The report of a speech, however excellent, is but a dull reflection of the original, as all may judge who consider the contrast between the entrancing rhetoric which daily holds spellbound the House of Commons and the plain prose appearing in the morning papers. It would ill repay the reader for the courtesy and charm she has shown throughout the perusal of these pages, were I to inflict upon her a mere verbatim transcript of Lord Repton’s famous harangue. But the gist of it well merits record here, not only because it did much to kill a poisonous spirit which had till then been growing in English journalism--but also because it was in itself a typical and splendid monument of the things that build up the soul of a great man. He began in the simplest manner with a review of what had determined some of them to bring forward this Resolution. It needed no reiteration upon his part, and indeed the matter was so painful that the mere recalling of it must be made as brief as possible. “It has been suggested that places in that House are acquired by process of purchase. “There, in plain English, is the accusation.” He would remark in passing that the cowards and slanderers--he did not hesitate to use strong language--(and even the sanctity of the precincts could not check a murmur of approval), the cowards and slanderers who brought forward that general accusation, dared not make it particular. “In one case,” he said, turning gravely to the place where he expected to see but was disappointed not to see the very aged frame of Lord Ballymulrock, “in one case which referred to a peer whose health I am distressed to say has made it impossible for him to be present upon this occasion” (a protest from an exceedingly old man who sat folded up on high--it was Bally himself!), “in one case a direct accusation has been made.... Melords, you know the issue. An appeal still lies, and it is not for me to deal with a matter which is _sub judice_; but apart from that case, these anonymous hacks who have for so long corrupted or attempted to corrupt the public mind in respect to this House, confine themselves to generalities upon which the law can take no hold.” It was upon this very account that the general resolution of which he had spoken had been framed, and he would pass at once from the unsavoury recollection of such acts, to that part of his argument which he thought would have most weight with his fellow-subjects.