The New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY). WEDNESDAY, JULY 30, 1879.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5720, 30 July 1879, Page 2

The New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY). WEDNESDAY, JULY 30, 1879.

The close of the debate on the Address was quite in keeping with all its previous course. The division which practically gave the coup de grace to Greyism, was taken at the time agreed upon between the two parties, and the majority against the Government was a crushing one. No Ministry ever had such a beating in this country before. The Opposition apparently suspected that the Government would endeavor to evade the exact record of their defeat by not calling for a division. They were quite justified in entertaining that suspicion after all the tricks they had been played. They therefore abstained from giving their voices when the question was put, and the Speaker consequently giving it in favor of the noes, a division was secured. That the Government had intended to avoid a defeat, if they could, was shown by one of the Ministers calling out in a feeble voice that no division had been called for. He was wrong of course, and the division ensued, with the result that forty-seven members against thirty-three voted that the Grey Ministry had so neglected and mismanaged the administration as no longer to possess the confidence of the House. An attempt has been made by the Government party to show that this majority was created by the faithlessness of members pledged to Sir George Grey, and by the offer made to them by the Opposition of unworthy inducements. That attempt, however, has miserably failed. It is quite true that several of the staunchest and most high-principled men in the House, who had previously supported Sir George Grey, voted against him on this occasion. But whose fault

was that? It was solely the fault of the leader, who by Ida treachery, perfidy, and violence had driven from him those who, if he had only behaved with common honesty and prudence, would never have deserted him, whatever his fortunes might have been. Accusations of ratting, and of currying favor with the winning side, fall harmless upon such men as Mr. Bryce, Mr. Hobbs, Mr. Greek, Mr. Gotten', Mr. McMinn, and others. Had Sir George Grey enabled them by his conduct to adhere to him with a shadow of self-respect, they would most assuredly have made his side the winning side, or else have gone cheerfully with him into Opposition. It is strange, indeed, how he, who seems by his talents and acquirements to be eminently a leader of men, dashes all his opportunities by his moral obliquity and his graceless disposition. Even after the division was taken last night, there was yet a chance for him to retire, not only with dignity, but also with a hope of rallying a party round him. Had he then stood up and made a frank and courteous speech, candidly accepting his defeat as a fair one, and generously attributing to his opponents the same honorable motives which ha claims for himself, he would undoubtedly have gained the sympathy and respect of the House and the public. Instead of doing that, however, he got one of the least considerable of his following to move a silly amendment, and his own particular parasite to talk against time, in order that he might have one more dance before the footlights. And what a dance it was —an exploded cracker—a stale dish—a raonotous reiteration of all the slanders and misrepresentations with which he has bored and scandalised the country for the last two years. This was obviously the speech which he had prepared for the Arcade - last week, but which the mob would not let him deliver. We will not discuss it in any detail now, but shall take another occasion to point out such of its fallacies and absurdities as seem to us to need exposure. We will only say that it was a speech entirely unworthy of one in his position, entirely unworthy of the conditions under which it was made, entirely unworthy of anybody claiming to be a statesman. And how flat it fell ! The rounded periods, the sonorous declamation, the pathetic illustrations, the indignant remonstrances, all went for nothing. Nobody cared a straw for it all. The feeling that the speaker was void of the sentiment of truth, and that the speech itself was a violation of decency, prevailed over every 'other. There he stood, an old man, with the shadow of a great name, occupying the last moments of his tenure of office by falsifying the history and vilifying the institutions of his country, and by uttering every mean and spiteful thing that a little mind could conceive. Even his followers must have felt ashamed of him. He himself, indeed, seemed depressed by a sense of his own shamelessness, and towards the end of his speech he almost dropped altogether that eloquence which is natural to him. He got very angry when some of his hearers were unable to repress their laughter, but really they were not to blame. The most merciful way to treat such a tiraSe is to laugh at it. If we do not consider it ridiculous, we must consider it very wicked. After all, what was the use of it ? When it was over, and the amendment was put, the Government dared not divide the House. Had they done so, we venture to say that Sir George Grey’s speech would have been found to have increased the majority against him by a considerable number of votes.