11 JUNE 1881, Page 2

The debate on the Irish vote of censure was concluded

yesterday week, when there voted for the censure 22, and against it 130. The debate ranged very wide of the facts of the case, and was remarkable chiefly for a very moderate and very sound speech by the Solicitor-General (Sir Farrer Herschell), and an equally moderate criticism on it by Mr. O'Connor Power. Mr. Cowen, as usual, was very violent against the Government, and he was, on this occasion, as weak as he was violent. He even condescended to conclude his speech by atrociously misquoting one of the most hackneyed of all quotations

"As bees, on flowers alighting, cease their hum,

So, settling upon places, Whigs grow dumb,",

which he gave us in this remarkable Cowenite version,-

" As bees, on flowers alighting, cease to hum,

So Liberals, settling into places, soon grow dumb,"

—a parody which would have made the poet boil with wrath.