our markets? (Hear.) I want to know how it is that, with an express declaration of the principles of the people upon the question of free trade, the landlords in the House of Lords and in the House of Commons, contrary to their own creed and in opposition to their own judgment, swerved from all that they had promised us, and threw up to those who were more impassioned and boisterous than themselves all that protection which they were bound in honour and in interest to uphold? (Loud cheers.) I feel that it is painful to speak of the landlords of this kingdom in the presence of so many of that aristocracy who shed a lustre upon their order, and whose presence here shows us how much they respond to our own principles. (Cheers.) We can never forget that those laurels which adorn the brow of the noble duke who presides over us were won in the most terrible and hard-fought encounters that ever brought glory, honour, and renown to the British arms, and that the noble duke has, from the period that he turned his sword into a ploughshare, ever stood true to the best interests of agriculture--(loud cheers)--has ever stood true to the declarations which he has made; and under all changes, and in the midst of the vapourings of his opponents, has been steadfast, untarnished, and unsullied, and now comes before us with renewed glory and increased claims upon our gratitude and support. (Loud cheers.) We cannot forget that the noble lord on his right--the Earl Stanhope--(great cheering)--whom it has been my privilege for five-and-twenty years to follow in the paths of philanthropy--who has come to the evening of a long and a useful life, in which he has shown sympathy to the poor, and has had the best interests of his fellow-men at heart--that he comes here, too, for the purpose of giving his powerful support to the great principles to which he and we are alike devoted. (Loud cheers.) They had also several other noble and honourable gentlemen present. They all knew the undaunted courage with which the Marquis of Downshire had fought for their right. They knew that the gentlemen around him were noble exceptions to that great defalcation which had been committed by so large a portion of the aristocracy. (Cheers.) Therefore, he (Mr Ball) could not discharge what he considered to be his duty now, without pointing them out as exceptions to the statement he was about to make--that they had fallen, not by Cobden's--that they had fallen, not by the League's tricks--that they had fallen, not by the treachery of Peel; but because their landlords--the aristocracy--those who should have upheld them--had swerved from their duty in the houses of Parliament. (Cheers.) We had the power--we had the majority--we had the voice of the country, not loud, but strong and firm, and ready to manifest itself when the moment for action came; but they were faint-hearted, they failed in the hour of need, and sacrificed us to the discordant elements of demagogueism and free-tradeism.