Issue

Contents

Date

By-line

Page/Cols.

1369

New session. Resignation of previous Speaker (Denison), election of new (Brand); reflections on changes under Denison’s 15 years; report of Lord Mayo’s assassination (formerly Lord Naas); Royal Park & Gardens Bill (political meetings in); Regulation of Mines Bill; Education (Scotland) Bill

February 14

1872

Sketches in Parliament I

174 cols. 1,2

1370

First ‘ecclesiastical Wednesday’ of session; Burials Bill debate (Nonconformist burial and Anglican churchyards); Thursday Ballot Bill, Public Parks Bill; Friday Private Members Bills; Monday appointment of Lord Chancellor, Gladstone’s speech   [INCOMPLETE]

February 21

1872

Sketches in Parliament II

197 col. 3 – 199 col. 1

1371

Game laws debate; Marriage with Deceased Wife’s Sister’s Bill; Thursday last, miscellaneous minor debates, Royal Parks and Gardens Bill; Friday, Indian affairs; Monday, Mr Forster, Education Act debate (disadvantage to Nonconformists)

February 28

1872

Sketches in Parliament III

222 cols. 1,2

1372

[‘The education Debate’, possibly not by WHW] Forster’s Education Act, opposition by Mr Dixon, long debate on religious instruction, denominational issues, Nonconformist objections

March 7

1872

Sketches in Parliament (index title)

244 cols. 1,2,3 – 245 cols. 1,2

1372

[‘Tuesday Night in the Commons’, possibly not by WHW] Education debate; R.W. Dale and other Nonconformist leaders in gallery; speeches of Messrs. Dixon, Henry Richard, Forster, Liddell, Backhouse, Corrance, Auberon Herbert, Lord Robert Montague, Leatham, W. H. Smith, Lyon Playfair, Fawcett, Mitchell Henry and Greene; vote

March 7

1872

‘From the Reporters’ Gallery’  [WHW?]

246 cols. 1,2,3

1373

Scotch Education debate; appointment of Mr Homersham Cox to County Court judgeship in Wales; Monday, in Committee, Estimates (on military spending)

March 13

1872

How it strikes a stranger

279 cols. 1,2,3

1374

[‘Mr Baxter and His Assailants’]Debate over alleged corrupt payments between Admiralty and Baxter Brothers of Dundee over supply of canvas; question of Sir John Hay; speech by Mr Childers; reflections on public morality

March 20

1872

By a stranger

301 col. 3 – 302 cols. 1,2

1375

[‘Mr Gladstone and the Irish University Question’] Mr Fawcett’s bill for reform of Trinity College, Dublin; abolition of religious tests to allow Catholic attendance; Gladstone’s speech; character sketch of Gladstone

March 27

1872

By a stranger

326 cols. 1,2,3

1376

[‘A British Fast’] Parliament adjourned. Good Friday; to Crystal Palace (too wet for ‘what I usually do on Good Fridays’ – walking?); crowds; attractions; sacred / secular aspects; reflections on (1) fasting – un-English and undesirable (2) on Good Friday – should be abolished – sombre events not to be ‘celebrated’ by a holiday (3) end ‘empty homage’ to religion in false notions of the ‘sacred’

April 3

1872

‘By our Parliamentary Correspondent’ [WHW?]

350 col. 3 – 351 col. 1

1377

Not available

April 10

1872

Reports from Parliament – no by-line

NOT COPIED

1378

Debates on the ballot; tedium of debate; secret voting; speech by Mr Cavendish Bentinck; Gladstone’s response; pointless wrangling; return of Bright

April 17

1872

How it strikes a stranger

406 cols. 2,3 – 407 col. 1

1379

Debate of previous Thursday; Mr Leatham’s amendment on compulsory voting secrecy; Conservative opposition heavily whipped; Mr Forster’s poor speech for Government; criticism of Mr Vernon Harcourt; closing speech by Gladstone; vote and govt. defeat; forthcoming motion by Mr Miall

April 24

1872

How it strikes a stranger

430 col. 3 – 431 cols. 1,2

1380

Mr Fawcett speech on his bill for reform of Trinity College, Dublin; attack on govt.; determination to press on with his bill; speech of Mr Bouverie, attack on Gladstone; Gladstone’s reply; Monday, Prince Imperial in strangers gallery

May 2

1872

How it strikes a stranger

457 col. 1 – 458 cols. 1,2

1381

Passage of the Ballot Bill; debate and speeches; changes to Parliamentary procedures; report of Mr Dowse’s speech on female franchise; Monday, Scotch Education Bill

