Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1882-05-08

he wished to make bis adversary ridicu-
Ious. Here is a specimen from one of his
speeches against Peel. He accuses Peel
of being ga burglar of other mems IDEAS"
and of having sfound the Wings bath
ing. and run away with their clothes"
Nor was this the worst of it; the Prime
Minister had condescended to Dor
row his policy even from obscure ''pen-
dants." ''Why, sir, these are matters of
general notoriety. After the day that
the right honorable gentleman made his
first exposition of his schemes, a gentle
man. well known to the House. and
learned in all the political secrets behind
the scenes, met me and said, We'll,
what do you think of your chiefs plan2'
Not knowing exactly what to say, but
taking up phrase which has been used
in the House, ] observed, We'll. sup
pose it is a great and comprehensive
plan 'Ohr hs replied, we know all
about it; it was offered to us. 1t is not
his plan; it's Popkin's plan. And is
England to be governed by Popkin's
plan? Will he go to the country with
it?" Lord Beaconsfield, like sgd
new Smith, loved sometimes also
to hug a droll idea, and develop it
through a series of illustrations. Every
body remembers Sydney Smiths
witty description of a certain fat lady:
"YOu might walk around her to get up
an appetite, or you might people a col
onv with her, or you might read the riot
act and disper. e her." More picturesque,
if not so comical, is Mr.. Disraeli's witty
description at Slough of the collapse of
the debate on the Indian policy of the
Derby government in 1853 1t has often
been quoted, but will bear quoting again:
1--WE were all assembled, our Der ches,
with their serried ranks, seemed to rival
those of our proud opponents, when sud-
denly there arose wall of distress-but
not from us. l can only liken the
scene to the mutiny of the Bengal
army. Regiment after regiment. corps
after corps, General after General,
all acknowledged that they could not
march through Coventry with Her Ma
jesty's opposition. 1t was like convul-
sion of nature rather than any ordinary
transaction of human life. 1 was remind
ed by it of one of those earthquakes
which take place in Calabria or Peru
There was a rumbling murmur-a
groan-a shriek-a sound of distant
thunder. No one knew whether it came
from the top or the bottom of the house.
There was a rent, assure in the ground,
and then a village disappeared, then a
tall tower toppled down, and the whole
of the opposition benches became one
great dissolving view of anarchy"
Another of the charms of Lord Bea-
cOnsfeld's oratory was his happy knack
of coming phrases which contained in
miniature whole argument, or stereo-
typed some popularity or characteristic
of an opponent. He denounced Mr..
Gladstone as "penurlous prOdigal,
because he was obliged, as Chancellor of
the Exchequer in Lord Palmerston's
government, to find money for an ex-
travagant and wasteful expenditure,
which he at the same time condemned.
Mr. Bereford Hope will never be able to
rid himself of the "Batavian grace"
with which Mr. Disraeli endowed him;
and poor Mr.. Horsman carried with him
to the grave the epithet of superior
person, which Mr. Disraeli gave him in
the Denmark debate in 1864. The most
savage of these barbed phrases that we
remember occurs in one of his
retOrts on Mr.. Lowe, whom he will not
duNlSo W I6Iu6 W us cave, DuJ 10 a
more cynical place" To have hidden
his opponent go to his kennel would,
even if parliamentary, have outraged the
audience and recoiled on the orator him.
SELF But Mr.. Disrael contrived to say
precisely the same thing by his adroit
use of the word cynical, in its ety.
biological sense. This is a good speci
men of these dexterous unexpected
thrusts which used to be 80 enjoyable to
hear, and which made up no small por-
ton of the charm of his oratory. And
we believe that his best things of this
sort were really impromptus; certainly
this was true of what he used himself to
characterize as his best mot, namely, his
retort on the Tounton elector when he
was standing for that borough. On the
day of nomination the opposing candi-
date uttered string of platitudes upon
which he declared himself determined to
"stand." "And what do you stand
upon2" cried a man in the crowd when
it came to Mr.. Disraeli's turn to speak.
"Sir," was the Immediate reply, 81
stand upon my head"