for; but the wildest of Scotchmen has the redeeming sense and canniness of his race—­always excepting Mr. Cunninghame Graham, whose Scotch blood was infused with a large mixture of the wild tribe of an Arab ancestress; and Mr. Keir-Hardie—­speaking a good deal like Mr. T.W.  Russell—­made a foolish proposal in a somewhat rational speech.  But he was unlucky in his backers.  The Liberal benches sate—­dumb though attentive, and not unamiable.  Mr. Gladstone gazed upon the new Parliamentary phenomenon with interest, but the only voices that broke the silence of the reception were the strident tones of Mr. Howard Vincent, of Sheffield, and Mr. Johnston, of Ballykilbeg.  Now Howard Vincent is known to all men as one of the people who speak in season and out of season, when once they mount their hobby.  The other day I heard of a bimetallist who was so fond of discussing bimetallism that the railway carriage, in which he went to town every morning, was always left vacant for him; nobody could stand him any longer.  Similar is the attitude of the House of Commons to Howard Vincent.  Fair Trade is his craze.  He proposes it at Tory Conferences—­much to the dismay of Tory wire-pullers; he gets it into the most unlikely discussions in the House of Commons; and all the world laughs at him as though he were to propose the restoration of slavery, or chaos come again.  Poor Mr. Johnston only cares about the Pope, and cheers Mr. Hardie simply as a possible obstruction to Mr. Gladstone.  Ill-omened welcomes these for a friend of Labour.

[Sidenote:  Sir John Gorst.]

Sir John Gorst occupies a curious position in his own party.  He is one of their very ablest debaters; always speaks forcibly and to the point; rarely makes a mistake; and has a wonderfully good eye for the weak points in the armoury of his opponents.  He was the really strong man in the old Fourth Party combination; but somehow or other he does not get on with his friends, and has been left without Cabinet office at a time when many inferior men have been able to get ahead of him.  He has a cold, cynical manner; suggests usually the clever lawyer rather than the sympathetic politician; and altogether seems at odds with the world and with himself.  He made a bold bid, however, for labour legislation; placed himself in a different position from the rest of his colleagues; and altogether made one of those speeches which are listened to in amused curiosity by political opponents, and in ominous silence and with downcast looks by political friends.  Mr. Balfour’s face was a study; but it was a study in the impassibility which politicians cultivate when they desire to conceal their hatred of a political friend.  It is on the same side of the House that the really violent and merciless animosities of the Parliamentary life prevail.  I should think that Sir John Gorst is the object of about as bitter a hatred among his own gang as any man in the House.

[Sidenote:  Mr. George Wyndham.]