ers to show a watchful constituency that they are alert;
others to get on and to get a place in the Government; others from an
accumulation of little motives they could not themselves analyse, or
because it is their habit to ask things. And a proper reply must be
given. It was said that "Darby Griffith destroyed Lord Palmerston's
first Government," and undoubtedly the cheerful impertinence with which
in the conceit of victory that Minister answered grave men much hurt
his Parliamentary power. There is one thing which no one will permit to
be treated lightly--himself. And so there is one too which a sovereign
assembly will never permit to be lessened or ridiculed--its own power.
The Minister of the day will have to give an account in Parliament of
all branches of administration, to say why they act when they do, and
why they do not when they don't.

Nor is chance inquiry all a public department has most to fear. Fifty
members of Parliament may be zealous for a particular policy affecting
the department, and fifty others for another policy, and between them
they may divide its action, spoil its favourite aims, and prevent its
consistently working out either of their own aims. The process is very
simple. Every department at times looks as if it was in a scrape; some
apparent blunder, perhaps some real blunder, catches the public eye. At
once the antagonist Parliamentary sections, which want to act on the
department, seize the opportunity. They make speeches, they move for
documents, they amass statistics. They declare "that in no other
country is such a policy possible as that which the department is
pursuing; that it is mediaeval; that it costs money; that it wastes
life; that America does the contrary; that Prussia does the contrary".
The newspapers follow according to their nature. These bits of
administrative scandal amuse the public. Articles on them are very easy
to write, easy to read, easy to talk about. They please the vanity of
mankind. We think as we read, "Thank God, _I_ am not as that man; _I_
did not send green coffee to the Crimea; _I_ did not send patent
cartridge to the common guns, and common cartridge to the breech
loaders. _I_ make money; that miserable public functionary only wastes
money". As for the defence of the department, no one cares for it or
reads it. Naturally at first hearing it does not sound true. The
Opposition have the unrestricted selection of the point of attack, and
they seldom choose