Page:Australian views of England.djvu/104

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92
AUSTRALIAN VIEWS
[Let.

hinted intelligibly enough that he was prepared to refer it for final trial to the constituencies. The effect was a childish confusion and terror. Mr. Walpole wouldn't move at all. Mr. Disraeli castigated Mr. Walpole's want of pluck, and Sir W. Heathcote reproved Mr. Disraeli. Lord Palmerston, when he rose in the futile debate that followed, indulged in a characteristic sally of cruel jokes, declared that Mr. Stansfeld had made an excellent speech against his own motion, and assured the House that his Government had no notion of "swallowing the leek" which had been so kindly prepared for them. And then the House of Commons, which was going to put a check on the extravagant waste of the people's money, whatever might be the consequence, threw out Mr, Stansfeld's motion by 367 to 65, Mr, Disraeli's speech in this debate was a masterly charge of financial mismanagement against the Government, which fully sustained his great powers as a debater, and which has not yet been met How far the orator's advocacy of retrenchment has been stimulated by a desire of office is another matter, which people must decide for themselves.