Labby is usually brilliant; while he
discoursed on Uganda he actually made people think Mr. Gladstone ought
to have made him a Cabinet Minister--he displayed such undiscovered and
unsuspected powers of respectable dulness.
[Sidenote: Still the seats.]
Nevertheless, there was still room for excitement and drollery in the
perennial question of the seats. Mr. Chamberlain is not a man to whom
people are inclined to make concessions; he is so little inclined to
give up anything himself; and, accordingly, there arose a very serious
question as to the first seat on the third bench below the Gangway,
which he had taken all defiantly for his own. He counted without one of
the oldest and most respected, but also one of the firmest, men in the
House. Mr. T.B.--or, as everybody calls him, Tom Potter--sits for
Rochdale; he was the life-long friend, and for years he has been the
political successor of Cobden in the representation of Rochdale, and he
is likewise the founder and the President of the Cobden Club. Every man
has his weakness, and the weakness of Mr. Potter is to always occupy the
first seat on the third bench above the Gangway. Everyone loves the
good, kindly old man, the survivor of some of the fiercest conflicts of
our time, and everybody is willing to give way to him.
Pages:
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35