The Sun.
London, England, 1870-05-21 00:00:00

PRICE 1(1.
STAMPED 2d.

SKETCHES IN PARLIAMENT.

The Upper House was the centre of attraction on Thurs-

day night. There was a full muster, that is for the peers,
as many as two hundred being present at one time. The
Treasury bench was closely packed. There was Lord
Granville looking as full of sweetness, as though he
were a West Indian planter; Lord Clarendon, who seemed
to be a good deal more interested in the telegram which
was brought into him than in the debate ; Lord de Grey,
alas ! in deep mourning, and probably having a keen inte-
rest in that telegram ; the Duke of Argyll with, his ye,llow
hair—surely the youngest-looking grandfather that ever
carried his years lightly; Lord Kimberley, the type of
a shrewd man of business ; Lord Dufferin, who
has aged wonderfully during the last ten years;
young black-moustached Lord Lansdowne, and other minor
members of the Ministery. Lord Hatherley, spare, not
to say attenuated, of course sat on the woolsack. On the
front opposition bench were the Conservative chiefs, the
Duke of Richmond, the Duke of Marlborough,
Lord Cairns, Lord Derby, and for a short
time, Lord Salisbury. But the sight of sights
was the Bishops' bench—l ought to say benches,
for no fewer than eighteen of their right rev. lordships

overflowed the red morocco seats with their waves of
spotless lawn. I wondered how any layman could venture
to sit among them even for a minute. Xet there was one
who did; who ventured, child of earth as he was, and
clad in sable garments, to sit for a few minutes among
those spiritual looking persona, yea to talk familiarly with
them. The fault is not mine, but his, that he sug-
gested to me the idea of a very black goat among a
flock of milkwhite fleecy sheep. So great is the change
that has befallen the personnel of the episcopate that even
old habitues of the House could not tell me alitheir names.
I recognised the Archbishop of York, who sat for a =dime
on the woolsack chatting to the Chancellor, the Bishops of
London, Winchester, Salisbury, Hereford, Peterhorough,
Ely, and Ripon. Of all the bishops none can compare with
Dr. Wilberforce in activity. He was here, there, and every-
where, as though he were engaged for the evening as
whip. In fact, the only peer who displayed equal loco-
motive powers was Lord Colville, the Conservative
whip, and he was so very peripatetic that until
the Duke of Marlborough declared that the measure
which had brought down so many peers was not a
party question and that not a single peer had been asked
to attend, everybody supposed that there was to be a
stand-up fight between Liberal and Tory. Considering
the nature of the bill—one for the " Abolition of Aunts,"
as some one has humourously called it—there was a won- •
derfully. small attendance of ladies : there were
not a dozen at any time, and the largest party
was under the protection of Mr. Motley, the hirsute
historian ambassador. Nor were there many members of
the Lower House. There may have been a score lounging
or squatting on the steps of the throne. Perhaps the want
of proper accommodation keeps hon. gentleman away.
Mr. Gladstone appeared, but I don't think, he came to
hear the debate. He had a message for his col-
league of the India-Office, the MacCallum-More,
and as soon as he had delivered it, he took his leave. The
Duke of Cambridge was equally brief in his visit. The
Duke of Somerset was more patient, and Lord Shaftes-
bury was most assiduous is the strict etymological sense
of the word.

