NOTES OF THE MONTH.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 206, 5 February 1875, Page 3

NOTES OF THE MONTH.

(From the Spectator .)

Mr Fawcett addressed his constituents in a vigorous speech, the chief points of which were his plea for the extension of household suffrage to the counties, with a complete redistribution measure; his advocacy of some plan for representing all shades of really widely received opinions in each constituency, when the redistribution is complete; and his belief that the disestablishment and disendowment—in some sense much beyond that of the Irish experiment—of the Church of England are rapidly approaching the condition of practical questions. With regard to the agricultural labourers, he connected his demand of household suffrage for the counties with the laborer’s great need of more self-respect, and declared that it was as irrelevant to plead that his wretched wages of 12s a week are determined by “ the laws of supply and demand,” as to plead that the limbs of the victims of a railway accident are broken “in exact obedience to the laws of motion and gravity.” In relation to his second point, the uselessness of extending household suffrage to the counties without a new distribution of seats, Mr Fawcett was not very strong. Finally, in touching the Church question, Mr Fawcett declared his belief that it would be said of Mr Disraeli, “ He was a Tory Minister who enfranchised the democracy and disestablished the Church.” Nor would the epigram be quite so full of paradox as it seems. If Mr Disraeli were an American statesman, unquestionably his affinities would be more with the Democratic than with the Republican party. Mr Disraeli likes to find a stratum of opinion thickened by a good deal of prejudice, a public opinion of high specific gravity, to float upon, and that will always be best found in the mind of the residuum, —which is another way of saying in the residuum of the mind,—-and when found, it will generally prove to have a good deal of affinity with the old Tory view. Mr Knatchhull-Hugessen has made a very good speech at Deal, the otdy fault of which was that he seemed to think the fact that the Conservatives are continuing to do all they blamed the Liberals so unjustly and so severely for doing, a sufficient proof that they ought not to have been carried by the people into power. But is not this the very evidence that a Conservative Government is appropriate to the time—the fact, we mean, that the Conservatives can afford to continue literally almost all the Liberals were doing, without ceasing to be Conservatives ? When the interval suitable for political enterprise ceases, Conservatives may naturally enter into the fruits of Liberal labours—and are not grateful for them—political parties being never grateful except to themselves. In speaking of the Church question, Mr Hugessen seems to us to have put much too strongly his assertion that a Legislature which is not bounded by the Church has no right to determine the creed of the Church. Surely it has as much right as ever to determine what creeds it will permit to share the revenues bestowed by the State. Greed is a question of conscience, but the award or refusal of State aid is a question of political expediency and enlightened calculation. The Scotch Universities are true to the spirit of the day. Both Edinburgh and Glasgow have defeated the Liberal candidate for the Rectorship, and elected a Tory Minister to that not very important or onerous post. The University of Edinburgh has elected Lord Derby its Rector, and rejected Dr Lyon Playfair, the numbers being —for Lord Derby, 770 ; for Dr Playfair, 583 ; majority, 187. Glasgow has followed the example, re-electing Mr Disraeli its Lord Rector by 700 votes, against 600 given to Mr R. W. Emerson. So we may perhaps hope this year for two addresses on the Conservative character of Scotch learning ; only, Lord Derby’s literary influence will not, perhaps, pull altogether with Mr Disraeli’s. For instance,he is much more likely to advise a careful study of the Liberal political economy than to warn the Scotch against “mumbling its dry bones.” Indeed, the contrast, if we are permitted to" see it, between the two types of literary Conservatism, —the unheroic type of the cautious peer, and the heroic type of the great literary adventurer, —is pretty sure to be instructive. The Republican victory at Irun has not been followed up, General Loma having received orders to re-embark all his troops and proceed to Santander, The troops are said to be enraged, and murmurs are heard that Serrano’s Government is playing the country false, and that it desires to protract the war for the sake of postponing the assembling of the Cortes. It is hardly possible to suspect even a Spanish Government of treachery like this, but it is quite possible to suspect it of wishing to terminate the war by a “transaction,” rather than to risk its only army in a battle which despair might render terrible. One thorough defeat of the national army, and the lutransigentes would be masters of half the towns in Spain. This kind of calculation is the regular mode in Madrid, and is the reason why anarchy in Spain lasts so much longer than in any other country.

The Nerv York Times has been discoursing pleasantly enough on American idioms, in the production or conservation of which New Hampshire seems to occupy an honorable place. The writer remarks on the oddity of the adjective ‘ handy,’ as applied to oxen to express that they are well broke to the yoke and draw well. Probably, however, that meaning is only derivative, and what the word does express is ‘ amenable to the drover’s hand,’ or ‘ well-in-hand,’ as we say of our horses. Thus, ‘ handy’ is a common enough English expression, though used mainly in the sense of being near at hand, rather than amenable to the hand —as in sentences like “Is it handy?”— i.e., convenient to get at. There is no very wide difference of meaning between 1 convenient to the hand,’ in the sense ol ‘ near,’ and

‘convenient to the hand’ in the sense of ‘manageable’(which is only Latin for ‘handy’ after ail) Another curious New Hampshire phrase is 'forehanded,’ —which is Yankee slang for “ well off,” or. equivalent to the si an g term in English “ warm.” But that, again, is almost identical with our English idiom, “ beforehand with the world,” only that the succincter Yankee idiom omits the explanatory addition, “with the world'” With us, however, the idiom no doubt refers to time, and is intended to describe a man who does work in advance of bis needs — i e, who saves. ‘ Forehanded’ looks as if it had more reference to the grasp of mind which gains success by stretching out a hand beyond the immediate spot, so as to anticipate the conditions of the future—and this corresponds rather more closely perhaps with Yankee enterprise, than the idea embodied in our ‘ beforehand with the world,’ which regards simply the saving to be made out of “ over-time.” The “ Colston ” anniversaries at Bristol were not very interesting, except so far as regards a speech from Mr Richard (M.P. for Merthyr Tydvil) at the Liberal meeting, which seems to prove that the loyalty of the Orthodox Dissenters to Mr Gladstone is considerably strengthened by his recent pamphlet With regard to the future, in his opinion there was no possible leader for the Liberal party except Mr Gladstone. He was their leader, not only by virtue of his surpassing eminence as a statesman and an orator—and in these respects no one approached him but Mr Bright—but because there was an instinctive feeling that Mr Gladstone was a man to be trusted, from the religious earnestness of his nature, and the depth and sincerity of his convictions. . . . Mr Gladstone had, he thought, fallen into one error in his article in the Contemporary Review in nut attaching sufficient importance to the essence and core of th« whole matter, —namely, that ritual becomes important only as it becomes the symbol of doctrine. Assuredly, however, there could now be no doubt in any mind that Mr Gladstone was a sound Protestant at heart, and the stupid calumny which had ruined the minds of a large number of old women of both sexes at the last election, that Mr Gladstone was a Rxmanist in disguise, would be heard no more.” The loyalty of the party it evidently returning rapidly. We only trust that Mr Gladstone will not throw cold water on it, by declining for another session the regular duties of the Leader of the Opposition. An absent leader is worse than an ineffective leader. He is not only ineffective, but the cause of ineffectiveness in others.