mm it CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Cornell University Library DA 550.M11 1890 v.3 History of our own times. 3 1924 028 052 714 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028052714 J^ lIISTOJtY OF OUR OlA'X TIMES i-TJOJ/ Till: ACC£>S/Oy OF QCEEX Vl':rO]:l.l To THE GEXERAL ELECTIOX OF 1: \0 Ey JUSTIX McCAETIIY AUTHOR OP "TirE WJ,TERDALE NEIGIIE' '!;.■; " " Jfi" tNK.MV'i DAUC:: VOL. Ill :^y. . \ Y y E ^\' Y R K '=f, HAETER & I5U0TI!EU>. P UB I. IS II E H 3 •■<■ v3 QUEEN VIOTOEIA PREFACE The first and second volumes* of "A History of Our Own Times " appeared in 1878. It had occurred to the author that one of the most difi&cult tasks for a young student just then was to get hold of the history of our own times. , If anybody wanted to learn something of the facts concerning the reign of Elizabeth, or the reign of Anne, or the reign of George III., or the years of the great Reform Bill, there were standard books on every subject which could be got at in every public li- brary, and which indeed stood on the shelves of most men's private libraries ; but to make one's self acquainted with what had happened in the reign of Queen Victoria, there were only the interminable files of newspapers to consult, except, of course, for some special works deal- ing with particular chapters of history, such as the Crimean War or the Indian Mutiny. This was the want which the a-uthor of the History was anxious to supply, and he started upon his task with the conviction that there was no necessity for making even contemporary history a dry record of facts and dates. A third and * Composing Vol. I. of the American edition. iv PREFACE fourth volnme* were added to the stoi'y somewhat later, and the reriew of events passing within our own recol- lection was brought np to the crisis of 1880, when Mr. Gladstone, at the head of the Liberal party, once more returned to power. The present supplemental volume takes up the story at that momentous epoch. Its object is to pass in review all that has happened in the affairs of the Empire from that time until the "Diamond Jubi- lee " of the Queen's long reign ; and it is hoped that it may be found worth reading for the sake of the events described in its pages, and even apart from any interest it might have as a successor to former volumes. That it is written without undue sway of party or partisan feeling the author trusts that the general public, from knowledge of the previous volumes, may be kindly dis- posed to believe. * Composing Vol. II. of the American edition. April, 1897. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. The New Liberal Administration 1 II. The Bkadlattgh Episode 17 III. Inherited Responsibilities— and Others ... 36 "^ IV. The Irish QmesTiON 57 V. " On Fame's Eternal Bbadroll " 83 VI. "Oh! ■whither hast thou led me, Egypt?" . . 95 VII. Some Losses to the World — One Gain, at least, to Parliament 113 VIII. Reform Amid Storm 131 IX. Fall of the Liberal Government 153 ^ X. Home Rule 171 a/XI. Wrecks of Many Kinds 109 ^Lxil. "Parnellism and Crime" 211 XIII. The Year op Jubilee /. . 339 XIV. Only a Death-roll 351 -f^ XV. Home Rule without Parnell 378 XVI. Mr. Gladstone Resigns — Lord Rosebery Suc- ceeds 396 XVII. The Cordite Explosion 317 XVIII. The Eastern Question Once More . . . . . 334 XIX. Venezuela and South Africa 348 XX. Death— AND Dynamite 374 XXI. The Dongola Campaign 397 XXII. "The City of Blood" 413 vi CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGB XXIII. Pitman— Spenceb Wells — The Appeal op the Pbince op Wales 433 XXIV. The South Africa Committee 434 XXV. Blondin— Nansen— The Penrhyn Quabeies— The Education Bill 440 Index 455 ILLUSTKATIONS QUEEN VICTORIA Frontispiece JOSEPH CHAMBRHLAIN ', Facing p. 2% WILLIAM EWAET GLADSTONE " 56 LORD BBACONSFIBLD " §4 EARL GRANVILLE " Ug SIR GARNET JOSEPH WOLSELBY " 140 GENERAL CHARLES GEORGE GORDON . " 168 THE MARQUIS OP SALISBURY " 196 CHARLES S. PARNELL ■' 234 LORD TENNYSON " 253 CARDINAL MANNING " 280 CARDINAL NEWMAN " 308 JOHN MORLET " 336 LORD ROSBBERY " 364 SIR WILLIAM VERNON HARCOURT "393 ARTHUR JAMES BALFOUR " 430 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES FEOM 1880 TO THE DIAMOND JUBILEE CHAPTER I THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTEATION (In the early spring clays of JLSJ^O the Liberals, after a long exile from office, came DaBE'to power with a tri- umphant majority and with Mr. Gladstone as their leader. Mr. Gladstone found himseli confronted with the diffi- culty which meets every Prime-minister who has to form an administration suddenly and after his party have long been shut out of offic^ This would be something of a difficulty in any cas^T^'Hd we have several highly humor- ous presentations of it in some of Mr. Disrael fs novels. Must we really have this man again ? Can't we get rid of that man ? Isn't it about time that such a person was going to the House of Lords.? Would a baronetcy satisfy such another ? Some of fhese new men must come in, or there will be a row in the country. The WKps insist that a place must be found for this or that rising man, but several of the risen men imply that they won't play any more if the rising man is brought into the admin- istration. In 1880, however, the difficulty was much greater and more complicated than usual. Many changes 1 2 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TlMJSb had taken place during the retirementjof^ Mi\ Gladston from the leadership of the Liberal party,- ^New aijd^ rions responsibilities had been imposed: upon the Libera ~~sta^smen"sucoeeding to po^r by the foreign policy o their Conservative predecessors^ There were troubles ii Western Asia, in Egypt, anff^uth Africa. The Libei als had inherited a war or ^wo as yet unfinished. Somi of the men who were most necessary to a strong Libera administration were in their hearts, and according t( their repeated public professions, utterly opposed to ani policy which aimed at the extension of territory or war like enterprise of whatever kind. fOne of the first ques tions which came up to the lips of every one was, Whal will ^hnJSligJji think about Afghanistaii, and Egypt, and South A friga ? Yet, if it was doubtful whether Mr] Bright would consent to take office under such condi- tions, it was quite certain that a really strong Liberal ad- ministration could not be formed without him just then. There were home difficulties and hom e troublesjjg well. They came into the light at every popular meeting of Radicals, and were well known to all the provincial agents and managers of local parties. One fact was certain, beyond any possible question or doubt. That fact was, that the great bulk of the Rad icals had long been weary of the leadersh ip o f Lord Hartington. There~warn"othing of the born leade r about him. He could not lead^ — he could only be pushed along to do his work. He had not sought the position of leader; it had been imposed upon him. He had accepted its ob- ligations manfully, because there was no one else at hand to take them. He had done his very best to im- prove himself as a debater, and he had succeeded to a surprising degree. Prom being one of the worst speak- ers in the House of Commons he had drilled himself to become a really effective and sometimes even a powerful THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION debater. But he_could not lead. Mr. Chamberlain had publicly described him in the House of Commons as " the late leader of the Opposition/' whije he was still the titular successor to Mr. Gladstone. (^That was at the time when the Badicals...i n. coniunctioa "with the Irish Kati onalistSj we re making their great fight for the^aboli- tion~ ol flogging i n the army aBU the Pavy, and for a reform in the system of prison j^iscipline. Lord Har- tington moved forward in obedience to the goad, and did his best with the rest of the work for the time ; but a leader who will not move without the goad is not like- ly to excite the enthusiasm of his followers. /Therefore the ver y diffi calt^ of dealing with Lord Hartington only made the Eadicals more eager for forward raoVement under the guidance of Mr. GladstoneT] ^ot much in the way of forward moygnjeut . waSexpected any longer from Mr. Bright. The great popular tribune, although younger than Mr. Gladstone, was in ^feeble health and somewhat weary of battle. Moreover, he never had been an advocate of_ragid_change when once the great reforms to which he had devoted his eloquence and his energy had been wholly or for the most part accom- plishecL/ Therefore all men. Liberals or Conservatives, lojokSdupon Sir Ch a rles Dilke a nd . Mr. C hamberlain as th e two strong pillars o f _democ£afi#Jii the. ^constructed J jjberal partv. It was clear from the moment when Mr. .Gladstone took office that^_one_or _o thereof these men must have a place in the administration, if n.ot_actually in the Cabinet . Both""i)ilke and'tTEamberlain knew very well that most of Mr. Gladstone's older colleagues would do all they could to reduce to it s lowest possibil- ity the admission of the men who re presented the new Radical element in politicajLAnd social Some of the appointments to the new Ministry were easy and obvious enough. There were excellent men 4 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES ready for the posts — men who had ..£][2ved^heirwort hy service in former administrations, men who couL norHTany case be overlooked. Lord Selborne becam Lord Chancellor. He had been Solicitor-General am Attorney-General under former Liberal administrations and he might have been Lord Chancellor when Mr Gladstone came back to power in 1868. But Sir Koun dell Palmer (as he then was) could not see his way to i thorough acceptance of Mr. Gladstone's Irish Ohurcl policy. He had no objection to the disestablishment o; the Irish State Church, but he could not stomach its disendowment. He was a man full of nice scruples, He was a theological politician, the theologian perhaps predominating over the politician. Later on, when Lord Hatherley resigned office, he became Lord Chancelloi under Mr. Gladstone, and now becomes Lord Chancellor again. His name was identified with many endeavore at useful and practical law reform, and he will always be remembered among the great lawyers of this country who were as strongly in favor of progress as Lord Eldon was in favor of a stand-still. He had been accounted at one time a power in the debates of the House of Com- mons, but in 1880 this fame had become a sort of tradi- tion, the foundation of which young and sceptical mem- bers were inclined to question. It is needless to explain that there is a fashion in parliamentary debate, as there is in dress and in social usage, and it is enough, per- haps, to say that Sir Eoundell Palmer's style had gone out of fashion. But he was unquestionably a man of great ability, a man of the highest character, a man of the most exalted purpose. The' Du ke of Argy ll was naturally offered a seat in Mr. Gladstone's Cabinet. For the third time he became Lord Privy Seal. The Duke of Argyll could hardly be called a very stable politician. He had a little too much of the essayist and the small riiJ!i JNJfiW LIBERAL ADMINISTKATION 5 philosopher in him to be a stalwart political figure. But he was one of the finest speakers in the House of Lords, a master of phrase and polish and rounded sentence ; just the sort of orator that an old-fashioned French Academician would be sure to admire. Such a man Avas of value to an administration like Mr. Gladstone's, al- though even when he accepted office there were some people who thought that he was not likely to get on very well with the new Radical principles, and that he probably would not long hold his place in the Cabinet. Lord Kimberley, a safe and steady -going man, also joined the new administration as Secretary of State for the Colonies. Mr. Fawcett was appointed Postmaster- General. Mr. Fawcett's remarkable career, pursued so pa- tiently under such cruel difficulties, has been described already in this History. He would, no doubt, have been received into the Cabinet but for his blindness. It was thought impossible to accept as a Cabinet Minister a man who had to be indebted to the eyes of others for an exposition of the contents of the most confidential and secret despatches. Sir William Harcourt became Home_ _S££XfiiaEy. He had long since made up his mind to renounce a nv career that might come from his profes- sion as a lawyer. Mr. Childers, Mr. Mundella, Sir Henry James, and Mr. Dodson, afterwards raised to the peerage as Lord Monk Bretton, had places in the new administration. Mr. Grant Duff, who had formerly been Under-Secretary for India, became Under-Secre- tary for the Colonies. At that time Mr. Grant DufE was still held to be a man who had the possibility of a great career before him. He was not eloquent, and he had not the voice for eloquence ; but he was a man of intel- lect and a man of thought, and he had studied Euro- pean politics, partly as a political philosopher, partly as a traveller, and partly as a fldneur. He wrote a book, 6 A HISTORY OP OUK OWN TIMES called " studies in European Politics/' which made at the time a great mark on the minds of thinking men, and some chapters of which foreshadowed with prophetic instinct the rearrangements which would have to be made in the European dominions of the Ottoman Porte. When the war between France and Prussia broke out in 1870, Mr. Cardwell, then Minister for War, declared in the lobby of the House of Commons that it meant the French in Berlin in six weeks. Mr. Grant Duff, on the other hand, maintained that it meant the Germans in Paris in six months. Mr. Grant Duff, however, did not go so far as most people expected. After a while he gave up the House of Commons, and accepted the office of Lieutenant-Governor of Madras on the death of Mr. William Adam, once a Liberal Whip, and the only man who distinctly foresaw, and figured up, and announced in advance the signal victory of the Liberals in 1880. Mr. Forster was made Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. In the mind of English Liberals and of Irish Nationalists alike this seemed at the mo- ment a very hopeful appointment. Mr. Forster had been in strong sympathy with Ireland and with Irish- men. His father and he had rendered signal personal service to the Irish peasantry during the famine of 1846 and 1847. He was the brother-in-law of Matthew Ar- nold, whose Celtic sympathies were part of his nature, and informed and suffused his poetry. Mr. Forster had a seat in the Cabinet, for it was easily understood that he was not likely to be a mere subordinate instrument in the work of other men. One possible diificnlty in Mr. Gladstone's way was removed by the personal action of Lord Lytton, the Viceroy of India. Lord Lytton was a man of high intellect, of charming poetic and literary gifts, a fascinating talker, a delightful companion. But he was inspired by all Lord Beaconsfield's theories and THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION 7 dreams about the extension of our Indian Empire. No one knew precisely what he wanted to have done in India, just as no one knew what Lord Beaconsfield had in his mind to accomplish there. But it was clear to all reasonable men that a great Eastern empire cannot be established by talking the language of Marlowe's " Tamburlaine," or incessantly calling out, with trumpet accompaniment of hyperbolical phraseology, " Go to ! Let us make ourselves the supreme Oriental Power." Lord Lytton saw, of course, that with the fall of Lord Beaconsfield had come up a more prosaic and less peril- ous time for Indian viceroys. He resigned his post, and was succeeded by Lord Eipon. It required some courage on the part of Mr. Gladstone to make Lord Eipon Viceroy of India. Eor Lord Eipon had lately committed an offence which, in the minds at least of some influential Englishmen, was absolutely un- pardonable : he had become a Eoman Catholic. Some even of the Eadical newspapers expressed a doubt as to whether a public man who had shown himself thus out of touch with the great majority of the English, Scottish, and Welsh people was the best who could be found for such a place as that of Indian Viceroy. Mr. Gladstone, however, took no account of such criticisms, coming from friend or enemy. Lord Eipon went out to India. We shall have to speak of his career as Viceroy later on, but this much, at least, may be said for Jaim in advance — that if the feelings and the judgment of the native populations are to be taken into any account, their feel- ings and their judgment undoubtedly approved and en- dorsed Lord Eipon's administration. Except for Lord Eipon's appointment, there was noth- ing, so far, which put any real difficulty in Mr. Glad- stone's way, and even Lord Eipon's appointment did not cause him one moment's hesitation. The serious trouble 8 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES was as to the manner in which the .Eadicals of the Liberal party were to be represented in the new ad- ministration. The days of Lord Palmerston had quite gone by. The suffrage had been largely extended. The working-classes all over the country had been en- dowed with a quite new power. There had been po- litical organization and trade organization everywhere. Even among agricultural^TabbTe^ there had been, as we have seen already, an uprising of political agitation and an ordering of ranks for political purposes. No Liberal statesman could possibly fail to take account of the movement in town and village ; the movement of Hodge, as well as of Alton Locke, Kingsley's tailor (During Mr. Gladstone's retiremen t from the leader- ship of the Liberal party many per sonal chang es had been showing themselve s^ in _political life, both on his side of the field and on that of his parliamentary ad- versaries. New me n had been coming to the front — and not merely new men, but, it might quite fairly be said, ne w groupg o r sectioxig or parties. , On the Liberal side there had been a suddenafld a powerful jtram_towards advanced R adicalism. ^ /Jwo . of 'the most influential among the rising Liberals wer e Sir Charles Dilke^ n d Mr . Chamberlain. We have had* occasion to say something aBout~"STr~Charles Dilke in the second volume of this History. We have heard him avow himself a republican m theory,; and although more lately he suppressed his republicanism, he had^jieyer re pudiated it^ nor was he even supposed to have rMiounced it. He mere ly putl t- away because he was a n emine ntl y practical politician , and he saw clearly that if ever the question of a republic was to come up in the England of his time, it certainly had not come up just then, and was not likely to come up soon. He continued to be an advanced Kadical and THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION 9 to carry his Badical principles into practical action. He was a .man of g yfinit pTinity o-n^ mdomitable force of character. He was .not eloquen t' in th e richer sense of the word, for he had no imagination and ^no ^ift of "phrasing"; but he was a mos t self-posse ssed, dogged, and foriiiidn.h1 e debater, and he took care to speak only on subjects with which he was thoroughly acquainted. He had a n intimat" ^^^^1Y^qf^,'^fl?',.,^^' home politics and parties, and probably no other man in the House of Commons knew nearly so much of foreign and colonial affairs^ He had been an immense traveller, and he had travelled with a purpose. Burke spoke of Howard as having made a circumnavigation, of philanthropy. Sir Charles Dilke had made many a circumnavigation of personal instruction. No question of foreign or colonial policy could well come up in the House of Commons about which he was not able to say : "I know the place ; I know the conditions; I know the men. """He " was^ niuch at home mAsia^ Africa, America, and Australasia as he was in any of the capitals of Europe. He had carried the Red Cross of Geneva over many a stricken field. Once in the House of Commons he was speaking on some military subject. He was expressing an earnest opinion, a little dogmatic perhaps, when he was inter- rupted rather contemptuously hy a military officer, a member of the Tory party, who seemed to be annoyed at the idea of a mere civilian presuming to offer any opinion on such a question. " May I assure the honorable and gallant general," Dilke said, quite composedly, "that I have seen more battle-fields than he has ever seen." Dilke ha d put himself a t th e head of the Radical democ- ra cy of the ^metropolis, and he was looked up to with cnnfidenne a nd ^admiration by the working-men of ftrea£^ Eritain. ^S»-was on the m ost cordial terms with the Irish Home-Rule party, and avowed himself frankly to 10 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES be in fay or of Home Eule for Ireland. (Nothing could be moi-e^aturaT'foFarmairwho 'liad~seen on the spot what Home Eule had done for Canada, for the Austra- lasian colonies, and for South Africa. Nothing could be more clear than the fact that Sir Charles Dilke must be reckoned with in the construction of the new Liberal Government. The regular old-stagers of Liberal administrations were a good deal disconcerted by the look of things ; but the days of the mere Whigs were done. To most of them Gladstone seemed far too rapid and forward in his moyements ; but then it was clear that they could not do without Gladstone, and must even take him as he was. Yet it seemed a little hard to have to mtt up with Dilke and Avith Chamberlain. ^r Mr. Joseph_^haniber]§in_^was one of the strong mra^j^ithout whom the new Liberal party could not Tiope to get oiTT^Mr. Cha mber lain had what may fairly be called agreat~reputation, in its way, before he be- came a meraber of the House of CommonsJ ffitis was, however, altogether a provincial, and for the most part a municipal , repu tation. He had acquired a kind of fame as a municipa l admini ,§Jaaliflr o f^Birmingham , then, as nowToniToFthe best-managed cities in England . But he was known as a politicjan alsq^^and iie was understood to be one of the most advanced o^jidvanced Kadieals. The notion of the average Tory or WMgTnemEer of the House of Commons was that Chamberlain's main object in life was to overthrow , first the throne^ andjhejuthe altar, xir first the altar, and then the throne — the honest average Tory or Whig did not pledge himself to the exact order of succession. When Mr. Chamberlain was first elected to the House of Commons, in 1876, his very appearance, and still more his maiden speech, as- tonished most of his political opponents. They expected a Boanerges in outlandish costurpe ; t^ej found a quiet. THK NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION H Boft-,-s pokfin ,.-well- dressed, and dapper p-p.T it1fiTna,n. /Mr. Chamberlain so on proved himself to be one of the _Kee"n- est aii d most formidable debaters in the iHo use. He had a^lear, incisive Toioe. .w hich he never liad occasion to strain in order to make himself heard over all the benches ; he had a perfect self-control, and showed when interrupted a great readiness of repartee. He had none of the imagination which goes to the making of an orator, and his reading was too limited to allow him to bring up that apt illustration from history and from literature which tells so well in the House of Commons. But the whole House felt at once that what Mr. Rudyard Kipling calls "a first-class fighting-man" had been added to its ranks, and he was, therefore, cordially welcomed, even by those who most thoroughly dreaded and detested what were then understood to be his political opinions. Mr. Chamberlain, too, was a man with whom it was abso- lutelynae cessar^ for Mr. Gladstone to reckon. rSirCharles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain were great friends and alliesj /Their poljg &^jwis understood ta rep- resen t .the hi gh-water mark of what may be called Radi- calism, as distinct from Socia lism,. Even on the ques- tion of Irish Home Rule it was understood that they were in general agreement. There was a certain differ- ence, as one of the two explained to a friend on an im- portant occasion. Sir Charles Dilke was convinced that Home Rule for Ireland was a thing actually desirable in itself — that it would be for the good of Ireland and for the good of Great Britain too. /jfi. Chamberlain was for trying t o satisfy Irela nd by giving her a jull and. fair share of all the advantages which. Great Britain p.qs:-. sesse^n JuTlf airthat did not bring about a perfect union he y as prepared to go the full length oT^rome"" RuieTJ CSfith men were in constant and cordial amance the Home-Rule party in the House of Commons. 12 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES The HoTTT R Rnlfirs-a nd th ^ Eadicals had fought many a BgliiE side by side on th e »outJi AtrTcan p olicy of the Tory Goyernment^^on prison discipline, and, as has been already said, on flogging in the army and the navy. It was the humor of the House of Commons. at that time to call Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain the At- torney-General and Solicitor-General for the Irish Na- tionalist party. Therefore there was a great strength of English democracy and of Irish Nationalism behind Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain. It was believed at the time, and with very good reason, that Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain had entered into an under- standing that neither of them would take office of any kind unless one or othejLwere offered a seat in the Oabi- netj /Nothing could be more justifiable, and from every oint of view more honorable, than such an agreement. It was impossible that men like Dilke and Chamberlain couldTuSie any part in the forniing of a new administra- tion which left therising"«!adi^l£arty without a repre- sentative in the Cabme t. ^In the natural course of thmgiTt might have seemed that Sir Charles Dilke, who had been for several years in the House, should have had the first claim. But we believe it was Dilke's own desire and determination that Chamberlain should be pressed forward, i^cordingly, Mr. Chamberlain was brought into the Cabinat as Preside nt of the JBgardof T rade, and ^Sir Charles Dilke" became Under-Secret ary "^fState^for Eorejgn Affai r sH Mr. Bright consented i^fojoin the administration as Chancejjflr of the Duchy ofLancastgt- He had occu- pied the same position before. On the former occasion, as on the latter, it had been a strong wish of Mr. Glad- stone that Mr. Bright should accent one of the great secretaryships in the administration^^ Each time, how- ever, Mr. Bright felt compelled to decline the ofier. THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION 13 |His co ndition of health had been for many years a trouble to him. He could only consent to take a place which involve d comparatively little work a nd still less responsibility. Lord Granville, youthful and buoyant as ever, although in his sixty-fifth yea r, on ce more be- ca me_S ecretary of State for Foreign Affairs. / fTwo noted names were absent from the list of minis- terS;____J)ne was that of Mr. Stansfeld, who had held im- portant office before, ana wHo had been one of the fore- most of the younger Radical party in the days when it yet had all its work to do. Mr. Stansfeld's first speech in the House of Commons had won a genial tribute of praise from Mr. Disraeli, who, no matter how he might disagree with a man's political opinions, had always a genuine zeal for the recognition of rising talent. Mr. Stansfeld had held various offices in Liberal administra- tions. He had been a Lord of the Admiralty in 1863, and he resigned the post a year after because of the absurd and grotesque attack made upon him in the House of Commons on the ground of his intimacy with Mazzini. "We have already told the story. He was made a Lord of the Treasury when Mr. Gladstone came into office in 1868, and he succeeded Mr. Goschen as President of the Poor Law Board in 1871. When the new Local Government Board was created, in August, 1871, he was made its president, and he held that position un- til Mr. Gladstone's resignation in 1874. In all these various offices he obtained the credit of being a work- ing administrator of the first class. In the House of Commons he was a powerful and an eloquent debater, and his personal character was of the highest order. He was sincere, self-sacrificing, heroic, sometimes even to a quixotic degree. He had one persistent enemy —ill-health. He could not always command his phys- ical energies, and bring them to work as his mind 14 A UISTORY Of OUR OWN TIMES was able to do. Therefore he begged to be allowed to remain out of the administration of 1880. But he returned to office later on ; and meanwhile the Liberal Government then formed could count on no support- er more loyal to Liberal and Kadical policy than Mr. Stansfeld. Another man who disappeared at once from office and the House of Commons was Mr. Robert Lowe. Mr. Lowe was made Lord Sherbrooke, and vanished in the House of Lords. No assembly could have been less sympathetic to his peculiar nature and his way of think- ing ; for although he had spoken with contempt of " the people who live in those small houses," he loved brilliancy and sparkle in the occupants of any house whatever, and he found not much of these in the House of Lords. On the day when the report of his elevation to the peerage appeared in the morning papers he met a friend, a member of the House of Commons, in a West End London street. The friend asked him, somewhat timid- ly, if it was true that he was about to become a peer, and, if so, whether he, the friend, ought to congratulate him. Lowe answered, not without a certain tone of acerbity: "It is true, I am going into the House of Lords, but I should have thought you would know better than to talk of offering me any congratulation." Lord Sherbrooke never tried to make any figure in the House of Lords. His day was done. He died not very long after he had become a peer. His short-lived fame is already fading in the public mind. But he will al- ways be remembered by readers of English parliamen- tary history as one "who blazed, the comet of a season." The familiar face of Mr. Goschen was missed for a time in the House of Commons. Mr. Goschen had rendered zealous service to the British bond-holders in THE NEW LIBERAL ADMINISTRATION 15 Egypt when, with the French delegate, M. Joubert, he went out, in 1876, to concert measures for the conversion of the debt. Immediately after Mr. Gladstone's return to ofi&ce in 1880, he was sent out to Constantinople as Ambassador - Extraordinary, in order to press for the execution of unfulfilled promises made by the Porte in the Treaty of Berlin. We may as well dispose of this part of our story at once. The claims which the Porte had not satisfied, and apparently was not even thinking about satisfying, were those of the Montenegrins for the cession of the port of Dulcigno, on the Adriatic, which had been as- signed to them by the Treaty of Berlin, and the pos- session of which was almost essential to the continued existence of the plucky little State ; and the demand of Greece for the cession of Thessaly and a general rec- tification of frontier, also promised by the Tre'aty. Turkey delayed and delayed about the cession of Dul- cigno, and the port was at one time actually occupied by the Albanians, who forestalled the Montenegrins, the Turkish Government having withdrawn their troops, and making no attempt to interfere. Then Mr. Glad- stone induced the Great Powers who had signed the Treaty of Berlin to make a concerted demonstration of war-ships in the Adriatic. This "naval demonstration," . if Via ghfti]1 'l come back , into office he would J)ring in a measure to give Ireland national self-government. These reports were promptly denied. I'iiey were aeniea by more than one former col- league of Mr. Grladstone's ; but it was noticed at the time that no contradiction came from Mr. Gladstone himself. To some observers of political affairs, the fact of Mr. Gladstone's having published no denial was all but con- clusive that the rumors were true. Some members of Parliament, at all events, found nothing incredible in the report, even in its earliest and crudest form. yVTr. Gladstone had been meditating over the Home Eule question for m any years. It had been brought under his notice by events and by politicians ; and Mr. Gladstone's order of mind was not that which could deal with unwel- come subjects, as Dickens's Mr. Podsnap did, by simply putting them behind him, and so clean away. Mr. Glad- stone's mind was eminently open to receive new im- pressions. Like the hero in the "Arabian Nights," when he saw a gleam of light anywhere, he endeavored to track it to its source. Five years, at least, before the time at which we have now arrived Mr. Gladstone h ad T""""" "^'-"^Yirin tb" q"TTi tion_of Home Eule for Ireland. He had suggested to a friend that it might be well to write an article or two in one of the great London reviews, putting the case for 8* 178 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Home Eule fairly before the English public. He did not then profess himself in favor of Home Eule. His mind was far from being made up on the subject. But he thought the question was of importance enough to en- title it to be brought up for the quiet consideration of the English reading public. Mr. Gladstone had at the moment two great difficulties in his mind — difiBculties which any imperial statesman was bound to consider. /In the first place, he was not certain whether a scheme oP Home Eule could be shaped which, while giving Ireland the management of her own affairs, could yet secure the supreme and final control of the Imperial Parliament. The second difiiculty was, that he had no clear evidence before him as to the desire of the grea t ma jority of the Irish people for a measure of Home Bule.\ Mr. Glad- stone's second difficulty was easy to understand. We have already mentioned the fact that the Irish represen- tation was, until the passing of Mr. Gladstone's Eeform measures of 1884 and 1885, left almost altogether in the hands o^he landlord class and the wealthy trading class. \^he,most ardent advocate of Home Eule could not have denied, before the passing of those measures, that the majority of the Irish representatives in the House of Commons were either directly opposed to Home Eule, or were cold and lukewarm supporters of the principleJJ ^Jter the new Eeform Bill of 18841 here was a remaTkable change in the condition of things'so far as Ireland was concerned. A _ popular suffrage h ad beeq^es- tablished in Irel and, w ith the result that the genuine Home Eule party came back to Parliament 82 strong, out of a whole national representation of 103^ The Tory members, the Orangemen of the North, «ffia others retained their seats for the most part, but the nominal Home Eulers, as Mr. Gladstone had called them, abso- lutely disappeared from parliamentary life. Such a fact HOME RULE 179 as this could not but make a profound impression on the mind of a man like Mr. Gladstone. It became clear to him that the vast majority of the Irish people had set their hearts on a policy of Home Rule. One of his diffi- culties was, therefore, gone altogether. When, in 1874, after the general election which re- sulted in the defeat of himself and his party, Mr. Glad- stone spoke on Mr. Butt's Home Rule motion in the House of Commons, he opposed Mr. Butt's motion on the ground that neither England nor Ireland had made up its mind as to the principle of Home Rule ; but he took care to add that, if the principle were once recog- nized, he could not think much of the statesmanship which was not able to construct a plan adequate to such a purpose. One can, of course, only follow by mere con- jecture the working of a great statesman's mind on any subject, but it seems to us that in this case conjecture is safe enough. We have the fact, which was plain to Mr. Gladstone's observation, that Ireland, at least, was by its vast majority resolute for Home Rule, and we have then Mr. Gladstone's own declaration, that he could not think much of any statesmanship incapable under such condi- tions of framing a Home Rule measure. It was no surprise, therefore, to some political observers when the rumors began to float about that Mr. Gladstone had become a convert to the principle of Home Rule for Ireland. It appears to be certain that he did not for some time take the whole of his leading colleagues into his con- fidence. Some of them he did consult — among others, Mr. John Morley, who was afterwards the Chief Secre- tary to the Lord Lieutenant under Mr. Gladstone's Gov- ernment. However that may be, it very soon became known to the world that time and events had effected the great conversion, and that the principle of Home Rule had passed from the hands of Mr. Butt and of 180 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Mr. Parnell into those of the greatest IJTJng E nglieh statesman . Soon also it became apparent that this on- ward movement of reform was not to be accomplished without the disadvantage which has attended every move- ment of reform made by an English Liberal statesman — the falling-o2 or the revolt of a certain number of his followers who did not see their way to acknowledging his guidance any more. This was what happened when Mr. Gladstone brought in his Keform Bill in 1866. His ef- forts were paralyzed for the time by the fact that some of his ablest colleagues turned away from him, or were led into revolt against him. Even while Mr. Gladstone was actually forming his new Government in the Feb- ruary of 1886, people talked freely about this man or that man who was sure not to hold office if Mr. Glad- stone persevered with a scheme of Irish Home Eule. Lord Hartington, it was said by everybody who profess- ed to know, could never be got to adopt such a policy ; and after a while it began to be confidently affirmed that Mr. Chamberlain, too, would in such a case revolt against his leader. No one was surprised about Lord Harting- ton. He had never been enthusiastic for reforms of any kind in Ireland, and, indeed, was not given to be enthu- siastic about anything. But many persons were still in doubt as to Mr. Chamberlain. He had always been, as every one could see, the close associate of Home Kulers in the House of Commons for many years. The Home Rulers had given him their confidence, as they had given it to Sir Charles Dilke, and there was not the slightest reason to suppose that Sir Charles Dilke had changed his opinions or his attitude in regard to Home Eule. There- fore when the Government was still in process of forma- tion the public in general was expecting to hear some- thing serious about Lord Hartington; but the outer world was still incredulous ^s to the possibility of Mr. HOME RULE 181 Chamberlain's refusing to Join the Administration. The air was thick with all manner of reports, assertions, and contradictions, and to the observer who was not too deep- ly concerned in the realities of the crisis the whole state of things was one of cnrious interest. The new Parliament was opened by the Queen in per- son on January 31, 1886. The speech read by the Lord Chancellor made allusion to the agitation going on in Ireland against the Act of Union, and declared that if the existing provisions of the law should prove inade- quate to cope with the growing evils of organized in- timidation, Parliament would be asked to grant further powers to the Administration. It may be noticed in con- nection with this announcement that Lord Carnarvon had quite lately resigned his office as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. A correspondence on the siibject had taken place between Lord Carnarvon and Lord Salisbury. Lord Carnarvon, in allusion to rumors which had been going about as to the reasons for his resignation, invited Lord Salisbury to say whether it was not a fact that Lord Carnarvon had accepted office only as a provisional and a temporary arrangement, and whether he had not made it distinctly understood that his occupation of the office was to cease with the opening of the new Parliament. Lord Salisbury, of course, confirmed these statements, and spoke in the highest terms of the satisfaction which Lord Carnarvon's conduct as Lord Lieutenant had given to all his colleagues in the Administration. So that was all right. There can be no doubt that Lord Carnarvon did make the stipulation as to the limited time of his Viceroyalty ; but there can be no doubt also that Lord Carnarvon had set his heart on giving to Ireland a measure of national self-government such as the Irish people could accept, and that for one reason or another he was not able to carry all his colleagues with him. 183 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES There can be no doubt that he sought an interview with Mr. Parnell, and that Mr. Parnell and he seemed to have found a satisfactory basis of arrangement. Short as the time of his Viceroyalty was, Lord Carnarvon succeeded in making a most favorable impression on the people of Ireland. To begin with, he went about without any armed escort whatever. Some of his predecessors never passed through the streets of Dublin without a squad of cavalry to take care of them, a futile defence against some determined assassin firing with a rifle from a garret window. Lord Carnarvon walked about the streets of Dublin with his wife just as any ordinary couple might do ; they went into shops and bought things, looked into shop -windows, talked freely with everybody who came in their way, and were never molested by anybody. Lord Carnarvon had deliberately made up his mind before going to Ireland that he would go there as a free man, if one may use that expression, and would have no cluster of dragoons to protect his movements. When the pas- sage in the Eoyal Speech to which we have referred be- came known, it was impossible for the public in general not to feel convinced that there had been a difference of opinion between Lord Carnarvon and the majority of his colleagues on the subject of Home Eule for Ireland. He would, no doubt, have gone out of office about that time in any case. But if his ideas had been accepted by the Cabinet, no paragraph could have appeared in the Eoyal Speech to announce that any further attempts to disturb the Act of Union would be answered by coercive legislation. The debate on the address was of the nature of a mere ceremonial. Everybody knew that Lord Salisbury's Gov- ernment was doomed to go out of office, and it did not matter much from what hand came the coupe de grdce. As a matter of fact, it came from the hand of Mr. Jesse HOME RULE 183 Collings, at that time a strong Eadical and Home Enler. Mr. Collings proposed an amendment to the address ex- pressing regret that no measure had been announced by the Government for the relief of agriculture, and espe- cially for affording facilities to agricultural laborers to obtain allotments and small holdings on equitable terms as to rent and fixity of tenure. This was, in fact, what was afterwards known as the " Three-acres-and-a-cow " resolution. The amendment was warmly supported by Mr. Glad- stone, by Mr. Joseph Arch, and by Mr. Chamberlain. Lord Hartington and Mr. Goschen strongly opposed it. The amendment was carried by 339 votes against 350, and Lord Salisbury's Government immediately went out of office. On February 1 Lord Salisbury announced in the House of Lords the resignation of himself and his colleagues, and added that Mr. Gladstone had under- taken the task of forming a government. Presently it became known that Mr. Gladstone was to be Prime- minister, and Sir William Harcourt Chancellor of the Exchequer ; Mr. Childers was to be Home Secretary ; Lord Rosebery, Secretary for Foreign Affairs ; Lord Granville, Secretary for the Colonies ; Lord Kimberley, Secretary for India, and, as every one had expected, Mr. John Morley to be Chief Secretary to the new Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Abei-deen. To the surpi-ise of many persons, Mr. Chamberlain came into the Govern- ment as President of the Board of Trade. The name of Lord Hartington did not appear in the published list of members of the Administration. It soon became known that Lord Hartington had . positively declined t o ^ake office under Mr. Gladstone, on the ground that he jould nat -accept Jlr. Gladstone's policy with regardto a_meas:_ ure o f Home Rule for Ireland. The general expectation "more lately had been that Lord Hartington and Mr. 184 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Chamberlain would go hand in hand, whether to enter office or to back out of it. The line of cleavage had already shown itself. The question was, how much further was it likely to stretch. One other name was missed from the list of the new Ministry. It was that of Sir Henry James, who had been Attorney - General under Mr. Gladstone in the Government which came to an end in 1885. Sir Henry James was not credited by many of his colleagues or friends with any very profound seriousness of conviction on political subjects. He was considered by everybody a very rising man in the House of Commons. At the Bar he was a most brilliant advocate, and in the House he was one of the best debaters among those who did not claim to be great orators. A splendid career seemed to be before him. The exalted position of Lord Chan- cellor appeared to be waiting for him to come and take it when a Liberal Government should again enter into office. Every one who knew him liked him, but people generally regarded him as a man delighted with his own career at the Bar and in Parliament, and not in the least likely to allow his convictions on mere political subjects to stand in the way of his personal advancement. Yet it is certain that Sir Henry James refused to take office under Mr. Gladstone, when Mr. Gladstone made it known that he was about to bring in a measure to give a separate Parliament to Ireland. Even those who most deeply regretted Sir Henry James's unconquerable ob- jection to the policy of Home Eule could not but admit that be had made a sacrifice of his own immediate per- sonal interests when he declined to' serve in Mr. Glad- stone's Administration. Those who knew him always believed him to be an ambitious man, and here, at a great turning-point in his career, he had renounced the immediate object of his ambition. Only a very unquali- HOME RULE 185 fied partisan of Mr. Gladstone's policy could refuse to give to Sir Henry James some tribute of admiration for his sincerity and for his resolve. It must be remem- bered, too, that although he had some friends among the Irish Nationalist party, he had never identified him- self with them or with their cause, as Mr. Chamberlain at one time had done. Emerson once said of Wendell Phillips, who, although a man fond of social intercourse, refused to go to any dinner-party where wine was drunk, " Let us at least give him the credit of his hair-shirt." The same sort of credit ought to be given to Sir Henry James, for the hair-shirt which he put on when he de- liberately renounced his immediate chances of advance- ment because he could not see his way to accept the policy of Home Eule. Parliament reassembled on February 3, and writs were moved in the Commons for seats rendered vacant by members who had accepted oflBce in the new Ministry. Mr. Gladstone issued an address to the electors of Mid- lothian, in which he touched upon the Irish difficulty, but was still somewhat vague with regard to the ques- tion of Home Eule. " The hope and purpose of the new Government," he said, "in taking office was to ex- amine carefully whether it is not practicable to try some method of meeting the present case of Ireland, and min- istering to its wants, more safe and more effectual, going nearer to the source and seat of the mischief, and offer- ing more promise of stability, than the method of sepa- rate and restrictive criminal legislation." The House met again on February 18, and Mr. Gladstone stated that the business of supply would have to be pushed on with- out delay, as it was absolutely