276 J^ACT AGAINST FICTION. 



Well, I begin to regard myself as a mile -stone 

 left on the side of tlie political highway. I 

 commenced life as a Whig, or, as we were then 

 called, a '' Liberal," but the drivers of coaches 

 to consecutive Governments either forgot to give 

 me a lift, or I fell asleep among the primroses 

 by the road side, where I seem to have taken 

 root, until the coach of Liberality, by employing 

 coachmen of too levelling a laxity, has been 

 driven into a sort of slough, whence none of 

 the passengers seem able to escape in any direc- 

 tion, and all seem bent on pulling eacli other to 

 the bottom of the bog, in the hope of standing 

 higher on each other's heads. -* 



At one moment Members of tlie House of 

 Commons, inclined to sedentary or predatory 

 habits, — politically they often go together, — 

 assail protection when it is extended to the 

 beautiful pheasant, partridge, grouse, the deer, 

 the hare, and rabbit ; at another time they in* 

 stitute new laws for the protection of gulls and 

 owls, and other obscenities. Therefore, in passing 

 on to the change of climate and the alteration 



blame arising from their after-dinner speeches, though in tkei?' wine 

 there was 710 truth. 



