Page:English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the nineteenth century.djvu/390

 had rather a facility for getting himself into trouble. There was much excitement in and out of the House with reference to the additional grant to Maynooth College. In the course of the debates, Sir James Graham retracted an expression which he said had fallen from him in the heat of debate, viz. that concession in favour of Ireland had reached its utmost limit, and hoped that his actions had proved better than his words. Among the subsequent cartoons by Leech, he figures as Peel's Dirty Little Boy. "Drat the boy," says Dame Peel (as she chastises him), "he's always in a mess." Towards the close of the debate two remarkable speeches were delivered by Lord John Russell and Sir Robert Peel, both of whom concurred in the necessity of a conciliatory policy towards Ireland. This rapprochement between the two leaders of the opposite camps, and the leanings of Sir Robert in the direction of a Liberal policy, are referred to in Leech's cartoons of How do you Like the New Whig? and the Premier's Fix (Peel between Free Trade and Protection), the last borrowed from one of Cruikshank's drawings. The Railway Juggernaut of 1845 (also suggested by Cruikshank's well-known etching), refers to the then mania for dabbling in railway shares.

Between the two stools of Free Trade and Protection, Sir Robert, as might have been anticipated, ultimately fell through; an event which is chronicled in vol. x., the idea in this instance being taken from the celebrated drawing in the late Mr. Clarke's "Three Courses and a Dessert," the cartoon of Peel driving the vehicle of Protection, which has broken down, bearing the title of The Deaf Postilion. A change of ministry took place in 1846, little Lord John replacing Sir Robert Peel as "First Lord of the Treasury." He cuts an amazingly queer figure (in vol. xi.) in the ex-premier's huge hat, vast coat, and voluminous waistcoat and inexpressibles. Little Lord John was an enduring subject of Punch's satire during that statesman's somewhat unsatisfactory political career, and Leech was never weary of comparing him with his far more brilliant and able contemporary. Here we have the pair figuring as Dombey and Son (Dombey being Sir Robert, and the son Lord John),