The Sun.
London, England, 1864-05-18 00:00:00

regretted having done so, because he believed it was
politically the right course. (Applause.) Never-
theless, he was also conscious that there wore cir-
cumstances connected with the conduct of Sir It.
Peel at that time which threw an aspect, he would
sot say of bad faith, but least of dubious conduct
over a large portion of his p,rty. Of that states-
man he would never speak but with respect, for
he had always shown him signal private kind-
ness ; but he himself would have been the last
man to acknowledge that the disunion of the Con-
servative party during his administration,
although ho considered it necessary for the
good of his country, was unfortunately con-
nected with most painful and disadvantageous
circumstances to that party itself. With reference
to that demonstration made by a portion of the
country on the question of religious liberty —a nes-
t ion which had now almost entirely died away—it
was one on which h 9 was conscientiously obliged by

a large portion of his constituents. At the succeed-
ing election they showed that those circumstances

had operated on their minds, and a large portion of
them withdrew from him that confidence which

they had given him, and he was returned to Par-
liament by a very small majority. Looking back
upon those times, he could only say that he believed
in the conduct he pursued he was in the right; and
he believed many of his constituents wore right in
the conduct which they pursued. lie believed the
position, on the whole, was not one discreditable to
either party; and if he found new friends in the
political turn of things to which he then attached
himself, he, nevertheless, retained the private
friendship even of those whose political confidence
for a time he had lost. (Applause.) Therefore, he

thought he might say the independence the people
of Pontefract had enabled him to exercise had not

been injurious either to the borough or to hie own
character. (Hear.) He thought it was an advantage
in the mixed system of society in which we lived

that there should be smaller constituencies, which
enabled a man of his temperament and habits to take

that part in public life which otherwise he might
not do. They would see by the contemplation of
foreign countries that it was the great object to get
as many persons of independent thought and inde-
pendent means as they could to interest themselves
in politics. It did not matter whether they were
country gentlemen, or manufacturers, or whatever
course of life or position in society they belonged
to; but it would be a very disadvantageous thing
if there were no means in the Constitution by

which such persons should take an interest in poli

tical life. It was seen that among us there was

growing strongly this tendency. Country gentle-
men were not now so willing as they were 50 or

100 years ago to come forward and seek to become

members of Parliament. In the large towns com

mercial men, who were engaged in active business,
and making a good deal of money, thought twice,
and very often abandoned the thought altogether,
before they gave up their profitable occupations
and business for the honour of a seat in the House
of Commons, where at least they could make no
money, Eind very often lost any reputation they had
got. (Laughter.) Country gentlemen, who were
accustomed to be treated with some deference by
the people around them, shrank from going into an
assembly in which when they got up to speak some
very rough member immediately called out " Oh,
oh!' and where if he attempted any kind of joke,
which would be all very well in his own house, he
would very probably be coughed at and even hooted
down. (Laughter.) Therefore it would be seen
that small constituencies had political uses, and
though he called himself in the strongest sense a
Liberal statesman, nevertheless he bad always felt
that the existence of Euch boroughs Was not only
not injurious to the working of the Constitution,
but most beneficial to it, and most useful to our
social welfare. (Hear, hear.) He looked back to
the time when ho first addressed them in that hall,
and he could not but be conscious, as all would be
conscious, that in that more than a quarter of a
century many serious events had happened. We
had come to think that after the great Peace of
1815 Europe et last had got into a condition of
comparative repose, and that there were going to
be very
few changes either in the arrangement of
States or in the condition of society. That hope or
expectation \.7as very much dispersed by the French
Revolution of la", and by the subsequent agita-
tation in England whi.:ll produced the Reform Bills
of 1.931 and 182. When I.': came into Parliament
-Qt eacended the
in 18,-37 a young Queen had ja.
only
throne—a bright, lively, and intelligen:
made serious by the sense of the duties and rt.-41)°11,
sibllies of her peculiar position. That lively gir.

was now a desolate widow, who passed only on
Saturday on her way from the tumult of London to
the retirement of Scotland, and on whom the great
calamity she had suffered weighed so heavily that
she was utterly unable to throw it off sufficiently to
resume the position in which she formerly showed
herself so continually to the frequent delight of the
people. (Applause.) We could only hope that
those consolations which the high nature, the piety,
and the virtuous character of our Sovereign so fully
deserved might, in the course of time, be pcure,i
upon her, so that she might remember the calamity
she had undergone was ore of those solemn dispen-
sations of life to which all are subject—which are
common to the throne and to the cottage, and which
demand that resignation before the will of Almighty
God which is equally due from the highest and the
lowest of mankind. (Applause.) In looking back
to that distance it was impossible for him not to
remember the many forms of intelligence, youth,
power, and strength with which he was familiar in
his early days in Parliament, but which in the course
of that time, though that of his own contemporaries,
had passed away from among them, though not en-
tirely from their memory ; he could not forget that
the men whom he should have expected to meet in
the House of Lords, to which the favour of her Ma-
jesty had called him, would have been Lord Herbert,
Lord Canning, Lord Dalhousie, Lord Elgin—men
who had fallen in the service of their country as truly
as if they had been shot down by the enemy's cannon
in the battlefield. (Applause.) He also could not
forget the name of one who was suffering at that mo-
ment under what he feared must be a mortal malady,
the Lord-Lieutenant of the neighbouring county
of Nottingham, the Duke of Newcastle, a nobleman
to whose good sense and judgment this country had
looked forward as likely to produce a great states-
man in future times, when those old ones we now
had should have passed away. Of course there were
brighter sides to this picture. There was a bright
side to his old friend Lord Palmerston—who
when he entered public life was past the maturity
of ordinary years, and who in his bright and intel-
ligent old age governed this country with signal
prudence and good sense, holding the balance be-
tween contending parties, acting fairly and justly
by each, doing his duty to the past recollections of
our Constitution and the future hopes of the nation.
(Applause.) Now, so much for the past. A word
for the future, In those times to which he had
alluded we had undergone important commercial
changes, and it was a peculiarity of this country
that, although changes of that kind might be un-
willingly received at first, yet, nevertheless, in a
short time even those persons who suffered from the
change felt that there was a certain necessity for
them, and would hardly wish to return to the former
position. Such had been the case with regard to
the great question of the repeal of the corn laws.
It was perfectly true that the anticipation of Sir R.
Peel, when he said he believed the average price of
wheat would be 565. per quarter, had come very
short, indeed, of the facts of the case. (A laugh.)
They all knew that as farmers, and still he did not
bteo f
American last
La yearnc a
Lancashire
when believe there was a man among them who would
have wished that the old system had been in
vogue
ireeal a
were
el i all
ye : the
and
throwngr ea
weret out
unableofwork
commercial
classes
y hto
earn their bread by the ordinary means. He
Lid not suppose there was one of them who
wo aid think it would have been safe for ono
of wise Lancashire artisans to be able to say,
o you ilut an artificial price on the bread we are con-
sfaurnomdmi dnr:gga
ga;tilavgere are class interests which prevent us
k ing the most of the little pittance we have,
on life under these sad circumstances
as well as we might do." He did not think there
was any one of the strongest supporters of the old
corn laws who could say society would have been
saft, if those two thoughts could have come together