17.1

MR. ROBBOCK'S ATTACK.

263

otside, and to be raising the public opinion of constituencies
to an inconveniently strong pitch. Cobden. was scarcely
wllowed to explain what he had really said to Mr. Roebuck.
It was simply this :— If you justify Lord Brougham in
this attack on the ministers who attend the conference of
the Anti-Corn Law League, you will get into trouble at
Bath, and you will be considered the opponent of that body,
and you will have your Anti-Corn-Law tea parties, and some
embers of the League visiting Bath. So far from wishing
bo see Mr. Roebuck out of Parliament,” Cobden concluded,
“he is the last man I should wish to see removed from the
seat which he now holds.”

1843.

“siz. 39.

Cobden’s own remarks on this unhappy evening are
better than any that an outsider can offer. To his brother
Frederick he wrote as follows :—
“The affair of last Friday seems to be working more
and more to our advantage. It has been the talk of everybody
 here, from the young lady on the throne, down to
the back-parlour visitors of every pot-house in the metro-Polis,
 And the result seems to be a pretty general notion
that Peel has made a great fool of himself, if not something
Worse. He is obliged now to assume that he was in earnest,
for no man likes to confess himself a hypocrite, and to put
Up with the ridicule of his own party in private as a coward.
Lord —— was joking with Ricardo in the House the
Other night about him; pointing towards Peel as he wag
leaning forward, he whispered, ‘ There, the fellow is afraid
Somebody is taking aim at him from the gallery.” Then
the pack at his back are not very well gatisfied with them-Selves
 at having been so palpably dragged through the mud
b him, for they had evidently not considered that I was
threatening him. Indeed the fact of their having called
for Bankes to spesk after I sab down, and whilst Peel was