The Duke of Argyll made on Monday what we may
call the- minimum of apology for the very savage character of his attack in the debate of Thursday week on what he then termed "the railing and almost ribald" accusation brought against the- Government by the Lord Chief Justice of England. The Duke only said that some of his expressions had been felt by the Lord Chief Justice "as personally offensive to himself" (which is hardly surprising), and that while he (the Duke) maintained "for any member of the Government the fullest right to discuss.
with freedom both the writing and the publication of the Lord Chief Justice's letter to the Prime Minister," and while he was disposed to think that there were expressions in the Lord Chief Justice's letter which were perhaps open to the game objection that they were personally offensive to members of the Government, yet "under the circumstances he had no hesitation in expressing his regret for his use of any words which may have seemed personally offensive to the Lord Chief Justice." The Morning Post asserts.
that if this rather economical apology had not been made, the Lord Chief Justice would have been compelled to decline repre- senting any longer the English Government before the Geneva Arbitrators, and we hold that he would have been right.
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