Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, April 25, 1891Various
General
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, April 25, 1891
Various
English wit and humor -- Periodicals
_House of Lords, Tuesday._--Lords met to-night after Easter Recess; come
together with a feeling that since last they met a gap been made in their
ranks that can never be filled. The gentle GRANVILLE'S seat is occupied by
another. Never more will the Peers look upon his kindly face, or hear his
lisping voice uttering bright thoughts in exquisite phrase.
KIMBERLEY sits where he was wont to lounge. K. a good safe man; one of the
rare kind whose reputation stands highest with the innermost circle of
those who work and live with him. To the outside world, the man in the
street, KIMBERLEY is an expression; some not quite sure whether he isn't a
territory in South Africa. Known in the Lords, of course; listened to with
respect, much as HALLAM'S _Constitutional History of England_ is
occasionally read. But when to-night he rises from GRANVILLE'S seat and
makes a speech that, with readjustment of circumstance, GRANVILLE himself
would have made, an assembly not emotional feels with keen pang how much it
has lost.
The MARKISS should be here. Perhaps for himself it is as well he's away. To
him, more than anyone else in the House, the newly filled space on the
Bench opposite is of direful import. _The MARKISS has no peer now GRANVILLE
is gone; the two were in all characteristics and mental attitudes
absolutely opposed, and yet, like oil and vinegar, the mixing perfected the
salad of debate. The lumbering figure of the black-visaged Marquis at one
side of the table talking at large to the House, but with his eye fixed on
GRANVILLE; at the other, the dapper figure, with its indescribable air of
old-fashioned gentlemanhood, the light of his smile shed impartially on the
benches opposite, but his slight bow reserved for the MARKISS, as, leaning
across the table, he pinked him under the fifth rib with glittering
rapier--this is a sight that will never more gladden the eye in the House
of Lords. GRANVILLE was the complement of the MARKISS; the MARKISS was to
GRANVILLE an incentive to his bitter-sweetness. Never again will they meet
to touch shield with lance across the table in the Lords. LYCIDAS is dead,
not ere his prime, it is true;
"But, O the heavy change, now thou art gone,
Now thou art gone, and never must return!"
It seemed in stumbling inadequate phrase that CRANBROOK, KIMBERLEY, DERBY,
and SELBORNE strummed their lament. But, speaking from different points of
view, without pre-concert, they struck the same chord in recognising the
ever unruffled gentleness of the nature of LYCIDAS--a gentleness not born
of weakness, a sweetness of disposition that did not unwholesomely cloy.
Only Mr. G. could have fitly spoken the eulogy of GRANVILLE. After him, the
task belonged to the MARKISS, and it was a pity that circumstances
prevented his undertaking it. _Business done_,--Irish Land Bill in Commons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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