe that these initials were as symbolical as S.P.Q.R.,
for the interpretation of the collective signature was "Abest Consilium
Inde Regnuns Periet."