1 827.J Notes for the Month. 



in debating talent, it is singularly weak. The powers of Lord Goderich, 

 as an orator, are certainly very slender. His lordship's manner is unpre- 

 tending, and his delivery is sufficiently intelligible, and his style is so far 

 to be tolerated, that its fault lies in its being too light, rather than oppres- 

 sive or heavy; but all this is negative praise ; and yet it is the best that 

 his own friends, in candour, can afford his lordship ; excepting only some 

 touch of occasional readiness, he has not a single quality of a debater about 

 him. As we go lower, affairs hardly mend. Mr. Huskisson is an inva- 

 luable coadjutor in the administration ; but he cannot " manage the 

 House of Commons." Mr. Herries may do well as Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer ; that is, what he can do in that office remains to be proved : 

 but it is certain that, as a speaker, he can do nothing at all. The com- 

 fort of the ministers is, that what unofficial talent there is in the House 

 of Commons, it is all on their side. With Mr. Tierney as a regular retainer, 

 and Mr. Brougham and Sir Francis Burdett as volunteers, they have not 

 a great deal to apprehend (as far as eloquence is concerned) from the 

 attacks of the Opposition. 



The autumn assizes have passed over since our last, and have been marked 

 by an increase in the number of Actions for Libel, brought in the names 

 of plaintiffs who have no hope of recovering more than a farthing damages, 

 but really instituted by attornies, for the sake of obtaining profitable jobs, 

 by the payment of their " costs." This system like the new Old Bailey 

 science of horse-stealing is now making its way up into a regular trade ; 

 and we are not very sorry for the fact ; because, when it gets a little far- 

 ther, it must produce one or two advantageous results : it will either com- 

 pel an alteration in the present absurd and unjust construction of what is 

 " Libel" by the courts, or it will lead to a departure from the practice of 

 allowing a verdict of one farthing damages, in cases of libel, to carry 

 costs. We should be well pleased, for our own parts, with this last 

 arrangement. It could do no mischief; because, where a jury thought a 

 plaintiff entitled to costs, they would give him a shilling instead of a 

 farthing; and the increased amount of " damages" would be no great 

 infliction on the defendant ; while it would arm juries with power which 

 under the present system they do not possess of protecting a defendant 

 from being put to enormous expense by an action which their own verdict 

 declared to be purely litigious and vexatious. As the law which defines 

 libel now stands, every newspaper proprietor must publish two or three 

 libels every week. It is sufficient that he writes, or copies from another 

 publication, any statement which may (even remotely) tend to prejudice 

 the reputation of an individual, and which he cannot prove to be true, in 

 the very letter in which he publishes it. The moral absurdity which this 

 demand of literal proof constantly involves, is so notorious, that we need 

 not observe upon it. There can be no doubt that, if a newspaper stated 

 that a particular individual, A. B., had been convicted of burglary^ and 

 it turned out that the conviction had actually been only for stealing in a 

 dwelling-house, that individual, A. B., being charged by the newswriter 

 with a higher offence than the writer could prove against him, if he were 

 to bring an action for libel, must recover a verdict. But, what is far 

 worse by the law, which, in every case of libel no matter what the 

 amount of damages gives costs to the plaintiff, although the complainant, 

 in such a suit, may gain nothing (for the jury would dismiss it probably 

 with a farthing for the injury he had sustained) ; yet any attorney, who 

 can get leave to bring the complainant's action, gets certainly a job in his 