necessary to introduce a Financial Bill by March 22. After that date, he said he hoped to make a statement on the policy of the Gov- ernment with regard to Ireland. Then he came nearer 186 A HISTORY or OUR OWN TIMES to the point than he had done before Avhen he announced that the great desire of the Administration was to intro- duce measures of a positiye and substantial character with respect to social order, the Land question, "and the method of goyernment " in Ireland. If there could possibly have been any doubt as to Mr. Gladstone's pol- icy with regard to Home Eule, the words about the method of goyernment in Ireland must have made it certain that some great organic change was in contem- plation. By a curious coincidence, just three days before the Home Rule measure came to be introduced, Mr. William Edward Forster died in London. We haye had many occasions already to speak of Mr. Forster, and to de- scribe his public career. In private life he was a man against whom there was absolutely nothing to be said. His nature was pure, upright, unselfish, and honorable. But somehow the gifts with which his fairy godmother had endowed him at his birth seemed to be blighted in political life by the spell which the eyil-minded and hos- tile fairy had cast upon him. He had proved himself a genuine administrative statesman in his carrying through of the Education Bill of 1870, and when he became charged, as he was practically charged, with the admin- istration of Irish affairs, he went over to Dublin filled with the sincerest hope that he could do good to the country ; and Ireland itself was filled with the sincerest faith that he had come to do her good. One who since his time had much to do with Irish administration main- tained, half-humorously, and more than half-seriously, that Mr. Porster's great misfortune in Irish government was that he had not read Thomas Davis's poem on evic- tion, and Clarence Mangan's "Dark Eosaleen." The propounder of this theory insisted, with much justice, that no man ought to be sent over from England as Chief HOME RULE 187 Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant who had not thorough- ly mastered the meaning of these two poems. No man who had not done so, it was contended, could under- stand the paralyzing terror of eviction whichr haunted the mind of the Irish cottier tenant, or the passionate nationality which thrilled through the heart of the whole peasant population of Ireland. Mr. Matthew Arnold, Mr. Forster's brother-in-law, who had such a thorough appreciation of the Celtic mood and the Celtic genius, might have read and expounded to him Davis's eviction poem and Mangan's "Dark Rosaleen." But apparently no such exposition took place, and Mr. Porster failed to understand the country which he had been sent to govern. As has been said before, he became disap- pointed in the Irish people because they were disap- pointed in him, and the disappointment on both sides grew more and more acute with every day, until at last Mr. Forster seemed to have a positive dislike for the Irish people, and to the Irish people he became almost as much an object of dislike as another Castlereagh. An Irish Nationalist member in the House of Commons, and one who was not given to rhetorical exaggeration of speech, once said of Mr. Forster, in paraphrase of cer- tain famous words written about Lord Eldon, that it had seldom been the lot of any human being to have an opportunity of doing so much good as Mr. Forster had prevented in Ireland. Those who knew him, knew that he meant all for the best. Those who knew Ire- land could have told him in advance— some of them did tell him in advance — that he was adopting a course of policy which could only make all for the worst. His death was the melancholy close of what might have been a really great career ; all the more melancholy because the man's own gifts and merits deserved a much better end. 188 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES On April 8 Mr. Gladstone moYed in the House of Com- mons for leave to introduce his bill to make proTision for the better government of Ireland. Never in our time has there been so breathless an anxiety to listen to a ministe- rial statement. It was arranged that on that occasion the House of Commons should be opened for the admission of members as early as six o'clock in the morning. Many members, however, arrived as early as half -past five, and even five o'clock in the morning, and planted their backs to the doors in order to be able to rush in at the first moment when the doors were opened. A member who came down as late as seven o'clock in the morning had not the faintest chance of a seat, unless he belonged to the Government or to the front bench of Opposition. The House was so crammed that chairs had to be placed across the floor from the bar to the table in front of the Speaker. Nothing of the kind had been seen before in the present reign, and it was said at the time that we should have to go back to Lord George Gordon's famous descent upon the House of Commons in order to get such another illus- tration of parliamentary interest and excitement. When Mr. Gladstone entered the House from behind the Speak- er's chair at half-past four o'clock, he was received by the most enthusiastic cheering from all the really Eadical members in England, Scotland, and Wales, and from all the Irish Nationalist members who followed the leader- ship of Mr. Parnell. The whole scene was one not to be forgotten by any of those who were fortunate enough to have a chance of looking at it. Mr. Gladstone began his speech amid a breathless silence. His speech lasted for nearly three hours and a half, and yet did not seem to any listener one sentence too long. Mr. Gladstone's scheme proved to be somewhat more complicated than had been expected by the outer public. It had what may be described as two essential principles. HOME RULE 189 lj|he first was, that Ireland should have a Parliament of i ts own ; and the second was, that Ireland _s hodd have no representation in the ^Imperial Parliament at ^est- jiinster! in point of fact, Grattan's Parliament was to be given back to Ireland, without the narrow conditions as to suffrage, qualification, and religion which ended in the Kebellion of 1798. As in Grattan's time, so accord- ing to Mr. Gladstone's scheme IrelgjuL was to be ^ unrep - resented at Westm ^'riRf"^ Tf ^^s well known to those who came into the inner circle of politics tha t Mr. Parn ell and Jiis colleagu es had- after some consideration, given their assent to this principle. The Irish ^Nationalist mem- bers would then have been willing to accept almost any scheme which was based upon an admission of Ireland's right to have her own National Parliament. More than that, it was the impression of many leading Irishmen in and out of Parliament that it would be well to let Irishmen manage their Irish affairs apart from all di- rect connection with Westminster. Many such Irishmen thought that it might be difiicult to get the best intellect of Ireland into a Dublin Parliament, if the broader in- terests and the Imperial audience of Westminster Palace were still left to tempt young Irish ambitions. At all events, it was quite certain that the Irish Nationalist members were prepared to accept Mr. Gladstone's scheme, and would support the Government in endeavoring to carry it through. It is hardly necessary now to go into all the details of the scheme. Some of these seemed from their very an- nouncement to be doomed to failure. The Irish Parlia- ment which Mr. Gladstone proposed to set up was to be composed o f two orders, with power in either order to demand separate voting, and thus to put a veto on any proposal of legislation until the next dissolution, or for a least an interval of three years. The first order was 190 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES to consist of 28 representative peers, and 75 other mem- bers, elected for ten years by voters having a yearly quali- iflcation of twenty-five pounds and a property qualifica- tion of two hundred pounds a year. The second order — in other words the House of Commons — was to consist of the 103 members already allowed by the Act of Union, with the addition of 101 elected for five years. Now it was obvious that this scheme involved principles which certain members of the House would find it impossible to accept. The Home Eule Bill, moreover, was to be accompanied or followed by a great measure for the buy- ing out of the Irish landlords, a measure which Mr. Gladstone himself declared to be essential to the success of the Home Rule scheme. Then came up, too, the con- stitutional objections of many thorough-going English, Scotch, and Welsh Radicals to the policy of forming an Irish Parliament which was to have no representation at Westminster. Is not this, they asked, and with much show of reason, the setting up again of the principle of taxation without representation ? Of course, the several colonial Parliaments are entirely distinct and apart from the Imperial Parliament. But then, the Imperial Par- liament has nothing to do with the taxation of the Ca- nadians or of the Australasians. The desire of many friends of Ireland and Great Britain was that th e federal idea should be adopted, and that Ireland should hold the "~same relationship to England that a State o f th e Ameri- ca,Ti TTuion holds to the entire federal system — t hat is, that the State manages its own local affairs, and is repre- sented at Washington for the common business of the Republic. The interests of Ireland, it was pointed out, are indissolubly bound up with those of England, Scot- land, and Wales. There is a large Irish population in the three divisions of the greater island, and who, it was asked, is to speak up for their claims and their rights HOME EULE 191 in the Imperial Parliament if no representatives of Ireland are allowed to have a seat at Westminster ? Some of the leading men among the Eoman Catholic clergy in Great Britain were naturally anxious to know who was to look after the religions interests of the Irish Eoman Catholics in England, Scotland, and Wales, if Ireland was to have no voice in the Imperial Parliament. Many of the most sincere and convinced English, Welsh, and Scottish Eadicals, men who were as friendly to the Irish national cause as the Irish themselves could be, declared against Mr. Gladstone's measure because it loft Ireland to be taxed by the Imperial Parliament without having any representation at Westminster. Of course, there was a part of Mr. Gladstone's bill which proposed a general settlement of imperial charges. Ireland was to contribute one-fifteenth to the public expenditure in- stead of one- twelfth, which up to that time had been the proportion of contribution. Still, it is perfectly easy to imagine a state of things in which one-fifteenth might be too much to exact from Ireland as her contribution, and who was to say this in the English House of Com- mons ? Mr. George Trevelyan (now Sir George Trevel- yan), one of the ablest and most highly cultured men in the Liberal party, resigned office for that reason. As we shall see later on, he came back to hold office under Mr. Gladstone's Government when the diflSculty which oppressed so many sincere Eadicals in Great Britain had been removed. Much fault was found, too, with the principle of two separate orders in the Irish Parliament, which was considered by many impartial observers to be fantastic, and probably unmanageable ; and much fault, too, was found with the principle of property qualifica- tion. Mr. Chamberlain at an early stage of the debate an- nounced his intention to withdraw from the Govern- 192 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES ment. His ostensible reason for withdrawal was because of Mr. Gladstone's accompanying land scheme, even more than because of his Home Rule scheme, although he had by this time discoTered that he was entirely op- posed to the policy of Home Rule. Mr. Chamberlain had, in point of fact, constructed a scheme of his own for giving a certain measure of local self-government to Ireland ; but the scheme had to be given up because of the one difficulty that it was found impossible to get the Irish people to accept it, or even to take the slightest in- terest in it. Mr. Chamberlain, although a man of great shrewdness and ability, had by this time utterly lost his hold on the central fact of the whole Irish crisis. Per- haps he was too much of a business man by training to take any account of national sentiment, and, at all events, it is certain that at this time he had come to take no account whatever of the national sentiment of Ire- land. What Ireland wanted, first of all, was a distinct recognition of her nationality, and Mr. Chamberlain pro- posed to settle things by giving her such a scheme of local government as every English county and city pos- sessed. A more complete failure to understand the cardinal difficulty of the situation can hardly be im- agined. Mr. Chamberlain's great weakness, indeed, when he had to deal with questions of magnitude, was that lack of imagination which left him unable to understand any feelings but those which had to do with practical business interests. The Irish people did not care in the least about Mr. Chamberlain's scheme. An Irish mem- ber, quoting from some words of Mr. Disraeli in former days, described the scheme as "Popkin's plan." Mr. Disraeli, discussing Sir Robert Peel's scheme for the re- peal of the Corn Laws, said in the House of Commons that he had heard one of the followers of the Govern- ment declare that it was not really Peel's plan, but Pop- HOME RULE I93 kin's plan, and Mr. Disraeli added, with sudden and theatric energy, "I object to having this country con- vulsed because of Popkin's plan." At all events, Mr. Chamberlain withdrew from the Liberal Government, and it began to be clear to most people that the Home Eule measure was not likely to pass even through the House of Commons. In fact, a new political party was constructed on the ^basis of oppositian to th e Home Eule Rill. A great meeting was held in what was then Her Majesty's Op- era-house in London to uphold, as it was put, the ^legis-, IfttitvB T"''ni"ri betwee n. Great Britain and Ireland. Lord Cowper, who had been an Irish Viceroy in Mr. Porster's day, presided over the meeting, and Lord Hartington and Lord Salisbury and Mr. Goschen were among the leading speakers. Some men who had always, up to that time, borne the repute of being downright Eadicals appeared on the same platform and supported Lord Hartington and Lord Salisbury. One complaint very commonly made by the opponents of the scheme was that Mr. Gladstone had not given his colleagues of the Cabinet time enough to consider the whole question. Some of Mr. Gladstone's colleagues in the Cabinet, like Lord Spencer, for example, cordially accepted his policy, and stood by it to the end, for better or for worse. The truth is that many of Mr. Gladstone's colleagues had never been Eadicals, or even Liberals, in the real sense. Mr. Bright had pointed out years before, in a letter to a friend, when Mr. Goschen was taken into a Liberal Cab- inet, that Mr. Goschen had never really been a Liberal in principles at all, and predicted that he would one day be found a leading member of a Tory administration. The prediction, we need hardly say, was fulfilled in due course of time. The most damaging, however, of all the seces- sionists from the Liberal party was the secession of Mr. 194 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Bright himself. Mr. Bright had during the whole of his public career taken the deepest interest in the condition of Ireland. During the passion of the Crimean War he was burnt in effigy by a Lancashire mob as the friend of Ireland and of Kussia. No reasonable human being in these islands now defends the policy then pursued tow- ards Ireland^ or the policy of the Crimean War. Mr. Bright had stood up manfully for every proposed reform in the land-tenure system of Ireland. He had again and again preached the great doctrine that force was no rem- edy for Irish discontent. It is true that he had never given himself out as one who favored the idea of a sep- arate Parliament for Ireland. He had, indeed, on more than one occasion expressly declared against the idea. But he had so often given it as his opinion that every- thing ought to be done for Ireland by the Imperial Par- liament which an Irish Parliament could and would do, that he was taken in a certain sense as admitting the jus- tice of Ireland's national claim, provided that the Im- perial Parliament persistently refused to do her right. Mr. Bright's secession from Mr. Gladstone's policy had, therefore, a tremendous effect on public opinion. Up to that time, or until very lately, Mr. Bright had been as much in favor of governing Ireland according to Irish ideas as Pox himself was, and now, therefore, many Eng- lishmen repudiated the claim for Home Kule on the ground that Mr. Bright had spoken out against it. Mr. Bright later on explained his policy in a letter addressed to Mr. Caine, one of the seceding Radicals. "The action," he said, "of our clubs and associations is rapidly engaged in making delegates of their members, and in insisting on their forgetting all principles if the interests of a party, or the leader of a party, are sup- posed to be at stake." " What," he asked, " will be the value of party when its whole power is laid at the dis- HOME RULE I95 posal of a leader from whose authority no appeal is al- lowed ? At this moment it is notorious that scores of members of the House of Commons have voted with the Government who in private have condemned the Irish bills. Is it wise for a Liberal elector or constituency to prefer such a member, abject at the feet of a Minister, to one who takes the course dictated by his conscience and his sense of honor ?" Two days after Mr. Bright issued his address to the electors of the Central Division of Bir- mingham. In this address he refused to pledge himself to the principle of Home Eule, which, he said, had not been explained by its author or by its supporters ; and he added that the experience of the past three months had not increased his confidence in the wisdom of the Gov- ernment, or in their Irish policy. He repeated an opinion expressed by him in 1873, an opinion which, if we remem- ber rightly, was contained in a letter addressed to an Irish National representative, since dead, that to have two legislative assemblies in the United Kingdom would be a source of intolerable mischief; and he declared that he could not trust the peace and the interests of Ireland to the Irish Parliamentary party, to whom the Government now proposed to make a general surrender. These par- ticular utterances were not made known till after the fate of the bill had been decided in the House of Commons. But everybody in the House and out of it knew perfect- ly well that Mr. Bright had set himself absolutely against Mr. Gladstone's Home Rule policy. The effect of Mr. Bright's attitude may be fairly described as disastrous to Mr. Gladstone's bill. The constituencies in general cared little or nothing about the opinions of the Duke of Argyll or Lord Selborne on such a subject. But the opposition of Mr. Bright carried with it a weight and influence which were recognized and felt all over the country. We have already commented on the fact that of late years Mr. 196 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Bright had shown a certain estrangement from the policy of the Irish National party. He strongly condemned the systematized obstruction and the impassioned language used by many members of the party. In years far back he had often complained that the Nationalists at that time in Parliament were not nearly Nationalist enough, but from 1880 onward he complained of the Irish mem- bers because of their intemperate and aggressire nation- ality. Curiously enough, too, he sometimes complained in private conversation of the class of men who were often brought into Parliament as Irish representatives. Al- though himself of marked democratic principles, he still had the old-fashioned notion that the House of Commons is not a place for a poor man, or what is called a work- ing-man. nTowever that may be, his influence was given steadily aii9':^t rongly aga inst the Home Eule policy of ^r. Gladston e, and he renounc ed the .old-time frien'?]- ship a nd the ~?ild - time alliance a s energgiicaUyi. in his own way as ^urke had renounced the 'friendship ofFra^l fThe Home Bule Bill was doomed. It dragged TBt its length of debate, and many powerful and brilliant speeches were made on both sides. It is needless now to tell the old story in any detail. The Liberal secessionists held the fa te of th e bill in their hands^^ nd it was under- stood that unless the Irish representatives were to be re- tained in Westminster it would be impossible for the meas- ure to pass through its second readingj A curious change had come over a certain amount TJfpublic opinion since the early agitation- of Mr. Butt. The great objection then to the Home Kule scheme was that it proposed to retain a certain Irish representation in Westminster. It was then constantly asked, how the people of Great Britain could put up with an Irish Parliament in Dublin, the members of which, having settled their domestic legislation at home, without any interference from West- THE MARQUIS OP SALISBUKY HOME RULE 197 minster, were then to come over to Westminster and make laws for England, Scotland, and Wales. Mr. Butt had an ingenious scheme, by which Irish members were only to be allowed to vote in the Imperial Parliament on subjects which directly concerned the interests of Ire- land as a part of the Empire. This scheme, however, seemed rather too ingenious to bear the touch of criti- cism, and it was keenly satirized by Mr. Eobert Lowe in an animated speech which he delivered in the House of Commons. In 1886, nevertheless, the objections to Mr. Gladstone's bill were mainly founded on the fact that it proposed to withdraw the Irish representatives from the Imperial Parliament. That these objections were in a great many cases conceived in a spirit of absolute sin- cerity was made known later on, when so many seceding Liberals came back to follow Mr. Gladstone devotedly as the author of a new scheme of Home Eule which was to maintain an Irish representation in the Imperial Parliament. That, however, is anticipating events which will have to be taken in their due course as they come up. On June 7, 1886, the House of Commons came to vote on the motion for the second reading of the bill. The de- bate was wound up by a speech from Mr. Gladstone which friends and enemies alike admitted to be one of the most powerful, eloquent, and impassioned speeches he had ever delivered. Then came the division, and there were found to be 313 votes for the second read- ing of the bill and 343 against it. The excitement was not so great as had been seen in the House of Com- mons on many a less momentous occasion. The plain reason for this was that everybody knew in advance what was going to happen. The moment that the de- cision of the majority of the seceding Liberals became known to the public, every one knew that there was no 198 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES possibility of carrying the second reading of the bill. Mr. Gladstone and his colleagues took the only course which was fairly open to them. They determined on immediate dissolution, an appeal to the country, and a general election. The general election was brought to an end about the middle of July, and the Conservatives and the Liberal Unionists combined numbered 393, and the Eadicals and Home Eulers 375, leaving the Liberal Government in a minority of 118. The Cabinet at once determined to resign office immediately, without waiting for any formal pronouncement by a vote in the House of Commons. This is a course which, as our readers will remember, had been taken by Mr. Disraeli when the country declared in favor of Mr. Gladstone's policy with regard to the Irish State Church. Mr. Gladstone followed the example later on, and now once more acted in ac- cordance with it. It was a wise and reasonable policy, saved much public time, and avoided a futile parlia- mentary debate. CHAPTER XI WRECKS OF MANY KINDS The ConservatiTes of course came back into office. There was not much novelty in the composition of the Administration, except that Lord Eandolph Churchill became Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach accept- ed the office of Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. The interest of the public centred itself chiefly on Lord Eandolph Churchill. Everybody knew all about Lord Salisbury. No one for a moment supposed that he was likely to open up for himself, or for his party, any new career. The return to office of Mr. W. H. Smith was not accompanied by any thrilling expectations, even on the part of his closest friends. But the new position of Lord Eandolph Churchill was looked upon by most people as an event full of expectation and of possibility. Lord Eandolph had made a distinct success as Secretary of State for India, and people wondered what he would do when put in the very different position of Chancellor of the Exchequer. He had given the House of Commons and the public in general so many surprises that fresh wonders were now commonly expected from him. There- fore it is not too much to say that the eyes of the public were turned almost exclusively on him. As a matter of fact, he did, indeed, give the public before long quite a new surprise ; but then it was a surprise of a kind for which nobody had been looking. This, too, was char- 300 A HISTORY or OUR OWN TIMES acteristic. Lord Kandolph Churchill had tried many things, and succeeded in many things. But there was one thing he could not do. He could not be common- place. The public little anticipated that his return to high office was but the opening of a tragedy. On December 23, 1886, the outer public, and even a great part of those who were near the centre of politi- cal life, were much surprised by the announcement that Lord Eandolph Churchill had resigned the office of Chan- cellor of the Exchequer, and had absolutely withdrawn from Lord Salisbury's Administration. Up to the very announcement of the fact the common impression had been that Lord Eandolph was certain to make a distinct success as Chancellor of the Exchequer. No one before that time had given him credit for any mastery of finan- cial affairs, just as up to 1880 no one had given him credit for political capacity of any kind. "We have al- ready seen how, during his short tenure of office as Sec- retary of State for India, he had developed a faculty for grasping the whole condition of Indian aifairs which won the cordial admiration of old and experienced Indian officials. In the same way, the moment he became Chan- cellor of the Exchequer he applied his whole mind to the business of the office, and he seemed for the time to have found the true scope of his genius in the administration of finance. Just at the moment when almost every one supposed that he was aboxxt to open a new and a brilliant chapter of his life came the announcement that he had ceased to be Chancellor of the Exchequer, and had with- drawn from the Government. His way of making the announcement public was curious, and was quite char- acteristic. On the evening of December 22 he went down to Printing-House Square himself, and told the editor of the Times that he had sent in his resignation. He had before this written a letter to Lord Salisbury, in which WRECKS OF MANY KINDS 201 he insisted on certain financial arrangements being car- ried out as the sole condition on which he could continue to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. Lord Salisbury would not yield, and thereupon Lord Eandolph Churchill re- signed his office, and went to Printing -House Square and gave in his announcement. The general impression made on the public mind was that it was simply one of Lord Randolph's peculiar freaks. He was always doing something of the kind, people said, and no doubt it suddenly occurred to him, seeing how much was hoped from him as Chancellor of the Exche- quer, that it would be quite a humorous stroke of policy to withdraw from the business without any word of no- tice. "We have had occasion more than once in this history to show how difficult the public found it to take Lord Randolph Churchill seriously ; and, of course, one great part of the difficulty consisted in the fact that Lord Eandolph so often deliberately refused to take himself seriously. In this instance, however, as in others too, he had come to a se riou s resolve founded on the most serious convictions. \^hen Lord Randolph Churchill, following Mr. Disraeli, endeavored to create the part of t.lipJTnry c\ evf^nnrai: ^ >io was not nlav-acting . He had a strong conviction as to the possibilities of the work. He was filled with the idea that the Tory party could do more foj the democracy and the working-class than the Liber- als and the Radicals had ever done. Thus, too, although one of the most careless and extravagant of men in his personal and private dealings, he had become convinced of the necessity for the closest economy in the matter of imperial expenditure. All unnecessary expense, all showy expense, all braggadocial expense, if we may use that term, he was for cutting down with relentless hand. The budget which he was preparing for the next sitting of Parliament will probably be made known to the world some day, but 9» 202 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES as yet we of the outer public know nothing of its details, or even of its central proposals. All that we do know is, that it was to be a budget o f jigid economY, a nd of econ- omy exercised in the interest of the working-classes and the poor in general. The Houses of Parliament were opened on January 32, 1887, and in the debate on the address in the House of Commons Lord Randolph Churchill explained the rea- sons for his resignation of office. He announced that he had the permission of the Sovereign to give his expla- nation to the House, and then he firmly declared that he resigned because he was unable to accept the estimates for the support of the army and the navy in the coming year. There were other subjects too, he admitted, on which he was not quite able to agree with Lord Salis- bury. But these, he said, were matters well capable of compromise and of arrangement. The financial subjects, however, were questions on which he could not give way. He had pledged himself to economy and to retrenchment of expenses, and he was satisfied from his recent experi- ence in the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer that such a policy could well be carried out ; and, believing and knowing that, he could not continue to hold his place in an Administration which had made no profes- sion of any efEective retrenchment in the expenditure of the services. Mr. W. H. Smith, who was now leader of the House, made but a poor reply to Lord Randolph's statement. The substance of his answer was that if Lord Randolph Churchill could have pointed to any definite items of extravagant expenditure the G-overn- ment would have been quite willing to give every atten- tion to his advice. That is to say, we suppose, in plain words, that if Lord Randolph Churchill could have made it clear that the Government was paying twice as much for the building of an ironclad as any other European WRECKS OF MANY KINDS 303 State \ras paying, the Government would have endeav- ored to see that the overcharge was cut down. Or it might have been that Lord Kandolph considered some contractor for the clothing of the army did not give value enough for the money, and in that case the Govern- ment would have been willing to reason out the question with that contractor. But the House of Commons and the public in general knew perfectly well that this sort of difference of opinion was not that which caused the resignation of Lord Randolph Churchill. C^hat Lord Randolph Churchill wanted was a gene ral principle of retrenchmej^t. which would have kept the country out of fantastic and costly enterprises, and out of " bloated ar- maments" generally, and would have acknowledged in practice that the great strength of the Empire lay, after all, in the contentment of her domestic populations. Sir Algernon West published several years after a very interesting article in the Nineteenth Century on "Lord Randolph Churchill as an Official," from which we have already made some quotations. "From the very com- mencement of his career as Chancellor of the Exchequer," Sir Algernon West says — and Sir Algernon West ought to know — "Lord Randolph began his struggles for economy, his love for which was sincere and earnest. He determined that as long as he was responsible for the finances of the country he would enforce it. It has often been the subject of discussion, whether a man who is careful in his domestic affairs would naturally be an economist in public affairs, and vice versa. No one would ever have accused Lord Randolph of being a careful or even a prudent man in the management of his private concerns ; but his ruling idea as Chancellor of the Ex- chequer was for economy." "In a letter he wrote to me shortly after his resignation," Sir Algernon West adds, " Lord Randolph said : ' The budget scheme we 204 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES had in contemplation will now be relegated to the cata- logue of useless labor. The essential principle of any financial policy which I care to be identified with was zeal for thrift and economic reform. This was wanting, and the scaffolding was bound to come down.' It was the extravagance of the spending departments that in- duced him to write that fatal letter, which could only bring about his absolute supremacy or his resignation. No new fancy it was that dictated it. In October, 1886, he had said that unless there was an effort to reduce tlie expenditure it was impossible that he could remain at the Exchequer. Again he said, 'If the decision of the Cabinet as to the amount of the estimates was against him, he should not remain in office.' I recollect after his fall his appealing to me, and saying that I knew tliat his resignation was not the consequence of a moment's irritation, but was from his deliberate determination that in matters financial he would be supreme. This I was able fully to endorse." Lord Eandolph Churchill, then, passed out of public life an honest and honorable martyr to his own strong convictions. The rest is silence, or something, at least, which calls for not much talk. Lord Randolph Church- ill never again appeared to any effect in the life of the House of Commons. He travelled a great deal. He went to South Africa, and acted as correspondent to a London daily paper, receiving, it is said, enormous sums of money for his contributions, and making the con- tributions, very likely, rather as relief to his own mind and as change of occupation than for the sake of the payments they brought in. He came back to London now and then fitfully. He spoke occasionally at public meetings, aijd he spoke sometimes in the House of Com- mons. But the shadow of an early death was too evi- dently on him. Be had never been in really robust WRECKS OF MANY KINDS 205 health, and his way was always to put on himself more work than his frame could fairly bear. He suffered, it was believed, from some acute malady the pains of which could only be allayed at their worst by narcotics. As he had done everything recklessly, so he did too reck- lessly the travelling of his later years. Some of the speeches he made in his closing days of parliamentary life sent a chill to the hearts of the listeners. He had lost almost all control over his voice and his articula- tion, and his words could hardly be understood. The rousing, rattling orator, who once could hold the House of Commons almost as closely as Gladstone or Disraeli could hold it, was now listened to with pathetic regret and with pain. We are, of course, anticipating the close of his career. He lived till January 34, 1895. But this is not a calendar of dates, and it would be unmeaning to carry on the story after its practical interest had come to a close. There were many greater men in the House of Commons in Eandolph Churchill's own time, but there were none, perhaps, who had a career more unex- pectedly brilliant, more unexpectedly blighted. There were the elements in him of a great parliamentary leader. He mounted, almost at one step, into prominence and into power. He dismounted, almost at one step, from prominence and from power. His was undoubtedly one of the most interesting figures of our political time, and it is only just to say that all who knew him, whether political friends or political foes, lamented over his par- liamentary fall and his premature death. The first months of the new Ministry's existence were suddenly and sadly overclouded by the death of Lord Iddesleigh, who will always be better known in our mod- ern political history as Sir Stafford Korthcote. On Jan- nary 13, 1887, Lord Iddesleigh left the Foreign Office, and went to make a call on Lord Salisbury at the Prime- 206 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES minister's official residence in Downing Street. The attendants noticed that in going up the stairs Lord Id- desleigh seemed to be breathing hard and walking with difficulty. He reached the anteroom, and while the mes- senger was going to announce his name to Lord-Salisbury, who was actually waiting to receive him, Lord Iddes- leigh suddenly groaned deeply and sank into a chair. Everything was done that could be done under the con- ditions. Doctors were sent for, but about a quarter of an hour after his first faint Lord Iddesleigh was dead. He had, it seemed, for many years suffered from some ail- ment of the heart, which, although it did not necessarily threaten his life, yet made it possible that any sudden excitement, physical or mental, might have a fatal end. The feeling of sorrow for Lord Iddesleigh was universal. There was, too, a kind of vague impression — founded for the most part, perhaps, on political gossip and the talk of clubs and smoking-rooms — that Lord Iddesleigh's services had not been adequately considered in the forming of the new Administration. It was well known beyond ques- tion that Lord Eandolph Churchill, who was all-powerful when the Ministry came to be formed, was determined to have the process of what is called "the infusion of new blood " applied to the Tory Government. Lord Eandolph Churchill had made no concealment of the fact that while he admired Lord Iddesleigh personally, he did not think him equal to the task of leading the House of Commons. The only decent way of removing Sir Stafford ISTorthcoto from the leadership was to send him into the House of Lords, a process of "levelling-up" which is, of course, distinctly understood by Parliament and by the public. It means : " My good sir, your really active political work is done. You are not up to the mark any longer, even though you may have been at one time, and the best thing for ypu is to seek repose in the restful House of Lords." WRECKS OF MANY KINDS 207 Now, in the case of Mr. Disraeli the change of place brought no manner of humiliation with it. Disraeli had been for many years a most brilliant and successful leader of the House of Commons. The vigor of his mind^ and even of his voice, was wholly unimpaired up to his last speech in the representative chamber ; and it was quite natural that he should seek for some lightening of the burden of work. Moreover, it was well known that from the earliest part of his career Mr. Disraeli had made up his mind to end his life in the House of Lords. But with Sir Stafford Northcote things were quite different. He had no ambition for the House of Lords, and yet he was not quite satisfied with his own career in the House of Commons. Therefore the change carried with it a dis- tinct sense of failure. He was, indeed, intrusted with one of the most important offices an Englishman can pos- sibly have — that of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Still, there was a sense of humiliation, which perhaps some of his friends felt even more keenly than Lord Id- desleigh did himself. We all remember the story about Fox when, in one of his later fits of illness, it was in- timated to him that the King, out of his great kindness, intended to confer a peerage on him. Fox lifted himself up in his bed, and clinched his hand, and said : " Good God ! He does not think it has come to that with me yet, does he ?" Many of Sir Stafford l^orthcote's friends were made all the more angry because they saw in his transfer to the House of Lords an evidence of the ill-will of Lord Kandolph Churchill. Now we confess that, for ourselves, we cannot see that there is any fault to be found with any one who, being powerful in the forming of a new administration, tries to get the very best men for the work. Sir Stafford Northcote was not, indeed, old in the sense in which we understand old age at this time of long- living statesmen. He was not quite seventy years old 308 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES ■vvhen he died. But, then, it must be owned that he had not been a great success as a leader of the House of Com- mons, or of the Conservative party in opposition. We have made this admission already in this History, while professing at the same time a very cordial admiration for the character and the statesmanlike abilities of Sir Stafford Northcote. It was not all his fault that he did not make a greater success as a leader. He was not at any time, as it seems to us, quite appreciated by the House of Com- mons. His manner wanted strength, his voice wanted strength ; and the cases are rare indeed in which a man without strength of voice or strength of manner has been a successful leader in that House. Perhaps also he was a little too conscientious for the place. We do not mean to cast the slightest doubt upon the conscientiousness of other men, but Sir Stafford Northcote's conscience was very sensitive, and when he found that he had made a mistake he did not endeavor to brazen the matter out, but he owned to his mistake — "took it all back," as the American phrase goes, and apologized for it. The House of Commons likes to be in the hands of a man who is-, as Lord Holland said of Macaulay, cocksure about every- thing. Sir Stafford Northcote was not cocksure about anything. Por that reason, and for other reasons as well, his really great abilities were never quite appreciated by the House of Commons in general. Yet he was an admi- rable financier— had been trained in finance by Mr. Glad- stone, whose private secretary he was for a long time. He was a charming debater, though not of the more im- pressive and overbearing order, and he had a wide knowl- edge of affairs, domestic and foreign. He had borne himself throughout the difficult course of the negotia- tions in Washington arising out of the Alabama clamis with dignity and firmness, and made, with his colleagues, WRECKS OF MANY KINDS 209 the best that could be made of a Tery bad case. In private life he won the respect, the admiration, and the affection of every one who knew him. His nature was absolutely unselfish, his career was blameless. Political differences of opinion never interfered in the least de- gree with his private acquaintanceships and friendships. He was a man with many literary gifts, which, however, he had no time to turn to any advantage. His reading was broad and varied. His knowledge of classic and of English literature, while it made no pretensions to actual scholarship, was wide and deep. He had a great gift of humor, and was a delightful talker, while he never seemed to be talking for talking's sake, or with any idea of showing off his cleverness. He was intense in his admiration for the great dramatists of the Elizabethan age, and he had been heard to say that he had only one serious difference of opinion with Disraeli, and that was because Disraeli could not take any delight in the com- edies of Ben Jonson. Some of Sir Stafford Northcote's speeches in the House of Commons were very rich in happy and unexpected citations and illustrations from Walter Scott and some of the great English writers of fiction. His death unquestionably left English public life the darker for the time. His was a very curious position, which even a much greater man might not have filled to such advantage. He had to a remarkable degree the gift of conciliation. People could approach him easi- ly. He was willing to listen to a suggestion from any one, and men of different political parties in the House of Commons felt sure that if they attempted to approach him they would not be put aside by a jest as in Lord Palmerston's case, or by a blank and silent stare as in the case of Mr. Disraeli. His mourners, therefore, " were two hosts — his friends and foes;" political foes, that is, for he never could have had a private enemy. The 210 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES leadership of the House of Commons, which Lord Kan- dolph Churchill so soon gave up, may, no doubt, come some time or other into stronger hands than those of Sir Stafford Northcote ; but there can hardly come a leader of an English Administration, or of an English Opposition, who will leave behind him a purer record or a better memory than that which Lord Iddesleigh bequeathed to our parliamentary history. CHAPTER XII "PARNELLISM AND CEIME" Ok April 18, 1887, the world was startled by an extraor- dinary publication in the Times newspaper. The Times printed in fac-simile a letter professing to be signed by Mr. Parnell, and dated May 15, 1882, a few days after the murders in the Phcenix Park— a letter which, had it been genuine, would undoubtedly have proved that Mr. Parnell, if not actually an accomplice in the murder plot, was certainly not sorry that the murders had been com- mitted. It will be remembered that at the first meeting of the House after the murders Mr. Parnell had professed the uttermost horror of the crimes, and had declared his belief that the murders were committed by men who ab- solutely detested the course of constitutional policy with which he had been identified, and who had perpetrated that crime as the deadliest blow in their power against his hopes, and against the new policy which the Government of that day had resolved to adopt. The letter is enough of an historical document to be worth reproducing : "Dear Sir, — I am not surprised at your friend's anger, but lie and you should know that to denounce the murders was the only course open to us. To do that promptly was plainly our best policy. But you can tell him, and all others concerned, that, though I regret the accident of Lord Frederick Cavendish's death, I cannot refuse to admit that Burke got no more than his deserts. You are at liberty to show him this, and others whom you can trust also, but let not my address be known. He can write to House of Commons. " Youra very truly, ., Charles S. Parnell." 