LORDS PALMERSTON AND JOHN RUSSELL.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 424, 26 November 1856, Page 5

LORDS PALMERSTON AND JOHN RUSSELL.

(From the ' Liverpool Albion.' Palmerston's disbelief in original sin must be undergoing some rapid mutations of late, though ihc never-to-be-contaminated native innocence of the juvenile still sustains him in unflagging buoyancy amid all the evils of tli;: wicked world envirouing him. The double tides he now works, the day an.l night sittings he has to stand, leave him as undisturbed as when he had nothing to do on the' Opposition benches ; indeed, apparently a good deal more so ; for then lie was perpetually contriving how to trip other people, whereas now he carries on as jauntily as though he had the freehold of office, as no doubt he has. Amazing is his management of the House, to be sure; —always ready with a rattle or a toy to entertain them, and draw them oft" the scent with some parochial fiusiness or other, bands in the park, fireworks, Irish education votes or anti-voles, or some such trivialities, while he solidly works out his ends, whatever they may be, or wherever directed, and that is what not only nobody kuovvs, but no one can guess at. Day after day and night after night increases one's astonishment at the Minister and the man, and this feeling grows as the session runs atit—carrying the brains of his cabinet quite as exclusively as did the gentleman who sits opposite in respect to the Derbyites. You would suppose, to look at him, that he never bestowed a thought upon business of any sort; but merely t->ok matters as they turned up from hour to hour, always in time, but never an instant before the time. Yet it is clear that he is familiar with every detail of every office ; that Clarendon can't order a stick of sealing-wax fur correspondence with the. heir of her late Majesty, Pomare, Queen of Tahiti, nor Frederick Peel sanction the issue of a penny-worth of pipecla-, for the use of the Ballywhack Fencibles, without the sanction of their noble friend. Does he everslee;> ? If so, when ? It every day in the year were the 21st of June, and each such day as dreary as this, so as to'keep everybody indoors, or drive them to the desk in desperation, he couldn't get through a tenth part of what he must have to do, that is, supposing iie did it, like everybody else, which of course he does'nt; and the puzzle is, how does he? Al- . though he constantly seems to slumber in the House, whence he is neve." abser>t half an hour at a time all through the sa-sion, it is questionable if he reall ever dozes, much less takes a genuine 40 winks. Supposing him to have the Napoleonic faculty of dropping offat will, which Napoleon hfidn't that wouldn't meet the mystery. Weasels, it is said, sleep with one eye o:>en j and hence are never found napping. But Pahnerston must sleep, if he do sleep, with both ears open ; for at the end of a long debate during which he ma}-, to all appearance, have been under the influence of Morpheus, not a Mi. Mulligan or Flaherty, a M'Pherson or a Mackie, a Smith, Brown, Jones, or Robinson, has said a syllable deserving of notice, or that will serve for a remark, but what has been heard and heeded by the Premier. A man would have to be acclimated to St. Stephens for years before he could fully percieve, and even then be could not deiine wherein consists Lord Palmerstun's superiority of management over that of Lord John, who is daily dwindling away into greater and greater insignificance in the presence of his successor. ■ Mis effort on Monday last in regard to the Crampton-Dallas business was a strange exhibition, serving to show the hold his past reputation still gives him on the respect of the House. No man but he would have made such a speech at such a moment, and from no other man would such «i speech have been endured. He rose to ask a single question, and he made an hour's address, going the whole matter as though he were speaking to a regular motion, thus taking the wind' completely out of the sails of Sir Edward Bulwer. who sat on the opposition bench, with his hand in the form of a conch shell to his dctf year, and looking twice as bothered with astonishment at Lord John's audacity as with his natural auricular infirmity. His Lordship, while speaking, kept turning constantly to the bar, and looking with cvrpat «••!«;>,.». „;...«;«... v - -•. .«—,„„„.„.;„„. ..^ o -• c» j \- .inie.ii.v _,„ —vusptentiality under the gallery, nobody being able to make out who it was; but everyone supposing it must be Dallas or Crampton, or perhaps' both. However, it was neither. Our expelled plcuipo was to have been there, but he wasn't, probably his reception at the Foreign Office giving him quite BtiHiciient foretaste of the opinion formed of him, and satisfying him that he had small chance of a duplicate of the distinctions bestowed on Sir Kars Williams to-day, though it is clear he was twice asgre.it a hero in his own estimation. A phenomenon of the same kind, Cardigan, was in the Peers' gallery, as were also many others of the hereditary. The Duku of Cambridge being ills;) at the back ef the Speaker's gallery, and secmiuulv very g'-id that thoro was no necessity for crossing the Atlantic to assist Britannia to rule the waves, lit; would have ben astonished had be been in the House last night, and heard Paliveiston talk of all the Guavds that had gone to the Crimea vyni'ng back to London

again in triumphal procession—a statement which the report in the morning papers says produced " some sensation." It did indeed, but not quite so flattering as the Premier could desire for he showed his Celtic affinity, rarely exhibited in that way, by perpetrating a decided Patlandistn.