Last week, the Duke of WELLINGTON took occasion of the
ge- neral Levee, and the King's good-nature, to read to his Majesty a long petition against the Reform Bill. HENRY HUNT had once at- tempted a similar act of intrusion, but the attendants interfered. The proverb says, one fool makes many. Next Levee-day, the Marquis of LONDONDERRY must needs emulate the Duke.. In the case of old Tae-de-fer, both Ki' ' Veople, for " auld lang syne," are content to make great allowances ; in the case of my Lord TaeLde- bois, there are neither the same recollections nor the same consider- ation.; The King, who had tolerated the Duke's rudeness, after the MaTquis's harangue about the 'Prentice-boys of Derry was finished, exclaimed, in his significant way—" Very young counsellors, my Lord." Had such a rebuke been dealt by the Sovereign to the Duke; he would have received it in good part, and deported himself aCeordingly ; but the Marquis must. needs' have little more of it : net conceiving that he' had sufficiently "bothered" RoYalty- with•his viva voce harangue; he must write a letter, " through the proper • channel," to add explanation to rudeness. .
These have not been the, only attempts to convert the Levee of the Monarch into a debating society. Lord RonEx has entertained the King With a sermon on Irish Education ; to which Lord ELDON has added, "with bated breath and whispering humbleness," a lecture on himself—his age—his services, so devotedly - given, so poorly paid---and his conscience, so sensitively alive to the interests - of the country and his own.
Of. Alio four, this aged man is certainly the most distressing
spectacle.- the Duke, he is, with all -his rage for getting back to office) .a man under no aspect, however ridiculous, to be looked on without respect; Lord RODEN is Anti-Catholic mad, but the sin- cerity of his motives makes large amends for the vagaries of his conduct; Loa LCiNDONDERRY'S aberrations are amusing ; but Lord'ELDON'S exhibitions inspire no feeling save that of profound nielancholy. For what can be- mere pitiable than to see an old hroken-down man, on the brink of the grave, devoting to miserable factious intrigues those hours which grey hairs and dim eyes and a tottering gait so forcibly call away from politics to prayer—from the Vain and vanishing conceits of this world to an humble prepa- ration for the next !
In other respects, these attempts to worry the King are grati- fying. They show the utter desperation of the party. Their
power is gone with the Public ; in the Senate it is going ; one last trick remained—the King—and they have lost it. It is impos- sible to be angry with men in their woful condition.
, The Archbishop. of CANTERBURY, with the prudence inherent in lawn sleeves, leaving the King to the less scrupulous laymen, has attacked • the Queen; and, if report say true, has found in her Majesty- in indulgent auditor. In answer to a congratulatory ad- dress presented by the Archbishop for himself and the Bishops, the Queen is described as having expressed herself in the follow- ing Warm- terins-
exert yourselves, as you have hitherto so honourably done, fiivel* rsfitino of &li
"I thank you, my Lord, for this address. I st. that you e.rill- uously our Chula did State. Believe Me, that I am in heart q..ijs a454600f: to their raqintenance." I■Tahing certainly can be more amiably disinte testa4iaiSer MajasWi hive to the English Church and the E 'bating the one legal tie which connects her, with the country, -there is not perhaps a lady in it who is less connected, directly or Indirectly, with the welfare of either.
We have no wish to be monopolizers of politics. Heaven knows, -the supply is large enough to satisfy all that ask. But we would, 'for their own sake, prefer that women, at least married women, should choose some department of literature where the thorns are fewer and the flowers more abundant. We hope that many, if not :all the stories, that hold up the Queen as the partisan of the :Ultra-Tories in Church and State, are without foundation. No- -thing would more tend to cool the affections of the public than a belief that she indulged in those feelings which the enemies of the public would fain attribute to her Majesty. If that event :which is inevitable, and which, in the order of nature, she must -expect to behold, were come—or were it only in prospect—how long does Queen ADELAIDE think her paling light would stand --against the rising sun of the house of Kent? Her declining iyears, she may depend upon it, will not be cheered by the flattery of a Church and State faction—they court from hope, not from gra- titude.
While the Duke's party and the Ultras are bearding the King, --with the view of putting down all Reform, the Bit-by-bit Re- :formers are beating up for recruits to support their still more des- perate cause; and the clique of the Canningites are joining in the -petty game. Lord HARROWDY has sent a circular to his friends, en- treating them above all things to permit the second reading of the Bill, and to reserve their opposition for the Committee—to concede the -principle of its vitality, and then to tear its heart one; and Lord ,G. BENTINCK, it seems, has been as busily canvassing for a case to justify the ratting of his noble house, as if it had never ratted 'before.
This breaking up of the Opposition, we have on a previous oc- casion adverted to, as a hopeful symptom. They are all well in- ..lined to do mischief, but they are incapable of determining on -what particular mischief they shall first attempt. In the mean -time, Lord GREY'S eyes have long been open, and the most trim- 'ming of his friends can no longer pretend not to see what his -enemies and ours are about.
* Extract the venom" is the phrase used in an account of the letter which appeared Acarly in the week in the Times. The letter itself has not yet been produced—this 'rests livith Lord HAI:noway, who challenges the accuracy of the account published.
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