312 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMKS The Times explained that the body of the manuscript ■was apparently not in Mr. Parnell's handwriting, but that the signature and the words "Yours very truly" were unquestionably written by him ; and it added that " if any member of Parliament doubts the fact, he can easily satisfy himself on the matter by comparing the handwriting with that of Mr. Parnell in the book con- taining the signatures of members when they first take their seats in the House of Commons." The letter, as we have said, created an immense sensa- tion. The House of Commons was at the time engaged in a debate on the second reading of the new Coercion Bill for Ireland introduced by the Conservative Govern- ment. Mr. Sexton, one of the most distinguished of the Irish Xationalist members, opened the debate, and, with- out waiting for any opportunity of communication with Mr. Parnell, denounced the letter as "a base, manifest, clumsy, and malignant forgery." Mr. Sexton took his course on the simple ground that, from his personal knowledge of Mr. Parnell, he well knew that Mr. Par- nell never could have written, or signed, or authorized such a letter. To all political and personal associates of Mr. Parnell the letter was as obviously a forgery as if it had been signed with the name of " William Ewart Glad- stone," or "Hartington," or "Arthur J. Balfour." Mr. Parnell's friends and colleagues knew him to be a man of perfect honor, and one who utterly detested crime and outrage in any form, not alone upon his own account, but also because he was convinced that, where Ireland's affairs were concerned, " the man who commits a crime," to adopt O'Connell's words, " gives strength to the ene- my." Therefore Mr. Sexton naturally had no more hesi- tation in branding the letter as a forgery than he would have had in denying, without any previous consultation with Mr. Parnell, the allegation that Mr. Parnell had "PARNELLISM AND CRIME" 3I3 forged a cheque or picked a pocket. Mr. Parnell came into the House while Mr. Sexton was speaking, and when he got a chance of making a statement he denounced the letter in the Tiines as "a villanous and barefaced forgery." In order, he said, that his denial might be full and complete, he declared that he had never writ- ten such a letter, never authorized such a letter to be written, never signed such a letter, and never saw the letter itself until it appeared in the Times of that morn- ing. He declared that no man was ever more surprised and thunderstruck than he was when he heard of the Phoenix Park murders. "It is no exaggeration to say," he added, "that if I had been in the Phoenix Park that day I would have stood between Lord Frederick Caven- dish and the daggers of the assassins, and between the daggers and Mr. Burke as well." He declared — and all those who knew him believed in the truth of his words — that no other man had suffered more than he had suffer- ed from the terrible deed in the Phoenix Park, and that no nation had suffered so much from it as the Irish na- tion. It is not, perhaps, saying too much to add that the sympathy of the great majority of the House of Com- mons went with Mr. Parnell. One Conservative member, a man of ability and high character, declared at once that he felt no doubt upon the subject, and was convinced that the letter published in the Times was a gross and mon- strous forgery. The Times published other letters purporting to be signed by Mr. Parnell, and all written in the same spirit. Some of them were set down at once by every one who knew Mr. Parnell as very stupid forgeries, for the mere reason, if nothing more, that they contained absurd er- rors in spelling. Now, all Mr. Parnell's friends knew very well that one of his strongest peculiarities was a passion for accuracy in spelling. Of course the Times 314 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES had not said that Mr. Parnell wrote the letters with his own hand, but, to those who knew Mr. Parnell, the idea of his putting his name to any ill-spelled document was impossible to entertain for a moment. The Times had for long before been conducting a series of systematic attacks on Mr. Parnell. It had evidently wound itself up into the mood that Mr. Parnell was an- other Catiline, or, worse than that, a common enemy of mankind. It would be impossible to believe that the conductors of a journal like the Times could have been influenced by any purely malignant hatred of Mr. Parnell as a public man. But they had undoubtedly wrought themselves up into that temper which can believe any- thing, however bad, of an extreme political opponent. The conductors of the Times, many years before, had got into the same way of thinking about Daniel O'Oonnell, and had denounced him and vilified him as if he were guilty of the basest crimes that could defame humanity. No one can doubt that the conductors of the Times be- lieved that the documents they published were genuine. But there was apparently no trouble whatever taken to ascertain whether the letters were authentic or not. The letters were given or sold to the Tinws by a man named Pigott, a person who had once conducted a Dub- lin National newspaper enterprise, and who afterwards lived, or tried to live, by begging-letters and by black- mail. Again and again this man had written to some of Mr. Parnell's political associates, urging, beseeching, and praying them to get him some help from Mr. Parnell out of the National funds ; and again and again Mr. Parnell had advised his friends not even to answer the letters of such a man. As it was well said afterwards, if the cor- respondent of the Times in Ireland had asked the sentry on guard at Dublin Castle what sort of a man was Pigott, the sentinel would have warned the correspondent to have "PARNELLISM AND CRIME" 215 nothing to do with such a creature. It is not necessary to say too much about Pigott. He was a man of a class which is always appearing and reappearing in history — a man of the order of Titus Gates. There is nothing sur- prising in the appearance of such a man at the time of a great political crisis ; but the very surprising thing is that the conductors of a great paper like the Times should be taken in for a moment by so pitiful a scoun- drel. "We believe it is quite certain that the letters had been shown in the first instance to the private secretary of Lord Hartington, and that the secretary did not think it worth his while even to submit such rubbish to his chief. The Times had, however, committed itself to a series of articles on " Parnellisra and Crime," and seemed as though it were bound in honor to keep up to the level of its own assertions. "We shall see afterwards that these statements became the occasion for a special judicial commission. The articles on "Parnellism and Crime" contained the most astonishing statements, some of which might be considered as absolutely ludicrous, if the whole subject were not rather too solemn and grim for laugh- ter. One of these allegations — afterwards, to be sure, withdrawn — was that the Phoenix Park murders had been arranged by Mr. Parnell and a number of his friends at that lonely spot, convenient for conspiracy, the "Willesden Junction Station. Among the alleged conspirators with Mr. Parnell in this "Willesden Junction gathering was the writer of the present History. Of course, all these " charges and allegations," as they afterwards came to be formally called, could not be al- lowed to pass without some form of inquiry. The ques- tion was brought up again and again in the House of Commons. Mr. Parnell himself challenged the fullest investigation, and the only question with him and with his friends was as to the form which the inquiry ought 2W A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES to take. Mr. Parnell was quite willing to submit the whole matter to the judgment of a committee of the House of Commons, and one of Mr. Parnell's colleagues ofEered on his behalf to accept the judgment of a Par- liamentary committee to be composed exclusively of members belonging to the Conservative party. Mr. Par- nell and his colleagues were perfectly satisfied to sub- mit the charges of the Times to the judgment of any committee of gentlemen in the House of Commons, no matter what their political opinions might be. In the end the Government proposed the appointment of a special commission of three judges to inquire into the "charges and allegations" made in the Times against Mr. Parnell and certain of his colleagues. An Act of Parliament, passed on August 13, 1888, appointed the Commission. Sir James Hannen was made president of the court. Mr. Justice Day and Mr. Justice A. L. Smith were the other members. The passing of this measure was strongly opposed by the Liberal party in the House of Commons. It was argued that it estab- lished a new and very dangerous precedent in the way of dealing with political controversy. A Government, it was urged, might at any time consign a certain num- ber of their political opponents to be tried before a court of judges, each of whom might be a Government par- tisan, and might thus obtain a judgment amounting to a condemnation of a whole political party. It was not suggested that Sir James Hannen, or Mr. Justice Day, or Mr. Justice Smith was a man in the least degree likely to be guided by his political opinions in the de- cision of such a question ; but, then, it was well known that the political opinions of these judges were opposed to those of Mr. Parnell ; and, in any case, it could not be denied that the introduction of such a precedent would sanction in troublous times the setting-up of a "PAENELLISM AND CRIME" 317 tribunal which might be simply a court to find oppo- nents of the Government guilty of some offence not created by statute law. The functions of the Special Commission were not in any sense Judicial. Mr. Par- nell was not charged with any direct offence committed against the law of the land. Nobody in his senses sup- posed, and the suggestion was never made by the stout- est Conservative in the House of Commons, that the Times could be in possession of evidence to prove that Mr. Parnell was an accomplice in the Phoenix Park mur- ders. As a matter of historical interest, it may be no- ticed that nobody in the House of Commons itself be- lieved Mr. Parnell to be guilty of having given any sanc- tion, either before or after, to such a crime. The Commission, however, was appointed to consider a vast number of historical and controversial questions, over which no humanly constituted court of law could possibly give a decision that would be binding upon any- body. Did the speech of Mr. Parnell delivered in Dub- lin tend to stimulate hatred of the Government in the county of Cork ? Did the speeches of Mr. Parnell and two or three of his friends made in New York, and Washington, and Chicago tend to rouse the Irish peo- ple at home into hostility to the Queen's Government ? All these are purely historical questions, with which no strict judicial court can possibly deal. There are laws which limit the freedom of speech. There are laws against sedition — that is to say, direct incentive to rebellion, even where no overt act has been committed. If a man by his speech offends against any of these statutes, he can be arraigned for the offence and tried before a court of law. But to this Special Commission court was assigned the task of giving the legal decision of three Judges on the whole struggle of Irish history. Suppose the three agreed that the Irish people ought 10 218 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES to have been content with the Government under which Providence had been pleased to set them, and ought not to have carried on any agitation against it, who on earth would have cared anything for such a judgment ? We might as well have had a special commission of three judges to decide whether the American people were right in making their declaration of independence. If the Spe- cial Commission had been limited to the task of decid- ing whether the letters alleged to be dictated and signed by Mr. Parnell were genuine or were forgeries, that would have been a question on which the decision of three English judges would have been accepted as au- thoritative by most people. Or if the question sub- mitted to the judges had been, whether Mr. Parnell had or had not any complicity in the Phcenix Park murders, on that subject, too, the decision of the judges would have been felt by most of the public to be a declaration of the highest importance. But as the Commission was framed it authorized these three judges to pronounce a decision on every subject belonging to the whole poHti- cal agitation in Ireland. Such a scheme could only tend to lower the authority of the judges, because assuredly no rational being in Great Britain or Ireland could have been affected one way or the other by any decision which the judges might pronounce as to the reasonableness of the Home Eule movement, or the propriety of the Plan of Campaign. Therefore the leading members of the Opposition fought strongly against the appointment of any commission with so limitless a field of inquiry. The Government, however, being in a majority, carried their point and set up their Commission. On the whole, there seems to us no reason now to regret that the Commission was set up. On, the main questions, which had a distinct and pressing interest — on the per- sonal questions, if we may put it so — the decision of the "PARNELLISM ANE CRIME" 219 judges was entirely satisfactory to most of the men against whom the " charges and allegations " were made. Per- hapsj also, it is just as well for the purposes of history that we should have an authenticated account of all the wild things that were spoken or written or done during a period of national convulsion. Otherwise there was a good deal ahoat the whole inquiry, however grave and important its purpose may have been, which partook of the charac- ter of opera-bouffe. The tribunal was like one of which Carlyle spoke many years before, and which seemed to him to have been summoned for the purpose of ascertain- ing whether or not a certain man had a nose on his face. If there were anybody who really did not know that a terrible land struggle, a life or death struggle, was going on in Ireland, such a man ought to have been deeply in- terested in the proceedings of the Special Commission. But he might have got all the information he wanted out of the London daily papers. If he were anxious to know how much the teachings of Mr. Parnell, or of Mr. Davitt, or of Mr. Dillon had to do with the creating of a disturbed condition of things in Ireland, that was a question on which everybody could form his own opinion just as well as any of the three Judges in the Commission court. If there were any human being alive who really fancied that an impassioned political and agrarian agitation ever was carried on in any country in the world without some rough speaking and some wild deeds, then, indeed, such person might have found a student's interest in the read- ing of the evidence brought before the court. What peo- ple did really want to know was, whether Mr. Parnell had dictated and signed the letters published by the Times, and whether Mr. Parnell and any of his colleagues were accessories before or after the fact to the mur- ders in the Phoenix Park. As to the general charac- ter of the agitation in Ireland, there was nothing to be 330 A HISTOEY OF OUR OWN TIMES added to wliat the public already had ample means of knowing. The court met for the first time for actual business on October 23, 1888. The Attorney-General of the Conservative Government conducted the case on behalf of the Times, and the .leading counsel on Mr. Parnell's side was Sir Charles Eussell, now Lord Eussell, of Kil- lowen. Chief -justice of England. The charges made by the Times amounted in substance to an indictment against the whole Irish people at home and abroad. The counsel for the Times were more ingenious than Edmund Burke. Burke said he knew of no means for the framing of an indictment against a nation. The counsel for the Times were able to manage the work. The defendants in the proceedings were, speaking gen- erally, the whole body of the Irish Nationalist members of Parliament, and the members of all the various Irish organizations "known as the Irish Land League, the Irish National Land League and Labor and Industrial Union, the Ladies' Land League, the Ladies' Irish Land League and Labor and Industrial Union, the National League, and the afHliated societies in Great Britain and America, all forming one connected and continuous organization." Then the indictment went on to say that "the ultiniate object of the organiza- tion was to establish the absolute independence of Ire- land as a separate nation. "Witli a view to effect this, one of the immediate objects of the said conspiracy or organization was to promote an agrarian agitation against the payment of agricultural rents, thereby securing the co-operation of the tenant farmers of Ireland, and at the same time the impoverishment and ultimate expulsion from the country of the Irish landlords, who were styled the English garrison." Here, then, was a cheerful lit- tle indictment brought against several millions of Irish "PARNELLISM AND CRIME" 221 persons, men and women, abroad and at home. The first application, made to the court on the opening day, was in itself a cnrious illustration of the futility of the general proceedings. Sir Charles Kussell applied for the release of two Irish members who were imprisoned after having been convicted of delivering speeches which were found to be contrary to law, and who were believed to be material witnesses in the proceedings before the court. Here, then, was the fact made clear that the civil courts of law were sitting in Ireland, that the Queen's writ still ran in Ireland, and that if men were convicted of a breach of any statute they could be sent to prison. One of the prisoners whose names were men- tioned by Sir Charles Russell was Mr. John Dillon, son of a most respected Irish patriot and gentleman, and himself a man of the highest and most honorable posi- tion. It did not need the setting up of any new tribunal to show that the condition of things in Ireland must be serious indeed when a man of Mr. Dillon's character was imprisoned for a breach of the law. Everybody knew that the moment Mr. Dillon was released from prison he would be welcomed cordially back to his place in Parlia- ment by nine out of every ten of the members of the House of Commons, no matter to what party they be- longed. The agitation going on in Ireland could only be judged according to one's convictions as to its neces- sity or its inexpediency. Mr. Dillon, as a matter of fact, had friends amongst the highest order of her Majesty's judges in England, who, although they might not have approved of every hasty word spoken by him at a public meeting, were well convinced that, on the whole, the agitation in Ireland had an honorable and a patriotic purpose, and that those who mainly conducted it were not adventurers or criminals, or the promoters or the paymasters of crime. 233 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMKS The Commission went on with its work week after week, and even month alter month. Witnesses were call- ed from all parts of Ireland — landlords, land-agents, magistrates, police-of5Bcers, parish priests, curates, wom- en of all ranks and classes — all to prove that somebody said something here and somebody else said something there ; that there were riots at evictions, that resistance was ofEered to the police, and that outrage and murder were committed in too many instances. It needed no ghost come from the grave, it did not even need three learned judges come from their grave pursuits, to obtain such information as that. One of the defendants, as the winter was setting in and the proceedings seemed likely to be the same sort of thing for months to come, obtained the permission of both parties in the case to spend the worst of the winter - time in Algiers. Nobody had the faintest doubt that he would return whenever his pres- ence was required. There was, of course, the usual evi- dence of the paid spy, the professional informer. There were, no doubt, some secret societies amongst the Ameri- can-Irish, and the only question of any real importance was, how to establish some direct connection between these societies and Mr. Parnell and his friends. . It was not supposed to be probable that the decision of the three judges in the Commission court would have the effect of disbanding the secret societies in America. The evidence of the professional informers went as far as it could in the desired way, but the truth was that the public in general did not take much account of the professional informer. Nor was it news to anybody that there were Irish associations in America which repudiated Mr. Parnell and his constitutional movement, and would be contented with nothing less than the independence of Ireland obtained on some undefined battle-field. The professional informers were wholly unsuccessful in con- "PAKNELLISM AND CRIME" 233 necting Mr. Parnell with the encouragement of any such scheme. But until the evidence of Pigott came on the informer and his testimony made the only really interest- ing or dramatic part of the proceedings before the Court. By the time Pigott's turn had come the question before the public mind narrowed itself down to two particular points. The first was — Did Mr. Parnell dictate or sign the letters ? I'he next point was — Did Mr. Parnell pay over to a man named Prank Byrne a sum of money in order to enable him to escape from these islands after the murders in the Phcenix Park ? Apart from these ques- tions, nobody any longer cared much about the whole progress of the evidence. When Pigott's turn arrived, then indeed a keen inter- est was aroused, and the interest in the course of events soon turned into horror. Under the merciless cross- examination of Sir Charles Russell the wretched man ut- terly broke down. He was invited to write on paper- a miscellaneous list of words which Sir Charles Eussell dictated to him. This list contained all the words mis- spelled in the letters which professed to be signed by Mr. Parnell, and in every instance Pigott's misspelling was identical with that of the documents published in the Times. This, with the revelation of Pigott's previous life and character, settled the whole question so far as his evidence was concerned. Pigott did not present him- self for any further cross-examination. He fled from the country. He took refuge in Madrid, and there, being visited by the police, he killed himself. A warrant had, in fact, been issued for his arrest under the extradition treaty with Spain, and it was only when the officers of the Madrid police knocked at his door that he saw the game was up and committed suicide. It was not his su- icide, however, which settled the question of the forged letters. That question had been settled in advance of 224 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES his death. He had made in private an unsolicited con- fession to an English member of Parliament — Mr. La- bonchere — that the letters were all of them forgeries. He had made about the same time a qualified confession to another person, to the effect that some of the letters were forgeries and some genuine. He had written to the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin a long series of letters, warning the Archbishop that a great danger was threatening the Irish party by the publication of forged letters tending to incriminate Mr. Parnell and some of his colleagues with the fomenting of outrage and murder in Ireland. He had written to a prominent Irish Na- tionalist, undertaking to countermine and explode the forgery plot if he were paid a sum of five hundred pounds to relieve him from his money troubles. He had been writing all sorts of letters to various public men, threat- ening them with criminal exposure or offering to defend them against it. But everything had to do with a cer- tain amount of money contribution. He had applied for pecuniary relief on the ground of the death of some near relative who was actually then alive, or who had died years before. He declared in the court that he had had a long and private interview at a hotel in Covent Garden with a member of the Irish Parliamentary party well known in London, and that they had come to a friendly understanding on all sorts of subjects. That member of the Irish Parliamentary party was able to go into the witness-box and to -swear that, although he had received many begging letters and some threatening letters from Pigott, he had never seen the man in all his life. There did not seem any particular motive for this statement on Pigott's part. Apparently he had a taste for perjury, a sort of passion for perjury, and possiblyre- garded perjury and forgery as branches of the fine arts. Mr. Frederick Bayham, in Thackeray's novel, "The N CHARLES S. PAHNBLL "PARNELLISM AND CRIME" 235 Newcomes/' says to somebody, " It is my firm belief that, on the whole, you would rather lie than not." Unfortu- nately, Pigott apparently would much rather lie than not. It is only fair to observe that, before the suicide of Pigott was known in England, the Attorney - General, acting for the Times, withdrew the forged letters alto- gether from the case, and expressed his deep regret that they had ever been published. Mr. Parnell afterwards recovered damages from the Times for the publication of the letters, with the object of completely re-establishing his character, and the Times offered no real opposition to the action. There had been a sad, a strange, and an un- accountable mistake on the part of the conductors of a great journal. Nothing of the kind had ever occurred- before. Nothing of the kind probably will ever occur again in the history of the English newspaper. The interest in the proceedings of the Commission was somewhat stimulated by the appearance of Mr. Parnell himself in the witness-box, and by the speech of Mr. Davitt in his own defence. But the substance of the in- quiry was practically done with. The powerful reasoning and noble eloquence of Sir Charles Eussell in his opening speech for the defence, which, of course, preceded the evidence of the defendants, will pass into history and be remembered" for its own sake. It was not until February 13, 1890, that the report of the Special Commission was issued and laid upon the table of the House of Commons. There was a scene of wondrous excitement when the first bundles of the report reached the House. Members were too impatient to wait for their distribution in the office where parliamentary documents are to be had. The bun- dles were simply flung upon the floor in the inner lobby, and were scrambled for by the members. No report pre- sented to Parliament in our time has ever created such a scene of excitement. The report, as we have already 10* 236 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES said, must have been satisfactory to every reasonable man. If the great bulk of its contents had but a purely historical interest, and only contained such information as every- body might have obtained from other sources, that was in no sense the fault of the three Judges. They had been appointed to make a vast, comprehensive, and wholly unnecessary inquiry into the condition of Ireland, and they had to do their duty. But on the- only questions concerning which rational persons cared anything what- ever for the opinions of any commission of inquiry the judges were clear, explicit, and impartial. They found that the members of Parliament who were defendants in the case were not collectively engaged in any conspiracy to establish the separate independence of Ireland, but that certain Nationalists inside and outside of Parlia- ment were anxious for separation, and that some of these were anxious to use the Land League as an indirect means of accomplishing Ireland's independence. All this, of course, everybody knew before. Many Irish members had proclaimed over and over again that they asked for nothing but the right of Ireland to manage her own do- mestic affairs as a partner in the British Empire. Other Irish Nationalists had openly proclaimed that they had no hope in anything but the absolute independence of Ireland. These, however, were the few, and most of them were men of no real authority and influence. The judges found that the charge of insincerity in denouncing crime was not established against the defendants, and they found, of course, that the fac-simile letters were forgeries. They found that neither Mr. Parnell nor any of his colleagues had supplied Frank Byrne with any money in order to enable him to escape from justice. These were the two questions in which alone any real public interest was felt. ISTobody could have been great- ly excited over the finding that Mr. Pavitt had been a "PARNELLISM AND CRIME" 227 member of the Fenian organization. Mr. Davitt had been convicted and had suffered many years' imprison- ment for his share in the Fenian movement of 1867, and he would have been greatly surprised indeed to hear that any one supposed he had not been a Fenian. Neither did it add very much to the common public opinion of Mr. Davitt that the judges found him to have been quite sincere in his public denunciations of criminal out- rage. Mr. Davitt was well known to all the leading men of the English democracy, and to many who were not democrats in any sense of the word, and he was recog- nized by every one as a man of stainless character, to whom the bare idea of crime was naturally hateful. The judges found that the defendants had not paid any one to commit crime, but that some of them did incite to intimidation, although not to the commission of more serious offences. The report was very long, and very interesting in its way, and, as has been said before, it may prove a valuable historical study for generations to come. But the setting up of such a tribunal is a task which we fancy no English Government will ever attempt again. By the public in general., even by those who least sym- pathized with the political action of Mr. Parnell and his colleagues, the report was accepted simply as a verdict of acquittal. The first time Mr. Parnell appeared in the House of Commons after the issue of the report he was greeted by an extraordinary demonstration. It was late when he came in, and the House was crowded. The moment he appeared the whole Liberal party, including the occupants of the front Opposition bench, rose to their feet, and, standing, cheered him again and again. Some even among the Tory ranks joined in the demonstration. It was felt to be an honorable testimonial of sympathy offered to a man who had been cruelly calumniated, and 228 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES who had obtained a verdict of acquittal from a tribunal created by his political oppoBents to inquire into the conditions and character of his whole career. Not often has such a scene been witnessed in the House Of Com- mons, and, whatever different persons may think of Mr. Parnell's politics, there are very few indeed who will not say that it was a. generous and a manly tribute, which did honor to the House of Commons. Mr. Parnell himself seemed embarrassed and confused by this totally unexpected exhibition of feeling. He was by nature a shy and retiring man, and as he settled into his seat he said to a friend who was next to him, "Why did you fellows all stand up ? You almost frightened me." That scene was the zenith of Mr. Parnell's parliamen- tary career. CHAPTER XIII THE TEAK OF JUBILEE Early in the year 1887 it became known that Sir Michael Hicks-Beach had given up the office of Chief Secretary for Ireland, and that Mr. Arthur Balfour, up to that time holding the new office of Secretary for Scotland, had been appointed his successor. Every one was sorry to hear of Sir Michael Hicks-Beach's resigna- tion, and especially because of the reason for it. Sir Michael Hicks-Beach had been affected by some serious trouble with both eyes, and the most eminent oculists declared that he must absolutely give up all official work for the time. We are glad to say that the trouble was afterwards overcome, and that Sir Michael Hicks-Beach was able later on to return to parliamentary, and-^even to official, work. Sir Michael Hicks -Beach had the cordial respect of every one in the House of Commons. He was an able administrator, a courteous and kindly gentleman. During his tenure of office as Chief Secre- tary to the Lord Lieutenant a great financial crisis sud- denly came on in the south of Ireland, a sort of local "Black Friday." Sir Michael lent his most cordial and painstaking assistance to the Irish Nationalist members in the device of measures to tide over the trouble. Mr. Arthur Balfour, in becoming Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, entered on his first difficult official position. He was a man of undoubtedly great capacity, and, if he did not succeed as Irish Chief Secretary, it 230 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES may be said of him, as of his predecessor, that it was only because success was absolutely impossible to a mem- ber of a Tory Government endeavoring to administer the affairs of Ireland. The utmost any minister em- ploying Tory measures could do in Ireland was to turn the Government there into an armed camp, and keep order by the mere force of military and police. Even that much no Tory Government had yet succeeded in doing. No fault must be found with Sir Michael Hicks- Beach or Mr. Balfour, because neither could achieve the impossible. On May 17, 1887, Mr. "W. H. Smith, who had become leader of the House of Commons when Lord Randolph Churchill went out of office, proposed that in celebra- tion of the fiftieth year of her Majesty's reign the House should attend at St. Margaret's Church, "Westminster, on the following Sunday. Mr. Gladstone seconded the mo- tion, which was unanimously agreed to. This was, in point of fact, the formal opening of the Jubilee celebra- tions of 1887. The very next day the London Gazette announced the issue of the Jubilee coinage, to be marked by an alteration in the likeness of her Majesty, and by the introduction of a new coin, the double florin. The great day of celebration was on June 21. The Jubilee was shared in almost all over the world. It was honored in the European capitals, in Canada, in Australasia, in all the British colonies, and not only by English people in the United States, but by Americans themselves, among whom Queen Victoria has always been very popular. June 21 in London was a day of brilliant sunshine, just suited to set off the magnificent ceremonial. Every de- scription given of that day's display testifies to a marvel- lous success. London would not seem in general to be a metropolis well adapted for a splendid show, but on this occasion the testimony of all observers is agreed upon THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 331 the fact that nothing could have been more magnificent and more snperh. Miles and miles of streets were dec- orated with flags, evergreens, and festoons, and every nook and corner and available inch of ground on the line of procession was crowded by spectators, whose en- thusiasm seemed to know no bounds. There was a ser- vice at Westminster Abbey, and the Queen drove from Buckingham Palace to the Abbey, with the royal princes on horseback acting as an escort to her carriage. Among those who thus escorted the Queen, the tall and stately figure of Frederick, the German Prince Imperial, the husband of the English Princess Victoria, was observed and admired by every one. This soldier-prince had been trained to the art of war from his youth upward, had fought in campaign after campaign, bearing all the hard- ships of the field just as the private soldier had to bear them, and in the struggle between Prussia and Austria he had come out as a rival and an equal of his cousin, the famous Bed Prince. Few who looked on him with ad- miration that bright day could have foretold how soon that soldierly and stately figure was destined to crumble into dust. There can be no doubt whatever about the enthusiasm with which the vast majority of the Queen's subjects in London and all through England and Scotland took part in that Jubilee. Every one who was capable of thinking over the subject at all in a reasonable way must have known, and did know, that the Queen was the first constitutional sovereign who ever occupied the throne of England, and that she was, on the whole, the best English sovereign that ever reigned. Down in the East-end of London, where the grip of pinching poverty pressed hard on thousands of people, there were, no doubt, some mutterings and grumblings at the expense lavished on a great pageant when men and women were dying of hunger or swooning 232 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES from weakness at the workhouse gates. But the genius of man has not yet discoyered, or come near to discover- ing, the art of rulership which shall find employment for all deserving men and women ; and it was, in any case, no question of royalty against any other form of govern- ment, for only in the imaginations of children lingers the idea that the sovereign is able to make every one comfort- able and happy. It is only bare justice to the Queen's reign to say that her Majesty never failed to do all that lay in her power for her people in Great Britain whose condition came most nearly within her range, and that her own judgment had always dictated, or at least con- firmed, a wise and a saving policy towards her great co- lonial and Indian empire. When the Queen came first to the throne the Canadian colonies were torn asunder by internal discord and by rebellion against the Crown. The policy which converted Canada to the most devoted loy- alty towards the sovereign was, as we know, accepted and approved by the Queen herself. N"owhere over the world ' — not even in England — was the Queen's Jubilee cele- brated with greater enthusiasm than in the several prov- inces of Canada. One discordant note, and one only, was heard during the celebration of the Jubilee. Perhaps it ought not even to be called a discordant note. Perhaps we ought rather to say that one note of possible acclamation was silent. The Irish people as a whole bore no part in the celebra- tion. On May 23 in the Jubilee year the Dublin Cor- poration agreed by 25 votes to 5 not to take any share in the public rejoicing. This was, indeed, a correct ex- pression of the feeling entertained by the vast major- ity of the Irish people. It would be to fail utterly in the duty of a serious historian if one were not to take account of a fact of this kind. It would be a poor and worthless attempt at a compliment to the Queen herself THE YEAR OF JUBILEE JJ33 if the veriest courtier who was instructed to tell the story of the whole celebration were to leave such a fact un- noticed. The honest truth must be told, that Ireland had had for many years little or no share of royal coun- tenance. The Queen during all her reign had only spent a few days in Ireland. A fortnight would more than cover the whole time of the two or three royal visits. The Irish people were allowed to feel that they had nothing to do with the Sovereign of the country. The Irish people as a whole were long inclined to be devotedly loyal ; even Mr. Disraeli admitted that much about them. They cared little or nothing about the controversy between monarchy and republic. Their natural inclination was to an enthusi- astic and, I had almost said, a servile, loyalty to the ap- pointed sovereign. They became wildly enthusiastic over George, the Prince Eegent ; and, as I have shown in the earliest part of this History, there was no one living who welcomed the new Sovereign at the opening of her reign with a more chivalrous and thorough enthusiasm than Daniel O'Gonnell, who was then the recognized leader and dictator of the whole Catholic and Nationalist popu- lation of Ireland. But it would be impossible to doubt that the enthusiasm inspired by O'Gonnell soon began to chill and to die. To Ireland the Sovereign became a mere name or a mere myth, for the Grown was only rep- resented by a partisan viceroy, who was changed with each succeeding change of partisan government. At the very time when London was celebrating the Eoyal Jubilee the Irish Nationalist members were struggling vainly against the passing of a Goercion Bill for Ireland, introducing an exceptional system of legislation, which no man in his senses would have thought of applying to England or to Scotland, amid the most tumultuous conditions of politi- cal controversy. We must take all these considerations into account 234 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES when we have to describe the cold and distant attitude maintained by Nationalist Ireland towards the celebra- tion of the Queen's Jubilee. No word of disrespect was spoken or written. Of course, no educated Irishman im- agined for a moment that the Queen was responsible for the long denial of good land laws to Ireland, or for the introduction of coercion measures, any more than she was for the enormous financial overcharges put upon Ireland, which the- inquiry of the late Parliamentary Commission has disclosed. It is not likely that there was one single man or woman in Ireland who had not a thorough feeling of respect for the Queen personally. She was regarded everywhere in Ireland as a noble ex- ample to wives and to mothers. But the feeling was that Ireland had. been left out in the cold, that she was the Cinderella, that she was the poor step-sister, and that she had nothing to do with the rapturous celebration of the reign of any English sovereign. That was the one de- pressing part of the whole ceremonial. No one regret- ted it more than the author of this History, but no one more thoroughly recognized the fact that it was inevita- ble. History would be written in vain, even contempo- rary history, if one were not to notice such a fact, and to invite attention to its teaching. Except, however, for this one shadow falling on a part of the ground which might otherwise have been a scene of gladsome celebration, the whole Jubilee was a demon- stration of loyalty, of devotion, and of afEection which might have brought a thrill of pride to the heart of the greatest sovereign in the world. No one can doubt that the Queen felt a genuine delight in this spontaneous tribute of admiration from her people. On June 24 she sent from "Windsor to the Home Secretary a letter of thanks to her subjects in general which is touching, and well deserves to be recorded and remembered. "I am THE TEAR OF JUBILEE 235 anxious," so ran the words of her Majesty's letter, "to express to my people my warm thanks for the kind, and more than kind, reception I met with on going to and re- turning from Westminster Abbey with all my children and grandchildren. The enthusiastic reception I met with then, as well as on all these eventful days in Lon- don, as well as in Windsor on the occasion of my Jubilee, has touched me most deeply. It has shown that the la- bor and anxiety of fifty long years, twenty-two of which I spent in unclouded happiness, shared and cheered by my beloved husband, while an equal number were full of sorrows and trials, borne without his sheltering arm and wise help, have been appreciated by my people. This feeling, and the sense of duty towards my dear country and subjects, who are so inseparably bound up with my life, will encourage me in my task, often a very difiicult and arduous one, during the remainder of that life. The wonderful order preserved on this occasion, and the good behavior of the enormous multitudes assembled, merit my highest admiration. That God may protect and abun- dantly bless my country is my fervent prayer." The Conservative Government undoubtedly did some good work during its five or six years of power. There were several excellent administrators among its ranks, not men who went in much for showy speech-making, or flashing cut -and -thrust in debate, but men who were capable of not merely abolishing old abuses, but of devis- ing new and working systems. One task of dif&culty had long been perplexing the minds of successive Ad- ministrations, Liberal and Conservative. Each Govern- ment had tried in turn to settle the difficulty, or, at all events, to make some advance towards a settlement. The Conservative Government was lucky enough to come in for the first really good chance, and to know how to make use of the opportunity. How to govern London 236 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES had been for years a most perplexing question. At one end of the metropolis there was the Corporation of the City, presided over by the Lord Mayor, who was chosen annually to fill the office. The City of London was, and is, a very small place comparatively, and having only a very limited resident population. That is to say, the greater part of the City has long been occupied by banks and offices of various kinds, and shops, the owners of which did not live on the premises, but went out every evening to their homes in the West-end, or in some of the suburbs, and left their places of business in the charge of caretakers. The City of London was, in any case, only a small corner of the great metropolis. But, then, the City of London had its history and its tradi- tions. It had represented the municipal life of London for many centuries. It had welcomed kings and dis- puted with kings. It had fostered literature. Within its domain some of the greatest English men of letters were born and lived and died. On the whole, with whatever defects and shortcomings and blunders, it was beyond doubt a stately and a famous municipal institution, not unlike some of the great municipalities of Italy in the mediaeval days. Outside the City of London, the whole metropolis may be said to have been managed up to a certain date on the parish vestry system. London, indeed, was not a city, but an agglomeration of cities or towns. There was the city of Westminster, with its distinct and separate rep- resentation in the House of Commons. There was Pins- bury under the same conditions. There were Lambeth and Southwark on the southern side, and there were other great divisions as well. Mr. Gladstone's Act of 1884 had reconstructed and reorganized London for political rep- resentation in a much more symmetrical and satisfactory form. But the municipal government of London was not THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 337 remoulded by that measure. The management of tbe vast extent of the greater London by vestries had long been a source of trouble and confusion. The regulations of one vestry were often totally difEerent from those of another, and sometimes the houses of one side of a street were in, let us say. Vestry No. 1, while the houses on the other side of the street were in Vestry No. 2. This con- dition of things frequently led to the most ludicrous, and at the same time the most vexatious, anomalies. The rating in one parish might be moderate, and even low, because it happened to have a vestry capable of managing things economically and well, while the neighboring vestry might be rated heavily, and see all its local affairs grossly mismanaged. Efforts, therefore, were constantly made to bring about some principle of unification in the London outside the so-called city. Bills were brought into Par- liament again and again for some such purpose, and were unsuccessful. At one time there was a vigorous j)ublic controversy going on as to whether London ought to be under one system or under many systems. The difi[iculty of settling the matter may be effectively illustrated by the fact that two such men as John Stuart Mill and Sir George Cornewall Lewis took different sides of the question. Mr. Mill aimed at unification, with one centre of authority. Sir George Cornewall Lewis spoke as if there might be some positive danger to the authority of the Govern- ment and the Crown if so vast a place as London were to be self-governing, under one single system. "VVe all know how much phrases have to do with the guiding or the mis- guiding of the public mind in any momentous controversy, and there was a famous phrase at that time, to the effect that the State could not, without risk, give local self- government to "a province covered with houses." The province covered with houses did great duty in the con- troversies of those now distant days. After a while the 238 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES necessity for some new system, and the importance of the whole subject, evolved the creation of the Metropolitan Board of Works. This board was established in 1855, for " the management of public works in which the metropolis had a common