to task for this indiscretion hugely delighted the House of
Commons.

[Illustration: MR. LOWE.]

"Sir," snapped Mr. Lowe, "my recent speech at Retford contains nothing
relating to you. I must therefore decline to answer your questions."

That would have shut up some men. It had the effect of inciting Mr.
Charles Lewis to further action. He brought forward a motion for a
return setting forth the text of the oath of Privy Councillors,
explaining that he desired to show that Mr. Lowe had, in the disclosure
made, violated his oath. There followed an animated and angry scene.
Disraeli, whilst dealing a back-handed blow at the inconvenient friend
behind him, struck out at his ancient enemy, Lowe, whose statement he
said was "monstrous, if true." He added that he was permitted to state
on the personal authority of the Queen it was absolutely without
foundation.

These are some of the episodes writ large in a notable Parliamentary
career. Their range shows that Mr. Lewis was a man of high, if
ill-directed, capacity. No mere blunderer could have stirred the depths
of the House of Commons as from time to time he did. He was, in
truth--and here is the pity of it--a man of great ability, an admirable
speaker. If his instincts had been finer and his training more severe he
would have made a position of quite another kind in Parliamentary
annals. Vain, restless, with narrow views and strong prejudices, he was
his own worst enemy. But he will not have lived in vain if new members,
entering the House from whatever quarter, sitting on whichever side,
will study his career, and apply its lesson. His character in its main
bearings is by no means unfamiliar in the House of Commons. It was his
special qualities of courage and capacity that made him so beneficially
prominent as an example of what to avoid.

CABINET SECRETS.

Amongst the characteristics of the present Government that make them in
Ministries a thing apart is the almost total absence of the air of
mystery that, through the ages, has enveloped Cabinets and their
consultations. Never in times ancient or modern was there on the eve of
a new Session so little mystery about the intentions of the Government.
There was still practised by the morning newspapers the dear old farce
of purporting to forecast the unknown. On the morning that opens the new
Session there appears in all well-conducted morning papers an article
delivered in the style of the Priestess Pythia in the tem