that it is proposed by this association to exercise an influence,
through the constituencies, on the House of Commons. I have not
the least hesitation in saying that I have the smallest amount of
faith in the House of Commons at present existing and that I
consider the exercise of such influence highly necessary to the
welfare and honour of this country. I was reading no later than
yesterday the book of Mr. Pepys, which is rather a favourite of
mine, in which he, two hundred years ago, writing of the House of
Commons, says:


"My cousin Roger Pepys tells me that it is matter of the greatest
grief to him in the world that he should be put upon this trust of
being a Parliament man; because he says nothing is done, that he
can see, out of any truth and sincerity, but mere envy and design."


Now, how it comes to pass that after two hundred years, and many
years after a Reform Bill, the house of Commons is so little
changed, I will not stop to inquire. I will not ask how it happens
that bills which cramp and worry the people, and restrict their
scant enjoyments, are so easily passed, and how it happens that
measures for their real interests are so very difficult to be got
through Parliament. I will not analyse the confined air of the
lobby, or reduce to their primitive gases its deadening influences
on the memory of that Honourable Member who was once a candidate
for the honour of your--and my--independent vote and interest. I
will not ask what is that Secretarian figure, full of
blandishments, standing on the threshold, with its finger on its
lips. I will not ask how it comes that those personal