interest." It was elected, not by popular suffrage, but by the vestries and other local bodies. It did not work very successfully. No institution of the kind, elected by an indirect suffrage, ever does work very successfully, and in 1888 a Eoyal Commission was appoint- ed by Parliament to inquire into the whole conditions and operations of the Board. There were many charges made against the Board of negligence, ineificiency, irreg- ularities, blunders, and more or less extensive jobbery. There were even some charges made of corruption. But it did not seem that there was any clear evidence of cor- ruption to be established against most of those who were charged with it. Yet, from the moment when the Com- mission made its report, it was evident to all who were in touch of parliamentary affairs that the Metropolitau Board of Works was doomed. Indeed, it had been'for a long time in the thought of more than one Government that some advance must be made towards the establishment of a more directly representative system than that on which the Metropolitan Board of Works was founded. So long as human nature remains what we know it to be, it would be impossible that any board intrusted with such powers, and at the same time relieved from all direct responsibil- ity by such a method of election, should not lapse into indifference, carelessness, neglect, favoritism, jobbery, and sometimes even downright corruption. The Metro- politan Board of Works was therefore got rid of, and a good many people thought that the less said about its pass- ino- away the better. It had come to be, if not a public scandal, yet certainly something very nearly approaching to a public scandal. At all events, it was an anomaly and THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 239 an otstruction in the way of the improvement of London. Let us do it justice, however, no matter what its later faults may have been. It set to work in the beginning with a certain reforming energy. It constructed the Thames Embankment, and it greatly helped in the puri- fication of the river. These works are its best monument. Had it been positively faultless in its administration its mode of construction would have had to be reorganized. The country had outgrown the ways and the feelings when a great metropolis like London could be governed by a body of delegates sent in by all manner of local vestries and local boards, about whom the outer world knew noth- ing whatever. On the ruins, therefore, of the Metropolitan Board of "Works the government of the London County Council was set up in 1888. The London County Council had wider attributes than those given to the Metropolitan Board of Works. It had the full municipal government of that vast agglomeration of cities and towns outside the City of London which we now call the metropolis. It was even intriisted, to a certain extent, with the di- rection and the control of the places of amusement to be set up in London. The Lord Chamberlain has in his hands the regulation of the Middlesex theatres, but in the hands of the County Council was placed a direct control over the conduct of the music-halls and of the public dancing-halls. We have heard a good deal lately of the criticisms and the controversies which rise out of the manner of exercising that jurisdiction ; but the whole principle of the jurisdiction is simply that the duly and publicly elected municipal representatives of London shall have a right to some control over the conduct of entertainments which cannot be given at all without some manner of formal license. The fundamental dif- ference between the construction of the London County 340 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Council and that of the Metropolitan Board of Works lay in the fact that the members of the County Council were to be elected as members of Parliament are — by the direct vote of their constituencies. The London County Council thus established was fort- unate from its very birth, and in the number of able and distinguished men of all ranks and classes whom it attracted to its service. The commonest of all Jests in English literature for generations about municipal as- semblies turned upon the supposed ignorance, assump- tion, and vulgar self-seeking among their members. Even the august City of London itself, with its stately history and its long traditions, was very often in this way the butt of the comic writer and the caricaturist. The first chairman whom the County Council of London ap- pointed was no less a man than Lord Eosebery. The second chairman was Sir John Lubbock, one of the most able and highly cultured men in the House of Commons. The County Council had the right to elect for itself a certain number of aldermen, who might be chosen from the outer public; and amongst those who were thus elected at first were Sir Thomas Parrer (now Lord Far- rer). Lord Hobhouse, Lord Lingen (formerly Perma- nent Secretary of the Treasury), and Mr. Frederic Har- rison, one of the ablest, the broadest -minded men in literature, a man of exquisite culture and refined tastes —the very last man whom, under old-fashioned systems and the influence of old-fashioned caricatures, it would have been possible to think of as a London alderman. We must, of course, make allowance for old-fashioned caricatures as well as for old-fashioned systems. There were aldermen of the City of London in former days who had intellect and culture, and something approach- ing to genius. There was Alderman Beckford, for ex- ample, the author of "Vathek," that marvellous "fan- THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 241 tasia " from Oriental literature, wliich he wrote first in French, and afterwards in English, a romance which will always find student-readers if not popular readers. But of late years the humorous idea of an alderman of the City of London had so far overgrown the serious idea, that when the London County Council came to start al- dermen of its own there was a feeling of popular amaze- ment that men like Sir Thomas Farrer and Mr. Frederic Harrison should be chosen for the office. Among the members of the new Council not aldermen were Mr. John Burns, one of the ablest, most eloquent, and most judicious representatives of English democracy ; Lord Monkswell, son of the eminent judge long known as Sir Eobert Collier ; Augustus Harris, afterwards Sir Augustus Harris, since dead, the owner and manager of Drury Lane Theatre ; Lord Compton, Mr. Brudenell Carter; Mr. Harry Lawson (the present C.C. member for Whitechapel), who was then M.P. for West St. Pan- eras, and is son of the proprietor of the Daily Telegraph, one of the greatest London newspapers ; and many other men of equal mark and equally representative position. The first County Council would certainly seem to have fulfilled in its way the idea of a thoroughly representa- tive governing body. No class in the community, so far as we can see, failed to be represented there, even at the starting off. Lord Eosebery could represent the views of one class of society; Mr. John Burns could represent the views of another class ; Sir John Lubbock could speak for the interests of the bankers, and also for the ideas of the thinking men ; and so on, if we follow out all the names of the men first elected, we shall find in every name a convincing evidence that there was a fair representation of the whole commu- nity of London. Nor did the County Council since that time degenerate in its representative position. W^ have 11 242 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES already shown how, in the case of the school boards, there was at first a great attraction to men of name and celebrity to accept a seat at their tables. There have been no signs of degeneracy in the anxiety of really dis- tinguished and representative men to take a part in the discussions of the school boards since their formation. So, too, it has been with the London County Council. Men of the highest position are glad to come there, jnst as representative men of the humblest position are glad to come there, and are welcomed there. It is not too much to say tbat the London County Council has taught some lessons to the House of Commons. Mr. Stuart Mill, in his volume of essays on " Eepresentative Govern- ment," has well said that " it is quite hopeless to induce persons of a high class, either socially or intellectually, to take a share of local administration in a corner, by piecemeal, as members of a paving-board or a drainage commission." " The entire local business of their town," he says, " is not more than a sufficient object to induce men, whose tastes incline them and whose knowledge qualifies them for national affairs, to become members of a mere local body, and devote to it the time and study which are necessary to render their presence anything more than a screen for the jobbing of inferior persons under the shelter of their responsibility." It is well to observe that all this, and perhaps more especially the sentence that follows, was written and published many years before the breakdown of the Metropolitan Board of Works. " A mere board of works," Mr. Mill says, " though it comprehend the entire metropolis, is sure to be composed of the same class of persons as the vestries of the London parishes ; nor is it practicable, or even desirable, that such should not form the majority ; but it is important for every purpose which local bodies are designed to serve, whether it be the enlightened and THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 343 honest performance of their special duties, or the culti- yation of the political intelligence of the nation, that every such body should contain a portion of the very best minds of the locality, who are thus brought into perpetual contact, of the most useful kind, with minds of a lower grade, receiving from them what local or pro- fessional knowledge they have to give, and in return in- spiring them with a portion of their own more enlarged ideas and higher and more enlightened purposes." A deep interest seems to attach to those memorable words of Mr. Mill. He was dead years and years before the movement set in for the abolition of the Metropolitan Board of Works, and the creation of a really representa- tive county council for the metropolis of England ; but a better or more timely advice could not possibly have been given to the public of London, and could not pos- sibly have been accepted more faithfully and in a more earnest spirit. The constitution of the London County Council would, beyond all question, have received Mr. Mill's most cordial acceptance, could he have been living to see it a reality ; and, as far as we can judge, it has been conducted on the same principles and the same lines since the first day of its formation. One side-effect of the setting up of the London County Council was curiously different from the result of the creation of the school boards, and it was one of which Mr. Mill would most certainly have disapproved, al- though in the case of the County Council it was purely incidental or accidental. By the School Boards Act it was made open to women to be elected members of a board. As a matter of fact, many distinguished women entered the London School Board and school boards all over the country, and nobody said them nay, and they rendered great service, and are rendering great service down to the present time. Indeed, it would seem only 244 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES natural and reasonable that women should be expected to do good service in the direction of the manner in which children ought to be taught. But when it came to the question of the county councils a diffeirent principle seemed to prevail. Lady Sandhurst, a woman distinguish- ed for her services in the cause of education, and of every beneficent public cause, was elected to represent one of the divisions of London. Miss Cobden, daughter of the illustrious free-trader, was elected to represent another. Mr. Beresford Hope, son of the Beresford Hope who had long been conspicuous in the House of Commons, and the grandson of the author of that "Anastasius" which ought to be remembered and is almost forgotten, con- tested the seat against Lady. Sandhurst. As we have said. Lady Sandhurst was elected, and Mr. Beresford Hope was defeated. Mr. Beresford Hope appealed against the right of Lady Sandhurst, and of women in general, to sit as members of the County Council. The Court of Queen's Bench took some time to consider the matter, and on April 13, 1889, ruled that as no provision was made for the election of women in the Local Govern- ment Act, neither Lady Sandhurst nor any other woman could be elected to a seat in the County Council. On May 20 in the same year a gallant attempt was made by the Earl of Meath in the House of Lords to pass a bill allowing women to sit as members of county coun- cils. The bill was defeated by a vast majority. Only 33 peers had any consideration for the rights of wom- en, while 108 ungracious noblemen voted against them. The London County Council itself was, by a consider- able majority, in favor of the admission of women to sit in county councils as they sat in school boards. But it was stated in the House of Commons, by the leader of the Conservative Administration there, that the Lo- cal Government Act, a different Act from that consti- THE TEAR OF JUBILEE 245 tuting the school boards, was not intended to give a right to women to sit in county councilsj and that the Government could not even hold out a hope of being able to set apart a day for the mere discussion of the question. Mr. Mill probably, if he could have known of the events, might have been saddened to think that his teachings had not gone further towards the abolition of the curious prejudice which prevailed against the ad- mission of women to public boards, where the influence and the guidance and the suggestions of women might have had the most practical effect. The movement, how- ever, for what is called the emancipation of women has undoubtedly been growing in strength and much improv- ing, we may say, in reasonableness of late years. So far as England is concerned it is altogether a movement of the reign of Queen Victoria. It has, of course, had its moods of aggressiveness, and even of extravagance. De- mands have been made which the more rational women of all classes would have discouraged and discounte- nanced. It has been the target of all manner of satire, ridicule, and caricature. It has gone through its baptism of fire, as, indeed, every progressive movement always has had to do. It did not come over to England, as some people now seem to think, from the United States ; on the contrary, it spread from England to the United States. It had nothing to do with the sudden, epheme- ral, and hysterical outcry raised by a few women in the days of Godwin and of Shelley for the emancipation of the sex from the bondage of the matrimonial tie. Taken on the whole, the movement for woman's rights, to use the popular phrase, in these countries was thoroughly sound, healthy, and practical. What it aimed at was the removal of the restrictions which prevented women from practising in some of the professions, from having votes for the election of representatives in municipal and other 246 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES public bodies, and from the right to vote for members of the House of Commons. Of course, there were some women who went into extremes in England, and who made themselves, and even their movement, seem ri- diculous for the time. But we have all heard of move- ments conducted by men, sincere and well-intentioned movements, no doubt, in which men too have sometimes made themselves and their efforts seem ridiculous enough. Even at the present moment, if we may judge from the re- ports in the newspapers, there are men who make this or that movement seem for the hour superlatively ridiculous. On the whole, the agitation for woman's rights, what- ever any one may think of its principles, its purposes, or its possibilities, was conducted with great sobriety, steadiness, and moderation. The movement in this coun- try did not even get mixed up with any question as to the right of woman to put off petticoats and adopt pantaloons. In America, there was a good deal of that great question brought to the front in the early days of the effort towards the progress of woman. The mighty Bloomer controversy forced itself at one time on public attention in the United States, and by reflex action here also; but even in the United States, where it had its birth, few sensible women troubled themselves about it, and in these islands no sensible woman whatever took any account of it, except to be quietly amused by it. In America, too, the woman's rights movement got to be mixed up, rather unfortunately, with the doctrines and the doings of a few persons of both sexes who de- clared themselves advocates of the principle of free love that is to say, of love given at will, and without any necessary reference to the marriage system. No doubt there were some advocates of this principle here at home as well as in the United States, but it never took any serious hold of the public mind in this country. Here THE TEAR OF JUBILEE 247 at least it did not make way enough to render it neces- sary for anybody of influence to take the trouble of com- bating it, or even denouncing it. Even in the American States it was but the vagary of a small number of maudlin zealots and enthusiasts. We read a great deal in the newspapers here about the extravagances and the ad- vances of the Free-love sect in America; but only those who were personally familiar with the United States and its people at the time could have known what a small hold the whole doctrine had on the attention, not to say the sympathy, of the vast majority of American men and women. The movement for the emancipation of women, to give it its familiar name, spread to Prance, but took little hold of Italy, or Spain, or other continental na- tions. "We may perhaps say, too, that it found but few representatives in Ireland. In Great Britain, and espe- cially, perhaps, in England, it did undoubtedly make progress, and what its advocates are entitled to call steady, encouraging, and healthful progress. Women are already allowed to practice in medicine, and even in surgery. Women have votes for the election of poor-law guardians, of municipal councillors, of members of the school boards and members of the county council. We now speak, it will be understood, of women who possess distinctively and separately the qualification for them- selves which would enable a man under similar condi- tions to give a vote. Women, as we have shown, can be members of a school board, and actually have been elected, although in vain, to be members of the London County Council. The decision of the law courts in the case of Lady Sandhurst and of Miss Cobden is not likely, we should think, to be long allowed to remain the law of the land. The wit of man seems unable to suggest why a woman should not be a member of the London County Council, and yet can be a member of the London School 248 A HISTORY OP OUR OWN TIMES Board. As yet a woman cannot vote in the election of a member of the House of Commons. This, too, is one of the disabilities which are not likely to last very long. Why a woman of education and independent means should not have the right to say whether she would pre- fer to have Mr. Brown or Mr. Jones to represent her in Parliament it seems difficult to understand. Many meas- ures discussed in the House of Commons deal exclusively with the interests of women, so far, at least, as it is possi- ble for any measure affecting one sex not to take account of the interests of the other. Then, again, all manner of measures are discussed in Parliament which affect the in- terests of all rate-payers and of all tax-payers alike. It seems out of reason to insist that a woman who is a tax- payer and a rate-payer on her own account shall not be allowed to say whether she would rather be represented by a man who is known as an economist of the public funds, or by one who will go in for lavish and extrav- agant expenditure, either on the ground that such ex- penditure does good to trade, or on the ground that it tends to frighten the French, the Eussians, the Amer- icans, the Patagonians, the Peruvians, and the aggressive spirits of haughty Guatemala. Of course, when one advocates, however mildly, the right of women duly qualified to vote in the election of the members of Parliament, one is instantly met with the suggestion that, if you allow women to vote in parlia- mentary elections, you cannot possibly draw the line so as to prevent women from becoming candidates them- selves, and from possibly being elected to the House of Commons. Now, people always ought to be a little dis- trustful of any theory which would reject a salutary and a timely reform because it might lead to somebody ask- ing for some further reform which might not be timely and which might not be salutary. It is not likely that a THE YEAR OF JUBILEE 249 great many women in these islands would be yery anx- ious to become members of the House of Commons ; nor, while the present comparatively restricted suffrage system endures, is it probable that ladies ambitious in this direction would find many women, duly qualified voters, greatly anxious to assist them. It is quite cer- tain that if at any time the public opinion of Great Britain and Ireland should so far change as to make most of us think it desirable that women should sit in the House of Commons, there will be very little difiiculty in finding a Government which will introduce a bill for the purpose. In the meantime, we can all afford to wait patiently for the development of events. The strong opponents of the whole woman's movement are asking again and again whether it is proposed to allow women to enter the army and the navy. The answer is perfectly plain — that women are not physically strong enough to be of any use in serving on the battle-field or on the ocean, and that the work of womanhood as a whole is in- consistent with any such purpose. But it is quite clear that if a woman is strong enough to sit at a school board she is -strong enough to sit in a county council, and that if her mere condition of sex does not rightly disqualify her from voting for a member of a board of guardians, it does not rightfully disqualify her from voting for a mem- ber of Parliament. One remark of John Stuart Mill's is always worth bearing in mind. In no department of life, he points out, but one alone, in which intellect is con- cerned has woman ever proved herself, even in solitary instances, the absolute equal of man. There has been among women no rival to Shakespeare, or to Michael An- gelo, or to Beethoven ; but there have been women, al- though few indeed, who in the domain of politics stood on a level with men. The names of Elizabeth of Eng- land and of Catherine of Eussia may be mentioned ; and 11* 250 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Mill mentions also the names of princesses of the native States of India who were not surpassed by any princes of their time or race in the genius for government. It therefore does seem a little paradoxical to say that while women may write and paint and chisel statues as much as they like, they are too far inferior intellectually to men to be allowed to have any share in the practical work of politics. However that may be, it is our chief purpose now to notice that the movement for the eman- cipation of women is a distinct and an important fact in the reign of Queen Victoria, and that up to the present it has done, so far as we can see, no harm whatever, and a great amount of good. CHAPTER XIV ONLY A DBATH-KOLL. On March 27, 1889, a long and great career came to a close. John Bright died at Kochdale, after an illness which lasted some time. He now seemed to get better, and now seemed to get worse, and his friends were kept — and he had friends and admirers all over the world — in constant anxiety. The end came as we have said. John Bright was born in 1811, and was seventy-eight years old when he died. Despite his failing health of later years he did not seem to look his age. His broad brow and noble head appeared to carry with them a suggestion of untiring activity. But it was certain that of later years his eloquence in the House of Commons and on the plat- form had not been quite what it was ; and, indeed, those who heard John Bright only during these later years did not know what the man's eloquence really was. Bright belonged to a Quaker family of the manufacturing class. He was not what could be properly called a self-made man, except in the general sense that every man is self- made, for he was always a man of considerable wealth, and a partner in a great' and successful manufacturing house. But he was to a certain extent a self-educated man. He never attended a public school or belonged to any university. Still his education, such as it was, has been underrated rather than overrated. He knew little Latin, and less Greek, to be sure, but he could read French and speak it fairly well, had educated himself 252 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES on the English of the Bible translation, and he was an enraptured devotee of Milton. It is curious, too, that with all his reverence for Milton — and only those who knew him well could know how deep that reverence was — he never followed Milton's Latinized style. He always spoke the plainest and the purest Anglo-Saxon English. There can he no simpler and finer English found than in some of the great speeches of John Bright. His literary tastes were undoubtedly narrow in their reach. He had no very cordial appreciation of Shakespeare. His early Puritanical training kept him in revolt against free speak- ing on many subjects where morality was concerned, and lago and lachimo were to him simply loathsome creatures. Even Spenser, the purest-minded of poets, repelled him by his frank outspokenness. From his first entrance into public life Bright devoted himself absolutely to every great cause which he believed to be just. A more un- selfish man never lived. He shrank modestly from being known as a philanthropist, and it is quite certain that he employed an agent privately to bestow liberally on deserv- ing charities about which his own name never came into print. He made many political enemies because of his earnest and strenuous nature, and because of the crushing power which he often brought to bear against the policy of his parliamentary opponents. He was, probably, the greatest orator of our time in the House of Commons. As a debater he could not compare with Mr. Gladstone, but on a great occasion, when he threw his whole. soul into the question, he rose to a loftier height of eloquence than even Mr. Gladstone ever did. Then, he had all the attributes of an orator. He had the commanding pres- ence. He had the marvellous voice, thrilling with every variety of intonation. He had the rich, genial humor, which even in its sarcasm never "carried a heart-stain way on iU Wade," and he had the simplicity of style in LOED TENNYSON ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 353 which every -word strikes its own note and tells its own tale. The news of his death became, as was but natural, the occasion of a great demonstration of sympathy and regret in the House of Commons. It is gratifying to know that the Irish Nationalist members joined in this demonstra- tion. Mr. Bright, as we have already seen, had withdrawn altogether from the Home Rule policy of Mr. Gladstone. Still, when the House of Commons came to pass its eulogy upon Mr. Bright's career, the Irish Nationalist members, through their spokesman, declared that Irish memory was not so short as to forget the days when John Bright stood forth as Ireland's greatest champion in English public life. In the Congress of the United States the warmest tributes were paid to his memory and to his services. John Bright had stood by the cause of the Federal Gov- ernment of America even in the very darkest days, and when all that was classified as society in England was on the other side. Bright found a principle at issue in the American war, and he clung to it and cleaved to it. He used to be accused very commonly at one time of being an anti-English Englishman, of trying to " Americanize our institutions," of being what would now be called a "Little Englander." John Bright, in truth, was one of the most perfect types of the highest order of English- men. He loved his country with the love of a patriot, but he wished that his country should always be just, be on the right side, be noble, and be true to herself. He hated war in general, as was but natural in a man of his Quaker family. But he was never a man to shrink from a war which he believed to be necessary and just. He had not much of sentimentalism about him, and per- haps he chilled some people by refusing to throw himself into the passion of the doctrine of nationalities on the European continent which the Emperor Napoleon III. 254 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES had brought into active existence and operation. In truth, Bright's general principle was that a nation has nearly enough to do in minding its own business and looking after its own people. But he had shown again and again, as he showed in the case of the American Civil War, that his full sympathies could go with the success of any great cause, no matter what sacrifice the struggle might impose. He cared little or nothing about extension of territory, and the Jingo adventurer could never have obtained any manner of sympathy or support from him. He loved the English working-classes and the poor in general, but he never played, if we may use the expression, to the gallery of the working-classes, or spoke as if the so-called work- ing-classes made up the whole of the best life of Great Britain. Indeed, he was at one time, curiously enough, rather opposed to the idea of having special representa- tives of the working-classes in the House of Commons. He assented to the idea only on the ground that the rail- way interests were represented there, that the banking in- terests were represented there, that the army and navy were represented there, and that, therefore, the working- classes had as good a right to representation as any other body of men. But his own idea would have been, no doubt, that men should be elected to the House of Com- mons on their own merits and for their own public ser- vices, and without reference to class or order, a state of things which it will take, we should think, the evolution of long ages to bring about. The very idea of such a state of things showed a power of hopeful imagination in Bright such as even his friends did not commonly give him credit for. With all his practical nature and his rigorous appreciation of facts, there was a dash of the poetic about him, which helped him to be not merely the orator he was, but also the great and noble citizen he was. His life was simple ; he had no ambition but the ambition to ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 255 do good, and his figure will stand out like a great statue through succeeding generations of English public life. On December 13, 1889, a bright star fell from the firma- ment of English literature. On that day Robert Brown- ing died at the age of seventy-seven. We have spoken of Browning as a poet in these volumes already, and need not again go over his claims to rank among great poets. Indeed, he is one of the immortals whose place is absolutely settled, and with whom criticism, as such, has no more to do than it has to do with the height of a mountain or the depth of a lake. But something may be said about Robert Browning himself. There was nothing whatever of the professional poet in his man- ner in private or his bearing in society. He never went about with his singing-robes on. If it were possible to suppose that one did not know who he was, one might have met Browning again and again without having the faintest idea that he was meeting a great poet. There was nothing eccentric about him ; there was nothing distant. He was never in the clouds so far as society was concerned, although as a poet he was undoubtedly very much in the clouds, and over the heads of some of the people who tried to make-believe that they appre- ciated him and understood him. In private life he was at once a brilliant and an easy talker and a most delight- ful companion. He was a talker who loved to listen as well as to talk. He never oppressed one with any sense of his gift of talking, but, on the other hand, he made an impression on those who came near him which never left them. The writer of this book, for example, can never forget the effect produced on him by Browning's quiet description of the acting of Edmund Kean, per- haps, on the whole, the greatest actor the English stage has ever had. Nothing that this writer had ever heard or read came near to the realism of the impression made 256 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES by Browning's easy, enraptured description. Browning was a man who took an interest, if it may be put so, in everything. Other great poets have wrapped themselves up in the glory or the mysticism of their poetry, and have been content to sit on their imaginary Parnassian heights and let the world go by as it would. But to Eobert Browning everything of human interest had a close in- terest for him. He used to go out of his way to en- courage any new and obscure author in whom he dis- covered any qualities deserving of success. There are numbers of us still living and writing who can never forget a kindly message from Eobert Browning at a time when they were to him personally quite unknown. The world recognized him but slowly ; for it must be owned that his was not a style which one who runs can read, or at least can understand. But the world came to him in time, and with abundance of appreciation and of praise. He himself sometimes spoke with quiet cheer- fulness about the long struggle he had had to make the public of these countries understand him. " Oh ! Brit- ish public," he wrote in one of his poems, " Ye who love me not I" and then, later on, " British public ! who may love me yet. Marry and amen." The British public came to love him at last. Towards the close of his career it became an affectation among many English people to declare that they had always admired Brown- ing from the very beginning, and that they understood him perfectly well when other people declared that they fonnd him absolutely unintelligible. Browning himself saw this quite clearly, and was good-humor edly amused at it. Perhaps no less self - conceited poet ever lived. Perhaps, too, no poet ever lived who did his work more seriously and more earnestly, and who waited more pa- tiently for its success. During his poetical career he had really only one great rival— Lord Tennyson ; and it de- ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 357 pends much on one's temperament whether he more ad- mires Lord Tennyson or Eobert Browning. Indeed, all such comparisons may be properly accounted odious; but there are, of course, levels of height for poetry as for everything else. It would be only reasonable to say, that during the lifetime of the two poets they stood on an elevation distinctly above the crowd of contemporary singers. A striking and in many ways a splendid figure passed from the world when Sir Eichard Burton died on Octo- ber 20, 1890. He was one of the greatest Eastern trav- ellers and explorers known to our time. Probably no other Englishman of his day knew Eastern races and Eastern languages nearly as well as he did. He was a man of absolute daring, to whom the idea of physical fear never occurred. In his younger days he showed just like the man he was — dark-haired with burning dark eyes, and all the outward presentment of an ad- venturer in the highest sense of the word. In the lower sense of the word he was not an adventurer at all. He had no passion to make money, and no passion even to make fame. He loved adventure and change of scene, and he loved the danger that made his blood tingle in his veins. In his later years he softened down a good deal, and put away the kind of aggressiveness and self- assertion with which people at one time found fault. He became curiously modest in his assertion of knowledge about Eastern languages and affairs, and a common say- ing on his lips was, if you asked some question, " I don't know," "I'm not quite sure," " Somebody else" — and he would mention a name or two — "could tell you much better than I could do." At one time, it is believed, he actually became a Mussiilman, merely, no doubt, because he was so much in sympathy with everything Easfern. The Orient had a fascination and a magic for him. He ap- 258 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES peared now and again in London society, and lie charmed people who in his former days had been taken by his ag- gressiveness, and in later days were taken by his quie- tude and reserve. Far too much work was made about his pilgrimage to Mecca, an enterprise of which he him- self thought little or nothing, and concerning which all sorts of extravagant stories were told. Nothing in life could be easier for a man like Eichard Burton than to succeed in accomplishing a pilgrimage to Mecca. Lord Tennyson did not linger very long after Broivn- ing's death. He died on October 6, 1892, at the age of eighty-three. In his case, as in that of Browning also, some of the most beautiful and touching lines he ever wrote became his sweet farewell to earth. Ten- nyson was not, like Browning, a man fond of society and social life. He loved his friends, and he was a most genial host to those whom he cared to see. But he was somewhat eccentric in his ways, and he had about him much more of what we have ventured to call the pro- fessional poet than Eobert Browning ever had. He sometimes alarmed people by a portentous solemnity, which was never shown to those who came within the reach of his intimacy or friendship. Those who knew him weU declared that there was not in his real nature the slightest taint of affectation. But to the outer world he alwavs seemed a poet wrapt up in his cloud of poetry, and who had nothing to do with the idle and common- place persons who could write no poems of their own, or, at all events, could write no poems that were worth reading. Probably a certain shyness and shrinking from commonplace intercourse accounted for what many peo- ple thought a chilling peculiarity in Tennyson's manner. It is a curious fact that Tennyson, who had the genius to convey his lofty thoughts, his most far-reaching stretches of imagination, in melodious language that a ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 259 child could understand, should have been so difficult to be understood himself as a man ; while Robert Brown- ing, whose own best admirers sometimes professed to find a certain difficulty in comprehending all his meaning, should have been the most genial and gracious and easily comprehended man in the world. There was no man or woman with whom Browning could not have. talked on terms of ease, familiarity, and sympathy. There were many men and women, devoted admirers of Tennyson, with whom Tennyson would have found it difficult to exchange half a dozen sentences. The contrast between the two poets and the two men will probably give a curious subject for literary discussion later on. But as to the rank of the two men there can hardly be any literary discussion at all. Between them they maintained the position of the poetry of the Victorian age. Tenny- son inherited the Laureateship from Wordsworth, and no one can doubt that he was Wordsworth's natural successor. The English tongue has never been made more melo- dious than by Tennyson. Its exquisite variances of ex- pression have never been more delightfully brought out than by him. Some of his poems which are the most popular do not seem to us to do justice to his gifts of imagination or of poetic expression. The thoughts of " Clara Vere de Vere " are commonplace enough, and "The Queen of the May "is cheap in sentiment, and Lady Godiva's sacrifice does not seem to amount to much. But Tennyson created anew King Arthur and his knights, and as long as human feeling remains eyes will be moistened and hearts will be lifted over the love and pathos of " In Memoriam." The mere songs scat- tered through some of Tennyson's poems might each of them have made a fame. The wonder is how so much tenderness and pathos and beauty could have been com- pressed into lines so few. Tennyson would be. a great 260 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Englisli poet if he had written only those verses and nothing else. For a long time after the death of Lord Tennyson the office, if it may be called so, of Poet Laureate was left unfilled. There was an impression among many people, a hope among many others, that the place of Poet Lau- reate was not to be restored. It is hardly a place that belongs to modern times. We have outgrown the days of the chief bard of the king. Still, there is many an institu- tion which everybody would be glad to keep up for the mere sake of its historic and traditional interest and sig- nificance, if nothing particular came in the way. But it is not always easy to fill the place of a really great Poet Laureate, and this is just what happened when Tenny- son came to die. Browning was dead — so was Matthew Arnold. There were two men who, so far as real poetic merit was concerned, might have been put in the place without any grotesque or painful suggestion of anti- climax — for no one could expect to have always a Tenny- son succeeding a Wordsworth. These two men were Mr. Swinburne and Mr. William Morris— Mr. Morris, who has since died. It would have been obviously impossible to offer the position to Mr. Swinburne. Many of his poems, even of his later poems, were not such as the Queen could possibly be expected to sanction with her ofBcial approval. On the other hand, it was quite certain that Mr. Morris would never accept the offer of the place, if it were made to him. Mr. Morris was a strongly convinced Socialist in many ways, and he had about him a sort of rugged independence which would have in all probability re- garded the Laureateship as something like the position of a liveried menial— a court flunky. Nothing could be more sweet and gentle, and delicate and touching than most of his poems ; but the man himself had just that sort of independence of which Kobert Burns boasted. ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 261 These two men, who had in the artistic sense absolutely no rivals left, were practically out of the question, and there were no men who could well be compared with them. Some critics suggested Sir Lewis Morris, author of "The Epic of Hades," and some, again, pointed to Sir Edwin Arnold, who had hymned in stately and mel- lifluous verse " The Light of Asia." Just at the moment it so happened that there were several young poets newly bursting into blossom whose poetical faculty seemed rich in promise ; but it is only fair to say that none of them had at that time given full assurance of a claim to a com- manding position. It is quite certain that a sovereign or a prime-minister must not experiment in a Poet Laureate. Therefore, not unnaturally, all the younger men were passed by, and the choice of the Conservative Govern- ment lighted on Mr. Alfred Austin, a fairly distinguish- ed man of letters, no longer young, who had written much verse and various leading articles ; who had done, not without success, much work as a foreign correspondent ; who was known everywhere in London society, and was liked by every one who knew him. Still, the appoint- ment came as a surprise u.pon the outer world, although in some of the inner circles it had long been said that if Lord Salisbury came back to office he would advise the appointment of Mr. Austin to the position of Poet Laure- ate. Of course there was any amount of adverse criti- cism. Mr. Austin was the man most to be pitied through- out the whole time of controversy. Every one had seemed disposed to give him credit for some poetic merits before, but from the moment when he was formally announced as Poet Laureate it would appear as if, in Shakespearian phrase, "the sense ached" at him. He did not deserve the position of Poet Laureate, but neither did he deserve all the disparagement which his appointment brought on him. Not all Poets Laureate have been great poets. The 363 A HISTORY OF OTIB OWN" TIMES pity was that the chair should not liave been left vacant, at all events, until the coming of more favorable times. The early days of January, 1892, were darkened for the Royal Family, and, indeed, for all the subjects of the Queen, by the premature death of the Duke of Clarence. The Duke of Clarence was the eldest son of the Prince and Princess of Wales, and stood, therefore, in the direct line of succession to the throne. He was born on Janu- ary 8, 1864. His birth was premature, and he never be- came robust in health. He was sent, with his younger brother. Prince George, into the navy, and both princes became midshipmen, and made many a long cruise. The Duke of Clarence, then Prince Albert Victor Edward, familiarly known as " Prince Eddie," studied at Trini- ty College, Cambridge, and then went into the army in 1885. In May, 1890, he was raised to the peerage under the title of Duke of Clarence and Avondale, and was a very regular attendant at the debates in the House of Lords. His premature death was made especially pa- thetic by the fact that only a few weeks before his mar- riage engagement to his cousin, the Princess Victoria May of Teck, was authoritatively announced in the news- papers. Suddenly it was made known that he had caught cold, and then that he had become a victim to the epi- demic of influenza, which that year was taking a terrible grip of many people in these countries. At first there was no thought of his being in mortal danger ; but he had not physical or constitutional strength enough to fight against the attack, and on January 14, some six weeks after his betrothal, his young life came to an end. It is no exaggeration to say that an intense sympathy with the Eoyal Family was felt all over the civilized and a great part of the uncivilized world. On the self-same day a long and a great career came to an end. Early on January 14 Cardinal Mannmg died at ONLY A DEATH-EOLL 363 Archbishop's Hoiise,"Westminstei'. Cardinal Manning was born in 1808, and was educated at a private school and at Harrow, and afterwards at Balliol College, Oxford. Ev- ery one knows the part that he played in the history of the Church of England, and afterwards in the history of the Church of Eome. He became a clergyman of the Church of England, and he rose in 1840 to be Arch- deacon of Chichester. He was soon after absorbed in the movement which was led by John Henry Newman, and although he held aloof for a considerable time from an actual secession from the Church of England, it was thought by most observers that he would be sure to fol- low Newman before long. The once famous Gorham case gave an impulse to his action. The Gorham case was a controversy about the refusal of the Bishop of Exeter to institute the Rev. Mr. Gorham to the vicarage of Bramp- f ord Speke, on the ground that Mr. Gorham had published unorthodox opinions concerning baptismal regeneration. