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    the lacebuttons braid of the perfectlrel...

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    TRIUMPH OF THE OPPOSITION IN PttANCE. Bi...

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    THE ITALIAN INSURRECTIONS. As yet we can...

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    The Couf Tt Bully In Parliament. Whetheb...

    that he should not betray his contempt for the House of Commons , or allow his whippers-in to boast so shamelessly of ' those rank majorities which swarm from the hive of the Treasury , and blacken the seats of the Senate . ' The country will tire of . his vulgar clarion , and ask what have been the works of a Minister whose mouth is in every mans ear , but whose policy is a blank , and whose supporters constitute a voiceless , shapeless , ana senseless mass . _ ' .

    The Court Bully came down to Parliament at the opening of the session , and told the liberals-that he would postpone political reform , in order , that he might clear off a large account of necessary practical improvements . His would be a government of conscientious administration and careful economy . It is no such thing . Lord Palmebston defends every job , and insults those who endeavour to explode it . When a member of

    Parliament states a grave question seriously , Lord Palmebston ' hopes he has had his swing , ' and takes his own swing in a tone of triumph and defiance very painful to his friends , and most offensive to those who sit around him . We knew that this year the Cabinet would have do policy , postpone reform , oppose the ballot , and shirk the property qualification question ; but where is the retrenchment that was promised , and what if the House of Commons were to be

    bullied into silence by the Minister ? Is a politician elected by a great constituency that he may sit in Parliament , cross his hands upon his knees , and not annoy the Premier ? Is debate ' haggling , ' and economy ' boggling ? ' Is a motion of Lord Paxmerston ' s clenched fist equivalent to half the argumeats in a spirited debate ? Perhaps the noble Lord is a consumer of hasheesh , and mistakes himself for a bully in a brigadier ' s uniform quelling a mutiny . The House of Commons

    is composed sufficiently often of ' a mob of gentlemen who vote with ease , ' but a corrupt and contumacious Minister may go too far . Lord Palmerston has begun to lose his hold upon the House of Commons ; he had packed one of the most obsequious majorities that ever aped the attitudes of independence , but his supporters are falling away ; he has been beaten six or seven times within , a fortnight , and from the day on which

    Mr . Hatter gave yent to his oleaginous chuckle— ' something like a House '—there has been reckless trading on the part of the Government . Even the Liberal party will throw a Minister who antics too freely in the saddle ; and if Lord Palmebstoit cannot school himself into decency , if not dignity , he may find before another session opens that the occupation of n Court Bully is gone , and that there are meu in . the House who will not be ridden down by a political dragoon .

    The Lacebuttons Braid Of The Perfectlrel...

    the lacebuttons braid of the No . 381 , July 11 / 1857 . 1 THE . LEAPEB . : 661 I— m t t ¦* 1 ¦ I 1 ' ¦ t . ? J Q ¦* J _ l _ _

    Triumph Of The Opposition In Pttance. Bi...

    TRIUMPH OF THE OPPOSITION IN PttANCE . Bight millions of votes were claimed for Louis Napoleon in 1852 . In 1857 he claims five millions . Confessedly , then , he has lost three millions of supporters . In Paris , five nrrondissements out of ten return Opposition candidates , and this is done in spite of tremendous pressure

    exercised upon the constituencies . The second elections took place under every possible circumstance of discouragement . The press had been ' warned' into almost total silence . A foray had been made among the ten or twelve thousand votera in receipt of relief from charitable institutions , and they were driven to the balloting urns with Government bulletins in their lands . Every official was raked out of his bureau ; not a single person

    wearing , , or Empire was left unsolicited—that is to say , uncoerced . Yet , in the three undecided circumscriptions an absolute majority was obtained by the Republican candidates , and this completes the verdict of Paris condemnatory of Loxris Napoleon ' s usurpation . The effect of the demonstration has been such that the insincere critics of the French Government in England have suggested to Louis Napoleon that he must effect another coup d ' etat , and abolish parliamentary institutions altogether . This , then , is to be the crown of the edifice . The elect of eight millions , seeing the eight reduced to five , and the educated classes dead against him , is to repudiate the principle of election and to become a French Mogul . Nothing could be more consonant with his system . He is an Emperor of Zouaves , and without an army of Algerian mercenaries would not remain . Emperor for a day . It is the misfortune of —

    France that her new sort of despotism is accompanied by a show of universal suffrage and representation . The show having been converted into a reality in Paris and the leading towns , we hear a proposal to ' take away that bauble , ' that Cavaignac and Cabnot may not stand too near the throne . Louis Napoleon

    may well be alarmed , by the prospect of standing face to face with the five distinguished Liberals , Cavaiqnac , Carnot , Goudchaux , Olivier , and Dabimon , at the head of a small but brilliant phalanx from the provincial cities . Angers , though infested by the imperial police , polls more than four thousand votes for the Opposition to less than two thousand for the Government .

