This was one of the semi-official denials which are generally regarded as the best testimony to the truth of the report denied.
[Sidenote: Mr.Morley.] If one were on the look-out for dramatic and instructive contrast in the House of Commons, one could not do better than study Mr.Morley and Mr.
Chamberlain for a week.

Mr.Chamberlain--glib, shallow, self-possessed, well-trained by years of public life--debates admirably.

Nobody can deny that--not even those who, like myself, find his speaking exasperatingly empty and superficial and foolish.

He is master of all his resources; scarcely ever pauses for a word, and when he is interrupted, can parry the stroke with a return blow of lightning-like rapidity.

But when he sits down, is there any human being that feels a bit the wiser or the better for what he has said?
And who can get over the idea that it has all been a bit of clever special pleading--such as one could hear in half-a-dozen courts of law any day of the week?
And, finally, who is there that can help feeling throughout all the speech that this is a selfish nature--full of venom, ambition, and passion--seeing in political conflict not great principles to advance--holy causes to defend--happiness to extend--but so many enemies' faces to grind to dust?
Mr.Morley is a fine platform speaker, but as yet he is not nearly as good a debater as Mr.Chamberlain.He stumbles, hesitates, finds it hard often to get the exact word he wants.