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council decided that the opinions held by Mr. Gorham were not contrary to the declared doctrine of the Church of England. This decision, against which Manning protested in a public pamphlet, decided his course of actioji. He said to him- self if the law courts are to settle questions of Church doctrine definitely and finally for us, it simply follows that we have no Church at all. If the legal judges are to be the interpreters of the Scriptures for us — the judges, who may, if they like, be sceptics or be atheists, then it is more clear than ever that we have no Church at all. But then he went on to argue with himself : "I cannot believe that man was left by the Creator without some authority to interpret His teaching in the form of a Church, and I cannot believe that the English legal authorities can con- stitute that Church." Therefore he looked out for a Church, and he found it in the -Church of Rome. We 264 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES are not now discussing the reasons or the justification for his change of faith, but are only concerned to set forth the reasons why he did change his faith. He passed over, as Newman had done, into the ranks of the Eoman Cath- olic Church, and he was received as a priest in 1851. He rose very high in the Roman Catholic Church, and he ended by becoming Archbishop of Westminster, and was raised to the dignity of cardinal. He came to hold a great position in all that part of the public and social life in England which is concerned with the welfare of the work- ing-classes and with the poor. Mr. Disraeli, in his novel " Lothair," has drawn a very life-like picture of Cardinal Manning under the name of " Cardinal Grandison," and has well described his manners, at once stately and sweet, his perfect ease in the best society, and his unobtrusive abstemiousness from any of what are supposed to be the pleasures of the dinner-table. Cardinal Manning at one time dined out a great deal, and was a welcome guest everywhere. But he was devoted to the principles of total abstinence from any manner of intoxicating drink, al- though he never obtruded or even sought to enforce his doctrines on those who met him in society, or who came to him in his own house. He founded an institution called the League of the Cross in London, for the pur- pose of spreading the principles of total abstinence, and he accomplished in England something very much like the work which Father Mathew had achieved in Ireland. He took an engrossing interest in all that concerned the welfare of the working-men. No one was ever more popular among the working - people of London and the great English cities than Cardinal Manning. Working-men who had no sympathy whatever with his Catholic doctrine, working-men who cared little or noth- ing for the teaching of any Church, were enthusias- tic about him because of the unsparing zeal with which ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 365 he gave himself up to any movement which could tend to the benefit of the toilers and of the poor. A great London newspaper, which was entirely out of sympathy with Cardinal Manning's religious principles, declared at a severe industrial crisis in London that Manning had really made himself the Primate of all England. His home, " Archbishop's House, Westminster," was poorly and barely furnished — the home, indeed, of an anchorite. He lived and died poor. He gave away and he be- queathed what money he got to charities. He received everybody who came to see him, and, unless when there was a special appointment, he received them according to the order of their coming. A London working-man told the writer of this book, that during the great dock strike of 1889 he particularly wished to have a few words of consultation with Cardinal Manning, who was actively engaged in an effort to reconcile the toilers and the employers. The working-man rang the bell at the Cardinal's door, and before the door was opened a car- riage drove up, and a great English Catholic nobleman got out. When the door was opened, the priest in at- tendance saw that the working-man had come first, and the Duke had come second. So the working-man got the first hearing, and the Duke had to wait for his turn. The incident was not much, perhaps. It ought to have been the same thing everywhere ; but none the less it impressed the London working-man. It had not come within his experience, or even into his imagination, that there might be a great prince of the Church who would give a working-man a first hearing, and allow a Duke to wait while the working-man was being heard. This incident illustrates clearly enough the impression which Cardinal Manning made upon the working - classes of England, and especially of London. His simple, quiet, sweet manner seemed not alone to level, but to ignore, 12 266 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMKS all distinctions of rank or class. His death, wMcli must have come soon in any case, for he was an old man, was perhaps hastened for a few days or a few hours by his rigid devotion to his principle of total abstinence. He ab- solutely refused to take any medicine which had an infu- sion of wine, or brandy, or alcoholic stimulant of any kind. He knew that the end was coming, and he deliberately refused to think that a few hours or even a few days of longer living would be worth the surrender of his conscien- tious convictions. Cardinal Manning had been married, but his wife was dead before he entered the Eoman Catho- lic Church. His daughter lived for many years after that event, but she died long before the death of her father. Since Manning's death a storm of controversy has been raging around a biography of him written by one who claimed, whether rightly or wrongly, to be in his confi- dence, and to have his authority. There can be no doubt that Cardinal Manning difiered on many ques- tions as to the discipline of his Church from Cardinal Newman, and from other great men belonging to the Catholic faith. But no biographer and no biography can ever damage the fame of Cardinal Manning, any more than such biographer or biography could damage the fame of Pascal, or of Fen61on, as an illustrious Catholic and Christian. The last day of the month of January saw the end of a man hardly less remarkable in his way, and hardly less influential in his own peculiar field, than Oardmal Manning-the great Baptist minister and pulpit orator, the Rev. Charles Spurgeon. Mr. Spurgeon was born in 1834 in the county of Essex, where his forefathers had long been settled. They were, however, of Dutch ex- traction, and some of them were Quakers. Char es Spurgeon took to preaching almost from his boyhood. He became a member of the Baptist body, and while ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 267 still very young was accepted as the pastor of a small Baptist ministry, where he soon began to be popular, and even distinguished, as the "boy -preacher." Later on, while he was still under age, he was invited to become a minister to a Baptist chapel on the South-side of Lon- don. Prom this time his fame began to grow and grow, and in a few years his Southwark Baptist Chapel was absolutely unable to contain anything like the crowds that thronged to hear the popular preacher. The con- gregation for a long time could find no place but Ex- eter Hall large enough for their religious celebrations. Even Exeter Hall had not space to hold the thousands and thousands of persons who tried to get in every Sunday in order to hear Mr. Spurgeon preach. People of all ranks and classes, of all religious denominations, and of no religious denomination whatever, made for Exeter Hall Sunday after Sunday in the hope of se- curing admission. It became the fashion to hear Mr. Spurgeon, and not to have heard him argued one's self out of the movement of public life. Great statesmen and parliamentary orators rushed to listen to him, and public opinion, of course, became greatly divided as to his eloquence. People ran into wild extremes about him. Some insisted that he was the greatest pulpit orator who had ever been heard in England, or, indeed, anywhere else. Others as stoutly argued that he was nothing but a windbag and a loud-voiced charlatan. On one point all had to agree — that Spurgeon had a magnificent voice, a fine dramatic gesticulation, and a style which rose from conversational simplicity to an im- passioned and a thrilling rhetoric. He had come into the pulpit determined to be heard — determined to be heard because, as he said himself, he had a message to deliver, and deliver it he would. He knew perfectly well the importance of getting himself talked about 268 A HISTORY OF OtIR OWN TIMES as soon as possible. He once told a friend that he was determined to attract attention, and that if there were no other -way of securing his object he would have worn a soldier's red coat when he got into the pulpit. This, it should be understood, was not in the least because Spur- geon cared about notoriety for its own sake. He had no personal desire to be known by the public. It was he- cause notoriety, even through eccentricity, was of value to him as a means of attracting an audience. All sorts of ridiculous anecdotes, most of them absolutely without foundation, were commonly told of the efforts he made to startle his audiences into attention. He very soon found that he needed nothing but his own eloquence to gather a crowd around him wherever he went. A chance and a calamity assisted Mr. Spurgeon in his purpose. The Surrey Music-hall was taken for some of his Sunday discourses. One day a sudden and false alarm of fire was raised while Mr. Spurgeon was preach- ing, and a number of people were crushed to death in their wild rush for the doors in order to escape. If any- thing had been wanting to draw attention to Mr. Spur- geon's preaching, this panic -boru calamity would have done the work. After that his congregation built for him the Tabernacle, as it was called, -on the Surrey side of London, a building which could hold 5500 persons. Mr Spurgeon was undoubtedly a great minister of the poor as well as a great public orator. He led a noble life of self-denial; if, indeed, that could fitly be called a life of self-denial which was absolutely given up to the very work dearest to Mr. Spurgeon's own heart. Large sums of money came to him by bequest and by presentation, and he employed them all in the mterest of those to whom he had devoted himself and his callmg. He lived a simple, modest, quiet life, like that of any humbler worker in the cause of religious mmistration. ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 269 He suffered mnch in his later years from gotit and rheumatism, probably brought on by overwork, by dis- regard of his own health, and by a singularly abstemious course of life. He died at Mentone, at the compara- tively early age of fifty-eight. During his long illness he received frequent messages of sympathy from the Queen, from the Prince and Princess of Wales, from Mr. Gladstone, from most of the archbishops and bishops of the Church of England, and from Cardinal Manning. Men of all faiths, and many men of no faith at all, united in regarding him as a devoted worker for religion and for the interests of the lowly and the poor. He was a fierce controversialist. He was " ever a fighter," like Eobert Browning's hero, and he sometimes quarrelled even with leading teachers of his own denomination. But no one ever doubted his truth, his integrity, his unselfishness, and his sincere and passionate desire to do good. Therefore general sorrow was felt all over the country, and amongst all English-speaking peoples when the news came that his task was done, and that his life had reached a premature end. An attempt has been made already in these volumes to describe the peculiar and almost unique position which Professor Freeman held in historic literature. Here we can do little more than record his death. He died at Alicante, in Spain, on March 16, 1892. He had been settled in Oxford for some years, having been ap- pointed Eegius Professor of History in that university in succession to Dr. Stubbs. His health for some time had not been good, and he was fond of spending his winter holidays in the delightful climate of Sicily. He was a man of a tremendous mental energy, and he was an advanced reformer in the truest sense of the word. Every cause which concerned the welfare of humanity had his strenuous support. There was a common im- 270 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES pression among the general puWic that Professor Free- man was a man of rough, arrogant, and overbearing man- ners. The writer of this History can only say that he never found anything rough, arrogant, or overbearing in Professor Freeman's demeanor. Freeman was thought by some people to be a man who had little regard for the growth of his country's empire, but as a matter of fact he had a regard above all other political desires for the reputation and the honor of his country. He was once engaged in controversy in Oxford as to the lending out of books for the students from one of the great libra- ries. He was in favor of a judicious liberality in such a matter. '-'A book," he said to an acquaintance, "is to some men a fetish. To me it is a working instrument." Thus it was with him iu his studies and in his life. He allowed no opinion to be with him a fetish, and, on the other hand, he recognized every opinion as a possible workiiig instrument. He was emphatically a strong man, and his name will probably grow steadily with the growth of historical literature. The death of Ford iladox Brown, which took place on October 6. 1S03, deprived English art not only of a ffT^t pcxinter, but of a great artistic influence. Mr. iladox Brown is commonly spoken of as the founder of the Pre-Eaphaelite school of painting in England. But nothing certainly could have been further from the mind of Madox Brown than the idea of forming or founding a school of any kind. Xo painter who ever lived had a more sturdy belief in the right of every artist to do the host he could of his own independent inspiration, and to trust all the rest to its result. But as it happened he oarne in just before the time when the so-called Pre- Eaphaelite movement was started, and undoubtedly it eau-iit much of its inspiration from him. He was born in CtUais of an English father and mother, and got all ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 271 his early education in France and Italy. He sent two cartoons to an exhibition in "Westminster Hall in 1845, and his genius was not recognized by the public at large, although Haydon in his diary speaks of Madox Brown's fresco as "the finest specimen of that difi&cult art in the Hall." It is very doubtful, indeed, whether Madox Brown ever won his full meed of praise from the English public. Certainly he never won it from the London public. But in Manchester and Liverpool and Glasgow, where there is a passion for art, which we in London cannot pretend to have, his paintings, like those of his friend, Dante G-abriel Eossetti, had an immense success. He was engaged for seven years in painting a series of historical pictures for the Manchester Town-hall, and he spent all that time in Manchester, steadily doing his work and patiently waiting for the approval of time. Ford Madox Brown was unlike many, if not most, other artists, if we may use the word in the narrow and the conventional sense. The artist in that sense is generally more or less withdrawn from any interest in the common affairs that trouble human beings. " Art for art's sake " was the motto at one time of a certain school of French painters and sculptors and poets. The meaning, so far as any meaning could be put into the plarase at all, was that no artist had any need to trouble himself about anything but the reality and the success of his picture, or his poem, or his statue. We do not say that there is anything ignoble about this doctrine. It pledged the man to do the very best work he could in the craft for which he labored. George Eliot's hero, Felix Holt, who is a carpenter by trade, declares that for him the will of God is to do good carpentering. One can quite under- stand a doctrine of that kind, but it did not satisfy the large and sympathetic mind of Ford Madox Brown. To him it was inconceivable that a painter or a sculptor. 272 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES as such, shoTild withdraw himself from continual interest in the pTocesses of human moTements. Nothing was erer done during his time in the cause of humanity but Ford Madox Brown's heart warmed to it, and it had his actual and his cordial assistance. Nobody could better hare loTed the human race than he, or done more faith- tzZj an that he posdhly could do to lighten the load of tbe heaTilj laden. There was no great cause or great m j-Teme^T at home or ahroad which had not his sym- 'pSiZi.j, szA. iz fax -as he could gire it, his helping hand. Tee man 'iiisiseli was greater than his works, and it is "ST ill tlj4S ib£ KngHirih pnhUe should know the fact, and rrifc ^' w aeeoidmgh'. He had suffered much in life. He ^d oz^i zTiAz rzLuering in the death of his son, Oliver Msiiwx BnrsTi, who died in his youth. That was indeed i-TLiiz -zT-Z'ZrlsL:-^ Tonth. Oliver Madox Brown had had a TiiT^ir-e "n i'^j or. the line in the Soyal Academy in his •rdx"-iTee~ ii jear, and had written a noTcl, called " Gabriel j>2-Ter.~ which made the whole English reading public bifere ijii: i gresr new noTeUst was coming into litera- iniTr. li SBTiiiz:^ could make some of us doubt the srz^i :i Cirljle"; saiing, that there is nothing in the mizii-ii"!?- - death of OliTcr Madox Brown. The pres- ets Triier certainly can rememher in his time no other cXiziT^ of premature promise so great and so prema- tar>r> iiiirrt>i. Ford Madox Brown lived on for many Tiirs' i±:cr Siis fetal hereavement, and never let go his L::i (HI the aetiTe interests of life. Its work did not .-^.is-- i:r him. nor his concern in the fates and fortunes cf o:ier i-ien. He was in truth a great Englishman, and an E:ii::i;ini:in with whom the honor and the real dig- nirv of his eonnrry counted for far more than her ter- ritorial aggrandizement. He was in many ways, apart ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 373 even from his artistic power, a typical Biiglishman of the noblest kind. He wanted England above all things to be just and to fear not. That would have been his pride in his country, and the country could hardly have, in that sense, a nobler citizen. We have dwelt so far upon the character of the man, because, while his paint- ings aiid frescos speak for themselves, they cannot tell the public of the future quite enough about the man who wrought them. Of course there were great painters and great sculptors who took a deep and a constant inter- est in the welfare of common humanity. Michael Angelo certainly was one of them ; so were many others of less transcendent greatness. But the painter or the sculptor, especially in later days, turns away too much from the vulgar concerns of humanity, and wraps himself up too much in his mantle of faintly colored sestheticism. Ma- dox Brown was not a man of that class. Nothing that concerned the ordinary affairs of humanity failed to in- terest him, and yet he did his own artistic work as steadily, as faithfully, and as well as though he believed that the painter had to think of nothing but how to paint, and that the poet had nothing to think about but how to evolve melodious rhyme. Ford Madox Brown was, of course, intimately associated, as we have said before, with Dante Gabriel Eossetti, and with William Michael Eossetti, and with Swinburne and the whole of that new school in painting and in poetry. But he al- ways remained steadily outside the classes of the school. He formed his own judgment on everything, and he held by it. There could be no doubt that if he had wanted to be the founder of a school, he could have accom- plished his desire. But he had no such wish. It was entirely out of his thoughts. His creed was original in- spiration for every man. It is only fair to say the same thing for Dante Gabriel Eossetti, who has been of late 12* 274 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES days commonly regarded as a man determined to set up a school of liis own. " You are^ of course, a Pre- Raphaelite ?" a lady once said to Eossetti. He replied, somewhat coldly, " I am not an 'ite of any kind ; I try to paint pictures, and I try to write poems." That, we believe, was the literal truth in the case of Dante Gabriel Eossetti. It was the truth so far as painting went in the case of Ford Madox Brown. He tried to paint pict- ures, and he succeeded. He tried to give every help in his power to every good cause, and he never failed when the opportunity came in his way. If he could have' founded a school of men as large-minded and benev- olent as himself, he might well claim to be remembered as one of the happiest benefactors of the human race. The whole reading world felt a shock at the news that Eobert Louis Stevenson was dead. He died on Decem- ber 3, 1894. The death, indeed, was not unexpected, be- cause Stevenson had long been in delicate and sinking health, and every one knew that he was not likely, as the Celtic phrase goes, "to comb a gray head." He had had to leave Europe altogether, and was settled in one of the South Pacific Islands, where the soft and exquisite climate, the mild, ever-enduring summer, and the per- fectly clear atmosphere, gave him the best chance that the world could give of a prolonged existence. All these chances failed him in the end, and he died at the age of forty-four. He had endeared himself to the whole of the reading public of English-speaking countries. Per- haps since the great days of Dickens, and Thackeray, and George Eliot, and Charlotte Bronte, there was no novelist more popular in England. Indeed, at one time he got about him, certainly without any effort of his own, a school of enthusiasts and adorers who were pre- pared to put his name above that of any English nov- elist, living or dead, There were impassioned young ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 275 writers who clamored that some of his novels were be- yond any ever written by Sir Walter Scott. All this, of course, was absnrd ; bnt a man must have real genius in him who can create such a school of idolatry. There can be no doubt that many men and women of less rapturous and hyperbolic temperament were sometimes inclined to question Stevenson's merits, merely because of the wild trumpeting and drum-beating of his adorers. But Stevenson, judged impartially by his own work, is undoubtedly one of the greatest English writers dur- ing the later part of the nineteenth century. He stole quietly into the world of fame. Most of us heard of him, for the first time, a great many years ago, when a remarkable story, a short story, appeared in the Cornliill Magazine, called " The House on the Links," and signed with the initials ''E. L. S." None of us then had the least idea as to the identity of the writer of the story, but some of us, at all events, felt satisfied that a new and fresh power had arisen in English literature. All the rest of his career is, of course, the common pos- session of the reading public. He revived in " Treas- ure Island " something that might be called the litera- ture of Defoe, and in " The Master of Ballantrae " he gave back to us the method of Walter Scott. But he was no imitator of Defoe or of Walter Scott. His work was always essentially his own, sprang from his own inspiration, and was carried out by his own mode of treatment. In the minds of many persons — of those, possibly, who have passed the romantic and the heroic days — his essays were still better than his novels. Some of us, who cannot admit for a moment that his novels were equal to those of Walter Scott, are quite willing to allow that his essays are equal to those of Charles Lamb or Francois Copp6e. Some of his stud- ies of Edinburgh are perfectly captivating, at once by 276 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES their realism and by their poetic beauty. After hia death it was proposed that there should be a public monument raised to him in this country. The original suggestion was made by Lord Kosebery ; and, strange to say, some objection was started to it by a countryman of Stevenson and of Lord Eosebery. Better wait, it was urged, and see whether Stevenson's fame will hold out. This as a piece of advice was sensible enough. Monuments raised in a moment of national emotion are often apt to become unmeaning fabrics in course of time. Even a well-educated Englishman wandering about London to-day is sometimes apt to wonder, if he raises his eyes and looks at the things at all, who were the persons to whom this or that public monument was erected. It has been well said that if a man's fame needs a monument to preserve it, then he ought to have no monument at all. But in the case of Kobert Louis Stevenson it surely might have been clear to any reason- able person that his was a literary fame which must endure, monument or no monument. The idea is not that we, the public, should erect a monument to a man who has captivated and controlled us by his genius, in order that we may tell posterity that there once was such a man, but in order to express our grateful appreciation of the man's genius and of his work. The monument to Sir Walter Scott in Edinburgh, the monument to Eobert Bums in Ayr, were never put up with the foolish no- tion that by such erections, and by such erections only, could the memory of the men be perpetuated. The monuments were simply the tribute of gratitude from the living to the dead. They were designed as an im- mortelle is cast upon some great man's grave. Nobody supposes that the immortelle will prolong the great man's fame : it only testifies to other men's admiration, homage, and gratitude. In this sense, of course, a monn- ONLY A DEATH-ROLL 277 ment was due^ and is due, to Eobert Louis Stevenson. Hyperbolical admiration apart, it cannot be doubted that he started a new chapter, or at least that he revived an old and brilliant chapter, of English fiction. He will probably rank in time, not with the very best, but im- mediately after the very best. He created situations rather than characters, but when he set about drawing a character he drew with the firm and steady hand of a master. There was nothing oblique or vague about him. What he saw he saw, and what he saw he could describe. If that is not to be an artist, then we, at least, have no idea of what an artist is. CHAPTER XV HOME EULE WITHOUT PAENELL Meanwhile the difficulty of the Conservative Govern- ment at last came to be that it had no positive and dis- tinct policy to offer to the country. So far as one could see, the departments were managed well enough ; but the interest of the country is. not to be caught and kept up by a mechanical skill in the mere routine of administra- tion. There were three or four great questions absorb- ing the attention of the public in general, and on these the Government had practically nothing to say. It be- gan to be quite clear that there must be a new appeal to the country by the means of a general election. The sand-glass of the Tory Administration had obviously run down. The Parliament itself, like the too familiar giant of classical story, had to touch the ground in order to get new strength. The Irish Nationalists and Irish Cath- olics were determined to oppose to the uttermost the Education Bill for Ireland which had been introduced by the Government — a question stiff with difficulty then and since. On June 28, 1893, Parliament was prorogued, the sentence of dissolution was passed, and the preparations for a general election were begun. Mr. John Morley was the first statesman who had held Cabinet rank to announce the policy of the Liberal party. In his address he said : " It will still manifestly be my duty first and foremost to aid in prosecuting the great cause of the better government of Ireland to such an HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 279 issue as shall relieve the Imperial Parliament from a distracting and a now obstructive burden, and at the same time shall enlist the capacity and energy of Irish- men in the orderly government of their own country." Mr. Morley pointed out that ''the only alternative which Parliament had been able to devise to Home Eule is per- petual coercion as a permanent instrument of govern- ment." Mr. Morley insisted that "this abrogation of the civil rights and constitutional securities of Irishmen, this establishment of an odious inequality between the people of Ireland and the people of Great Britain, in spite of the most solemn pledges of perfect equality, both at the Treaty of Union and on many occasions since, makes it more than ever the bounden duty of Liberals to renew the strong effort which they made six years ago to satisfy the constitutional demands of the great majority of Irishmen." The principal other measures which Mr. Morley recommended — and, of course, in his recommendation he carried with him the authority of his colleagues — were a Local Option Bill, a bill for the establishment of parish councils, a bill for giving greater powers to the London County Council, an inquiry into the working of the poor-law, a reform in the laws re- lating to land tenure and to electoral arrangements, and the disestablishment of the State Church in Scotland and in Wales. Mr. Chamberlain followed with his ad- dress almost immediately afterwards. Mr. Chamberlain reminded his constituents that in 1886 he had under- taken to do all in his power to maintain the legislative union between Great Britain and Ireland, and to resist any measure or scheme which tended to put the loyal and Protestant minority in Ireland under the control of the National League. He expressed a hope that the Local Government Bill — the passing of which, he said, had been delayed by the threatened obstruction of the 280 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Gladstonian and Home Rule party— might become law in the next Parliament. "The issues," he said, "are the greatest which can be submitted to any people, and I trust that in this great crisis Birmingham will once more lead the way, and will give her united voice against a policy which would be dishonoring to England, dan- gerous to Ireland, and destructive to all hopes of Liberal progress." "We refer to these two addresses because they certain- ly put forth in the clearest light the questions of policy on which the decision of the country was invited. The general result of the elections was that Wales, Scot- land, and Ireland, taken separately, showed clear and large majorities in favor of the policy of Home Eule. England, however, declared by a majority of 71 in favor of the legislative union. Great Britain taken altogether showed a majority of 16 on the side of the Union. The complete majority for Irish Home Eule was 57. It was plain, therefore, that Mr. Gladstone, should he come into office, would find himself once again maintained in power by the Irish J^ationahst vote, and dependent on its support for the continued existence of his Government. There was some doubt as to whether Lord Salisbury would again meet Par- liament as Prime-minister, or would follow the prece- dents of 1874 and 1880, and allow his successful rival to enter office without the interposition of any formal delay. Under the peculiar conditions and uncertainties of the time, we think that Lord Salisbury was fairly justified in returning to the old-fashioned practice of taking the de- cision of Parliament as to the general course of his recent policy. There was much confusion and uncertainty as to the influence exercised in carrying the elections by the Home Rule measure, by the Scottish disestablishment proposal, by the local option scheme, and various other CAEDINAL MANNING HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 281 political proposals. Parliament met on August 4, and Mr. Peel was again elected Speaker. It was soon an- nounced that a vote of want of confidence in the Tory Gov- ernment would be moved in the House of Commons by- Mr. Asquith, one of the most rising of the newer members in that House, already distinguished as an advocate, and destined to be still more distinguished as a parliamentary debater and a statesman. The vote of confidence, accord- ing to the usual course on such occasions, took the form of an amendment to the address. Mr. Asquith's amendment declared that " "We feel it, however, to be our duty humbly to submit to your Majesty that it is essential that your Majesty's Government should possess the confidence of this House and of the country, and respectfully to rep- resent to your Majesty that that confidence is not reposed in your present advisers." Nothing certainly could be more pithy, and at the same time nothing could well be more vague and undefined. Of course'Mr. Asquith took care to point in his speech to the precise questions on which the Liberal party were disposed to condemn the Government. All these questions were fully discussed in the debate that followed. But Mr. Asquith's amend- ment, if it had never been debated at all, was quite enough for its purpose, and the division would have been just the same if it had been taken without any discussion what- ever. The clear fact was that the Government had been left by the country in a minority, and nobody on either side of the House supposed for a moment that any speeches delivered by anybody there could convert that minority into a majority. When the divison came to be taken Mr. Asquith's motion was supported by 350 members and opposed by 310. There was, therefore, a majority of 40 in its favor. The want of confidence was affirmed by the House of Commons, and there was an end for the time of Lord Salisbury's Administration. 283 A HISTORY OF OUE OWN TIMES Nothing remained but for Mr. Gladstone to come back to power, and to set himself to form a new Administra- tion. Mr. Asqnith was made Home Secretary, a position so high in the administratire sense that many people pro- fessed surprise at the nomination of a man comparatively new to Parliament for such a place. " Why Asquith ?" was the question that went about in political circles. Such a question is often asked in these same circles when a Prime-minister realizes the promise of a comparatiyely young man. The Prime-minister, however, if he is really fit for his leading place, is better qualified than any of his followers to light upon the talents and the character which are needed for high of&cial position. It will be remembered that when Mr. Disraeli made the Earl of Mayo Governor-General of India, the uttermost amaze- ment was freely expressed by Conservatives, as well as by Liberals, in the dining-rooms and the smoking-rooms of the House of Commons. Mr. Disraeli, however, knew his man. He had the instinct of genius to discover capac- ities which the House of Commons up to that time had not found out ; and the fact was that Lord Mayo proved himself to be one of the best Indian Viceroys who had ever served the Empire. In the same sort of way Mr. Gladstone saw in Mr. Asquith a capacity for administra- tion which, despite of Mr. Asquith's great ability as a debater, the House of Commons in general had not at that time discovered. Mr. Bryce, the historian of "The Holy Eoman Em- pire," a book which must hold a standard place in Eng- lish literature, and the author of a masterly survey of the working of public institutions in the United States, was made Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Mr. Arthur Acland, son of Mr. Gladstone's old friend. Sir Thomas Aeland, became Vice - President of the Committee of Council on Education — in other words, what would be HOME KULE WITHOUT PAENELL 283 called in coiintries less given to formality and circumlo- cution, the Minister of Public Instruction. Mr. Arnold Morley became Postmaster - General. These three men were quite new to official life. Mr. H. H. Fowler, also comparatively a new man, but who had already shown a remarkable capacity for debate, and especially for clear and convincing statement in de- bate, was appointed President of the Local Government Board. Lord Herschell was placed on the woolsack as Lord Chancellor ; Sir William Harcourt became Chan- cellor of the Exchequer, and Lord Kosebery was made Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Lord Spencer was First Lord of the Admiralty, and Mr. Campbell -Bannerman was Secretary for War. Mr. Mundella accepted the office of President of the Board of Trade, Lord Kimberley that of Secretary of State for India ; and Lord Eipon became Secretary of State for the Colonies. Lord Houghton, son of the poet and patron of poets, was sent to Ireland as Lord Lieutenant. Three familiar names were absent from the list of the new Administration. Mr. Childers had given up parliamentary life altogether owing to ill- health, the ill-health which soon afterwards hurried him to a premature grave. Sir Lyon Playfair had come back successful from a struggle in his Leeds constituency, and as it was not easy to find a place for him in the Govern- ment, seeing that so many younger men had to be pro- vided for, he was sent up into the House of Lords, and was made Lord Playfair. Mr. Stansfeld had achieved great distinction both as a debater and as an adminis- trator. While he was able to attend to the duty of an office, he won the credit of being one of the ablest, most energetic, and most untiring among the heads of admin- istrative departments. Mr. Stansfeld had opened his parliamentary life with every promise of a really brilliant career. One or two of his early speeches had won the 284 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES cordial approbation of Mr. Disraeli himself, to whom Mr, Stansfeld was opposed on almost every question of do- mestic or foreign policy. JSTo man in the House of Com- mons had a higher character than Mr. Stansfeld. He had that rare courage which enables a member of Par- liament to set himself on certain occasions against the whole current of what might, perhaps, be called genteel or Philistine public opinion. There can be no doubt that he injured his political prospects by identifying him- self with a certain movement in domestic legislation which did not find acceptance with most of the newspa- pers and most of the public. To Mr. Stansfeld that was a matter of no consequence. His conscience showed him his way, and he went his way resolutely, and whether we for ourselves think he went right, or whether we think he went wrong, we are all bound to do justice to the courage with which he maintained his convictions. But there were other reasons that weighed more heavily against Mr. Stansfeld's promotion to office once more. He was one of those whose forward movement is, to adopt the words of a charming writer, " checked and made slow and patient by ill -health." In all his administrative work he had to take account of his physical condition, and he was not able to throw himself absolutely into the life of the House of Commons and the work of a depart- ment as men of stronger physical frame might have done. So he passed, not unwillingly, out of official life, and be- fore long out of parliamentary life altogether. It is said that he was offered a peerage as a tribute to his ability and his public service ; but Mr. Stansfeld was a man who, although possessed of ample means, was republican in the simplicity of his way of life, and was strongly opposed to the principle of hereditary legislation. If a peerage was really offered to him, one can easily imagine with what an amused and quiet smile he would have declined the prof- HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 385 fered honor. The House of Commons became all the poorer for his withdrawal into private life. Much wonder was expressed at the time because Mr. Labouchere was not taken into the Cabinet, or even into the Goyernment. Mr. Labouchere had long held a dis- tinct and a peculiar place in the Liberal party. He was one of the most radical amongst Radicals, but he had always walked his own independent road, wherever that led him. He was a man of great ability, a man of large fort- une ; a clever, rasping, sarcastic debater in the House of Commons ; a speaker who always commanded the atten- tion of the House whenever he spoke, and who also com- manded a newspaper of great circulation and influence, in which he expressed with the uttermost frankness every opinion that came into his mind. He had again and again done splendid service in that paper by his fearless denunciation of all shams and swindles, all quackeries and humbugs, in the forming of companies or the proclamation of newly devised medical and chari- table systems. He accepted actions for damages not only with composure, but with delight, and he generally came off the victor in the courts of law. His cynical style made many people believe that he had no real con- victions, and only amused himself by passing off as an extreme Radical and a red-hot reformer of social abuses. Those who knew him well, however, always maintained that his professions of opinion were absolutely sincere, and that the cynicism was put on for his own personal amusement. However that may be, it is certain that he was not invited to join the new Administration, and it may also be taken as certain that Mr. Gladstone never had any intention of making him an offer of such a place. It may be that Mr. Gladstone thought that the proprietor and editor of a popular newspaper would not be the best sort of man to be a member of the Cabinet. 