[THE TRIALS OF BENEFACTORS.]
"I have lately started
a store in the village."
The other day a friend of mine was in much the same position as I am to-night. He owned a large estate in the neighbourhood, and he was asked to preside at a meeting of the candidate who was going to come forward. I asked him afterwards if the meeting was successful. "Oh, yes," he replied, "it was fairly successful, but they began to find out my failures and shortcomings." I said, "What have they found out about you?" The reply was, "I have lately started a store in the village, so that the agricultural labourers might have their beef and groceries at cost price. I thought that was rather a good thing to do, but it was far from a good thing in the opinion of my opponents. All the butchers and grocers declared they would make it very hot for me." I am in a somewhat similar position, and I told my friend so. "What have you done?" asked my friend, and I replied, "I have given a public park to the Newport people." "What has that to do with it?" "Well," said I, "they make out that it has increased the rates."
Conservative Meeting, Newport,
February 2nd, 1894.
[WHAT IS A PHILANTHROPIST?]
"A philanthropist is an old gentleman,
probably with a bald head."
There are moments in a man's life when there is a contest between the lip and the eye, whether we should smile or cry. I am sure you would not like to see me cry just now, but there is a certain amount of sentiment in an affair of this sort. For a person in my position it is rather trying. I feel very much like the little boy you all knew in your nursery stories. The boy had a pie, and "he put in his thumb and pulled out a plum and said 'What a good boy am I.'" That is what I feel now. I suppose I should feel like a philanthropist. You probably all know what a philanthropist is. A philanthropist is an old gentleman, probably with a bald head, and he tries to make his conscience think he is doing good all the while he is having his pocket picked.