Lord Howick's speech, so that they got all the discredit of this concession without any compensatory advantage. They had begun the campaign by the abrupt expulsion of Glenelg (nobody has ever made out exactly why) and by bringing over Normanby in breathless haste to supersede him, without any reasonable probability of his giving such an accession of vigour and capacity to the Government as would justify this operation, and accordingly as more than ordinary success was requisite for a man promoted under such circumstances, the deeper were the mortification and disappointment at his failure. The Irish Committee, which put him on the defence of his administration there, distracted his attention and disturbed his mind, and he turned out to be unequal to his situation. His defence of himself upon Ireland was very weak, and his whole parliamentary conduct of colonial affairs lamentably inefficient. Then Mr. Spring Rice kept falling into continual discredit by his financial incompetence, so that day after day, from one cause or another, the Ministry sank in estimation, and got more weak and ridiculous. Of this they were not at all unconscious, and it was settled that something was to be done, though the difficulty both as to the manner and the matter was exceedingly great. Rice himself was eager to escape, and tried hard to be Speaker; but though the Cabinet had resolved he should be the Government candidate, it was found that no adequate support could be depended upon for him, and he was obliged, and they were obliged, to let Lefevre stand instead; at which Rice himself was so sulky that he showed his spite by contriving to arrive too late from Tunbridge for the division. They scrambled on till the end of the Session, when the changes which had long been discussed and battled were to take place, and then, naturally, came into play all the vanity, selfishness, and rival pretensions, which a sense of common danger could not silence. In the arrangement of all these things, Melbourne is said to have severely suffered, so repugnant is it to his nature and habits to be the arbiter and adjuster of rival claims and pretensions.