The debate opened at twenty minutes pastfivewith a speech
from Lord Houghton in favour of the bill for legalising
marriage with a deceased wife's sister. I have never heard
his poetic lordship so earnest before. He spoke for over
40 minutes; and-was sometimes quite excited; so that it
needed the quaffing of a good deal of water to keep him
down to a tolerable temperature. He spoke well, and,
save for some hesitation, eloquently. But he made
a slip. Arguing that the present law was opposed
to the feeling of the people, he said that if it was
not repealed, the people would go en breaking it- -
would continue to violate the laws of God and man. The
Duke of Marlborough, who led the opposition to the bill,
was too quick to let the blunder pass, and he made the
most of it, to the great amusement of their lordships. He
made them laugh also when he urged that inas-
much as a man may obtain a divorce, he
might under this bill marry each of his sisters-in-law in
succession, and that therefore the word " deceased "
might be omitted. Then he quoted the ridi-
culous paragraph from a Chicago paper headed "Justi-
fiable Suicide," in which a man's father marries his son's
wife's daughter, and so becomes his own grand-
father, and gets so bothered about his own
identity that he gets rid of ft. Altogether
though the Duke denounced the agitation
for this bill as purely fictitious, and got up by
a few wealthy men who had broken the law,
• and now asked Parliament to condone their offence, there
was more of persiflage than of grave argument in his
Grace's forty-five minutes' speech. Young Lord
Lansdowne followed, but was not much listened to,
for his delivery is bad, and he is difficult
to hear. Then arose the Bishop of Ely, first of the pre-
lates to enter the fray, and then, of course, we were in
for a regular theological discussion, with all the usual
stock references to Leviticus, Deuteronomy. the
Talmud, St. Basil, and so forth. Lord Kimberley
had little patience with all this " back-along " talk
(to use a Devonianism). He contended that expediency
ought to settle the matter, and that if so there was no
doubt how it would- be settled. The Bishop of Ripon
then arose, a tall, handsome man, in truth a very hand-
some man and, save for the Bishop of Salisbury, far and
away, the most comely occupant of the Bishop's Bench.
He has a strong, clear voice, a rapid and animated de-
livery, never pausing for a word. The manner was better
than the matter ; though as his brother of Ely had been
quoting St. Basil, the Waldenses, and the rest against the •
bill, it was quite fair for Dr. Bickersteth to quote Archbishop
Whately, Deans Dale, Hook, and Close, and Dr. Tregelles,
of Plymouth in favour •of it. The mistake was, and it is
one generally made by bishops—to suppose that a matter
of this kind will be settled by the authority of any
number of learned pundits. The Bishop of Ripon
' was followed by Lord Lyvedet, now beginning to
look the old gentleman with patriarchal hair, though
those of us who remember him as the dandy Vernon
Smith scarcely like to think so, lest, perchance, it should
imply that we too are beginning to shew signs of tennpus
edax. Lord Lyveden, though a Wliig, was strongly
against the bill. - He excited quite a roar
of laughter when combating the notion that the
number of petitions in favour of the bill was any
proof of the popular demand for it. He said, look at the
small number of petitions in its favour compared with
those against admitting Mr. Newdegate into convents :
, of course, he meant against Mr. Newdegates' bill for the
inspection of convents ; but the blunder was better than
a blunder, it was a joke. Another Bishop came next, a
strange noticeable man, with something of the same cast
of head as his illustrious namesake; of whom Coleridge
said : " Have you ever seen a horse ? Then, sir, you have
seen Wordsworth."—The Bishop of Lincoln did not add
much to the argument.
At last came the real fun of the evening. Lord Westbury,
bald-headed and iilump, and rosy, deigned to address
their lordships. He directed his remarks especially to the
Bishops, and to hear Richard Bethel' lecturing the right
reverend bench on humility and the exegesis of
Scripture was grand. . Once upon a time,, not
many years ago, Lord Westbury castigated the bishops in
such a way that they all fled, save the then Bishop of
Oxford. But there is now another bishop in the House
who refuses to be " sat upon " by anyone, even though
-he be as illustrious in 'life and morals as the ex-
Chancellbr himself • that bishop is Dr. Magee, of Peter-
borough, and it fell to him last night to administeri to
the modern Martin Mar-prelate such a dressing
as even he, pachydermatous though he is, must
have felt. The Duke of Argyle was the first mem-
ber of the Government to oppose the bill, which
he did with much warlike gesture ; but he was mild
and sedate compared- with Lord Chancellor Hatherley.
Everyone knows that Page Wood is a deeply religious
man, and in this matter he feels strongly and intensely,
and his speech was delivered with an amount of pas-
sionate earnestness not often displayed on the woolsack,
and with a rapidity which is certainly not common with
Lord Hatherley. He spoke at unusual length ; and •
when he sat down Lord Granville thought it time
to interpose, both in order to remove any impression that
the Government opposed the bill, and to infuse a little
sweetness into the now somewhat embittered discussion. He
rather chaffed his colleague for his vehemence, telling him
that he had spoken as the chairman of a debating society
rather than as a statesman. It was now close upon mid-
night, a most indecorously late hour for their lordships to
be out, and so it was determined to close the debate.
Lord Hatherley rather blundered in putting the
question ; the Clerk took out four ivory wands from the
drawer, and gave them to the tellers (Lords Houghton and
Lifford for the Contents ; the Duke of Marlborough and
Lord Lyveden for the Non-contents.) Fourteen bishops
marched out in a row into the Opposition lobby,
and there was a good deal of excitement. The
Duke of Marlborough was the first to return, and
:going up to the table, muttered audibly, "77 ;" then
Lord. Houghton came in with 73, and the Duke,with great
glee took the paper, the Chancellor with -equal glee an-
nounced that the bill had been thrown out. The
non-contents cheered because it had been rejected,
and the contents because the majority was so
small. So every one seemed pleased, and all the
peers scampered away just like so many blackbeetles when
a lighted candle is suddenly taken into a kitchen.