1830.] Affairs w General 



And we really think that the Duke of Wellington could not do better 

 than take Sir Claudius Stephen Locum-lenens for his coadjutor in his 

 next attempt on the constitution. Now that Sir Robert Blifil Peel is 

 separated from his grace for Blifil follows the moral of his name too well 

 to have any thing to do with any body who can 110 longer help him to 

 the loaves and fishes we can think of no one under the canopy of London 

 smoke half so fitted for his grace's councils as Sir Claudius Stephen. 

 The baronet's propensities too are all military ; and if it had pleased the 

 king's stable keeper to set him on the white charger, that object of his 

 warlike ambition, Temple Bar would have never seen his equal. The 

 baronet too can make a blundering speech as blunderingly as any field 

 marshal on record ; and in a red coat at the head of that victorious, and 

 ever distinguished regiment the first London militia, bears a striking 

 resemblance to Alexander the Great. 



We understand that his distinguished services on the late occasion, in 

 saving the king and the royal family from being eaten alive between Tem- 

 ple Bar and the Mansion House, and the grand duke himself from being 

 roasted whole at Charing Cross, have attracted due notice in the highest 

 quarter, and that blushing honours in abundance are in reserve for him. 

 One of our contemporaries says that, " Sir Claudius Stephen is immedi- 

 ately to be raised to the peerage by the title of Baron Gog, of Guildhall, 

 in the county of Middlesex, with an addition to his armorial coat, viz. a 

 goose, proper, or, on a carit-or ; supporters, two asses erect ducally gorg- 

 ed. Sir Claudius is now sitting for his portrait to that distinguished 

 artist, Mr. George Cruickshank, which is to form the first of a series in- 

 tended by his majesty to adorn the walls of one of the private apartments 

 in Windsor Castle." 



We have no doubt that the baronet would make a very captivating 

 addition to the collection of any man or monarch curious in his specimens 

 of human absurdity. But the baronetage is quite enough for the poor 

 devil's demerits at present, and the public are not just now much in the 

 mind to see any more of those pleasant promotions of asses. 



We sincerely hope that the king will take the state of the Royal 

 Society into his immediate consideration; not for the foolish purpose of 

 giving money or medals to those people ; but for the purpose of castigat- 

 ing their foolery, ignorance, arrogance and presumption. This wise 

 body are, in the first place, in a continual squabble. They are all such 

 enormous philosophers that they cannot live in quiet a moment, but 

 every week produces the explosion of some petty jealousy, or local dis- 

 content, that sets them canvassing, speechmaking, and pamphleteering, 

 to the endless annoyance of the wiser community. 



One fact is clear, and it is the only point worth considering, that at 

 this moment there is no man eminent for science of any kind, within the 

 walls of the Royal Society. This the F. R. S.s know perfectly, and two 

 or three of them have lately written some dull pamphlets at once to pro- 

 claim the fact, and decipher the cause. 



Sir James South, in a pamphlet entitled " Charges against the Presi- 

 dent and Council of the Royal Society," says one of the reasons why he 

 complains against them is " for having intended to give the Copley medal 

 last year, for a paper presented to the society, subsequent to the period 

 when, by established custom, such competition was precluded ; and, 

 moreover, that such intention was expressed before the paper had been 



