The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1887-11-19 00:00:00

POLITICS OF THE RECESS.

MR. MORLEY AT EDINBURGH.

Mr. John Morley spoke at a meeting in Edinburgh
on Monday night, in support of Mr. lauchanan, who
is seeking re•election upon seceding from the Unionist
party. He accused Lord Hartington of having
changed his poßition, by first assenting tc satisfy the
patriotic Irishman by giving him a Legislative
Assembly subject to safeguards, and then desiring
him to drop his national aspirations. Alluding to
Mr. Bright's letter and to the expected Government
measure for buying out the Irish landlords, he said
he believed the country had not yet mastered the
Irish Land question, and he concluded by expressing
the shame he felt at the degradation cast upon Mr.
O'Brien by treating him as a felon.

THE COLSTON BANQUETS.

SPEECHES OP SIR M. DiCKS-BEACII AND MR. FOWLER.

The usual Colston Banquets took place at Bristol
on Monday night. At the Conservative gathering Sir
M. Hicks-Beach was the principal speaker, and in
replying on behalf of the House of Commons he
pointed with pleasure to the perseverance and cohesion
of the Unionist party during last session, and spoke of
the ability which Mr. Balfour had shown in the most
arduous and disagreeable office in the whole Govern-
ment. He warned those Liberals who were supportiP)g
Nationalist lawlessness that every argument they now
used might be turned against them by the Ulster
Loyalists should their Home Rule policy triumph as
they predict. He warned the people against being
deceived by the manner in which the Home Rule ques-
tion was now being presented, and whilst urging that
the first duty of the Government was to main-
tain the supremacy of the law, he hoped they would
exercise great caution in proceeding with any such
far-reaching scheme of laud purchase as that with
which they had been credited.
Mr. H. H. Fowler was the principal pie- t at the
Liberal banquet. He said the Liberal party, true to
its traditions, was bound to do what it could to end
the miserable strife about Ireland. It was impossible
to coerce an entire nation; and the English people were
rapidly coming to see that the only way to settte the
difficulty was by giving Ireland the fullest power of
self-government that wa s compatible with the unity
and security of the Empire.

MR. GOSCHEN AT MANCHESTER.
Mr. Goschen addressed a large meeting of Unionists
in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, on Tuesday
evening, upon the Irish question. He said the
vital interests of national prosperity were in-
volved in the present struggle, The impulse
given to anarchy in Ireland bad now reached
these shores. If the Government were not to
issue victorious from the struggle a blow would
be struck at the credit, the character, and the
confidence which were the indispensable condi-
tions of prosperity. What the leaders of the
Trafalgar-square riot on Sunday wanted was the
right of intimidation; and they preferred the square
to Hyde-park, not to persuade, but to alarm. There
were great arrears of legislation for England and
Scotland; and Ireland must no longer be allowed to
block the way. The struggle against obstruction
would require great patience and tenacity ; but their
motto must be that they would yield neither to crime
nor to time.

SIR C. RUSSELL ON TRAFALGAR SQUARE.
Sir Charles Russell, speaking at a meeting of the
Ifomerton Liberal Association on Tuesday night, said
the meeting in Trafalgar-square on Sunday was
announced for a perfectly proper object, and it was
perfectly within the right of those who wished to pro-
mote that object, which was to express in constitu-
tional and proper, although strong, language con-
demnation of the policy of the Governutent. But
the lagal right of the people to meet in frafalgar-
square was doubtful. Therefore it bad been rash in
the extreme to resort to violence, because. as the
working-men of the London clubs had been advised,
the legality of the matter would be tested in a court
of law.

MR. STUART-WORTLEY ON THE RIOTS.
Mr. Stuart-Wortley, M.P., speaking in Chelsea on
Tuesday night, said the permission to we Trafalgar-
spuare for meetings had been withdrawn very re-
luctantly, owing to its having been abused. Nothing
could justify the appeal to force which had led to the
scenes of Sunday last. He believed the closing of the
square, and the means taken to enfore it, were ap-
proved, and that the continuance of the prohibition
was desired by the vast majority of the inhabitants
of the metropolis.

