The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-01-17 00:00:00

TUESDAY MORNING, JANUARY 17, 1843

There are just now two important questions, antici-
patory of the coming session of Parliament, of which
We should be glad to be furnished with a solution,--
viz.: who is to be the leader of the opposition to Sir
Robert Peel's government ? and upon what great
question is that opposition to take its stand ? An un-
reflecting world, by the way, may say that the last
question ought to be the first—that the ground of
opposition should be first ascertained before we have
a chance of arriving at the man most likely to lead it.
But the world is wrong in this, as, indeed, it is in
many affairs of every day. Your true whig, your
liberal, or your radical, is not a character at all dis-
posed to doubt his capability to argue any question, or
any side of any question, which may be propounded
to him, at a moment's warning; and there is more
than one whig in the House of Commons of whom it
may be said, with the same justice as of Lord John
Russell, that he would "undertake to deliver a pastoral
charge, lead a forlorn hope, or perform the operation

for the stone, with equal nonchalance." We adhere,
therefore, with due submission to the world Pt large,

to our own arrangement of the order of enquiry

Who, then, is to be the Whig leader ? The first

name which presents itself, in reply, is, naturally, that
of Lord John Russell himself. • An admirable tactician
his lordship has approved himself ; unequalled in
stratagy and, withal, bold even to rashness. His own
opinion of his capabilities is on record, in the graphic
description, by Lord Brougham, above quoted. But,
somehow it strikes us that Lord John bolted the
course long before the close of last session, and, as
Palmerston might sentimentally exclaim,—

," Left the world to darkness and to ME 1"

His lordship sounded the note of onset most valiantly;
but he left his juvenile companion in defeat to sing the
dirge for the fallen. In good sooth, it strikes us that
it requires a peculiar talent—which we shall attempt to
point out—to enable any one man to lead an opposition
against a Conservative government in the present
House of Commons. Reader, you have perhaps occa-
sionally watched with interest—admiration ought to
have been the feeling—the patience and perseverance,
and we know not how many other attributes, with
which some frieze-coated native of the emerald isle
has handled a drove of porkers from the Clarence
Dock to the railway station in • Wapping. What
winning suavity of manner you have seen ! what
coaxing tones you have heard ! and when some adven-
turousingan
adjacent
juaneetenrt
bhrasewreursy or stabling, what an hed up some side street, smell-
confronted and persuaded to return
instanta-
neousd perception
nof the exact spot, at which he might
be advantageously
once more to the paternal supervision!. Anon, the
snouts and the tails of the drove have pointed in as
T
many different' directions as are marked by the signs
of the zodiac;
e rpay,
and d then, energyerence, or
with *hat
Murphy,
has danced round them, now
Plying his whip, and now all the tones of his mellifluous
brogue—wheedling, whistling, and swearing by turns
—until at length eyes in front," and the yard is
g-legged and long-eared rascals are
gained, and the lon
boxed up as snug as beggars in a lodging-house, and
about as throng ! There was never an Irishman,
we believe, who lost a pig under similar circumstances.
Now it strikes us very forcibly that it is the very
talent displayed so conspicuously by our industrious
brethren in the frieze coats, or apologies for the same,
which is required in a leader of the whig opposition in
the approaching session ; and that unless Lord John
is equal to the task of driving a score or two of pigs,
of independent habits and feelings, he may as well
attempt to whistle down the cross on the top of St.
Paul's, as lead, with any hope of success, that opposi-
tion. Of the herd of strange animals which he would
have there to drive, some crotchetty member, bearing a
remarkable likeness, in the length of ear and other
peculiarities, to Mr. Joseph Hume, would be darting
up an alley leading to " penny wisdom and pound
foolishness ;" some cadaverous-looking porker, in fea-
ture and leanness resembling the great Cobden, would
he off, grunting out " free trade and down with the
landlords ;" the tails and snouts of the whole drove
would continually be pointing a hundred ways, instead
of a dozen ; and in place of landing the whole in any
given spot, the unhappy drover would perchance find
himself some day, not a month after the commence-
ment of his adventurous exploit,' pleasantly seated in
the " verdant mud," having been brought low by his
capricious charge mistaking the capacity of his legs to

serve as an arched gateway !
Lord John Russell, then, we pass by. He is not
the man of whom we are in search. His lordship,
though unscrupulous as a politician, has yet some
noble blood in his veins. He has some little of the
chivalrous spirit of his race in his composition ; and
the man, who must lead the " all denominations," in
the present House of Commons, will have to do and
submit to things, of which we honestly believe his
lordship to be incapable. Who's next, then ?
Our judgment
Points, next in order, to Lord Pal-
merston. This venerable personage would not be
likely to indulge in any of the refinements of feeling
and taste, which might deter the ex-secretary for the
home department from undertaking an office so
onerous and perplexing. But, then, the foreign policy
of poor Palmerston ; how it has been cut and hacked
by every witling of the pack he would have to lead ;
denounced at League meetings ; made matter for
laughter at tea and toast gatherings—for laughter,
horrescimus references, which has rung from the lips o
the gentler sex, young and old, the objects .of its
author's fondest idolatry I
upon evil days," Besides, though " fallen
yet the necessity of some little con-
sistency and character, in one who aspires to the office
of their leader, may still be deemed, even by the Whig
and radical opposition, to be desirable; and if this be
so, the chance of his lordship is out.
Mr. Richard Cobden has graciously assured us that
he does not aspire to become prime minister, com-
mander-in-chief, chancellor, or to fill any other official
dignity, as the result of his virtuous labours. He
might, it is true,
patriotically throw the shield of his
great name over his disorganised party, in the capa-
city of leader of the opposition; but then unfortunately
the poor man has only one idea ! Take him off the
subject of the corn laws, and he would soon be as far
at sea as a reasonable being could wish to be. A
number of minor names suggest themselves to our
notice—of men who would be great indeed at a free
trade festival, an anti-monopoly meeting, or a chartist
soiree; but in the presence of such statesmen and
masters of debate as Peel, Stanley, Gladstone, Graham,
and the host of talent which rallies round the Con-
servative benches, they may, indeed, " pale their in-
effectual fires," and retire from the arena.
This question is beyond us, then; but in the next
which we have proposed, viz. : " what is to be the

great opposition question," we inay have better fortune.
It will not be the unfortunate budget of Lord Mel-