286 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES It will be remembered that, many years before, Mr. Bright, when he found that the time had come which made it necessary for him to accept a place in a Lib- eral Cabinet, at once withdrew from all connection with the Radical newspaper, the Morning Star. Perhaps Mr. Gladstone thought that it might be difficult for the pro- prietor and editor of a paper of great circulation not, some time or other, to be guided in his conduct of the paper by some information that must necessarily come within his reach as a Cabinet Minister. At all events, no tender of office was made to Mr. Labouchere, and he was left to his old function of free and independent criticism. The new Cabinet, as every one well knew it would, went to work at once to prepare for a second measure of Home Rule. The second measure was curiously un- like the first. To begin with, it entirely threw over the principle of an absolutely separated Irish Parliament, which had been the central theory of Mr. Gladstone's first Home Rule scheme. The new measure proposed to retain the Irish representation at "Westminster. A cer- tain proportion of Irish representatives was still to hold a place in the Imperial House of Commons. We have already mentioned the fact that the banishment, if we may put it so, of Irish members from Westminster was the chief reason why some of Mr. Gladstone's most devoted followers in Great Britain, men who were also thoroughly devoted to the principle of Home Rule, had withdrawn from his side when his first measure was under consideration. Of course we are not speaking of men like Lord Hartington, who had never professed the slightest sympathy with Home Rule, or, on the other hand, men like Mr. Chamberlain, who had always up to a certain date been the pro- nounced and proclaimed champions, if not of any par- HOMK RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 287 ticular scheme of Home Rule, yet certainly of the principle of governing Ireland according to Irish ideas. It has been already set out in these pages that Mr. Chamberlain was in favor of a Home Eule measure only as a last resource — that is, if it were proved to be im- possible to satisfy Ireland by any centralized system of government carried on in the Imperial Parliament. Mr. Chamberlain, however, had apparently made up his mind that he would not accept any Home Eule measure from Mr. Gladstone, and although the great difficulty of the scheme of 1886 had been removed by the proposal to retain a certain number of Irish members in Westminster Palace, it was not thought in the least degree likely that the concession would induce Mr. Chamberlain to with- draw from opposition to the bill. Other men, however, like Sir George Trevelyan, for instance, and like many who could be named, came round at once frankly and honorably to Mr. Gladstone's side when the difficulty which was too much for them in 1886 had been removed, and Ireland was still to be connected by direct repre- sentation with the Imperial Parliament. Therefore the second Home Eule Bill appeared to be introduced un- der happier auspices than the first. Indeed, it was easy enough to count the votes beforehand, and there could be little doubt that the measure would pass through the House of Commons. Still, at the same time, there was a certain lack of animation, and even of interest, about the whole debate in Parliament. Mr. Gladstone intro- duced the measure on February 13, 1893. Superstitious persons said that the day was unlucky, and asked what the late Mr. Parnell — he then was the late Mr. Parnell — would have thought of a measure introduced on such a day. For it was well known that Mr. Parnell, like many other strong men, had an unconquerable belief in luck or ill-luck on certain days and under certain condi- 288 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tions. Mr. Gladstone's new bill was called " A measure to amend the provision for the government of Ireland." Its essential proposition was, as we have said, for the es- tablishment of a National Parliament in Dublin, while retaining the services of eighty Irish members at West- minster under the same conditions as those existing at the time. There were to be two chambers in the new Irish Parliament — a Legislative Council, to be elected by voters who had a rating qualification of twenty pounds, and a Legislative Assembly, to be elected on the ordinary franchise which qualified for the choice of a member of Parliament. There was a good deal of objection felt to the property qualification, but it was not considered, even by the Irish members, worth while taking much trouble in opposition to such a proposal. The one great desire of the Irish Nationalist members was to obtain a Home Eule Bill of any kind, and leave any necessary emendation of its provisions to some later and more au- spicious time. Ireland's single desire just then was to have the principle of Home Eule affirmed by the Im- perial Parliament, and so to get some practical return for the long agitation which had begun with O'Oonnell, passed into the hands of Isaac Butt, and was so nearly borne to success by Charles Stewart Pamell. Thought- ful Irishmen knew but too well that if the second effort of a Liberal Government for the passing of Home Eule should fail, it was only too probable that the Irish National movement would fall again into the guidance of the extreme men — "the party of action," as the phrase used to go in the old Italian days, the men from whose hands Mr. Parnell had made it his business to remove the control of the Irish cause. For between the first and the second Home Eule Bill a great change had taken place in the conditions of the Irish Parliamentary struggle. On October 6, 1891, Mr. HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 289 Parnell died at Brighton. The close of that " really great career" deserves to be dealt with gently. Mr. Parnell became the occasion for a public scandal and for a trial in the Divorce Court. He made no defence to the charge against him, and Captain O'Shea, who claimed the right to divorce, had no difiSculty in securing a decision. There is no need for us to go into all that purely private question. The claim for divorce was allowed, as we have said, to pass undisputed, and Mr. Parnell afterwards married the woman who had been Mrs. O'Shea. But the case, as was natural, created an immense sensation in these islands, and indeed all over the world ; and there was a general election coming on, and everybody knew that it must be afEected to a great extent by the result of the proceedings in the Divorce Court. We have already described the zenith of Mr. Parnell's parliamen- tary career, when the whole Liberal Opposition rose up in the House of Commons to welcome him on his acquit- tal, as it may fairly be called, by the judges in the Special Commission Court. Too soon after that triumphant scene came the decision of the Divorce Court and the public scandal. Mr. Parnell's followers were at first determined to stand by him. They considered that the man's one private lapse from morality had little or noth- ing to do with his public career. They could review in their minds case after case in which English statesmen had been charged with the same offence, and yet had not been banished from public life because of the private scandal. The judgment in the Divorce Court was given shortly before the opening of Parliament, and it was the custom of the Irish Nationalist party to re-elect their leader on the first day of the session. When this particular first day came round Mr. Parnell was re-elected without a division, although not without a remonstrance on the part 13 290 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES of one or two men. It soon appeared, however, that it would be very difficult indeed to carry the country at the general election in favor of Home Rule if Mr. Parnell were to remain leader of the party. It will be remembered that at the time of the murders in the Phoenix Park Mr. Par- nell wrote to Mr. Gladstone offering to resign his seat in Parliament if Mr. Gladstone thought that his retirement from parliamentary life would be of any advantage just then to the progress of the Irish cause in English public opinion. When the decision in the Divorce Court was given Mr. Gladstone fully expected to receive something in the way of a similar message or letter from Mr. Parnell. He wrote to one of Mr. Parnell's party with whom he was personally acquainted, asking whether such a letter or message was likely to be received by him. The member thus addressed could only reply that he had received no intimation of any such intention on the part of Mr. Par- nell. There was a good deal of controversy afterwards as to the intercommunications which took place, the usual uncertainties as to the time when this letter had been sent out and that letter had been received, why some communi- cation had not been earlier made or some other communi- cation earlier acknowledged — in fact, there were all the usual discrepancies and misunderstandings that belong to a sudden crisis in parliamentary life. Some of Mr. Par- nell's followers began to think that for the sake of the Irish N"ational cause it would be better that Mr. Parnell should retire for the present from public life. Indeed, the major- ity of the party had taken it for granted from the very first that his temporary retirement was a matter of course. It did not occur to them as in the least degree likely that a man in his position would care to take an active part in the work of the House of Commons immediately after the deci- sion of the Divorce Court. The proposal made to him was that he should keep out of Parliament for a few months, HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 291 and that in the meantime the affairs of the party should be managed by a committee, the members of which should be nominated by him. Mr. Parnell, however, and a few of his friends took fire at the attacks made on him by some of the leaders and teachers of the iJfonconformist party in Great Britain, and thought of nothing else. Mr. Parnell not only refused to withdraw for a time from public work, but he issued a manifesto denouncing Mr. Gladstone, and the Nonconformist party, and the whole English people. That manifesto, it is only fair to say, he showed to one member of his party before its publica- tion. That member of the Irish party remonstrated in the strongest terms against the publication of any such mani- festo, and told Mr. Parnell that should it appear a break- up of the party was absolutely inevitable. His uttermost urgency could only obtain a delay of twenty-four hours in the issue of the manifesto, and after its appearance in print all hope of reconciliation was gone. Then began the celebrated sittings in Committee- room No. 15 in the Westminster Palace buildings. The question to be debated was, whether Mr. Parnell ought or ought not to continue to act in the House of Com- mons as leader of the Irish party. The proposal was again made to him that he should simply keep away from the House for a few months, and allow the Irish business to be conducted by a committee of which he himself should name the members. There was not a man in the party whose principal desire was not to make matters as easy as possible for Mr. Parnell. Many things were known by some members of the party which, ac- cording to their opinion, brought Mr. Parnell's moral guilt down to a comparatively venial degree of offence. Every one of them remembered with gratitude the splen- did work he had done for Ireland, and none of them thought of more than his temporary withdrawal from 293 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the action of his political leadership. Mr. Parnell, how- ever, did uot see his way even to a temporary retire- ment from parliamentary work, and some of his friends urged and inspirited him on to maintain his position at all hazards. The result was that after many days of de- bate in Committee -room No. 15 the Home Eule party broke up. The great majority elected a new chairman, and a small minority held to Mr. Parnell. Then set in a wild jcampaign over Ireland, in which the major and the minor divisions of the party fought each for its own cause. Some electoral vacancies hap- pened about the time, which gave an opportunity for a definite struggle. The first victory scored for the larger party was in the city of Kilkenny, where Sir John Pope Hennessy, an Irish Nationalist who had had a long and honorable career as a colonial governor, contested the seat as an opponent of Mr. Parnell's candidate, and was returned by a great majority. Mr. Parnell threw his whole soul into the struggle then and after. He was a man of immense physical strength, but not by any means of great constitutional strength — the two conditions do not often go together. He was always remorseless in the way in which he overtaxed himself when he had any work at heart which he was determined to accomplish. During his Irish campaign after the split in the party he never spared himself. He travelled night and day, addressing great meetings in Ireland here, there, and everywhere. He was like a man "possessed," in the mystic sense of the word, by his cause. Some of his closest friends warned him that he was overworking and overtasking himself, and that worse would come of it. He was buoyant, he was indifferent, he was fearless, as indeed was his whole nature and temperament, and he would not listen to any suggestion of rest. " Eest else- where " he, too, had apparently taken for his motto, like HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 293 the famous Flemish rebel against the Spanish rule. The " rest elsewhere " suddenly came. He had kept up his personal friendship with some of the men who had with- drawn from his leadership, and one of these in the clos- ing days of the campaign strongly advised Mr. Parnell not to rack himself out with incessant travelling and speech -making. Mr. Parnell smiled blandly, and said that the travelling and speech-making did him, on the whole, a great deal of good. "Within a fortnight he was dead — dead at the early age, for a public man, of forty- five. Mr. Gladstone always spoke of him with the utmost respect and regard, and openly deplored the sudden and melancholy close of what had been, as he called it, " a really great career." Mr. Parnell's disappearance from public life, and the conditions under which he disappeared from life alto- gether, came undoubtedly as a cold blast to wither the prospects of the Home Rule cause. Yet the Home Eule cause made a distinct step in advance under Mr. Glad- stone's leadership. The Home Eule measure passed through the House of Commons by a majority of 301 against 367, and was rejected only by the House of Lords. Now, in practical politics, a measure which is carried by the House of Commons and rejected by the House of Lords is looked upon as in a fair way to success. Every popular measure is rejected by the House of Lords in the first instance. Mr. Gladstone's Home Eule Bill of 1886 was rejected by the House of Commons. His second measure, of 1893, despite the great disruption in his party, was accepted by the House of Commons, and would have passed into law but for the action of the House of Lords. Therefore the hopes of all those who were in favor of Home Rule might well have been satis- fied, and even gratified, by what happened in 1893. But it would be idle to deny that the split in the Irish party. 294 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES and the bitter quarrel between Mr. Parnell and some of his followers, and the immediate cause of the whole quar- rel, had done a good deal to discourage the English and Scotch and "Welsh supporters of Home Kule. These men for the most part stood by the cause, and supported it by Toice and by vote. It is surprising, indeed, that so many friends of Home Rule in Great Britain remained wholly undismayed by the conditions , under which the struggle had to be carried on, and were faithful to the principle which, under Mr. Gladstone's inspiration, they had Toluntarily undertaken to maintain. But there was confusion for the time in the conditions of the Irish question. The Irish party, which had fought so well as one unanimous body, had been broken into opposing sections, and although one section represented a large majority, and the other only a small minority, the fact remained that there was no longer a thorough union in the Irish ranks. Then, again, for a long time the Eng- lish Radicals of Great Britain had come to have a per- fect faith in Mr. Parnell's genius for the mastery of the party, and for its guidance, even at the shortest notice, in the right way. Mr. Gladstone has over and over again paid tribute to the unvarying help which Mr. Parnell had given him in the conduct of the common cause. And now Mr. Parnell was dead ; and, according to the opinion of many Englishmen, something like chaos had come again. We have anticipated the fate of the second Home Rule Bill. It was carried, as we have said, through the House of Commons by a substantial majority. There were some powerful and eloquent speeches made on both sides of the debate ; perhaps, after Mr. Gladstone's own speech on the second reading, the greatest impression was wrought by the speech of Mr. Asquith. Those who heard it recognized in it a ready and a satisfying answer HOME RULE WITHOUT PARNELL 295 to the question, Why Asquith ? The bill went up to the House of Lords, and was read there a first time on September 2, 1893, and as everybody expected, when it came on for a second reading it was rejected by a ma- jority of 419 against 41. It had at least advanced one stage, and cheerful persons reassured themselves with the recollection that a measure which has once fairly passed through the House of Commons is certain in the end to pass through the House of Lords. But that end was put ofE for the present, and relegated to an indefinite time, and the fate of Ireland was cast into the Medea caldron once more. CHAPTER XVI MR. GLADSTOlfE RESIGNS — LORD ROSEBERT SUCCEEDS Many of Mr. Gladstone's most devoted followers were strongly of opinion that, after the decision of the House of Lords, he ought to have obtained permission to dis- solve Parliament, and appealed to the country at a general election on the clear, direct question of Home Eule or no Home Eule for Ireland. Some members of his own Administration — even, it is said, of his own Cabinet — were believed to have been distinctly of this opinion. On the other hand, there were Eadicals of the most advanced order who thought the country ought to be asked for a decision on the general question as to whether the overruling power of the House of Lords could be tolerated any longer in a constitutional State, the government of which was based on the prin- ciple of representation. Mr. Gladstone must undoubt- edly have had in his own mind good reason for not taking either course. It is too soon yet for the public to get any really clear idea about the reasons which de- cided Mr. Gladstone's course of action. The world will have to wait for the time when the letters and the me- moirs of statesmen now living come to be published in order to understand the causes of Mr. Gladstone's quiet continuance in office after the Home Eule Bill, on which he had staked so much, and which he had carried through the House of Commons, had been contemptuously re- jected by the House of Lords. Mr. Gladstone, as every MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERY SUCCEEDS 297 one knew, had been for a great many years a decided opponent of the predominance asserted by the House of Lords. So long ago as the far-oS days when his own . bill for the abolition of the duty on paper was rejected in 1860 by the hereditary chamber, he had denounced the action of the House of Lords as a " gigantic innova- tion," and had, in a subsequent session, literally com- pelled the House of Lords to pass the measure. Nat- urally, therefore, the outer public in general expected that Mr. Gladstone would take the opinion of the coun- try, either on the question of Home Eule, or on the action of the House of Lords. The more, however, we recognize this fact, the more will reasonable and im- partial observers be inclined to admit that Mr. Gladstone must have had substantial cause for accepting the de- feat, and remaining quietly in office as if nothing had happened. But the effect on the Liberal party for the time was deeply discouraging, and almost even prostrating. The whole heart seemed for the hour to go out of Liberalism, and the Government itself was infected with the com- mon feeling of humiliation and disappointment. The Administration dragged along, and stuck to its work in a dogged, cheerless sort of way, but every one felt that some serious change was impending. For a long time nobody of the outer world had any suspicion of what the change was likely to be. Mr. Gladstone was at his post with unselfish and unsparing attendance as long as the House of Commons kept sitting. The House adjourned for a very short recess on September 31, 1893. Parlia- ment met again on November 2, and sat, except for a short holiday at Christmas, up to March 5, 1894. Mr. Gladstone went at Christmas for a brief holiday to Biar- ritz, a favorite winter resort of his before and since, and he was again in his place on the Treasury bench before 13* 298 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the close of February. During his absence in Biarritz a positive statement appeared in a London evening news- paper — the Pall Mall Gazette — to the effect that Mr. Gladstone had finally made up his mind to resign his office as Prime-minister, and to withdraw altogether from parliamentary and public life. This paragraph, it after- wards appeared, had been previously offered to other newspapers, and rejected by them, on the ground that they did not see evidence enough of its authenticity. It is believed to be certain that the statement was offered in the first instance to the Times, and was rejected. The Times, perhaps, had had enough lately of secret informa- tion tendered for sale. When the statement appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette, it was at once contradicted by per- sons who professed to have, and were likely to have, Mr. Gladstone's own authority for the contradiction. It was said, later on, that Mr. Gladstone had not been consulted about the issuing of the contradiction ; and it was said, also, that at the time when the contradiction was pub- lished — and this seems very probable — Mr. Gladstone had not made up his mind as to any immediate resignation, and was still open to argument on the subject. Those who were a little within the circle of political knowledge had known for some time that Mr. Gladstone's thoughts were turning towards a resignation of the Prime - minister's office and a withdrawal from public life ; but none, or at least not many, of those who knew this much were prepared to expect any immediate action. The fact that Mr. Gladstone had remained in office after the rejection by the House of Lords of his Home Eule measure, and that he had continued to work on as if nothing in partic- ular had occurred, seemed to most people a good reason for beligviijg that he would continue to work on still, so long as his physical powers were spared to him. As far ag most members of the House of Commons and the MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERY SUCCEEDS 299 strangers in the galleries of the House could judge, his physical powers did not seem to have deteriorated in any- serious way. His voice was still clear and strong and resonant, his energy was unabated, his capacity for work seemed unlimited, and the fire in his eyes was not quenched. Few of us knew that his sight and his hear- ing had been of late years much impaired ; and, although we all knew his age, yet we had got into the way of regarding Gladstone as a sort of half -immortal member of Parliament, who would see every other member of Parliament into the grave, and go on just as before. Nearly twenty years had passed since Mr. Gladstone with- drew from the leadership of the Liberal party on the ground that his advancing years and diminishing ener- gies allowed him no longer to undertake the incessant duties of such a position. There seemed to most of us no real difference between the Gladstone of 1875 and the Gladstone of 1894 ; and as he had returned to public life in the former case, we did not see why he should not hold on to public life in the latter. On March 1, 1894, Mr. Gladstone spoke in the House of Commons in his capacity of Prime-minister. The oc- casion of the speech was the interference of the House of Lords with a measure of scarcely capital importance — the Parish Councils Bill, sent up from the House of Com- mons. "In our judgment," Mr. Gladstone said, speak- ing with the utmost gravity and solemnity, " this state of things cannot continue." The declaration was re- ceived with the most enthusiastic cheering from the Lib- eral benches. "For me," Mr. Gladstone added, "my duty terminates with calling the attention of this House to a fact which it is really impossible to set aside — that we are considering a part, an essential and inseparable part, of a question enormously large, a question which has become profoundly a truth, a question that will de- 300 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES mand a settlement, and must at an early date receive that settlement from the highest authority/' Few men who listened to that speech in the House of Commons knew that it was Mr. Gladstone's farewell to ofiBcial, to parliamentary, and to public life. Had this heen known there would have been such a demonstration in the House of Commons as the House probably had never known be- fore. But it was not so understood by the majority in the House. On the contrary, the majority on both sides regarded it rather as a new call to battle from the old chief who had led his followers on so many a field of fight. There is a touching and beautiful passage at the close of one of the forgotten novels — forgotten, I am afraid, even in Germany — of Jean Paul Eichter, the " Flegeljahre," which came into the mind of one listener as he heard the speech, and felt that the House in gen- eral did not understand its meaning. In Kichter's novel one of the twin-brothers, the musician brother, Vult, feels himself bound to go away forever, and in parting plays a farewell tune upon his flute. But the other brother, Walt, does not suppose that it is a farewell, and Walt listens with delight to the notes of the flute until they grow less and less in the distance of the streets, "for he did not know that with them his brother was leaving him forever." The House of Commons certainly did not then know that its greatest man was making his farewell speech. The House listened with delight to that eloquence which was made so impressive by the thrilling tones of his still unimpaired voice and utter- ance, and thought of nothing else, for it did not then know that Mr. Gladstone was leaving it forever. Why did not Mr. Gladstone appeal to the Country, and demand a settlement of the long and great controversy with the House of Lords ? As we have said, he must have had good reasons. But could any one tell us what MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS-LORD ROSEBERT SUCCEEDS 301 the reasons were ? Quite lately, more than two years after the event, one newspaper attempted a public ex- planation. The Pall Mall Gazette, which, as we have already said, published the first announcement of Mr. Gladstone's im- pending retirement, came out thus lately with what it called "a plain story " of the reasons for that resignation, and of the disputes among the Liberal statesmen which followed it. The "plain story" has undoubtedly a cer- tain historical interest. We shall speak first of its relation to Mr. Gladstone's withdrawal from public life, and shall afterwards have an opportunity of alluding to its com- ments on the consequent differences of opinion among the leading Liberals in Parliament. "It may be stated," says the Fall Mall Gazette, " without fear of contradiction, that almost from the time of his taking office in August, 1892, to the date of his resignation in March, 1894, Mr. Gladstone was on many occasions, and on several points, not in complete harmony with the members of his Cabi- net. He had formed it with the view of carrying a Home Eule Bill at all hazards, and necessarily had to enlist some fresh recruits, owing to the defection of certain of his former colleagues of light and leading, who had de- clared against such a measure and gone over to the enemy's camp." " The Cabinet," the Fall Mall Gazette says, "continued to be a far from united and happy family, and when, at one of its meetings, a majority of its members determined that Parliament should be asked to sanction a largely increased expenditure on the navy, Mr. Gladstone did not hesitate to express his indignation in terms both forcible and clear. Towards the end of February, 1894, the Parish Councils Bill, it may be re- membered " — this is the bill to which we have just referred " owing to amendments introduced into it by the House of Lords, was the cause of considerable friction 303 A HISTORY OF OUE OWN TIMES between the two Houses, and on March 1, in the Com- mons, Mr. Gladstone, while, as a sort of Hobaon's choice to save the bill, accepting certain alterations that had been made in the Upper House, emphatically described the action of the Lords in regard to this and other Gov- ernment bills as raising questions of the gravest charac- ter." All this, of course, we could have assumed to be generally true, but the more important statement is to come. " There is good reason," says the Fall Mall Gazette, "ioT believing that Mr. Gladstone had already urged his colleagues to reject the Lords' amendments, and to go to the country upon the question of their treatment of the Home Eule and Parish Councils Bills. It this view were adopted, he declared himself prepared to continue as Premier ; but his proposal did not commend itself, and was overruled." Now, of course, as we have already said, it is not possible just yet to know the whole truth and the exact truth on this subject. We must wait until correspondence and memoirs are published. But to the writer personally it would seem more than probable that Mr. Gladstone did take up the attitude which the Pall Mall Gazette ascribes to him. Such an attitude would be consistent with the whole tone and tenor of his speech in the House of Commons on March 1, 1894, and that speech could hardly be consistent with any other attitude. Mr. Gladstone no doubt deeply felt the rejection of his Home Rule measure by the House of Lords, although he must have known well that a rejection was certain to come. The House of Lords never gives way in the first instance to a popular demand. The people have to beat at the doors of the peers' chamber again and again before the demand is conceded. But the people have only to beat at those doors again and again in order to make concession a certainty. Mr. Gladstone may well have thought that the mutilation of the Parish Councils Bill, coupled with ME. GLADSTONE KESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERY SUCCEEDS 303 the rejection of the Home Rule scheme, gave a good op- portunity for an appeal to the country as to the general action of the House of Lords, and its position as an im- portant factor in a great constitutional system. " Can we put up- with it any longer ?" we can imagine his asking the country. " Who gave it the power of interfering be- tween the representative chamber and the progress of popular legislation ? Has not the time come to make up our minds as to some settlement of this great question, and to say whether the present position and privileges of the hereditary chamber are not becoming an anomaly and an obstruction ?" Certainly, until we are convinced to the contrary, we shall believe it likely that the Pall Mall Gazette was either well-informed or made a happy con- jecture, and that Mr. Gladstone's voice was for instant dissolution, and for an appeal to the country against the action of the House of Lords. The Fall Mall Gazette, however, goes on to say that, ''strangely enough, as far as can be ascertained, Mr. Gladstone does not appear to have been referred to on the subject of his successor, nor, as far as we are aware, was he consulted before Lord Eosebery was sent for by her Majesty.^' We confess that this conjecture seems to us to want seriousness. It is all but incredible that Mr. Gladstone should not have been asked by any one, and should not have told any one, the name of the man whom he believed to be best qualified to act as his suc- cessor. As regards the one question of Home Eule, it may fairly be assumed that neither Lord Eosebery nor Sir William Harcourt was what Mr. Gladstone would have thought quite up to the mark. The conversion of Sir William Harcourt had been, in one way, almost as remarkable as that of Mr. Chamberlain in the other. Lord Eosebery had never professed to be an enthusiast on the subject of Home Eule. The Pall Mall Gazette 304 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES suggests that if Mr. Gladstone had been consulted with regard to the nomination of his successor/ he would not have named either Sir William Harcourt or Lord Eose- bery, but a member of the House of Lords who was not Lord Rosebery. It seems to us hard to believe that Mr. Gladstone, with all his strong feelings against the recent action of the House of Lords, and with his thorough knowledge of the fact that Parliament must be governed from the House of Commons, could have suggested any peer as the future Prime-minister — we mean, could have made such a suggestion if left to himself, and not over- borne by the opinions of some of his colleagues. On the other hand, we put aside altogether the suggestion that he was not consulted upon the subject. It is, indeed, quite possible that he may have deliberately declined to give any recommendation of his own. He knew well that there was at the time a serious crisis existing in the Liberal Cabinet and the Liberal Administration. He must have known that there were members of the Liberal Cabinet who were declaring in private that they would not serve under Sir William Harcourt as Prime-minis- ter. We quite agree with the Pall Mall Gazette, that "it is difficult to understand how the mere fact that Sir William Harcourt was not Prime-minister was sufficient to reconcile those of his colleagues who had objected to his holding that position to continue in office." Still, it is perfectly certain that the fact was so, and that two or three influential members of the Liberal Cabinet had made it known that they would not serve under Sir William Harcourt as Prime-minister, and yet were will- ing, or at least were not absolutely unwilling, to serve under him as leader of the House of Commons. So began the question about the arms of Achilles. Mr. Gladstone was gone, and who was to take his place ? Of course, in the true sense of the words, there was no MB. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERT SUCCEEDS 305 one who could take his place, for the four seas that surround Great Britain and Ireland did not enclose any living man who could possibly be regarded as the equal of Mr. Gladstone, Still the Liberal party had to choose a leader, and the question put was, who the leader should be. In the House of Lords there were two or three capable men among the Liberal peers — Lord Kosebery, for example, Lord- Eipon, and Lord Kimberley. There were younger men, too, eloquent, able, and full of promise, but public opinion set them aside, chiefly because they were considered too young for the leadership of a great party. Gradually the choice narrowed itself down to the appointment of Lord Eose- bery or to the selection of a leader from the House of Commons. Of course, it was assumed in all this con- sideration, and very naturally and properly assumed, that the Queen would act upon the advice of the Liberal Ministry in appointing a successor to Mr. Gladstone. Lord Eoseberry was undoubtedly a man of great and varied abilities. He was probably the ablest all-round man, as the Americans say, to be found in the House of Lords. He was what the Germans used to call a many- sided man, and, indeed, it may be that his many-sided- ness told against him when he came to fill the office of Prime-minister. He never professed to be a scholar in the pedantic sense, but he was one of the best-read men in the country. He was a good writer, and he was a brilliant and powerful speaker. Some of the addresses he delivered on great public occasions, as on the unveiling of a monument to Burke in one place, or to Burns in another, were models of oratorical and literary achieve- ment. He had a great love of art, and knew as much about painting and statues as any amateur of his time. At his intervals of leisure he was devoted to the turf — or perhaps it should rather be said that he was devoted 306 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES to the turf when his intervals of leisure from politics and books and art allowed him a chance of attending to other affairs. Certainly, if the Prime-minister were to be chosen from the House of Lords, there could be no serious doubt about Lord Eosebery's title to the position. But there was natur^illy a very grave objection to the idea of once again choosing a Prime -minister from the House of Lords. This objection has been dwelt upon more than once in these pages already. The time will undoubtedly come when the country will no longer en- dure the idea of a Prime-minister kept far aloof from the direction of the political campaign by his position in the distant House of Lords. Lord Eosebery, moreover, had the disadvantage of never having had a seat in the House of Commons. Lord Salisbury fought his way in that House for years and years, and had thoroughly mastered its ways before he went up to the House of Lords. So, too, in former days had Lord Derby, the eloquent Lord Derby, the Eupert of debate, who had his training and won his fame in the House of Commons. But Lord Eosebery had never been in the House of Commons, except as a visitor in one of the galleries, and no one in the representative chamber had any means of knowing whether he was likely, or not likely, to succeed in the position of Prime-minister. Now, in the House of Commons there were at least three men intellectually qualified to take the leadership of the representative chamber itself. These men were Sir William Harcourt, Mr. John Morley, and Mr. As- quith. Mr. Asquith, however, was by almost common con- sent put out of the reckoning, for the reason, suggesting no disparagement to him, that he was too young a mem- ber of the House of Commons to be lifted into such a position. Something of the same kind was felt with re- gard to Mr. John Morley. Mr. Morley had within a very MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD EOSEBERY SUCCEEDS 307 few years risen immensely in the estimation of the House of Commons. He had proved himself to be a great par- liamentary debater and a genuine statesman. We do not mean by this that the whole House of Commons approved of his action as a statesman. • Of course, it is needless to say that the Conservatives and Unionists in the House entirely disagreed with his Irish policy, and it was in his Irish policy that lie had his chief opportunity of proving himself a statesman. What we do mean is, that even those who most strongly disapproved of his Irish policy recognized in him the capacity which lifts a man above the level of the commonplace, hard-working head of a department, and exalts him into the order of the states- man. The stoutest Liberal would not deny that Mr. Disraeli was a statesman; the most inveterate Tory would not think of suggesting that Mr. Gladstone was only a mere administrator. In this sense, then, the whole House was beginning to recognize Mr. Morley as a rising statesman. But, at the same time, it was thought by many Liberals that Mr. Morley had not been lono- enough in Parliament to be put at the head of the Liberal party in the House of Commons. Then, above all other considerations, came the claims of Sir William Harcourt. As we shall point out presently, the con- sideration of these claims raised a question which could not have come up in the case of Mr. Asquith, or even of Mr. Morley. That question was, whether Sir William Harcourt ought not to be the Prime-minister. He had rendered splendid services to his party. He was, after Mr. Gladstone, the greatest gladiatorial champion on the Liberal benches. He was ever ready for the fight, and his style of eloquence had perhaps the one single ad- vantage over that of Mr. Gladstone, that it never by any chance, or in one single sentence, went above the heads of the House of Commons. Mr. Gladstone sometimes 308 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES bewildered most members of the House by some daring citation from a classic author whose name they could barely remember, and whose language they could not possibly interpret ; but Sir William Harcourt, as Disraeli said of Sir Robert Peel, never gave to the House any quotation which had not been commended by frequent repetition. Sir William Harcourt was in every sense of the word a strong man. He stood up a commanding, intrepid, undaunted figure in politics. The darkest days of political disaster never shook his nerves or lowered his spirits. Undoubtedly, in many ways he was the man best qualified to be the successor to Mr. Gladstone. But the fact was that Sir William Harcourt, like most men of that energetic and strenuous tempera- ment, had made many political enemies, and was not thought likely to be a popular man, under whom a gen- eral election could be fought in the Liberal interests. Even in the Liberal Cabinet itself there were men of mark who, it is said, had firmly declared that, although they would consent to serve under Sir William Harcourt as leader of the House of Commons, they would not serve under him as Prime-minister. Then, again, the House of Commons is free to choose its own leader, but it is hardly free to choose a Prime- minister. We have seen that when Mr. Gladstone re- signed his of&ce as leader of the Opposition many years before, the Liberal members of the House of Commons met as a body and elected the then Lord Hartington as successor to Mr. Gladstone. The Liberal members of the House of Commons could, of course, have met to- gether and elected Sir William Harcourt to be leader of that House, but according to all usage it would hardly be within their province to elect a Prime-minister, especially if the proposed Prime-minister happened to be a mem- ber, not of the House of Commons, but of the House of CARDINAL NEWMAN MK. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERY SUCCEEDS 309 Lords. All these difficulties ended, as was but natural, in a compromise. With many of the Liberal party the main desire was to get a Prime - minister whose name would carry the greatest degree of popularity at a general election, which every one knew must come before long. Now, Lord Rosebery was undoubtedly one of the most popular men in the country. His manners were charm- ing, his style of speaking was delightful ; his variety of tastes and occupations gave him so much the greater variety of admirers, and his love for the turf and his success in the racing-field would have won the cheers of multitudes all over the country. Some even of those who would personally have preferred the choice of Sir William Harcourt acknowledged that they saw greater help to the Liberal cause by the selection of Lord Rose- bery. So the compromise was made, and Lord Rose- bery was recommended to the Queen as Prime-minister. The whole arrangement was carried on in private. The Liberal party in general was never taken into any con- fidence on the subject. A few of the Liberal leaders in the House of Commons talked with a few of the Liberal leaders in the House of Lords, and the question was set- tled, and the arms of Achilles were handed over to Lord Rosebery. Even those who had supported privately the claims of Sir William Harcourt could not help wishing every God-speed to so brilliant and charming a statesman as the new Prime-minister. Lord Rosebery had friends everywhere and enemies nowhere, and even those who doubted whether he was strong enough for the place were glad that he had the chance of testing his strength. A compromise, then, was effected. Sir William Har- court was in a certain sense the fighting Ajax of his party, but, unlike the Ajax of classic story, he was willing to accept terms of arrangement, and he did not think of committing political suicide. Lord Rosebery became 310 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Prime-minister, and to Sir William Harcourt was given the leadership of the Liberal party in the House of Com- mons. He had in this way an immense advantage over Lord Eosebery. We are not speaking of the two men as rivals, but only endeavoring to describe the quite different positions which they were called upon to occupy. If Lord Eosebery had been Pox, Gladstone, and Bright all in one, he could have done nothing whatever for the Liberal party in the House of Lords. The Liberal peers were in a miserable minority. They counted for absolutely noth- ing when a party division came to be called ; and nobody studied the debates in the House of Lords with any expectation of finding political guidance there. Where party politics were not concerned, the peers could gen- erally discuss a measure with judgment and calmness and practical good sense. But when a political question came before them, then they became simply a chamber with an overwhelming and unalterable Conservative majority. Sometimes, indeed, it must be owned that even under these conditions they adopted a wise and statesmanlike course. But that was only when they were under the guidance of some Conservative statesman who recom- mended a wise and sound compromise. Lord Beacons- field had induced the peers more than once to refrain from setting themselves against the public opinion of the country; and so, before his time, had other Conserva- tive statesmen done, with a like effect. But when Lord Eosebery became Prime - minister he had to deal with Conservative statesmen who were not much inclined for compromise of any kind with Liberal measures. Lord Salisbury was by training and by temperament a fighting statesman ; and just at the time the serious losses of the Liberal party held out to him no very tempting invita- tion to arrangement. Therefore Lord Eosebery found the Conservative peers in a domineering and aggressive mood. MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBEEY SUCCEEDS 311 and there "was practically nothing he could do to soften their temper or to frighten them into quietude. Then, again, the new Prime-minster undoubtedly dis- appointed some of his own followers by his way of express- ing himself on certain of the great questions which were supposed to be the creed and the charter of the Liberal party. He discussed the Home Rule question in what might be called the amateur philosopher's manner of treatment, and he pointed out that there was not much chance for Home Rule until what he termed " the pre- dominant partner" — England — had been convinced of the merits of the scheme. Now, no doubt there was, as his friends said at the time, clear common -sense and sweet reasonableness in this declaration. England, if taken alone, had not up to this time been converted in her electorate to the principle of Home Rule for Ireland, and England was undoubtedly the predominant partner. But then, it had to be observed that through nearly all the great reforming struggles of later years the reforms had been carried by the overweight of the Scottish and Irish and "Welsh constituencies. England, if taken alone, was in general a Conservative country. The impulse and inspiration to reform came from the partners who were not predominant. Then, again, it would not be thought a happy inspiration on the part of a general about to en- ter on a great campaign if he were publicly to assure his army that he did not quite know whether the greater num- ber of his officers and soldiers were not rather indisposed to win a victory for the cause which he represented in the field. Anyhow, Lord Rosebery's words undoubtedly sprinkled a gentle shower of cold water on the eagerness of the Liberal party. Furthermore, Lord Rosebery, al- though long known to be resolute in his purpose for some sort of reform in the constitution of the House of Lords, did not by any means satisfy the demands of Liberals in 313 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the House of Commons and outside it, who thought that the Liberal party ought then and there to make a resolute and concentrated attack on the hereditary chamber as a political institution. The result of all this was that to the outer public Lord Eosebery did not seem quite up to the mark as a Liberal Prime-minister, and as the successor to Mr. Glad- stone. No Eadical could forget that Mr. Gladstone's last words in the House of Commons had conveyed to the Liberal party the bequest of a duty to stand up against the privileges of the House of Lords. Liberal feeling, therefore, was damped and chilled at the very outset by the tone and attitude of Lord Eosebery. Very likely the seeming lack of energy and of conviction came from the mere fact, on which we have already dwelt, that Lord Eosebery was condemned to a station where he could do absolutely nothing for the advancement of the Liberal cause. The position of a Liberal Prime-minister in the House of Lords is that of a man whose official functions compel him, when he speaks at all, to be always calling out, if not exactly to solitude, yet to listeners the vast majority of whom he cannot possibly hope to convert.' Lord Eosebery had obtained a position which was not only absolutely unenviable, but which appealed to the sympathy and even the compassion of all his best friends. It had been known for a long time in the House of Commons that the state of Mr. Arthur Peel's health made him anxious to be relieved from the hard work of Speaker. Years before Mr. Peel, on returning thanks for his re-election, spoke pleadingly for himself and for any possible defects that there might have been in his conduct of the House, by referring with emphasis, well appreciated by all who heard him, to the " almost in- tolerable tedium " of some of the long nights spent in debate. Even in more recent years, when the work .of MR. GLADSTONK RESIGNS— LORD ROSEBERY SUCCEEDS 313 the Speaker is lessened, and when all-night sittings are made practically impossible, the Speaker of the House of Commons has a terribly hard time of it. He takes the chair at three o'clock every day, except Wednesday, when he assumes his official position at twelve noon, and, un- less when the House is in committee, he has to remain in the chair during the whole of each sitting. When the House goes into committee he has some relief, because then the chair, or rather the deputy chair, is taken by the Chairman of Committees. But even then a Speaker gets only an uncertain respite. He lives, if we may put it so, on the premises, and he cannot leave his own home while the House of Commons is sitting. Wo one can tell at what moment he might not have to be sent for to decide some question of order. Therefore he cannot, like most of us when our active work is done, go to bed and sleep, and forget his cares. There are even still many ques- tions, financial and other, which are exempted from the early closing rule — the rule which declares that no con- tentious business can be taken in the House of Commons after midnight. Therefore the Speaker, even in these days, when obstruction may be met by the closure, has to remain ready for action in his house on certain occasions, hour after hour past midnight, until the whole of the long day's work is done. On an ordinary day, when the House is not in committee, the Speaker occupies the chair from three o'clock until half - past twelve, midnight, or thereabouts, with one single interval of about twenty minutes for food of some kind ; dinner it could hardly be called, since no man not a born Texan could gulp down a genuine dinner in twenty minutes. This kind of life had been telling severely on Mr. Ar- thur Peel. He had in his earlier parliamentary days suffered a great deal from his occupation as Parliamen- tary Whip to one of the great parties, and the office of 14 314 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Parliamentary Whip keeps a man almost incessantly on his feet. It had been his evil fortune to go through a long period of the obstruction struggles in the House of Commons, when six o'clock in the morning was no un- usual time for the House to conclude its sitting. All this told upon him — for his constitution, like that of his illustrious father, was not naturally very robust — and no one was surprised to hear that he had determined in the early part of 1895 to seek retirement and rest. The leaders of the Liberal Government were anxious to elect Mr. Leonard Courtney to the position of Speaker. Mr. Courtney was one of the ablest men in the House of Commons in many ways. As Chairman of Committees he had proved himself most efficient and absolutely im- partial. He had his own strong views on most subjects — he had even his own strong prejudices — but he never allowed these to overmaster him when, as Chairman of Committees, he was guiding a debate in the House of Commons. His manners in public life were not genial, and his action as Chairman was sometimes very peremp- tory. But he won the respect of everybody, and it was thought quite likely in the House of Commons that he would be accepted as Speaker. The result, however, proved otherwise. The Liberal Government endeavored to make friendly arrangements with the Conservative Opposition for the unanimous election of Mr. Courtney, but the Opposition proved to be implacable. Mr. Court- ney had been an absolutely independent member of the Liberal party. He had again and again on this or that question supported the Tories against the Liberals. He had to pay the penalty of his independence, for the Tories had lately become displeased with him because, when upon certain occasions they counted upon his support, he had given it to the other side. Therefore it soon be- came clear to the Government that there was no chance MR. GLADSTONE RESIGNS— LORD BOSEBERY SUCCEEDS 315 of carrying Mr. Courtney withont a struggle and a divis- ion, which are always held to be unsatisfactory and to be deprecated where the election of a Speaker is concerned. Of course there have been, even in our own more recent times, disputes and divisions