The Press.
London, England, 1857-10-03 00:00:00

MR. OSBORNE'S LAST SPLASH.

WHEN a water-dog has been kept for a month
without diving or fetching, it is most amusing
to witness his joyful alacrity in plunging into
a pond, after being unmuzzled. In he goes
with a souse, and out he bounds, splashing
over all his friends, without any regard to sex,
age, or station, or the least respect for silken
petticoats, or white continuations. Mr.
OSBORNE'S great splash at Dover exhibited
similar rude delight. Tied up for a long time,
at last the silent Secretary, whose bark has
been so rare of late, got an opportunity of
jumping into a subject, and he certainly (lid
contrive to spatter the Cabinet in a style that
Sancho or Tray could never have surpassed.
It was really a very laughable and perfectly
characteristic exhibition. It is so long since
Mr. It. OSBORNE has performed on the public
stage, that we shall dwell on this mirth-
creating actor's reappearance.
His long speech at Dover had all the point-
less attempts at wit which invariably dis-
tinguish his elaborate performances. It had
industrious jocoseness, some habitual slang,
a few laughable attempts to soar, and not a
few ponderous sinkings. The farmyard bird
attempting an aquiline flight is not more absurd
than Mr. OSBORNE in aspiring to carry the
laurels of an orator. his physical vivacity is
no substitute for airy grace, and when he
affects the light tone of a political wit he
always reminds us of a strolling player stamp-
ing through the part of Lord Foppington in a
barn. Mr. OSBORNE'S light comedy is superla-
tive in its heaviness. He wants the feathery
touch of a graceful comedian ; he thumps where
he should tickle, and he scolds where he
should merely sneer. Rollicking in his mirth,
he always rants in his affected heroics, and
even when he has been well primed he is sure
to go off at half-cock.
There is a capital character in one of CON-
on,EvE's comedies, called Witwould, placed in
artistic contrast with Truewit. In Witwould
the brilliant dramatist gave the exact anatomy
of a smart pretender. His fussy vivacity, his
" breaky " style, his desperate attempts after
point, his false congruity and inexact analo-
gies, his mere mannerism of wit, while pos-
sessing no genuine imagination, are all ex-
quisitely drawn in a style that never has been
excelled. The Secretary to the Admiralty is the
Witwould of the Liberal party. He laboriously
toils in vain to be accepted as a Sheridan, or
Tierney, or Sheil. His attempts are obvious ;
his successes are not visible. He can at times,
to the utter disregard of Parliamentary man-
ners, screw himself up into a sort of small
browbeater, but his malevolence is too mala-
droit to do mischief except to his friends. His
feeble virus is suffocated under his load of
verbosity, and his concocted poisons exhale
harmlessly in ephemeral flatulence. ‘Ve recol-
lect having seen once "Joe Miller's Cookery
Book," and amongst other things it contained
a recipe for " Sawdust Pudding." The basis
of the condiment was sawdust, and certain
quantities of lemon, cloves, sugar, allspice, and
nutmegs were to be added, not forgetting a
mug of yeast. A schoolboy, home for the
holidays, made up a pudding accordingly, and
administered it to a Yorkshire rustic, anile
in sex and years, but far sharper than the pre-
sent Secretary to the Admiralty pretends to
be. " Dang it, measter," was the venerable
dames criticism ; " this here pudding is dB
" splutter and flash. They spoiled the yeast."
We always think of sawdust pudding after one
of Mr. OSBORNE'S speeches. Their yeast—or
vivacity—goes for nought. The speaker wants
imagination, deep thought, and high intellect.
He has a large stock of small cleverness, but
its pattern is extremely coarse ; and we never
saw a machine invented for turning gingham
into satin, though Mr. OSBORNE tries to do it.
Nothing differs more from a diamond than its
paste counterfeit. The poignant wit of SHE m-
DAN, or the caustic common sense of TIEhNEV,
are reproduced, only in a Witwoulds bur-
lesque, when Mr. OSBORNE opens his jaws.

955

Even if Mr. OSBORNE were either a wit or
an orator, his fatal indiscretions of tongue
would ruin him as a candidate for high official
employment. He scarcely ever makes a speech
without committing either himself or his
friends. Imagine the rich absurdity of Mr.
OSBORNE saying, " I have not the honour of
" possessing a seat in the Cabinet ; I ant not
" highly connected enough for that.' Indeed !
We recollect the late Mr. BERNAL, father of the
Secretary to the Admiralty. He was an amiable
and most accomplished gentleman, and a
virtuoso of no ordinary kind. He was the
intimate friend, if we mistake not, of the present
Premier, and he was for thirty years Member
for Rochester. Mr. Osnoas has married an

Irish heiress, the last representative of a
family cf considerable distinction in Ireland,
and honourably known in the annals of the
Irish Parliament. Mr. OsuonsE himself has
been for seventeen years in Parliament, and
what an account he gives of himself when he
says that he " is pot highly connected enough
" for a seat in the Cabinet " into which Mr.
SMITH and Mr. BAINES have been received !
Oh, Mr. OseoRNE, when will you come to years
of discretion ? Observe, also, the hint to Sir
COR:IEWALL LEWIS, Sir CHARLES WOOD, and
others, that it is because they are " highly
connected " that they have seats in the Cabinet !
He had the indiscretion, also, to rake up Lord
DERBY'S speech about " the appendages " to
Lord PALMERSTON ; and, carefully avoiding all
allusions to a New Reform Bill, this subor-
dinate of a Whig Cabinet actually panegyrised
Lord ABERDEEN as "a true and honest Re-
" }Omer, who has, I believe, been much mis-
" understood." That was a bright ,not, a
genuine good thing, and all the wittier as it
was not intended. Well might the speaker
say that " his colleagues would probably
" doubt whether he had spoken with too much
" reserve."

Mr. OSBORNE has exchanged Middlesex, and
there is an old English proverb about sending
a certain bird to Dover,—

And the same he will come over.

The Secretary to the Admiralty has not be-
come a swan after his trip to Dover. We
were, ourselves, recently visiting the Cinque
Ports, and we were shown the Margate Pump,
" a model," says the guide-book, "of the
" celebrated lantern of DEMOSTHENES at
" Athens." After the spouting of Mr
OSBORNE, WO think not of DEMOSTHENES, nor
attic salt, but of the brackish effusions of the
Margate Pump.