May 8

1872

How it strikes a stranger

490 cols. 1,2,3

1382

House abandons late start normal on Ascension Day; opposition of Beresford-Hope and Gladstone; discussion ridiculed; Ballot Bill; debate; speaker’s styles; Alabama claim, Gladstone’s statement; recollection of preacher’s advice; presence of Belgian King

May 15

1872

How it strikes a stranger

517 cols. 2,3 – 518 col. 1

1383

Order Book of forthcoming subjects; indignation of writer over plans for roads through great London parks, only quiet places for the poor; how (badly) the House conducts business

May 22

1872

How it strikes a stranger

550 col. 3 – 551 cols. 1,2

1384

Demonstration at Bradford; reflections on Bradford Tories choice of candidate; Miall the Liberal member for Bradford; Monday, Sir Stafford Northcote on Alabama claim; speeches by Disraeli and Gladstone

May 29

1872

How it strikes a stranger

574 col. 3 – 575 col. 1

1385

Appeal of Lord Garlies on military discipline; Ballot Bill debate; Act of Uniformity Amendment Bill (from Lords); dispute over Parliament and Convocation rights in liturgical changes; Gladstone’s speech; vote, govt. victory with Conservative support; Gladstone’s unintelligibility in Alabama claim debate; Act of Uniformity Amendment Bill again

June 5

1872

How it strikes a stranger

597 col. 3 – 598 cols. 1,2

1386

Tichborne case questions; Alabama claim; Gladstone’s statement; Scotch Education Debate; Portsmouth dockyard, M.P’s reflect naval work put there; Monday, debate on estimates; financial controls

June 12

1872

How it strikes a stranger

622 cols. 1,2,3

1387

Alabama claim; Scotch Education Bill; petition presented by Lord Mayor of Dublin; continuation of Claim debate, speeches of Mr Corrance and Lord Bury; clerks mistake in Notice

June 19 1872

How it strikes a stranger

646 cols. 1,2,3

1388

Quorum questions; Mr Newdegate; scorn of writer at his speech; Scotch Education Bill; Mine’s Regulation Bill; Monday, Army Estimates; Holms speech; Colonel Loyd Lindsay; shortcoming of metropolitan militia regiments

June 26

1872

How it strikes a stranger

670 cols. 2, 3 – 671 col. 1

1389

Alabama claim; arbitration result and final settlement; Mr Miall’s motion; fine speaker; ‘writing [this]at nine o’clock in the morning after sitting up half the night’

July 4 (Thur)

1872

How it strikes a stranger

694 cols. 2,3 – 695 col. 1

1390

Question of Mr Robertson on disturbance caused by Guards firing in Hyde Park, disturbing morning riders; Mines Regulation Bill; mine owners interest predominating; Jamaica and Governor Eyre, reports

July 10

1872

How it strikes a stranger

722 cols. 1,2,3

1391

Contagious Diseases Bill but inquorate House; Mr Stanhope, new Conservative member for West Riding takes seat; reflections on his election and ambition; Licensing Bill; Health Bill; Monday, Naval Estimates; procedural wrangling

July 17

1872

How it strikes a stranger

746 cols. 1,2,3

1392

Latest night sitting of session; Mr Stacpool on desirability of a royal residence in Ireland; Gladstone’s brief reply; Sir Thomas Bateson on possible resignation of Lord Lieutenant of Leitrim (Lord Granard); Sir Selwin-Ibbetson on the Licensing Bill; Public Health Bill; Church Seats Bill ( a ‘marvel’ to the ‘non-ecclesiastical’ writer), on free and let sittings in Anglican churches; Monday, Contagious Diseases Act (writer present ‘but declines to touch the subject in this column’)

July 24

1872

How it strikes a stranger

769 col. 3 – 770 col. 1

1393

Debate on Judge Keogh; Irish petitions for his removal; Mr Butt’s speech; Monday, Colonel North and Mr Bowring’s pension (Governor Eyre affair); Navy Estimates

July 31

1872

How it strikes a stranger

794 cols. 2,3 – 795 col. 1

1394

Public Health Bill; Mr Knight’s speech, style; Monday, visit of General Sherman; dreary end of session atmosphere

August 7

1872

How it strikes a stranger

818 cols. 1,2,3

1395

Appropriation Bill (finances); dispute over Dr Hooker at Kew Gardens; Sir John Lubbock speaking for Hooker; Mr Osborne’s tedious humour; Mr Bromley Davenport’s attack on Mr Ayrton (First Commissioner), contrived style; Keogh debate, full House, Irish interest; Black Rod brings summons to Lords; end of 1872 session [short column follows on ‘Facts for Reformers’ – House has too many ‘warlike’ members, wars and military spending must be cut. Not by WHW?]