•
MUNDELLA AT LOWESTOFT.
Speaking at Lowestoft on Tuesday evening, Mr.
Mandel's, M.P., advocated the whole administration
of the fisheries department being placed under one
head, and as to railway rates he believed that their
reduction would prove a benefit to the railway pro-
prietors, in addition to being a great advantage to the
consumer generally, No question since the American
war had excited so much bitterness among politicians
as that of Ireland. The American contiuent wa3 lost
to England because the Liberals were divided by the
Court Whigs leaving the true party, and the Liberal
Unionists of to-day were doing work similar to that of
those Court Whigs.

THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL AT BEDFORD.
The Poctmaster-General, speaking at Bedford on
Tuesday night, threw all the responsibility for the
Trafalgar-square riots upon the incendiary speakers
and crazy agitators. He ascribed Mr. O'Brien'a crying
out against the prison regulations to a want of manli-
ness. He also referred to the savings effected in his
department and to the advantages which benefit
societies would derive from the Savi—gs Bank Act he
gassed lest session.

SIR J. GORST AT CHATHAM.
Sir John Gorst, in his annual address to his con-
stituents at Chatham on Tuesday right, spoke in face
of persistent opposition arising out of the dockyard
discharges. He was also interrupted when he said
that the disorders in London were but the result of
the encouragement of disorder in Ireland. A vote of
confidence, though passed, was strongly opposed.

SIR M. HICKS BEACH ON OFFICIAL LIFE,
Sir Michael Hicks Beach, addressing a private meet-
ing of the Committee of West Bristol on Tuesday,
said the issue before the country was still the main-
tenance of the unity of the United Kingdom, It was
a pity to note the effect the alliance between Glad-
stonians and Home Rulers bad upon the former,
as it had brought them down to the level of active
sympathy with the elements of anarchy and
disorder. He was glad to note, however, that
Mr. Gladstone, in language uncommonly plain,
judged by the ambiguity of his recent utterances,
had condemned the scene witnessed in Trafalgar.
square on Sunday last as incompatible with the public
weal. Mentioning that he was no longer a member
of her Majesty's Government, Sir Michael said the
newspapers had been good enough to invent for him-
self a dozen different offices, but so far as he knew
there was absolutely no foundation for any of these
statements. Although his political vision was per-
fectly clear, yet it was only right that he should say
that his physical vision was far from being strong,
and be should not feel justified in attempting to
undertake the amount of reading which was abso-
lutely necessary for anyone who had to fulfil properly
the duties of the more arduous departments of the
Government. He was not anxious to return to
official life, and was perfectly happy to remain as an
independent member of Parliament.

TUE MURDER OP A VICAR.

At the Norwich Assizes on Tuesday, before Mr.
justice Field, Arthur Edward Gilbert Cooper, 34,
clerk in holy orders, was indicted for the murder of
the Rev. William Meymott Farley, Vicar of Creting-
batn, on October 2. Before the prisoner was arraigned
Mr. Murphy, Q.C., for the defence, applied that a
jury should be empanelled to try whether the prisoner
was fit to plead. This having been done, and the jury
having found that the pOoner was capable of plead-
ing, the trial proceeded. The prisoner pleaded "Not
guilty wilfully." Evideme as to the circumstances
attending the murder was given, after which witnesses
were called as to the state of the prisoner's mind. The
defence was that there was hereditary inBsnit3 in the
prisoner's family, and that in India he sustained a
sunstroke, which was followed by acute sun fever, and
that after his return from India, in 1878, he was con-
fined in two private lunatic asylums, from which he
went to St. Luke's Hospital, where he remained till
1882. During his confinement he showed homicidal
mania, and once tried to cut a fellow-patient's throat.
The jury found that the prisoner was insane at the
time he committed the act, and he was ordered to be
detained during her Majesty's pleasure.