590 The State of Europe. [JUNE, 



echoes of the deliberations in Downlng-street, and the ancient extra- 

 vagance of Palace-yard finds itself embodied in the Reform Bill of the 

 Cabinet. 



We are still sceptical (and it is from honour to the Minister's under- 

 standing and habits) as to his sincerity in offering that Bill to the nation. 

 It has hitherto been held up only as the promise, the extorted promise, 

 of party. The parliamentary demand of modification in one of its most 

 essential principles was acceded to with even more than diplomatic cour- 

 tesy, and yet the facility of Lord John Russell was not put on but by per- 

 mission. We may look for other modifications to render it palatable, not 

 merely to the Commons, but to the Peers ; the Minister's order may make 

 not the least of his considerations, and it may be his policy to place the 

 Bill, like ^Esop's husband of two wives, between the ancient peerage, who 

 will pluck out all the obnoxious black hairs, and the young radicalism 

 which will pluck out all the white, until it finally comes before the world 

 stripped of all source of contention, and in all the baldness of a measure 

 disclaimed and abandoned alike by all. But in this object, even his 

 knowledge of the absurdity of parties may, for once, be deceived ; his 

 new House of Commons may be restive ; it may refuse to be whipped at 

 one time and curbed at another, even by so skilful a charioteer. If it 

 resist, he is undone. 



But in all this nothing can be more amusing (we may have another 

 name in store for it) than the change of opinion in public men (and for 

 this too we may have another name). First, we have the Field-marshal 

 deploring his own measure, actually ratting from himself, and declaiming 

 with penitential tears, the true penitence of a prostrate Minister, on his 

 regret for the " Atrocious measure of 1829." " He finds that it has not 

 produced the consequences which he had expected from it," and the hint 

 is, of course, to be taken, that if he were carried on the shoulders of 

 reviving Toryism into office again, he would work miracles, pacify 

 Ireland, muzzle O'Connell, and purify England into the love of his 

 cabinet; but his Grace only wastes his eloquence. In the worst ex- 

 tremity, Toryism will not try him again. Like his own sentence on Peel, 

 a sentence pregnant with the supreme gall of overweening pride, " That 

 gentleman has put an end to his political existence/' The field-marshal 

 has branded exclusion upon his own brow, and to power he must bid 

 farewell for ever. 



But is it not incomparable to hear the subordinate himself performing 

 magnanimity, and, within the month, getting by heart the following sen- 

 timent. " To use the words of Mr. Fox, I should consider myself as ' a 

 traitor to my king, a traitor to my country, a traitor to my own consci- 

 ence,' if I did not prefer the maintenance of the constitution to a weak 

 subserviency to popular opinion, and if I did not protect the real interests 

 and privileges of the people against attempts to call that popular excite- 

 ment into exercise, the very vehemence of which is one of my arguments 

 against the present measure." 



And this from Sir R. Peel, Catholic-question-Peel. Shade of Demo- 

 critus, w r here do you sleep ! 



But, to come to another penitent. Every man who has looked over 

 the history of the prosecutions of opinion during the late Ministry, must 

 be familiar with the memory of Sir James Scarlett. Yet within the 

 month, on Mr. Cal craft's saying of statements contained in the Times, 

 " If they were libels so scandalous that it was impossible to pass them 



