The Press.
London, England, 1856-10-04 00:00:00

938

the House of Commons, or of public opinion.
Has Mr. LAYARD succeeded in producing a
scheme for " Army Improvement"? Or has
Mr. TITS laid even the groundwork for
"Administrative Reform"?
The truth is now visible to all that the Li-
beral party has always worked too much with
men of the hustings and the platform. Its
tone is not of that measured and serviceable
kind which is, after all, more appreciated in
England than tribunitian talents. We are
convinced that the Conservative gentry pos-
sess in a peculiar degree the special qualities
for taking an active part in public atlltirs.
Their tone and measures are more suitable to
a mixed community than the eager and ex-
aggerated vehemence common to noisy do
claimers and mere provincial politicians The
management of extensive properties fits them
for the business of life; their knowledge of
the world is drawn from varied intercourse,
and their natures are not narrowed by constant
calculations of loss and gain.
We may indeed admit that in political acti-
vity, and in zeal for putting themselves for-
ward before the public eye, the Conservative
gentry are not equal to the " Liberals," who
understand tho arts of notoriety, and who
might even give hints to Mr. BARNUM. Good
taste and proud self-respect preserve them
from such vulgarity. But we think that in
some respects the inaction is carried too far,
and we could desire that more zeal and energy
was shown by some of our respected Conserv-
ative representatives. Many amongst them
are recognised as having talents of the highest
order. The Marquis of CHANDOS is univer-
s Illy admitted to be an excellent man of
Lusiness ; in that (as in other respects) being
a worthy representative of the Granvilles.
Sir JOHN PAKINGTON has won great honour by
his practical legislation on various subjects.
Lord STANLEY'S indefatigable industry is
known to the public. It might be invidious
to enumerate all the Conservative Members
whose talents for business admirably fit them
for active Parliamentary life in an age like the
present.
As the Liberal party has so decidedly
f ►iled to produce practical legislators, and as
Vie commercial representatives have lost in
vague and popular confidence, a great oppor-
tunity is now presented to Conservative Mem-
bers. Superior to sordid objects or vulgar
place-hunting, they occupy a distinguished
p -isition before the country, and we earnestly
hope that they will prove how superior they
are in practical ability to the declamatory pro•
fessors of Liberal principles and retrograde
copyists of bygone Cabinets.

MR. STAFFORD AT NORTHAMPTON.
IF there was one thing at least universally
admitted in this world of uncertainty and
contention, we had assuredly thought it was
the difference between a town and country
population. We read of it at school, we dis-
-6 iss it at debating clubs, and we act upon it
in mature life. And yet, because Mr. STAFFORD
has grounded a very innocent and customary
compliment to the farmers upon this convictions
and has quoted M. DE MONTALEMBERT ill sup-
port of his remarks, it is insinuated that he him-
self is,jesting, and that M. DE MONTALEMBERT is a
perverse-minded hypocrite. It is certainly
very unfortunate for those politicians who
have now for so many years been proclaiming
that the commercial interests of England were
paramount to every other, and that the
farmer was but a hewer of wood and drawer of
water to. the merchant, to discover that, after
all, they have not been so right as they
thought ; to find that the two most deen-
thinking political writers on the other side
the Channel, with opportunities of judging far
superior to their own, have come to conclu-
sions hostile to those opinions they have been
so long and so confidently thrusting upon us :
to observe that America, too, announces the
results of her experience to be the same, and
that her Minister has the audacity to assert
in public that the prosperity of the United
States is icUlldod upon agriculture. All this