Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 108, June 1, 1895Various
General
Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 108, June 1, 1895
Various
English wit and humor -- Periodicals
Between these eminent men there has been, from the first, a feeling
of generous rivalry. THE MACGREGOR, as befitted the riper genius, has
been more successful in concealing it. Whenever he has put a question
about the Crofters, WEIR has managed to drop in with supplementary
inquiry. His name appearing in the report, watchful Scotia would take
note that THE MACGREGOR was not the only one of her sons who, in a
foreign land, cared for her interests. THE MACGREGOR, on the contrary,
not less loftily because without apparent design, ignored WEIR.
There is reason to believe he did not regard with fullest measure of
appreciation his intellectual capacity, his business aptitude, or his
parliamentary manner.
"A puir creature!" he said, one night, staring straight up at the
gaslit roof. There was no one up there at the moment, and as this
happened to be the night when WEIR had eleven questions on the paper,
by way of showing his want of confidence in the Government, and was
approaching the ninth with ever deepening chest notes, there is too
much reason to fear that at that moment the Member for Inverness-shire
was not unconscious of the existence of the Member for Ross and
Cromarty.
JAMES GALLOWAY'S boot-issuing and blood-curdling tones; his tragic
reiteration of the phrase, "Is the right hon. gentleman a Weir?" The
solemn sweep of his arm as he places the reluctant _pince-nez_ on
his disputatious nose; his stare of haughty surprise when Lowlanders
opposite titter at his inquiry about the lost handle of the parish
pump in outraged Pitlochrie; his habit of turning up at unexpected
places on either side of the House below the Gangway--these things
are unique in their way. In the aggregate they would, save for THE
MACGREGOR, have placed him on an unapproachable pinnacle. After
to-night he will reign alone. The other King of the Bedlam Brentford
has abdicated. But evermore there will rest over JAMES GALLOWAY the
chill shadow of the mighty triumph with which his rival closed his
public career.
Nothing in the parliamentary life of THE MACGREGOR became him so well
as its quittance. The artful way in which he led the SQUIRE OF MALWOOD
up to confession of intent with respect to the Crofters Bill; the
SQUIRE'S humble plea to wait till Thursday; the MACGREGOR'S stern
response, "That is not good enough for me;" then his swinging march
down the Gangway (almost you could hear the pibroch playing); his halt
before the Mace; his stately bow to the SPEAKER; the march resumed;
the fresh halt at the Bar; another sweeping obeisance (again fancy
feigned the faint sound of the distant pibroch), and the MACGREGOR was
o'er the border, and awa'.
"A puir daft body," said JAMES GALLOWAY WEIR, his musing sight, by
strange coincidence, also fixed on the ceiling.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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