over the choice of a Speaker ; bu-t it is always felt that there is something unseemly in the dispute — that it may lead to a doubt as to the impar- tiality of the Speaker, and that therefore, if possible, a controversy ought to be avoided. The Liberal Govern- ment, very sensibly it would seem, forbore to put forward Mr. Courtney as its candidate for the Speaker's chair. The Liberal leaders looked round the House for the next best man possible, and their choice fell on Mr. William Court Gully, a distinguished lawyer and Queen's Counsel, and member of the House of Commons ; for, of course, it need hardly be said that the Speaker must always be a member of the House. Now it is not too much to say that to the great majority of the English people the career of Mr. Gully was absolutely unknown. More than that, there were many members of the House of Commons, not concerned with the legal profession, who knew nothing whatever about him. But the leaders of the Liberal Government proved to be amply justified in the choice they made. It was precisely one of those cases where individual judgment has to be trusted if anything is to be done at all. Over and over again in these volumes we have pointed to instances in which a minister, on either side of the House, has designated for high office somebody of whom the public knew next to nothing, and has been justified and warranted by the result. This was the case with Mr. Gully. He suc- ceeded one of the most distinguished Speakers the House of Commons has ever had. On April 8, 1895, Mr. Arthur Peel delivered his fare- well address to the House when resigning the Speaker's 316 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES chair. He spoke with infinite grace, dignity, and pa- thetic efEect. There was only one opinion in the House as to the manner in which he had maintained the honor- able traditions of the Speakership. During his earlier period of office he had to come into Collision with some of the Irish Nationalist members almost every day. Yet the Irish Nationalist members had no ill-feeling towards him. They thoroughly understood that he had duties to perform, and that he must perform them, and it is satisfactory to recollect that on this parting occasion a high tribute was paid to Mr. Peel by an Irish Nationalist member, speaking on behalf of his party. On the 10th of the same month Mr. Gully was elected Speaker, and, as has been already said, his career amply Justified his election. Later on, when the Conservatives came back to office and to power, we shall see that they had the good taste to support his re-election. It is felt to be quite a reasonable thing in the House of Commons, al- though not a very common course of action, to oppose the election of the Speaker who is put up for the first time ; but if a Speaker be once chosen by the House, it is thought not gracious or wise to oppose his re-election. CHAPTER XVII THE COBDITE EXPLOSION" Paeliameitt was prorogued on March 5, 1894, and tad only a week's interval of rest. The Houses came together on March 12, with Lord Eosebery as Prime- minister, and Sir William Harconrt as Chancellor of the Exchequer and, of course, leader of the House of Com- mons. To return again to the statements of the Pall Mall Gazette, we find amongst the " charges and allegations " one to the efEect that Lord Eosebery objected strongly to the death duties scheme which was proposed by Sir William Harcourt, and which made the great feature of Sir William Harcourt's budget. Now, the manner of dealing with the death duties was the capital point in Sir William Harcourt's budget, and, whether one approves of it or does not approve of it, will undoubtedly be con- sidered, one way or the other, the zenith of Sir William Harcourt's official career. To us it seems hardly credi- ble that on so important a question there could have been a great difference of opinion in the Cabinet, or that, if there had been. Sir William Harcourt could have been allowed to go his own way without check or pro- test. There has not been in our times a more important principle set up in public affairs than that which Sir William Harcourt put into action when he adopted the principle of the new scale and arrangement of death du- ties. The idea was very simple. It was, that if a man comes in for a vast property, he must pay duties on a 318 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES different scale of arrangement from that which applies to a man who comes in for a small inheritance. Sir William Harcourt's scheme struck altogether against the theory that a man ought to be taxed according to his relative liability — in other words, that a man who has only £500 a year should be taxed according to the same proportion as a man who possesses an income of £5000 a year, or even that a man with £500 a year of uncertain earnings should be taxed at the same rate as a man with £500 a year of secure and settled income. All this question had been a long-standing controversy among official statesmen, and among amateur statesmen as well. Of course, the question of income-tax was not exactly the same as the question of the death duties ; but the principle which Sir William Harcourt embodied in his budget with regard to the death duties was in its general bearings the same as that which had already been contended for, and within certain limits carried out, with regard to the application of the income-tax. It Was the old, familiar question. Shall the rich man pay more in proportion to the maintenance of the State than the poor man ? Everybody pays something ; everybody has to pay something. Shall the man of wealth pay more in proportion than the poor or the comparatively poor man ? Shall the man with £50,000 a year, or the man who succeeds to a property of £50,000 a year, pay more in proportion than the man who owns or succeeds to a property of £300 or £500 a year ? This was really the purpose and the spirit of Sir William Harcourt's budget, so far as the death duties were concerned. We can hardly think it probable that, as the Pall Mall Ga- zette says. Lord Rosebery objected strongly to the death duties, and was overruled by his Cabinet on that point. The question was really one of vital importance to the Liberal party. Its application raised Sir William Har- THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 319 court for the first time to a place amongst the foremost financial statesmen of the reign. It seems hardly credi- ble that such a principle could have been applied in con- tradiction to, and in defiance of, the firmly expressed opinion of the Prime-minister. Certainly, one does not think of Lord Rosebery as the kind of man who would be likely to remain at the head of a government the majority of whose members had decided to go against him on a question of the highest national importance. Lord Eosebery does not seem to have been particularly anxious to become Prime-minister. He had occupations enough already without that particular occupation. The place was obviously open to him, if he cared to seek for it, as soon as Mr. Gladstone had ceased to hold its com- manding position. We cannot, therefore, understand why Lord Rosebery should have consented to commit himself to the death duties principle of Sir William Har court's budget, if he had not approved of ihe prin- ciple, merely in order to maintain himself in a position which he had not particularly desired to hold, and which in the natural course of things must have been brought some time or other within his reach. It seems to us, therefore, likely that the Pall Mall Gazette was not thoroughly informed as to the reconstruction of the Cabinet after the resignation of Mr. Gladstone. The new Cabinet, one might be allowed to think, must have started with a common accord into its new business. The Liberal party had undergone a loss which never could be made good. Lord Rosebery must have felt, just as well as Sir William Harcourt did, how tremen- dous were the difficulties which stood in the way of the Liberal party's advance when Mr. Gladstone had ceased to be its guide. The most ordinary common-sense would suggest that at such a time there must be something like a general agreement among the Cabinet ministers as to 330 A HISTORY OP OUR OWN TIMES the principles which they intended to maintain and the measures which they proposed to bring forward, and that under such conditions a radical difference of opinion between Lord Eosebery and Sir William Harconrt would have been impossible. The Liberal Government drifted on. Drifted really is the only fitting word to describe its movement ; for there was no captain, and there was no pilot — at least, there was no one whom the crew in general regarded as either captain or pilot. The session, except for the proposals of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was, up to a certain time, so uneventful that the discussion on a proposal to set up a statue of Oliver Cromwell within the precincts of Parliament became quite a subject of importance, and even of excitement. It was certainly not a very new proposal. At various successive intervals since Oliver Cromwell's death motions have been made to set up a statue to the great Protector within the limits of West- minster Palace. To adopt a familiar form of expres- sion, there is a good deal to be said on either side of the question. That Oliver Cromwell was a great English- man no sane person can deny. That Oliver Cromwell did for a time reign over England is a fact that hardly even insanity itself could dispute. Cromwell reigned over England much more distinctively and more really than many an English king who came in the iinqiaes- tioned order of succession. But then, it has to be re- membered that a statue to Oliver Cromwell within the precincts of Parliament would mean the common parlia- mentary approval of what Oliver Cromwell's life and work had been. Now it would, of course, be obviously impossible to get the Irish people to join in any tribute of admiration to the life and the work of Oliver Crom- well. Every historian recognizes the fact that the work of Oliver Cromwell in Ireland was a work of reckless and THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 321 wholesale repression of all Ireland's national sympathies and efforts. To Englishmen of the Puritan and the democratic strain Oliver Cromwell seemed a patriot, a hero, and a wise and saying law-maker. To many other Englishmen, Scotchmen, and Welshmen he appeared as a rebel and a regicide. Then, to Nationalist Irishmen he showed himself simply as a merciless oppressor. Perhaps a time may yet come when a man can be a patriot in his own country, and, even though he belong to a conquer- ing race, be not regarded as an oppressor in any other country ; but that time certainly had not come when Oliver Cromwell was the foremost figure in English his- tory. There were two different and distinct objections to the many successive proposals for the erection of a statue to Oliver Cromwell in the parliamentary precincts. One was the objection that Oliver Cromwell was not a king, and that, therefore, his statue ought not to stand with those of the kings of England. This seems to us a wholly futile and even absurd ob- jection. Cromwell was, as we have said, much more distinctly a ruler of the English people than half the kings whose names go down in historical succession. Nor are the statues in Westminster Palace the statues only of sovereign kings. There are statues of statesmen, and soldiers, and judges, and orators, representing all the intellect and all the political parties of the country. But the other objection — that which came from the Irish people — was much more serious. To Ireland Cromwell was known only as a scourge and a curse. During the discussion in the House of Commons to which we are drawing attention an Irish Nationalist member put it that one might as well propose to erect a statue to the Diike of Alva in Brussels or Antwerp, as to expect the consent of the Irish people, still represented at Westmin- ster, to a statue of Oliver Cromwell within the precincts 14* 322 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES of the Imperial Parliament. Nothing came of the pro- posal. Mr. John Morley, who was then Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, explained that he had not quite understood that there was so deep a feeling in Ireland against the memorial of Cromwell. There is some good reason to believe that Mr. Gladstone thoroughly appreci- ated the meaning and the reasonableness of the Irish pro- test, and that he was well content that it should have been made, and pleased that it should have been suc- cessful. Then the Parliament went its way until the unforeseen occurred. Mr. Disraeli is generally credited with having originated the saying that the unforeseen always comes to pass. He may have invented it so far as his own reading was concerned, but it is certain that Euripides had made the remark a good many years before Mr. Disraeli's time, and it is quite possible that even Euripides may have caught the idea from somebody else. However that may be, it is quite certain that the absolutely unforeseen did come to pass with the Liberal Administration. On June 21, 1895, Mr. Campbell-Bannerman (now Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman), who was War Minister, brought forward an important scheme of army reform, which in- volved amongst other matters the resignation of the Duke of Cambridge as Commander-in-Chief. The House of Commons and the country in general were inclined to put up good-naturedly with the resignation of the Duke of Cambridge. The Duke had proved himself on the whole a very good managing officM of the army — if we may use such a phrase — and had looked after the discipline, the well-being, and the comfort of the men with watch- ful attention and with administrative success. But the Duke of Cambridge had never been regarded as a great soldier, and in any case he was growing old, and had long outlived the years of such men as Alexander the THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 333 Great, and Hanuibal, and Julius Caesar, and the First Napoleon. Therefore there was no general objection to the scheme of Mr. Campbell - Bannerman's reform, and everything seemed likely to be carried through in the most satisfactory way for the Government. All of a sud- den, however, Mr. St. John Brodrick brought forward a motion finding fault with the Government on some very small question about the supply of the material of cor- dite to the army. The question did not really arouse the faintest general interest in the House of Commons. Members who did not belong to the army or navy knew nothing and cared nothing about it. Even the military men in the House of Commons regarded the motion merely as a sort of attempt which it was quite right for a leading member in Opposition to make against the peo- ple in administration, but never supposed that anything serious was likely to come of it. So little was thought about the whole matter that a distinguished member of the Tory opposition, bearing an honored name, when agreeing to pair for the night with a member on the Lib- eral side, observed that "We may as well pair for the form of it, but it really doesn't matter much whether we do or not, as it is certain that nothing will happen here to-night." Something, however, did happen. The Gov- ernment was defeated by a majority of seven. Even then nobody supposed — at least, nobody outside ministerial circles supposed — for a moment that anything serious was likely to come of the Government defeat. It was a defeat, be it understood, in a committee of supply, a defeat on a single item of military expenditure ; and, of course, if a government were to go out of office on every such mishap, it would be impossible to have any stable administration in the country. Mr. Campbell-Bannerman, however, seems to have regarded the motion as a direct vote of censure on himself and on his personal adminis- 334 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tration of his department, and he declared that he could not continue in ofiB.ce any longer under such conditions. Then the members of the Cabinet generally made up their minds that the time had come for them all to throw up the sponge. In truth there were too many difiBculties in the Cabinet itself to allow of the Administration being carried on much longer to any satisfactory purpose. It was not the vote on the cordite question which killed the Government. The majority of seven against the Liberal statesmen gave the decent and plausible excuse for their withdrawal from a position which was becoming every day less and less de- sirable and convenient. To the country at large the sudden collapse was a matter of absolute wonderment. Even the knowledge that there had been a defeat of the Government in com- mittee of supply on the army estimates did not of itself suggest the slightest reason for the resignation of the min- isters. The newspapers of June 32 were read by most Liberals with complacency or with absolute indifference as regarded the cordite vote. Probably the majority of ordinary Liberals did not know what cordite was, and had not the faintest notion why the Liberal Government, which was supposed to be carrying on Mr. Gladstone's task, should feel bound to go out of office because the Tories did not think they had cordite enough in stock. Most certainly, if the Government whips could have known that a defeat on the vote was possible, they could easily have brought up men enough to render it impossi- ble. The vote was merely what is called in the House of Commons a -'^ snap vote." But the members of the Government had for internal reasons begun to find the condition of things intolerable, and the cordite vote did as well as anything else coi;ld do to furnish an excuse for their resignation. On June 34 the House of Com- THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 325 mons and the outer public learned that the Liberal states- men had resigned oflfice, and that the Conservatives were certain to come back to power. There seemed to be a curious dash of the harlequinade about the sudden trans- formation. The Liberal Government determined, like the stalwart parson in Mr. George Augustus Sala's story, to take the quarrel fighting, and not lying down. An appeal was made to the country by the process of a general election. Even the most enthusiastic Liberals had little hope of success. Many things were strongly against the Liberal Government. The retirement of Mr. Gladstone had, of course, left the party without the greatest leader it had had for generations. The defeat of the Home Rule measure by the House of Lords, and the absence of any response to Mr. Gladstone's appeal for a campaign against the hereditary chamber, had discouraged a great many of the sincerest Liberals. Sir William Harcourt's finan- cial policy had put rich men against him in almost every constituency. The Local Veto Bill, which Sir William Harcourt had introduced, turned nearly all the publicans over the country into Tories for the time, and a great many strong Liberal politicians thought the proposal un- timely and undesirable. The question was one especially open to controversy, and about which it would be impos- sible to hope for unity of opinion amongst Liberals them- selves. A leading Liberal public man wa,s asked whether he did not think the Local Veto Bill might well havo been postponed for five years. His answer was, " Yes, for five-and-twenty years, and by that time we should probably find that we did not need any such measure at all." Then, again, there were rumors spreading wider and wider in the political world to the effect that the members of the late Liberal Cabinet did not get on very well amongst themselves ; that there was a Rosebery 336 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES party and a Harcourt party, and that unity of policy, or at all events of action, was hardly to be expected under such conditions. The Liberals all over the country were therefore depressed and disheartened, and the battle was fought by them under the most unfavorable auspices. The result was what everybody might have expected. The Liberals were thoroughly defeated in England, and not very successful even in Scotland or Wales. In Ire- land, the Home Eule party came back in much the same numbers as before ; but then, the Home Rule party had been broken into two camps, one holding a large ma- jority, and the other a small minority. The minority was composed of men who would not unite with any Irishmen who had taken part in the deposition of Mr. Parnell. Furthermore, there was dissension even in the ranks of the majority of Irish members, and the dissen- sions proclaimed themselves most emphatically during the course of the general election. These quarrels in the Irish party tended still further to discourage and de- press the Liberal voters in Great Britain. No Liberal, it will be easily understood, deliberately voted against his principles and against his party under any conditions, however unsatisfactory. But the natural effect of such discouragement is that men do not think it worth their while to take the trouble of going to the poll, and that judgment is often thus allowed to go by default. Lord Salisbury came back to power as Prime-minister and Foreign Secretary, with Mr. Arthur Balfour as First Lord of the Treasury and leader of the House of Com- mons ; Sir Michael Hicks-Beach as Chancellor of the Exchequer ; Sir John Gorst, Vice-President of the Com- mittee of Council on Education ; and Mr. Gerald Bal- four, Mr. Arthur Balfour's younger brother. Chief Sec- retary to the Lord Lieutenant. Some new men were brought in ; among the rest Mr. Hanbury, who had given THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 327 each and every Grovernment for some years past some trouble by his unsparing criticism of the manner in which the services were administered. Mr, Hanbury was a man of decided ability, and well qualified to add strength to the work of any administration ; but we can hardly be wrong in assuming that he was taken into the Gov- ernment with the view rather of getting rid of a trouble- some critic than of finding a capable man for the business of a department. Some men who, like Mr. Hanbury, had distinguished themselves as Conservative legislators by criticising, and indeed worrying, their own official leaders, were not brought into the new Government, and took their stand accordingly as critics of Tory adminis- tration more severely than ever. The Government, on the whole, was one of undoubted ability, and the majority by which it had been returned gave it an absolute certainty, so far as anything in hu- man afEairs can be certain, of a long lease of power. Lord Eosebery remained leader of the Liberal party — at least, he remained for the time in that position — and Sir William Harcourt, of course, led the Liberals in the House of Commons. Lord Eosebery's task ought to have been easy enough, for, indeed, there was nothing that he or any other Liberal peer could do to help the Liberal cause in the House of Lords. He could make a number of brilliant speeches in each session, and thus, at all events, keep the Liberal standard flying in the hereditary chamber ; but he could not by any human possibility carry a majority with him, or even a con- siderable minority ; and, indeed, there was not the re- motest chance of his being able to change a single vote. The best fighting-man could do little or nothing under such conditions, except, indeed, show by his eloquence and by the expression of his convictions that he still be- lieved the Liberal cause to be alive. Very different was 328 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the position of the Liberal leader in the House of Com- mons. There, too, the cause for the present was hope- less, but a leader of the defeated party, who was worthy of his position, had to assume a fighting attitude day after day, as if there were still some chance of victory. The position of Sir William Harcourt in the new House of Commons was very difiicult. The leader of the Liberal party in that House found a band of follow- ers depressed indeed, and disappointed, and even dis- couraged, but still quite willing and eager to be led into fight again, and to encounter a numerical superiority of their opponents. Sir William Harcourt showed him- self a. fighting political leader of the first class. There was nothing much to be done ; positively, all that he could do was to wait until some advance was made by his opponents, and then to resist the advance. He had roused up bitter enemies amongst the Tory magnates and landowners by the financial policy of his budget in the year before, the main principle of which was that higher duties — that is, duties on a higher scale — should be exacted on the succession of property from those who had vast incomes than from those who had small in- comes. Probably the time will come when the principle put into law by Sir William Harcourt will be regarded as a financial platitude ; but it is quite certain that, at the time we speak of now, it was held by the Conserva- tive party to be an audacious innovation, and a part of a great scheme of revolution. Sir William Harcourt therefore found himself confronted by a fighting party whose numbers gave it a superiority in every division ; and he knew also that most of its combative bitterness was directed against himself, because of the policy he had initiated when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. All this only put him the more into a fighting mood ; and it must be owned that he showed himself just the THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 329 man to repair for the moment the fortunes of a fallen party. The Liberals took courage from him and from his fighting spirit, and they rallied again and again to his ef- orts to damage the measures of the Conservatiye Gov- ernment. By the energy and persistency of his opposi- tion he was enabled to render the first session of the new Government absolutely barren of results. The Gov- ernment introduced a new Education Bill — one other attempt to settle the controversy about public education which had been going on since Mr. Forster's bill was passed twenty-five years before. The great trouble was to find some basis of arrangement between those who con- tended that public funds, whether raised by State or by rate, ought only to be given for the purpose of secular education, and those whose conscience would not allow them to accept a merely secular education for the chil- dren of the people, and who therefore insisted that they ought to have equal help towards the maintenance of their schools. It was not a question between the Church of England and the Church of Kome, because many of the leading authorities of the Church of England were just as much opposed to a merely secular education as all the authorities of the Church of Eome. The question actually at issue was, whether the private and denom- inational schools ought or ought not to have an equal amount of public help towards the support of the schools to that received by the board schools, seeing that edu- cation was made compulsory, and that every rate-payer, whether he liked it or not, had to contribute towards the maintenance of the board schools. One might have thought that in a civilized community, where conscien- tious difEerences of opinion as to methods of education were recognized, some means might have been found of obtaining a settlement satisfactory to all alike. But if such means are to be found, as no doubt they are. 330 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tliey certainly were not found in the measure brought in by Lord Salisbury's Government. On the contrary, the bill seemed as if it were planned with the object of dissatisfying everybody. Its contents positively bristled with invitations to controversy. There was hardly a clause or a line which did not suggest some objection calling for exposition and debate. To add to the diffi- culties of the situation, Sir John Gorst, who had official charge of the bill in the House of Commons, did not appear to have his heart in the measure. People got it into their minds, whether rightly or wrongly, that Sir John Gorst was managing the bill with the main object of proving to his colleagues that he had not been prop- erly consulted as to its details, or even as to its princi- ples. To quote a phrase familiar at the time, and still, in the House of Commons, Sir John Gorst was said to be "Manipuring" the measure. The allusion was, of course, to Sir John Gorst's famous speech in the House some few years before when, as Under-Secretary for India, he poured out a stream of vitriolic sarcasm on the policy of his own and every other English Govern- ment with regard to the native princes and the Indian populations. " Manipuring it again " was a common saying in the House while Sir John was professing to defend the Educational Bill which was put in his charge. Sir John Gorst was undoubtedly a very able man ; proba- bly there was no abler man in the Conservative Govern- ment. Yet he had not got as far as some men, intel- lectually his inferiors, had gone. He was, for instance, not a member of the Cabinet. Those who vindicated the policy of Lord Salisbury asked. How can you have a Manipuring statesman in the Cabinet ? But there were others who asked. How are you to get on with a man. at once so clever and so reckless unless you put him in the Cabinet, and so fix on him his full share of responsibility THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 33 1 for the policy which he has to explain and to defend ? Before long it became obvious to every one that the Edu- cation Bill could not be carried through in that session. Strange to say, there are a great many troubles which come upon a government from the possession of too large a majority. The bonds of discipline become re- laxed. Everybody says to himself, " It does not matter whether I attend or not ; it does not matter how I vote ; I may allow myself when I like an occasional freedom of action ; my leaders in the Government are sure of a great majority all the same." So long as the majority is nar- row men will hold to the discipline of their party, and will be certain to vote in what they or their chiefs consider the right division lobby, and will devote them- selves day by day to their own political cause. But once you get an overwhelming majority on either side the bonds of discipline are naturally disarranged. A man says to himself, "Now, I have my own notions on this subject. It would be no part of my business to express them in voice or in vote if my opinions concerned the existence of the Government. But then we have a ma- jority of 150 or 160, and I am perfectly safe to express my individual opinions without in the least endangering the existence of the Government to which I profess my allegiance." Now that condition of things was one of the troubles of the Conservative Government in 1895, as it had been the trouble of many a government. Liberal and Tory, before that time. It is seldom a good thing for a Prime-minister to have too large a majority. It tends too much towards reckless individual action. If a man, say a Conservative, knows that a great deal de- pends on his individual vote, he is not likely to let him- self loose, and to set up what some Americans call "a side show on his own account." But if he feels quite certain that the Government has a safe and settled ma- 332 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES jority of its own, he regards himself, of course, as quite free to adopt any fatitasies of his own upbringing, and to let the Government do the best it can without him. No Government that ever was formed in England can count upon absolutely servile adherence. Some men, at all events, will always be independent of the mere requi- sitions of the Government whips. Therefore in every ministerial arrangement some account must be taken of the men who cannot simply be dragged into the lobby in obedience to the call of the ministerial officials. That is one of the disturbing problems of the working of the parliamentary machine. Given a Government with a great majority, it can always count on having that ma- jority for any essential political purpose, but it cannot always count on having that majority when a sudden side issue arises, the meaning and the force of which nobody had contemplated before. No crisis has arisen in the history of all the modern Parliaments more strik- ing than something which is created by an altogether unexpected event. Nothing is ever certain in the House of Commons. The most elaborate calculations cannot make it appear that the decision on some unexpected question is to go this way or the other. "When the latest Egyptian question came up the House of Commons knew no more about the whole subject than did the general public. The mind of the public was, so far as informa- tion went, a perfect blank. But there was a general floating idea that, as we had got into the Egyptian trouble, we could not help putting up with it until we could fairly get out of it. There was no very clear idea in our minds as to the perpetual occupation of Egypt by England. Few Englishmen, in fact, were particularly anxious for the perpetual occupation of Egypt. But still the idea was entertained that in face of the French Government, and in face of our Govern- THE CORDITE EXPLOSION 333 ment as well, England could not possibly let go her hold on the occupation of Egypt, whatever responsibility was involved in that policy. We are only referring to the last Egyptian expedition by way of illustrating the differ- ence which a Grovernment with a large majority experi- ences when some thoroughly Imperial question is not in hand. Not any of the Tories, and not many even of the Liberal Opposition, would have thought of interfering with the policy of the new expedition, directed, no doubt, in the way of Khartoum, although its purpose was kept as absolute a secret from the outer public as some stroke of Chinese Imperial policy would be kept from the vast majority of the Chinese population. But the Education Bill was quite a different matter. Almost every member of the House of Commons was interested in the question, knew all about it, and had long formed his opinions about it. It was, in brief, the old ques- tion between schools where religious or denominational education was given and schools where such education was purely secular. During the course of this measure through the House of Commons the supporters of the bill, as well as the opponents, helped to its final with- drawal. The supporters of the bill had their own strong opinions, and they were eager to argue every question and to confute their enemies, and so they helped their enemies to prevent the bill from passing. Even his strongest opponents cordially admitted that Sir William Harcourt had done his own work well in obstructing the bill, and in provoking its own supporters to obstruct it. The bill had to be withdrawn in the end, because the new Government had something else to do besides simply dealing with the question of education ; but there were some of the principles of the bill which deserved more tolerable treatment than they got. Anyhow, the with- drawal of the bill was a great triumph for the Opposition. CHAPTER XVIII THE EASTERN QUESTIOIT ONCE MORE In 1895 the Eastern Question broke out, not in a new place or in a new way, but in the terribly old, familiar place and way. It began again with the massacre of Armenian Christians in Constantinople itself, and in many of the provinces of the Ottoman Empire. The Armenians are amongst the best educated and the most intelligent among what we may call the working resi- dents in the Turkish capital and the Turkish Empire. As mere bearers of burdens they are strong and patient and capable, and they have an intelligence and an educa- tion that lift them sometimes beyond the mere position of bearers of burdens, but may not often, of course, carry them on to the intellectual level of the Greek residents in Turkey. To the fanatical Moslem the Armenian is a common subject of class and religious hatred. There is a labor question as well as a religious question. The Armenian is always suspected of having in hand some plot to overthrow the rule of the Sultan. Very likely the vast majority of Armenians, concerned chiefly for their bodily work, never trouble their minds about any such enterprise. But if the Armenian in general did trouble himself about such an enterprise there would be little reason to find fault with him for his purpose. He is suspected and hated by the Moslems in Turkey, and, as we have already seen in the course of this History, there are periodical and sporadic outbreaks of Turkish THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 335 mobs to get rid of the detested Armenian. Towal-ds the closing days of 1895 there began a perfect outburst directed against the Armenians of the Turkish cities, towns, and country places. It was like a mania, like a passion, of religious hatred and destructiveness. All the horrors, and worse than the horrors which Mr. Gladstone had denounced some twenty years before, were re-enacted in the Turkish capital and in the Turkish proyinces. Mr. Gladstone himself came out of his retirement, as he had done before, to raise his protest against those crimes committed against Christians under the rule of the Otto- man Empire. The memories of men went back to the old days of the great meeting in St. James's Hall, where Mr. Gladstone denounced the Bulgarian massacres, and Mr. Freeman supported him with all his strength. The Armenian massacres became such a scandal that the European Powers, apart from Turkey, had to take grave account of them. But then there were serious diflBcul- ties in the way. What was to be done ? Should the European Powers intervene, and put the Turkish Empire under coercion ? Undoubtedly, if the Western Powers had been agreed— and we only use the word Western to signify all the powers that are not Ottoman — the task would have been easy enough. If England, France, Eussia, Austria, Germany, and Italy had agreed to say to the Porte, "You must stop those massacres, or we shall occupy your capital and your country," all would have been comparatively easy. But there were differ- ences between the great European Powers. Eussia held off for a long time. The memories of the Crimean War were living still — of the war which England chiefly pro- moted in order to defend the Turkish Empire from the encroachments of Eussia. About the policy of that war there is not now, we fancy, a second opinion amongst educated Englishmen. It was not really an English war 336 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES at all. It was a war got up by Louis Napoleon, the Em- peror of the French, for the purpose of making an alliance with England, and with the hope of "booming," to use the American phrase, his dynasty. Such a war of course made Eussia suspicious of every alliance with England, and led her to see, often quite unjustly, some mysterious anti-Eussian purpose in every English enterprise. Then, again, the English occupation of Egypt made the French rather jealous, suspicious, and uneasy. The occupation of Cyprus made Eussia doubly suspicious, although the occupation of Cyprus was undertaken partly in order to obtain some guarantee or security for the right of England to interpose her protection between the Porte and the Christian subjects of the Sultan. Perhaps it was that very reason which made Eussia look with disfavor on the action of England with regard to the Christian sub- jects of the Porte. Nobody can doubt, nobody has ever expressed any doubt on the subject, that Eussia desired to have the protection of the Christian subjects of the Ottoman Empire left in her own hands. Then, again, Mr. Disraeli had called Cyprus " a place of arms." There cannot be any question that the action of English policy in regard to the Treaty of San Stefano had been a pro- found mistake. It had put Eussia against us almost as much as the Crimean "War itself had done. But after the jubilations in the music-halls of London and other such places over the break-up of the San Stefano Treaty a very different feeling began to grow up in soberized and reflecting England. The old idea that Eussia was our enemy all over the world began to give way, and the belief grew broader and broader that there was room enough on the civilized earth for Eussia and for England. Still, the old-time difficulty came up when English states- men had to take account of the horrible condition of things existing in the Turkish Empire, and to ask them- 1 WM M "^S 1 1 ^^'- '^^' H B^^ "'^ 1 I 1 f a, HJHi JOHN MOKLEY THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 337 selves what was to be done to put a stop to the massacres. A change of Ministry took place in England during the long prevalence of Ottoman crime, but so far as the pres- ent writer can judge there does not seem to have been any serious change of policy. The whole question had nothing to do with partisan politics, and the Conserva- tive Government must have felt very much the same about the Armenian massacres as the Liberal Government had done. Nobody could possibly have supposed that Lord Salisbury was devoid of the common feelings of humanity, or that the fact of a man's being a Tory Minis- ter made him suddenly indifEerent to the sufferings of his fellow-Christians in the Ottoman Empire. The first question was not what would, but what could, the English Government do. The great European Powers were split up in various ways. The choice of movement lay with Russia. The Eussian Prime-minster of that time — the time when the crisis was still new — Prince Lobanoff, was entirely opposed to any intervention of the European Powers for the coercion of the Porte. Probably, if Prince Lobanoff had been invited on the part of the Great Powers to intrust the task of intervention to the hands of Russia alone he might have found a different answer to the suggestions made to him. But as it was he made it known clearly enough that Russia would not consent to any European intervention for the coercion of Turkey. Then came up for Englishmen the question. What can be done in the way of practical intervention ? Is England to intervene single-handed, and undertake the coercion of Turkey as her own unaided business, with the chance or the certainty of having to encounter Russia, and to fight over again the old Crimean "War on totally differ- ent principles ? Having fought against Russia to main- tain Turkey, is she now to fight against Russia in order to put down Turkey ? No one can deny that English IS 338 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES statesmen confronted with snch a difficnlty found it hard to make tip their minds. Suppose England did take the matter into her own hands and make war against Turkey and against Eussia, would the unhappy Armenians be any the better for such an intervention ? Has any State a right to bring all the horrors of a great war upon its cit- izens merely with the noble quixotic purpose of saving a foreign race from ill-treatment ? There were many gen- erous Englishmen and Englishwomen who answered this question frankly in the affirmative : " Yes, let us risk everything rather than look on tamely and see this great wrong done to populations of kindred faith whom we have pledged ourselves by treaty to protect." It is hardly possible not to be fascinated by the nature of so high- spirited a proposition. The Cyprus Treaty gave England the right of protecting the Christian populations of the Turkish Empire, and the whole diplomacy of man can confer no protective right upon a State which does not carry with it the liberty to use compulsion as a last re- source. That was the worst about the Cyprus arrange- ment, and all the other arrangements, so far as England was concerned, which belonged to the Congress of Berlin. In that Congress England was occupied mainly with the idea of keeping back the policy of Eussia, and otherwise made little account of the responsibilities she was under- taking. English statesmen, one might well have thought, would even then have had some recognition of the pos- sibility that Christian populations might again be op- pressed and massacred in the Ottoman capital and in the provinces of the Ottoman Empire. But the one idea seems to have filled the diplomatic mind of England at the time — the idea that the enroachments of Eussia must be resisted; and thus England undertook responsibili- ties on behalf of the Christian populations of the Otto- man Empire which she apparently imagined that she was THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 339 never likely to be called upon to fulfil. Now the time had come, and she was called upon to choose between carrying out her obligations to the Christian subjects of the Porte, and the chances of turning Russia against her, and of having to stand the brunt of a great European war. Therefore, in point of fact, for drear and hopeless months after months nothing whatever was done. The representatives of the Great Powers at Constantinople consulted every day, and, of course, nobody in the out- side world knew what they were saying to each other, and the heart and conscience of England were agonized by the ever-recurring accounts, only too well authenti- cated, of the massacre of Christians. At last the whole subject seemed to become outworn and stale. Our eyes grew accustomed to the daily details of the outrages and the slaughter. We began by degrees to think that a new story of the murder of Armenians was only like an ac- count of a gale in the Channel or a police raid upon a gambling club. The human mind is constituted in that way, and the sensation of horror in matters that do not directly concern ourselves is not of long duration. To many of us it must have occurred during all those long and terrible months, that it would have been far better, after all, if England had adopted a policy of non- intervention as regards foreign countries in the strictest sense of Richard Cobden and John Bright. Bright once said that he was totally opposed to intervention in the affairs of foreign States, on the ground that we were certain to intervene too soon, or too late, or on the wrong side. It cannot be doubted that many of the massacres of the Armenian Christians were due to the Moslem fanat- ical hatred of England, which had undertaken to protect them. If England had left them alone from the begin- ning ; had said, " We have nothing to do with you, we 340 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES cannot protect you, we will not protect you/' the Ar- menians might have got on better with the Ottoman authorities. But the idea that there was a certain class of the population which was put under the special pro- tection of a Christian, and therefore an infidel. State un- doubtedly brought up a rankling sentiment in the Mos- lem mind. England had fought for Turkey and made a great war for her, had spent vast sums of money and many thousands of gallant lives for her, and had received just the gratitude that, under all the conditions, might have been expected. As the troubles went on English statesmanship, whether Liberal or Conservative, seemed to be well inclined to reconsider its position. At one time there began to be a general feeling that the best course to pursue would be to give Eussia the initiative in the policy of coercion. The present generation of Eng- lishmen had almost forgotten the dread and hatred of Russia which prevailed in the days of the Crimean War, and even in the days of the Berlin Congress. Yet it could not be questioned that Eussia had gained immensely in power since the Crimean War, and even since the Congress of Berlin. Her influence in the East had been making progress by leaps and bounds, and it would seem that of late she has been assuming something very like a pro- tectorate over China. But the feeling of alarm has passed away from