184.
Ae, 38.

244

Lir® OF COBIGEN, (oma?

tirade froma which they were suffering would receive # for
more powerful stimulus than the repeal of the Corn Lav®
could give, if Lord Palmerston had not, by a raischievor
political treaty, put an end to a freaty of commerce with
France, which would have opened new markets for al
the most heavily stricken industries of Hngland. Joseph
Hume urged that the Government should either agree ©
an inquiry, or else adopt the remedy of a repeal of the Cor
Laws. Lord John Bussell lamented the postponement of
remedies, but would leave to the Government the respo™
sibility of choosing their own time. The Prime Ministe’
followed in a speech in which he confined himself to very
narrow ground. It was rather a defence of his financial
policy, than a serious recognition of the state of the country
This provoked Cobden to make his first great speech in the
House (July 8). Mr. Roebuck, who spoke the same evenit8’
described it as “a speech fraught with more melancholy
instruction than it had ever been his lot to hear. A speec®
in the incidents which it unfolded, more deeply interesting
to the people of this country, he had never heard in his life ;
and these incidents wers set forth with great ability and
great simplicity.” As a debating reply to the Prim’
Minister, it was of consummate force and vivacity. The
facts which Cobden adduced snpported his vigorous charg’
that Peel viewed the matter too narrowly, and that circu?”
stances were mors urgent than he had chosen to admit
It wag exactly one of those speeches which the House of
Commons naturally delights in. It contained not a sing!
waste sentence. Every one of Peel’s arguments was met by
detail and circumstance, and yet detail and cirenmstance the
mosh minute were kept alive by a stream of eager and 0%
pressing conviction, Peel nd compared the consumptio? of
cotton in two-half-years; Cobden showed that for prrpos?®
of comparison they sere the wrong balf-years., Peel pd