    This is the beginning of the beginning , if not of the end . We would ask the original believers in ' the [ Imperial Infant' what they think of his dynastic expectations ? At what price might that reversion be purchased ? It is difficult for Englishmen to conceive the violence that has been practised by the Government , in order to influence the second Paris elections and regain the ground lost in the first . A vast number of arrests were

    made , upon no colourable pretexts whatever . Every possible expedient was put in action to prevent the distribution of bulletins in the banlieue . Two gentlemen of high character , M . Catalan and M . Fbebebic Mobin ( who has been imprisoned three times on political charges ) , were arrested for circulating the JEstafette , although its language has been indifferent and feeble . But it was in the provinces that the Government let loose its most rabid and reckless

    mercenaries . The law was violated without concealment by mayors , prefects , and magistrates of all descriptions . At Cadillac , in the department of the Gironde , a respectable citizen was arrested for endeavouring to placard the walls with the name of a Liberal candidate , and for distributing bulletins . At Fert 6 Mac 6 , in the Oise , a voter , supposed to be influential , was dogged during the two days of the election by two armed soldiers . At St . Etienne , where M . PisLLETANand M .

    Sain were the Opposition candidates , the latter was subjected to persecution and menaces almost incredible ; he was threatened with arrest ; five police agents followed him to the theatre ; hia most intimate friends dared not speak to him in public , and even feared to visit him . frequently , when the peasantry arrived with their bulletins ready , the police said , " Those bulletins are good for nothing j hero are others . " Thousands who would have

    abstained were warned to vote under vague threats of the most terrible consequences . Those facts we state simply , without attempt to enhauce their force ; out the statements

    are perfectly reliable , and are no more than illustrations of others which the Times , the Daily News , and all respectable daily and weekly journals in England have admitted to be true . Not one among our contemporaries , possessed of the least character or iufluence , has denied or doubted that Louis Napoleon makes use of these methods of coercion . And yet the eight millions have diminished to five . There is an independent Opposition in the Chamber . The Times affirms that the Empire cannot coexist with a real parliamentary Opposition . One must be crushed . If the Opposition , for how long ? If the Empire , how soon ? — . — — — 1 *— . li ' 1 « ^ - " - ' •

    The Italian Insurrections. As Yet We Can...

    THE ITALIAN INSURRECTIONS . As yet we cannot assume ourselves to be in possession of all the facts connected with the unsuccessful insurrection which has just put all the governments of Italy on the qui vive . Judging from what We do know , however , the conspiracy seems to have been more important , directed to larger objects , and conceived on a grander scale , than any other since 1848 . We wish we could say that the means had been in any way proportioned to the end—in other words , we wish we could absolve the

    conspirators from rashness and reckless exposure of human life . However ungenerous it may appear to say so , all these attempts must be judged of to a certain extent by the success that attends them . Failure not only entails death , imprisonment , or exile , on honourable and enthusiastic men : it strengthens the hands of the odious and degrading tyrannies intended to be overthrown . King Bomba , and the Pope , and the Grband Duke , may have been troubled for awhile . They are now at ease , and can revel undisturbed in the pleasures of vengeance .

    No one can deny that the scheme of the conspirators- —we prefer not to follow our contemporaries , and assume that M . Mazzini is the only man interested in revolutionizing Italy—the scheme , we say , was certainly bold , and all its details seem to have been well considered . But the means of execution were so disproportioned , that were it not for the blood already shed , and the blood that will have to be shed in almost every Italian city , f rom Turin to Palermo , the sense of the ridiculous

    would painfully force itself upon us . Arms seem not to have been wanting , but , from some mysterious circumstance there were no men to wield them . In every direction where the forlorn hope of Liberalism showed itself , it was unsupported , and was shot down , or dispersed with comparative ease . Are we to infer from this , that in no part of the Italian peninsula oppression is so goading as to have prepared the people for revolt ; or must we not rather suppose that fear of Austria and France weighs too heavily ou

    the minds of the masses r * It is possible , if the hints that have come from Paris are to be relied on , that the firafc blow was to have been struck in the real stronghold of arbitrary power . , We can easily understand that any rising in Franco , in whatever way brought on , would be the signal for risings everywhere in Italy and throughout Europe . But would it not be more prudent to wait for news from the centre , and not act on the supposition of a

    success which the doctrine of chances forbids us to expect ? There is certainly something very threatening in tho aspect of Paris at the present moment . We hear talk of a now coup d'ktat—which would , perhaps , not bo much blamed by government journalists on this side of the water . Bub a new eaup dUat is the unknown ; and might b »? followed by a dead calm or a tempest , according to the action of laws which have not yet been ascortaiuod . Such bping the position of affaire , it

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), July 11, 1857, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11071857/page/13/