Note 24 — POLITICAL SONGS AND SQUIBS.

Mr. Creevy, on bringing forward a motion for the reform of the Board of Control, March 16, 1822, took occasion to observe: "It happened that he had himself been Secretary, once upon a time, to this Board; during the thirteen months he was there, there was no board at all that he ever saw. His right honourable friend (Mr. Tierney) sat in one room, himself in another, and the gentlemen commissioners in a third. * * * He must also state, that during all the time he was there, there was not business enough for the situation." An admission which elicited the following sarcasm from Mr. Canning. "It seemed," said the latter, "a little extraordinary, that the idle secretary should be the person who called for such an inquiry. This was reform with a vengeance. This was no unfaithful picture of those principles on which reform was usually clamoured for. If they traced the principles of those who raised that clamour to their source, it would be found that habites rem confitentem, and that, nine times out of ten, the evil existed only when the clamour was raised. It was beyond his hopes that any Hon. Gent. should be so blinded by his fancies as to come forward with such a notice under such circumstances, crying aloud, 'Me, me, adsum qui (non) feci!' I am the man who did nothing; and I now call upon you to inquire why those men associated with me, and who were diligent, failed to follow my example."—Barham.