Posterity will scratch his head when he meets with the subjoined
passages whilst studying the Parliamentary intelligence in an ancient
file of the _Times_. MR. C. BERKELEY, moving the House into Committee on
the Expenses of Elections' Bill, said
"It was now a Bill merely to prevent the use of bands, bell-ringing,
and colours at elections."
After some remarks by MR. COWPER against the Bill,
"COLONEL SIBTHORPE then rose to move, in pursuance of notice, that
the Bill be deferred for three months. He said he had read the Bill
carefully over, and he thought he had designated it as it deserved,
when on a former occasion he had called it a mean, low, dirty bill.
(_Laughter._) It was a dangerous and delusive measure; it was a trap
set for unwary men, who might suddenly find themselves to have been
guilty of an offence which they had no intention of committing ...
It restricted the liberty of the subject...."
However, the House went into Committee on the Bill; and the COLONEL took
the opportunity of renewing his protest against it: declaring that
"He would oppose the Bill in every stage, for he regarded it as a
disgraceful, mean, dirty, shabby measure."
After the odd remark had been made by MR. F. SCULLY, that
"With regard to the carrying of flags and banners, he had no doubt
that in England such services were frequently made the means of
corruption,"
The report proceeds to state that
"SIR J. GRAHAM thought the best course would be to give up this
Bill, and proceed as soon as possible with the next order on the
paper, the Lunatics' Care and Treatment Bill."
Proceed with the _next_ Bill--the Lunatics' Care and Treatment Bill? How
the _next_ Bill? A Bill on the showing of which it appears that certain
poor creatures were in the habit of going about trumpeting, drumming,
bell-ringing, carrying flags--enacting such fooleries as these--on the
solemn occasion of electing a Member of Parliament; of contributing a
philosopher to the Collective Wisdom; a Bill in reference to
unfortunates corruptible by means of flags and banners: how, a rational
Posterity will ask, could this have been a previous Bill to the other?
Must not what was called the next Bill have been, in fact, merely the
next clause of the same Bill; a general measure relating to the care and
treatment of lunatics?
COLONEL SIBTHORPE'S denunciations of the proposed enactment will not,
perhaps, tend very much to prevent Posterity from taking this view of
the case.
[Illustration: The Member for Lincoln as he will appear at the next
General Election.]
* * * * *
BOMBA'S BANE.
The _Examiner_ states that the Neapolitan chemists are not allowed to
expose bottles, red, white, and green, because they form the tricolours
of Italy. We may add that BOMBA has nearly been poisoned by partaking of
an English salad which besides lettuce, contained red and white
radishes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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