The Sun.
London, England, 1857-03-24 00:00:00

HIT AND MISS.

(FROM A CORRESPONDENT.)
Thirty years ago we knew a country gentle-
man who thought he would test the probabilities
of his success as a duellist. We are not aware
that ho was intending an affront to any of the
class, rather large at that time, who thought
powder and lead the scales of gentlemen'i justice,
but our friend was a man whose blood coursed
pretty quickly through his veins at all times, and
it did not take much to get it' up to expres4, and
even to collision, speed. CURRAx proposed to a
challenger to chalk a man on the barn door, and
whichever hit him first should make the apology.
Our friend preferred a pump in his yard for an
experimental autigoniEt, and placing himself with
his back to his parlour window,, and in
front of his man, and, making his own signal, he
pulled the trigger, and—smash went the parlour
window ! Let no reader liken him, in imagina-
tion, to the Pickwickian who maimed Mr. Tur•
MAN. Our friend hardly knew what it was to
miss his bird. His bullet had, of course, hit the
pump—had mad© a wound that would assuredly
have been fat: I to any living pump ; and having
penetrated two inches or more into the wooden
or evpe rr eosue
rn
ft
ra;,ei
n"d'sofslu tioodolrmcan,y mortals, had rebounded
smashed the window, and
marked the opposite parlour wall ; he very wis•cly
thought his honour satisfied, declined a second shot,
and we never heard of his challenging a pump of
any sort again.

Perhaps our great Opposition Loader may, on
looking round, perceive his admirably-aimed bullet
has smashed the glass of his house also. Per.
duellist, as SIIYLOCK,
hohfeacdtlY ai mbe been ddeueep asllis any
t, could have wished, went
the ball into its mark. Lord PALMERSTON--
" The Tory Chief of a 1-taclical Cabinet." What
a shot at one asking confirmation in office from
the hands of all the Liberals in the kingdom I
Tories, can you vote fOr a captain who mans his
ship with Radicals? Radicals, will you vote
for a Minister who crimps your represent:l-.
tives to steer with them whither he pleases ?
The Tory Chief of a Radical Cabinet ! Excellent
that. We have not heard a smarter or a truer
thing for a while ; saving, of course, a little dif-
ference between the epigrammatic and the actual
radical qualities of Lord PALMERSTON'S staff. We
rather fear some of them would stammer at the
Candidate's Catechism as much as their master.
But let that pass. Mr. DISRAELI has made a
capital shot.

But then the parlour windows and the oppo-
site parlour wall ! Of what sort of Cabinet is Mr.
DISRAELI to be chief ? Of • Mr. GLADSTONE
and Mr. ROEBUCK, of Lord J. RUSSELL and Mr.
MIALL, of Sir J. GRAHAM and Mr. COBDEN, Of
MILNER GIBSON and Mr. LAYARD.--" Tory Chief
of a Radical Cabinet"—of a Peclite Cabinet, of an old
Whig Cabinet, replies the crashing glass ! Lucky
for the marksman if the shot has rebounded over
his shoulder, and not grazed him in passing.
Why, if ho once attempt to form a Cabinet out of
his majority, the whole China service presented
him by Mr. COBDEN'S motion would be smashed
on his mantelpiece, and by his own bullet. He
must be the Tory Chief of a Radical Cabinet—or
Peel-Whig-Radical Cabinet—equally odious, or
more so, in the eyes of all good Tories. Could
Mr. 1/ISRAELI
have meant to have a Radical
Chief of a Tory Cabinet ? Mr. COBDEN—whom he
and the Tories followed as leader in the House of
Commons Could ho mean thus to nullify a
Radical as the Radicals now nullify a Tory ?
Oh, but, of course, all except thorough-bred
Tories wore to be left behind. The DERBY-DIS-
EAELt Cabinet was to be of pure blood. Mr.
DISRAELI is to be the deputy Tory Chief of a
Tory Cabinet. But that's worse than the
smashed glass—it's the indented parlour wall. I
only shows with what deadly force the shot re-
bounds. Why, of all things in the world, that is ,