August 14

1872

How it strikes a stranger

842 cols. 1,2,3

1396

House not sitting. Reflection on Liberal Party programme for 1868; Liberal members becoming all alike, rich, dull, ‘safe’; ‘personal representation’ the answer, not party men; report of the Rivers Pollution Committee, industrial pollution of rivers; a walk in the country and reflections on ‘the power of the Established Church in country places’, rich parson existing on ten minute sermons and good living; strong influence, status means no cause or reform possible without his support; Mr Childers temporarily transferred to Duchy of Lancaster, needed at Admiralty again; Mr Goschen has ‘not given much satisfaction there’; improvement badly needed

August 21

1872

How it strikes a stranger

865 col. 3 – 866 cols. 1,2

1397

Further reflections on ‘personal representation’; instance of Mr Cavendish Bentinck, problem of getting private bills through; parliamentary procedures, too much talk; break up of parties, small differences between them; example of last Bedfordshire election, candidates only disagreement over disestablishment; Scotch Registrar-General report on 1871 census; his complaints of increased Irish immigration; education has not suffered in Scotland, figures for children aged 5 – 15 in school; writer cautions those reading Government advertisements for ‘boy-writerships and ordinary writerships for men’; pay is terrible, conditions poor, ‘want of exercise of body and soul is an especial encouragement to a development of sensuality’; possible return to House of Sir George Bowyer, a Roman Catholic, such rarely represented, last by Lord Robert Montague; poor prospect, ‘a bigoted Papist, and nothing more’, no Catholic majority in any English constituency, every Protestant would oppose him, rightly,  ‘for he has not a single sympathy with progress’; must be a joke that he is going to stand for Marylebone

August 28

1872

How it strikes a stranger

890 cols. 1,2,3

1398

Preston election; Conservative candidate Mr Holker, Q.C.; too many lawyers in House, seeking personal gain; Holker’s election address, very poor; flaw in Act introduced by Mr Stansfeld last session on support for illegitimate children; shortcoming of Parliament in making such mistakes; why not realised by men like Sir John Coleridge, great Liberal member; writer’s mistake in accepting opinion of others on Sir John, a ‘lesson repeated to us over and over again through life - not to yield our instincts or our opinions to those of other persons unless we are quite sure that those other instincts and opinions are really and properly ours’; Sir John’s lack of interest in law reform; Mr Frederick Winn Knight on Public Health Bill, had falsely accused Mr Stansfeld of indicating need for higher taxation if Bill passed; his retraction; further talk in the provinces by Knight against the Bill; writer condemns Conservative policy ‘no policy could be more essentially Tory that that of the cesspool’

September 4

1872

How it strikes a stranger

914 cols. 1,2,3

1399

Report from Times on Preston election, role of ‘advocates of special schemes’, for / against Anti-Contagious Diseases Act etc.; difficulty of Liberal candidate; Liberal Party has achieved major reforms and now cannot unite on important issues; only personal representation can reverse ‘the invasion of slow, stupid, meaningless parliamentary mediocrity’; newspaper pieces on manoeuvres and Police reports; report of Mr Holker’s speech, his opposition to disestablishment, tempered by need to appeal to Wesleyan Methodists in Preston; Holker understands religion even less than politics; ‘a more congenial subject’ – springs in chalk downs between Croydon and Ewell; Carshalton springs at headwaters of river Wandle, written of by Ruskin; formerly cesspools, his concern for their improvement; restoration at Ruskin’s expense, fitting memorial to him

September 11

1872

How it strikes a stranger

938 cols. 1,2,3

1400

Report of Select Committee on the Game Laws, and evidence submitted; Sir John Elphinstone, Member for Portsmouth, denies any hardship caused by laws, cheapness of rabbit over beef; writer has eaten rabbit, but ‘my family of two boys would make very grim faces if they were set down with their mother and myself to a rabbit’; exchanges between Sir John and Committee on eating rabbit; Sir John was not elected for Aberdeen, where he is a proprietor, writer has talked to Portsmouth Conservative electors about him, less enthusiastic than local newspapers reports on him; Preston election,  Conservative victory; Mr Fawcett’s attack on Sir John Coleridge in last session, spur to Plymouth speech by Sir John, but still no commitment to law reform

