Lord Derby has made a political speech of a very sensible character—"that goes without to say" in his case. He tells the Conservatives that they are to be neither apathetic nor precipitate, that they are to play a waiting game—the World to him who can Wait—and, meantime, they are to support Mr. Gladstone against the extreme men on his own side. And, said the Earl, "political life is not to be looked at as if it were a soaped pole, with £5,000 a year, and lots of patronage at the top." The sentiment is lofty and honourable. "But," said to Mr. Punch a rising lawyer, who intends to rise a good deal higher, "the deuce of it is that Lord Derby talks from the top of a golden Pyramid about soaped poles. Hang it! I'm like Becky Sharp—I should find it precious easy to be patriotic with fifty thousand a year. If I didn't feel I could manage the nation for the best (though of course I could), confound it! I'd myself engage the best Premier that money could secure, and serve the country that way. But blow it, as it is, and Henrietta's governor refusing to hear of me until I'm in Parliament, you see, old cuss——" "Virtue alone is happiness below," replied Mr. Punch severely, as he went away to get some oysters at Prosser's.
Note by a Foreigner.—On England's possessions the sun never sets. True; and on one of them, London, the sun never rises.
SAT UPON.
Hospitable Host. "Does any Gentleman say Pudden?"
Precise Guest. "No, Sir. No Gentleman says Pudden."