In an article of much pleasantry and truth as well
as point, the Times this morning took the following impartial survey of the position of Par- liamentary parties in the Ellenborough faction-fight of Thursday evening- " Something amusing and instructive always turns up when political parties find themselves at cross-purposes, and compelled for the nonce to hazard an attack, or persevere in a defence, which would have been only effectual in the hands, or upon the principles, of the opposite party. To find the Whigs zealously engaged in an orthodox crusade against the very shadow of idolatry, all out of compliment to Lord Ellenborough—and the Tories with as much urgency, though less willingness, engaged in shielding from public censure the over-liberal act of their Governor—suggests perverse speculations on the pro- bable language which would have been held by the two parties, had the delin- quent been a Whig instead of a Conservative Governor-GeneraL The debate, we suspect, would have exhibited less skill but more vigour. It is not at all difficult to imagine the torrent of generous zeal which, under such circum- stances, would have gushed forth from a Conservative Opposition at this insult to the religion of their country, or the contemptuous indifferentism by which a Whig Treasury bench would have quelled the uninformed bigotry which was unable to appreciate a statesmanlike condescension to existing passions and prejudice. The scene on Thursday was of a different kind ; and instead of the free and natural motions of orators wielding wills hardihood their own tried commonplaces, we find an exhibition of admirably-disguised uneasiness, somewhat more approaching the nature of a dance among red-hot plough- shares—each party bound by a stern political necessity to play off a series of unwonted arguments, but each equally unwilling to violate their own con- victions, or affront the feelings of their habitual allies, by maintaining them to any purpose."
Previous page