September 18

1872

How it strikes a stranger

962 cols. 1,2,3

1401

From holiday in the ‘far West’; local Conservative newspaper report on Liberationist conference in Birmingham, paper support for established church; ‘Dartmouth Scandal’ – new vicar, of St. Saviour’s, Mr Foster, a ritualist; parishioners and churchwarden (Mr Hockin) reluctant; position of choir – in gallery as previously, or in chancel now; vicar suspends choir, closes church; Bishop intervenes; vicar forces changes, police stand by; letter in Pall Mall Gazette, possibly by Froude, calls Dissenters not to interfere; damage to church of such disputes; writer urges Church of England ‘to denationalise itself’

September 25

1872

How it strikes a stranger

986 cols. 2,3 – 987 col. 1

1402

Still in west country. Game Laws, impossibility of their repeal; House dominated by shooters; reports from Aberdeen on limited reform; Attorney-General (Sir John Coleridge) at Exeter meeting of USPG and SPCK, defending state church; influence would be weakened by disestablishment; writer disagrees; Mr Lowe’s remarks on the Thames embankment; Treasury rules, difficulty of being paid for government work; Mr Cavendish Bentinck’s speech in his Whitehaven constituency, his garrulousness

October 2

1872

How it strikes a stranger

1009 col. 3 – 1010 cols. 1,2

1403

Still in west country. ‘Dartmouth Scandal’ continues; intervention of town council, supporting churchwarden; 500^th anniversary of the church, proposed civic service; postponed by vicar, march on church by Council; service; writer’s advice to combatants; ‘harvest celebrations’ in church, S. Michael and All Angels, Exeter; great preponderance of female attenders; ‘ritualism the type of all that is exclusive, priestly, unnatural’; Game Laws, further on Aberdeen reforms; rejected by landowners; speech of Sir Archibald Grant; report from Aberdeen Herald ‘a most trustworthy paper’

October 9

1872

How it strikes a stranger

1034 cols. 2,3 – 1035 col. 1

1404

Church Congress, Leeds; reflections on state church encouraging all kinds of people to speak on religious matters; Essex Toryism of Hinckford Conservative and Agricultural Club, discussing Prayer-book and Church; speech of Colonel Brise opposing changes to Prayer-book, and in usage of Athanasian creed; Colonel Jervis on Ballot Bill, Preston election and livestock imports; likewise Parliament discusses religious matters; Colonel Jervis opposed Miall’s motion of last session; Mr Morrison, visits Plymouth, favours personal representation, deserves Liberal support; Mr Lowe and Royal Commission to investigate Irish civil service pay, lower than English; need for civil service reform (as called for by Horace Mann); writer’s support

October 16

1872

How it strikes a stranger

1058 cols. 2,3 – 1059 col. 3

1405

Registrar-General’s annual report for 1872; reflections on information therein; figures showing marriages with great age differences suggest commercial reasons, not love; Prince of Wales shooting the wild cattle at Chillingham, then pheasants, fox-hunting; writer’s horror of hunting; Stopford-Brooke (rightly) condemns pigeon-shooting marches; United Kingdom Alliance meeting, Manchester; motion of Sir Wilfrid Lawson, support for Permissive Bill, but splits Liberal vote; personal representation the answer

October 23

1872

How it strikes a stranger

1082 col. 3 – 1083 cols. 1,2

1406

Sir John Coleridge, speech in Exeter, attack on Duke of Marlborough and Bishop of Gloucester; writer opposes continued payment to Duke; Bishop had spoken against those (like Canon Girdlestone) moving labourers from one part of country to another; church supports labourers too little, now better helped by Mr Arch and his Union; ‘poor are estranged from the Church … because they see that except on Sunday the Church is estranged from them’; Church is of the rich and Tories only; new Duke of Bedford, previously Mr Hasting Russell, member for Bedfordshire; gift to open up great square before Bedford church, gift of Bunyan statue; plans abandoned for new Admiralty and War Office in Whitehall, to continue in rented houses; no need for so many official residences in locality; Lord Eliot, President of the Cornwall District Union of the English Church Union, welcomes Bennett judgement against court involvement in church affairs; writer opposes ‘peculiarly hateful’ development of ‘High-Churchism’, priest rules on religious matters, laity must accept their opinion; ‘All ritualism goes to that – the elevation and domination of the priestly class’; praise for Matthew Arnold’s Great Prophecy of Israel’s Restoration (later chapters of Isaiah with introduction and notes)

October 30

1872