EVIL EYESIGHT.
Some of our contemporaries appear to be labouring under a political jaundice, by which distemper they are caused to see everything through a blue or buff medium. The Standard supplies a case in point, out of the Yorkshire Gazette; in the subjoined portion of an account of some local festivities:—
... "Before late in the day not less than 1500 had congregated together, and were engaged in all kinds of sports and games, and many were the waltzes and polkas, &c., which were gracefully performed by the lovers of the dance. The Earl and Countess of Mulgrave, with their children and the Honourable E. Phipps, the rejected candidate of Whitby, joined the party.
"We would advise our Conservative friends to watch the influence acquired by this new mode of treating."
This is the way in which one party looks at another, that other being a simple merrymaking! Motley is the only wear for a writer whose ideas are so party-coloured. Cannot the superior classes cultivate kindly feelings with their neighbours without being accused of inferior motives? Such mean imputations ought not to emanate from the forces who march under the banner of Colonel Sibthorp, but with whom the Member for Lincoln will be ashamed to march through Coventry, or at least, through thick and thin of this kind. The Colonel, who insists on the right of treating his constituents jovially, would repudiate with scorn the charge of corruption, brought against him for dancing amongst them around a Maypole; he would be highly indignant at being suspected of trying to turn voters round by spinning their daughters in a waltz; of insidious designs in tripping down the middle and up again, and, in doing hands across, of an underhand manœuvre: he would be disgusted to find himself thought capable of any trick below the double shuffle.
The "new mode of treating" might, indeed, be advantageously "watched by our Conservative friends"—and imitated. To treat the people, by mixing with them in courteous intercourse, would be wise of the aristocracy. But sorrily will the great folks be encouraged to relax their exclusiveness, either socially, or as proprietors of parks and picture galleries, by representing them as doing so merely in a spirit of baseness.
GREAT CURE AND SMALL PAY.
Did you ever hear of a clerical Sergeant Kite? Here you have apparently that non-commissioned officer—no offence to the probably Tractarian author of the advertisement following, taken from that highly religious paper, The Guardian:—
CURATE WANTED, for a small country village in the diocese of Lichfield. Incumbent resident; daily prayers; weekly Communion; day, night, and Sunday schools; plenty of work of all kinds. Salary £90, with a house and garden. The Curate must be a sound Churchman, with his heart in his work, and willing to obey orders. He must have good health, be able to conduct a choral service, and to preach (if necessary) three or four times a week. Direct P., under cover to Mr. Masters, 33, Aldersgate Street, London.