the English mind, and most English- men quietly accept the idea that Eussia must go as far as she can, and that it is no business of theirs to throw themselves, at whatever risk, across her path. Any move- ment on the part of our diplomatists to ofEer frankly an initiative to Eussia in the course of action to be taken for the protection of the Sultan's Christian subjects would have been welcomed by the vast majority of the people of Great Britain. But the months went by, and the massacres went on, and the diplomatists kept con- THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 341 suiting, and the outer public kept guessing at the nature of their consultations, until the outer public grew weary of guessing, and put the whole subject away. The troubles in Turkey were suddenly much compli- cated and made more bitter, if that could be, by the troubles in Crete. Crete is a small island lying just southeast of Cape Matapan and the main-land of the kingdom of Greece. Crete has been always in a state of chronic insurrection against the Turkish Government. If there is an island in the Levant which is thorouglily Greek in sentiment, in tradition, and in purpose, it is Crete. There shines upon Crete the beauty of the legend which says that in her Mount Ida Jupiter was born and bred. Crete passed through many hands ; almost every event in European politics from the earliest days handed her over from one conqueror to another. She has been compared to Penelope, but the comparison will not hold. Penelope was able to maintain herself and defend her place until at last her Ulysses came back from the war. Crete is more like the hapless lady whose story is told in prose by Boccaccio and in verse by La Fontaine, and who was captured by so many pirates and robber-chiefs before at last she settled down into a happy matrimony with the lover to whom she was engaged before she set out on her travels. Crete was conquered by the Romans, was seized by the Saracens, was sold to the Venetians, was captured by the Turks. Over and over again since Crete was seized by the Ottoman Government Cretan popular as- semblies demanded the freedom of the island. When the king of the Greeks was set up, mainly because of the spirited and honorable action of England, the popular assemblies of Crete again and again demanded union with the land through which, to use Byron's words, their life-blood tracked its parent lake. These appeals were always refused, for reasons which the ordinary and un- 343 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES diplomatic mind would find it impossible to understand. It was apparently laid down as an indispensable condition to the peace and comfort of Europe that the Greeks of Crete should be held under the dominion of the Turkish Pasha. So far as England was concerned the puzzle about this policy was that England, as has just been said, was the principal influence in setting up the kingdom of Greece and redeeming the most famous country in the world from the ignorant and brutal rule of the Turkish Government. One of the glorious dreams of English- men in the earlier part of the century was the rescue of Greece from Ottoman rule. Byron died for Greece, and Byron's name is still cherished and treasured in Athens, and in every part of the country to which he gave up his gallant and generous life. But, for that mysterious diplomatic reason of which we have spoken, a reason which we, like most others, fail to understand, the policy of the European Powers continued to declare that the Turkish rule must be maintained in Crete. When the Crimean War broke out England made herself the spe- cial champion of Turkey, and took a leading part in ter- rorizing poor little Greece out of any attempt to act on behalf of her fellow-countrymen and co-religionists, and of the island to which legend, at all events, ascribed the birth of Jupiter. Some very " independent " members of the House of Commons are in the habit of saying that when the two opposing front benches of the House — the Treasury Bench, that is to say, and the Front Opposition Bench; in other words, the men in ojfice and the men just out of it — are agreed in any policy, that policy becomes sus- picious to the country in general. It would seem that of late years any policy in which the great European Powers can act in concert must be a policy which the general public have to view with suspicion. We have THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MOKE 343 already mentioned how for months and months the European concert, as it was called, looked on impotently, hopelessly, at the crimes committed under the rule of the Sultan in Turkey and in Armenia. Much the same sort of thing was done in Crete. Time after time some new constitution was set up under the pressure of the great European Powers. But in order to know what the value of a constitution is, one must know what is the class of men by whom it is to be worked, and Turkish rule in Crete would have rendered worthless the finest constitution that ever could have been devised by Locke or by the Abbe Siey^s. The extortion, the rapine, the disturb- ances, the murders, went on all the same. It was not much comfort to an oppressed and impoverished Cretan that he was dying under a brand-new and beautiful con- stitution. The result of all this was that Crete was ever in re- bellion against Ottoman government. In truth, to any one who knows anything at all about the conditions and the feelings of Greek populations it might have been evident from the first that the whole of the forces of the great European Powers combined could not compel the Greeks of Crete to submit tamely to the Ottoman Government. All sorts of hard things have been said against the Greek populations, but none has ever said that the Greeks were either fools or cowards. Nothing, even in the deeds of England's own sea-kings, has ever surpassed the daring, the energy, and the success of Kanaris and his fire-ships against the Turkish navy in the war of independence. When, therefore, the troubles broke out in Crete this last time there was naturally an impassioned enthusiasm in Athens, and all over the main-land of Greece, and through all the islands as well, in favor of the union of Crete with the Hellenic king- dom. The Greek Government determined that it was 344 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES necessary to make some forward movement for the rescue of Crete. In point of fact, no Greek G-overn- ment could have held out for twenty-four hours which looked on at the steps for a reconquest of Crete and made no movement to prevent it. The conveniences of European diplomacy have, no doubt, sometimes their solid importance, and no great State wants, if it can avoid it, to get into diplomatic trouble with its neigh- bor. But all such considerations are apt to be forgot- ten when a thrilling question of kindred and religion arises, and thus it was that little Greece, with her small army and her small fleet, undertook to see that no further landing of Turkish troops should take place in Crete. Prince George of Greece, the second son of the King of the Hellenes, and the nephew of the Princess of Wales, was put in command of the expedition. His duty, so far as we understand, was to prevent the Turks from landing more troops in the island, and, if necessary, to occupy Crete itself in the name of the Greek Sovereign and of Greece. On the other hand, it appeared to many highly diplomatic minds that the best thing for the European Powers in concert to do would be to occupy Crete them- selves, and put down disorder, while considering what next ought to be done about the island : whether it ought to be left under the control of Turkey, with another fine new constitution specially devised, or whether it should be created into a sort of Bulgarian principality, or wheth- er it should be handed back to Turkey absolutely and un- conditionally. The tendency of public opinion in Eng- land was, we may say, almost overwhelmingly against any policy which seemed to palter with the question of a sur- render of Crete under any imaginable conditions to the rule of the Ottoman Sovereign. There was, indeed, at first a very common desire that Greece should go her way THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 345 and take her chance: "And if I perish, I perish," as Esther says in the Scripture. The European Concert naturally worked to little pur- pose so far as Crete and Greece were concerned. It could hardly be otherwise. Two of the Great Powers, at least — Russia and Germany — were totally opposed to the ad- dition of Crete to the Hellenic kingdom. The whole system of the so-called European Concert was utterly un- like the principle of George Canning, out of which came the emancipation of Greece. Canning's policy was to get into an effective combination the Great Powers that were in favor of the emancipation of Greece ; and he accom- plished this object, and Greece was set free, and became an independent kingdom, although he did not live to see his triumph. The European Concert of to-day is made up of a number of states which had no policy in common, and in which every movement suggested by one Power was opposed and counteracted by some other. All the Powers professed themselves willing to give self-govern- ment to Crete while leaving her still to be under the suzerainty of Turkey. The Cretans had had enough of that sort of thing, and had set their hearts on becoming a part of the Hellenic kingdom. Fighting was incessantly going on between the Cretan insurgents and the Turks, and the fleets of all the Powers who belonged to the European Concert sent war-vessels to try to maintain peace by the process of war, and also to blockade the Cretan shores. It was formally announced that if Greece should in any active way favor and promote the Cretan movement, the coasts of Greece herself would be blockaded. On the other hand, there was great clanger that the Greek volunteers, directed by the really powerful National Association, would cross the Macedonian fron- tier and make war there. The whole condition was full of peril to the maintenance of European peace, and no one IB* 346 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES could tell from one moment to another when the mainten- ance of that peace might not be rendered impossible. Public opinion in England, and indeed through all Great Britain, was much divided on the subject. It is not going too far to say that the vast majority in these islands were in favor of the Greek cause, and were also inclined to resent the idea of England being domineered over in her foreign policy by Kussia and by Germany. Meanwhile the fighting was going on in Crete, and on one occasion England was much startled to hear that an English admiral had joined in the shelling of some of the Cretan insurgents. On the other hand, many English- men pointed out that if Greece would only keep quiet she might have her own way in the end — as if it was by keeping quiet that Greece obtained her independence in the days of Canning. It was said that Greece had only to lie low and let the Cretans accept for the time any scheme of local self-government, and then when things had settled down, and Crete had got a local parliament, it would only be necessary for that parliament to declare the island annexed to Greece, and probably no one would intervene. But the difficulty in the way of these sug- gestions was that the Cretans would not listen to them. They did not believe in the good intentions of Turkey or the earnestness of the Great Powers, and even the King of the Hellenes himself could probably not have restrain- ed them. The King of the Hellenes was not himself in very safe condition. Greece was aflame with a passion for the annexation of Crete. Athens was the scene of tumultuous national meetings every day. It is doubtful whether the King could have made head against the fervor of the movement. Of course, he went thoroughly with it ; but personally, he still clung to the bare possibility of maintaining peace while yet keeping a way open for the union of Crete with the Hellenic kingdom. He ap- THE EASTERN QUESTION ONCE MORE 347 pears to have played a courageous and a dignified part all through this most trying episode of history, and to have shown himself as every inch a king. The Greek Government had at a comparatively early period of the controversy defended with skill and dignity the position it had taken up. In one of its despatches issued from Athens on March 8, 1897, the Greek Govern- ment said, "Unless, then, the new administration with -which Crete is to be endowed is such as will definitely restore order, the Hellenic Government is convinced of the impossibility of putting an end to the present state of revolution. Anarchy will continue to ravage the country. With such a prospect iu view, our responsibil- ity would be enormous if we did not earnestly implore the Great Powers not to insist upon the system of au- tonomy decided on, but to give back to Crete what it al- ready possessed at the time of the liberation of the other provinces which form the Hellenic kingdom, and to re- store it to Greece, to which it already belonged in the time of the presidency of Capodistria." Then follows a suggestive passage : " With these ideas and in the name of humanity, as also in the interest of the pacification of the island, a pacification which is the sole object of the solicitude of the Great Powers, we do not hesitate to ap- peal to them in regard to the other measure, relative to the withdrawal of our military forces. Even if in view of the presence of the united squadrons of the Great Powers in Cretan waters, and under the conviction that those fleets would not allow the landing of Ottoman troops on the island, the presence there in addition of all the troops of the Hellenic fleet now in those waters were not considered necessary, the presence in the island of the Greek army is, on the other hand, demanded by the dic- tates of humanity, and is necessary in the interest of the definitive restoration of order." CHAPTER XIX VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFEICA Ih the midst of various other foreign complications and troubles the Venezuela Question was suddenly started upon Great Britain and the world in general. It was started by no less a person than President Cleveland himself, who, in a message to Congress on December 17, 1895, declared in very peremptory tones that the Venez- uela Question must be immediately settled, and that, on the basis of the Monroe doctrine, he intended to appoint a commission which was to ascertain the true line of di- vision between British Guiana and Venezuela, and to an- nounce what course the disputants on both sides would be expected to adopt. The Venezuela Question is a very old outstanding dispute between the English Government as the occupant of British Guiana and the Eepublic of Venezuela. The dispute had been dragging on for years after years, and during the greater part of that time not one Englishman or one American in ten thousand felt the slightest interest in its principles or in its progress. Indeed, until quite lately the territory upon either side of the contested boundary-line was generally regarded as of no value even to its owner. The dispute began when Great Britain took Guiana from the Dutch in 1795. The boundaries between British Guiana and Venezuela were not settled as they ought to have been at that time, and had never been settled up to the date of President Cleve- land's message, In 1840 the Imperial Government sent VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 349 Sir E. Schomburgk to report as to a conyenient and sat- isfactory bonndary-line. Sir E. Schomburgk made a re- port, the principles of which, however, were not accepted by Venezuela. It is not necessary now to go into the whole history of the dispiite, and we have said this much only in explanation of the part which the Schomburgk line takes in the whole of the subsequent controversy. Meanwhile, however, an event took place, the like of which has had a good deal to do with many of our dis- putes in various parts of the world. Gold was discov- ered in the regions lying on both sides of the disputed boundary-line, and a rush was made by Englishmen and men of various other nationalities for the scene of "the potentiality of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice" — a phrase which, it may be remarked in passing. Doctor Johnson really never did use. The English Government was not so much concerned about the precision of the boundary-line as about the fact that under certain con- ditions a number of English settlers might possibly be handed over to the dominion and control of the Venez- uelan Eepublic. The United States offered early in 1895 to use their friendly offices in order to bring about a peaceful and satisfactory settlement of the whole dis- pute. Meantime, however, the Venezuelan Government, or at least some of its oflBcials, had been very peremptory and high-handed in their dealings with Americans, as well as with Englishmen, just across the English side of the proposed boundary-line. All this tended to exasper- ate feeling in England and to swell the mole-hill contro- versy to the dimensions of a mountain. Still, it must be owned that very few English people at home troubled their heads in the least about the dis- pute. There were numbers of more serious questions agitating and distracting public opinion. The Eastern Question, as we have shown, had again broken out with 350 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES a flame and a fury wliich threatened to involve the peace of all Europe. England had her troubles in Egypt, and was engaged in an expedition which, as many people thought, might lead to a misunderstanding with France. There were the troubles in South Africa, which many men at one time believed might lead to a serious mis- understanding with Germany. Then suddenly came President Cleveland's message, with its seemingly dic- tatorial and almost arrogant intimation that America had the right to settle the whole question between Eng- land and Venezuela. The message was the more surpris- ing because President Cleveland had always had the rep- utation among those who knew him, and among those who had read about him, of being what his countrymen would call a "level-headed" person. He seemed about the last man in the United States who was likely to make any appeal to the Jingoism of the population ; for, of course, it is needless to say that there are Jingoes in the United States just as there are Jingoes in England. We cannot yet know what was the real occasion, or inspira- tion, or purpose of President Cleveland's sudden burst of aggressive eloquence. When the private history of the time comes to be written we shall possibly get to know something about it. It is only fair to say that af- ter the burst of eloquence Mr. Cleveland showed himself through all the succeeding stages of the. controversy just the same cool, sensible, conciliatory statesman that he had proved himself to be in his previous career. The message created great anger and something like conster- nation in England, especially among Englishmen who did not know very much about the American Republic. In the United States it seems to have been taken quietly enough by the great mass of the population. To most Americans it was utterly impossible to accept with any seriousness the idea of a war between the great Eepublic VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 351 and England on a question concerning the bonndary-line between Venezuela and British Guiana. Most English- men, indeed, who gave themselves time to consider the subject coolly were of just the same opinion. In Wash- ington, it was very likely that a good many politicians simply " winked the other eye," if we may be allowed to use that slang expression, when they read the thrilling lines in President Cleveland's message. On the other hand, a good deal of nonsense was written in this country about the extravagance and the arrogance of the Monroe doctrine. Now, as we have already explained in these volumes, the Monroe doctrine, whether we of this gen- eration approve or disapprove of it, was not the device of President Monroe, but was the device and the idea of the great English orator and statesman, George Canning. The Monroe doctrine was suggested by George Canning, and was urged on President Monroe as a fitting means of preventing the fallen dynasties of the European con- tinent from establishing themselves on the shores of either America. It was for this purpose that Canning called in the New "World, as he put it in his immortal phrase, to redress the balance of the Old. The Monroe doctrine simply declared that the United States could not regard with approval any attempt on the part of a foreign power to set up a monarchy on American soil against the wish of the people who occu- pied that part of the country. The United States never interfered with the Empire of Brazil, and never dreamed of interfering with the Imperial occupation of Canada. But when the Emperor Napoleon III. endeavored to force an empire by sheer strength of arms on the people of Mexico, who were prepared to fight in the last ditch against it, then the United States acted on George Can- ning's principle, and told the Emperor that it would be better for him if he were to withdraw his French troops 352 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMKS from Mexico, which, of course, he promptly did. The Monroe doctrine is, on the whole, a very reasonable and practical principle, alike for the United States and for foreign powers. It was adopted in the interests of Eng- land as well as in those of the American Eepublic. It simply makes it clear, in the firmest and frankest way, that there are enterprises which the great republic can- not allow to be attempted on American soil. After the first alarm created by President Cleveland's message had subsided, negotiations at once set in for a peaceful adjustment of the whole dispute. Lord Salis- bury, the English Prime-minister, appears to have acted with great good-temper and prudence. He pointed out that there were certain questions in the controversy which England could not agree to leave to any arbitra- tion ; for, of course, every conceivable plan of arbitra- tion must have some limits assigned to it ; but he showed himself perfectly willing to enter into any reasonable scheme for arbitration. Lord Salisbury, it is mere jus- tice to say, abstained from the use of any words which might tend to inflame the temper of people on either side of the ocean. In truth, the vast majority on both sides were convinced that the dispute could be easily settled, and were only anxious to have it settled as quick- ly as possible. Therefore the negotiations soon began to take shape, and the agreement grew and grew, until at last it came to take in, not merely the terms of set- tlement as between British Guiana and Venezuela, but the terms of settlement concerning any future dispute which might arise between Great Britain and the United States. For many years such a scheme had been talked of and discussed. International arbitration had avert- ed a war between Great Britain and the American Ee- public on the question of the Alabama claims. Many Englishmen were somewhat sore about that settlement, VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 353 on the plain, rough ground that Great Britain had had the worst of it. But all the cooler minds in England admitted that a certain class of English politicians and English society had brought England into a serious trouble, and that she was well and honorably out of the difficulty. The Arbitration Treaty as suggested consists of fifteen articles. Its preamble sets out the desire of the govern- ments of Great Britain and the United States to continue and consolidate the friendly relations so happily existing, and to " consecrate by treaty " the principle of internation- al arbitration. By the first article of the Treaty the high contracting parties agree to submit to arbitration, in ac- cordance with the provisions and subject to the limita- tions of the agreement, all questions in dispute between them which may have failed to adjust themselves by diplo- matic negotiation. The second article deals with all " pe- cuniary claims or groups of claims " which do not in the ag- gregate exceed one hundred thousand pounds in amount, and do not involve any territorial dispute, and sets out that all such claims shall be dealt with and decided by what is called an arbitral tribunal, constituted as provided in the next following article. The words " or groups of pecuniary claims " are understood to mean claims by one or more persons arising out of the same transactions, or involving the same issues of law and of fact. This, of course, although a very useful arrangement, is not one that could be considered to have any great international importance. "We do not live in the days of Don Pacific© or of Monsieur Jecker any longer, and even in those days it would be hardly possible to imagine England and the United States going to war about a group of pecuniary claims which did not exceed one hundred thousand pounds in amount. The third article declares that each of the contracting parties shall nominate one arbitrator 354 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES who shall be a jurist of repute, and the two arbitrators so nominated shall, within two months of their nomination, select an umpire. In case they should fail to do so within a certain limit of time, the umpire is to be appointed by agreement between the members for thetime being of the Supreme Court of the United States and the members for the time being of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council of Great Britain and Ireland, each nominating body deciding by a majority. Then, again, all pecuniary claims or groups of claims which shall exceed one hun- dred thousand pounds in amount, and all other matters in dispute with regard to which either of the contracting parties shall have claims against the other, under treaty or otherwise, provided the disputes do not involve the determination of territorial claims, shall be dealt with and decided by an arbitral tribunal constituted for the purpose. Any controversy — and now we come to the really important part of the question — which shall involve the determination of territorial claims shall be submitted, according to the sixth article, to a tribunal composed of six members, three of whom shall be judges of the Su- preme Court of the United States, or justices of circuit courts, to be nominated by the President of the United States, and the other three to be judges of the British Supreme Court of Judicature, or members of the Judi- cial Committee of the Privy Council, to be nominated by her Britannic Majesty, whose awards by a majority of not less than five to one shall be final. If, however, the award shall be made by less than the prescribed ma- jority, it shall be final all the same unless either Power shall, within three months after the announcement of the award, protest against the decision, in which case the award shall be of no account. But in any case, and even with the protest made by one of the parties, or if the members of the arbitral tribunal should prove to be VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 355 equally divided, there shall be no recourse to hostile measures of any description until the mediation of one or more friendly Powers has been invited by one or both of the high contracting parties. The eighth article of the Treaty sets out that when the question involved con- cerns a particular State or Territory of the American Re- public, the President may appoint a judicial officer of such State or Territory to be one of the arbitrators ; and that where the question involved concerns any British colony or possession, her Majesty the Queen may appoint a ju- dicial officer of that colony or possession to be one of the arbitrators. Territorial claims in the Treaty are, accord- ing to Article 9, to include all claims to territory, and all other claims involving questions of servitude, rights of navigation, of access to fisheries, and all rights and in- terests necessary to the control and enjoyment of territory claimed by either of the contracting parties. The tenth article declares that if in any case the nominating bodies shall fail to agree upon an umpire, the umpire shall be appointed by his Majesty the King of Sweden and Nor- way. But either of the parties to the Treaty may at any time give notice to the other, that, by reason of material changes in the conditions which existed at the date of the Treaty, it is of opinion that a substitute for his Majesty should be chosen. The substitute is then to be agreed upon between the parties. The Treaty is to re- main in force for five years from the date of its coming into operation, and, further, until the expiration of twelve months after either of the contracting parties shall have given notice to the other of its desire to terminate the arrangement. It can hardly be necessary to point out to the readers of these pages the immense, the inestimable importance of such an agreement between the British Empire and the American Republic. The mere fact that any such 356 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES arrangement was signed by the British Ambassador at "Washington, Sir Jnlian Pauncefote, and Mr. Olney, the then Kegublican Secretary of State, marks a most important epoch m the history of the world. Two friendly peoples, of the same race and the same lan- guage, which have gone so far as that can never get back to the old barbaric principle which makes war pos- sible about every question of boundary or trumpery dis- pute over what the Treaty calls groups of pecuniary claims. In the message from President Cleveland which commended the Treaty to the Senate the whole arrange- ment, satisfactory as it promised to be, was pointed to in modest language as only " a long step in the right direction, as embodying a practical working plan by which disputes between the two peoples might reach a peaceful adjustment as a matter of course and ordinary routine." Nothing could be more important than the sense and significance of these words. The Treaty may be imperfect ; it may have to be amended, expanded, limited, but its justification and its glory are set forth in President Cleveland's words, that it embodies a prac- tical working plan by which disputes between the two peoples might reach a peaceful adjustment as a matter of course and ordinary routine. This is, as it seems to us, the highest point to which international civilization has yet reached. That the representatives of a great empire and a great republic should have been author- ized to agree on an arrangement for such a purpose is an event of which all civilized states in the world will have to take account. "We shall have to refer later on to the fortunes of the Treaty, but it is impossible to suppose that the spirit of the proposed agreement will not carry a wholesome contagion with it to all the great states. The greatest empire in the world and the greatest re- public in the world have come together in a common VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 357 desire to set up the principle of arbitration as the natural and immediate settlement of disputes. It .will be ob- served that the articles of the Treaty meant no limita- tion as regards the questions to be submitted to arbitra- ment. Every subject of dispute whatever that can arise between the great empire and the great republic is in the first instance to be submitted to arbitration between the two states. If, after an experiment in such arbitra- tion, the two states cannot agree, then, before any ques- tion of war can possibly arise, the subject in dispute is to be referred to the judgment of some quite impartial umpire. Of course, nobody in his senses could sujDpose that war could be forever rendered impossible between the British Empire and the United States of America by any treaty ; but we do not measure the importance of any agreement simply by the fact that it does not make war absolutely impossible. No agreement made on earth can ever make war absolutely impossible ; but we could be well content with an arrangement which made war between the two greatest states in the world absolutely impossible in the first instance. It would be quite enough for all reasonable human beings to know, that in any case of dispute between Great Britain and the United States there was to be no resort to war until several courses of pacific arrangement had to be tried and found wanting. The announcement of the proposed Treaty was received with the most cordial welcome by the general body of the public on both sides of the At- lantic. Some few critics on this side of the ocean asked what was to be done in the event of the United States summoning Great Britain to withdraw from the Domin- ion of Canada. Is that a question, it was asked, which Great Britain could possibly submit to arbitration ? The question, of course, was utterly absurd. The United States Eepublic is not altogether peopled by lunatics. 358 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Many years ago, when the late Kobert Lowe (afterwards' Lord Sherbrooke) was discussing in tlie House of Com- mons some question as to the privilege of the soTereign, he admitted that the sovereign had a right to make a peer of every cobbler in the country, and he put the question as to what would happen if the Queen were to make every cobbler in the country a peer ; and he made the pithy and sensible answer : " I don't know. I don't want to know. Nobody wants to know." Nothing could be more effective in its way. All priv- ileges, all agreements, all contracts, are founded on the assumption that they are conferred upon or made be- tween sane persons, and not Bedlamites. Nobody knows, nobody wants to know, what would happen if the United States were to call upon the British Government to va- cate her colonies in Canada. Nobody wants to know what would happen if the sovereign of England were to put in a claim to be declared President of the great American Kepublic. These are absurdities which are outside the practical consideration of rational human beings. Any agreement between the Imperial Govern- ment of England and the Eepublican Government of the United States is accepted as an agreement between sober statesmen and sane populations. Some few Englishmen, not well read in the history of the question, objected to the Treaty on the ground that it formally recognized the Monroe doctrine, As we have pointed out already more than once, the Monroe doctrine was the inspira- tion of English statesmanship. It was recommended to iPresident Monroe in the interests of England as well as of America. It has nothing whatever to do with the British colonization of Canada, and could not possibly be twisted by any perverted ingenuity of man into a reason for a quarrel or an arbitration on such a subject. It merely announced to the world that the American VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFKICA 359 Eepublic could not see without disfavor the establish- ment of any monarchical system in North or South America against the will of the inhabitants of the place where the monarchy was to be set up. Such a principle was well worthy of the English statesmanship which suggested the doctrine, and of the American statesman- ship which accepted and adopted it. No doubt the Treaty proposed between the British GoTernment and the American President did, to a certain extent, recog- nize and affirm the Monroe doctrine. But it is quite certain that no British sovereign will ever want to set up a monarchical government in North or South America against the wishes of the inhabitants ; and it is also certain that no American government will ever undertake to interfere with any form of institution which any population of South America may choose to adopt for itself. Nobody in his senses supposes that, if Patagonia were inclined to transform itself into a monarchy, the gov- ernment at Washington would take the slightest interest in the transformation. There are British dominions in South America to which the government at Washing- ton has never dreamed of raising the faintest objec- tion. When the agreement was signed at Washington be- tween Sir Julian Pauncefote and Mr. Olney, Mr. Olney's secretary, it is stated, kept the pen which had signed the document as a great historical relic. He was well ad- vised in doing so. The key of the Bastille lay, and no doubt still lies, on the table of George Washington's house at Mount Vernon. The pen which signed the agreement between the British Empire and the American Eepublic might well have a place beside it. In the closing days of 1895 the attention of England and of the world in general was suddenly directed to 360 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tlie Transvaal Republic, in South Africa. It will be re- membered that after the defeat of British arms at Ma- juba Hill the Imperial Goyernment had entered into an agreement, described as the Convention of London, with the Government of the South African Eepublic, which is commonly called the Government of the Transvaal. By this Convention England retained a certain suze- rainty over the Transvaal State. England undertook to protect the Transvaal from foreign aggression, and the Transvaal agreed to make no treaty with a foreign State until England had been consulted in the first instance. There has been some misunderstanding lately as to the terms of this part of the agreement. Many people thought that the Transvaal was absolutely prohibited from entering into negotiations for any treaty with a foreign power unless England gave her consent. This, however, was not exactly the fact. It was agreed on both sides that, in the event of the Transvaal statesmen desiring to make a treaty with a foreign power, the terms of the Treaty should be communicated to England, and if the Imperial Government did not within a certain specified time raise any objection to the arrangement the Treaty might then be concluded. This, perhaps, does not seem a very important difference, but it might have come to be important in the early part of 1896, when there was much agitation about the possible interven- tion of Germany. The English public had forgotten to trouble itself very much about the Transvaal until " Dr. Jameson's ride " and its consequences were announced in the closing days of 1895. Dr. Jameson was the admin- istrator of the Chartered Company in South Africa, and he had led a raid from the Imperial Crown Colony of Bechuanaland across the frontier of the Transvaal Ee- public, a State which was not only at peace with Eng- land and on good terms with England, but of which ViSJNEZUJSLA AND SOUTH AFRICA 361 England was, as we have shown, to a certain extent the suzerain power. It is necessary to go hack a little in order to ex- plain the causes of the raid, which created so much astonishment all over the world. In and around the Transvaal State was a large population gathered from all the adventurous countries in the world, who had settled there — had swooped down upon the land when it became known that the soil was rich with gold and diamonds. The original occupants of the Transvaal — we mean, of course, the occupants who came from abroad and settled there ; the native populations seem to count for nothing — were the Boers. The history of the Boers is curious, interesting, and in a certain sense pa- thetic. The Boers have sprung on the one side from the Dutch Protestants, and on the other side from the French Huguenot exiles. These men and women had been driven from their native homes by oppressive laws, and had found their way many generations ago to South Africa, which was then just beginning to be opened up to colonization. The Boer has succeeded in making a race and a people of his own. He lives apart and unto himself. He is not proud of his descent from the Dutch or from the French Huguenot. He cares nothing about his ancestors. He cares nothing about the history and the traditions of Europe. He only wants to live his own life and to be let alone. He is as peculiar a type in his own way, although it is a very different way, as is the Bedouin with his camel and his spear, who may be seen to this hour, as he was in the Bible days, outside the walls of Jerusalem. The Boer is religious, pious— nar- row-minded in his religion and in his piety. Like many others who left Europe to escape persecution, he is by no means above inflicting religious disqualification and penalty upon those who differ from him on questions of 362 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES religious faith. We shall presently see that the ques- tion of religious faith had a good deal to do with the troubles that broke out in the TransTaal Eepnblic. In the political government of that State no share what- ever was allowed to any one who did not profess the Protestant religion. In Africa, as we all know, more especially in South Africa, there are Africans and Afri- kanders. The African, of course, is the dark-skinned native ; the Afrikander is the settler from Europe, or America, or Australia. The Afrikanders, differing in many things, are in general agreement as to one thing — the right and the necessity of putting down the African as much as possible. The Transvaal State made him a beast of burden, and nothing else. The Transvaal State, moreover, did not want any Afrikanders but their own people. The Boer did not care about getting rich. It had not occurred to him that there were any means of getting rich. He was content to live upon the produce of his flocks and his herds and his fields. He almost lived in the saddle, with his rifle in his hand to kill the game and keep off the wild beasts and the hostile natives ; and he had shown at Majuba Hill what a Boer could do from behind a rock with his rifle in his hand. His one great terror was of English domina- tion. Wherever he set up for himself, it seemed to him that England was determined to follow him, to surround him, and to prevent him from carrying on the sort of life that suited him best. Again and again the Boer population changed its ground in order to escape being pressed by the English — from Cape Colony or Natal, or any of the other states which admitted the sovereignty of the Imperial Government. It is only doing the Boer simple justice to say that, like By- ron's Manfred, he wished to find the desolation, but not to make it. The Boers are not a social people, even \mKLVEhA AND SOUTH AFRICA 363 amongst themselves. As a rule, in the Transvaal State a man's family make np his world, and he is not particu- larly anxious for the society of his fellow-beings. He is very steady ; he is very sober ; he is very religious after his own fashion ; and he has all the courage of his Dutch ancestors. Now, when it was made known through the world that in and around the Transvaal State there was gold to be had in abundance, and the adventurers from all the earth swarmed upon the place, the Boer and his peculiar characteristics came into sharp contrast with the ways of what is called civilization. There were two great and conspicuous figures in South Africa at that time. One was President Kruger, and the other was Mr. Cecil Ehodes. President Kruger was a Boer of the Boers, an idealized type of the Boer creation. He was undoubtedly a man of great ability, of absolute integrity, firm as a rock wherever what he recognized as a principle was concerned, rough and rugged in appearance, blunt in manner, but with a certain characteristic humor, and with a clear and statesmanlike mind. He was a sort of Afrikander Abraham Lincoln or Peter Stuyvesant. Mr. Cecil Ehodes was an Englishman, educated at one of the great English universities, who had gone out when young to Cape Colony for the benefit of his health, and found his way there into politics and into finance, and became Prime-minister of the Colony, and was in every way its foremost man. Now we mean nothing disparaging to Mr. Cecil Ehodes when we say that he was above all things an adventurer by temperament and by career. He was an adventurer as some of Walter Ealeigh's com- patriots and colleagues were adventurers ; for there was a good deal of practical genius in some of Ealeigh's com- patriots and colleagues, and, eager as they were to extend the empire and the glory of England, they were not un- willing at the same time to make money out of the enter- 364 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES prise. Mr. Cecil Rhodes might undoubtedly, in a certain sense, be called a man of genius. He founded the Char- tered Company, which received Imperial sanction, and ■was in itself like the founding of a State. A yast terri- tory was called Ehodesia after his name, and he became — we cannot describe it otherwise — the chief and the dictator and the idol of all the mixed and various advent- urous population who streamed into South Africa, led by the longing to make money. Plutarch himself could not have devised a more striking contrast of portraits than that presented by the picture of President Kruger and the picture of Mr. Cecil Rhodes. Power, position, greatness, money— these were of absolutely no account to President Kruger, and they were the natural pursuit of Mr. Cecil Rhodes. The influence of Mr. Rhodes grew and grew. The Chartered Company was in itself a commanding power. Whether the Imperial Government ought in our days to recognize the establishment of a Chartered Company at all is a question which must before long come up for the consideration of the Imperial Parliament. England had in the end to get rid of her " Chartered Company," her "John Company," in India. She will very soon have to ask herself what she is going to do with her Chartered Company in South Africa. At all events, it was quite certain that, sooner or later, the influence of President Kruger and the influence of Mr. Cecil Rhodes must come into collision. As Prevost Paradol said of France and Prussia more than a quarter of a century ago, if you start two express trains from difierent points along the same line, the encounter is only a question of hours. Great controversy soon arose between the Boer Government and those who were called the Uitlanders, or Outlanders— that is to say, the settlers in and around the Transvaal State, who had come there to make money. LORD UOSBBERy VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 365 It is quite likely, it may even be taken for granted, that President Kruger and his colleagues were unduly sus- picious of the Outlanders. They were far too apt to identify the aims of the Outlanders with some desire on the part of England to conquer the whole country and obtain possession of it. The truth is, that not one Eng- lishman in a thousand, after the feeling about Majuba Hill had cooled off, felt the slightest desire that his Government should conquer and annex the Transvaal State, and not one Outlander out of ten thousand cared very much about English annexation of the territory. The Outlanders had streamed into South Africa, as they had streamed into California and into Australia many years before, with the sole object of making money, and settling down to be happy in the spending of it. A vast number of the Outlanders lived within the limits of the Transvaal State. They largely outnumbered the Boer population, even in the State itself. The great majori- ty of them cared nothing whatever about any supposed desire on the part of England to take possession of the Transvaal. But they began to complain, and with a certain reasonableness in their complaint, that the laws of the Eepublic were very unfair towards foreign set- tlers. The foreign settler was allowed no rights of citi- zenship. Now it is quite certain that no State allows to incomers an immediate and ma,tter-of-fact right of citizenship. Even in the great American Republic, where, as Lowell says, the latch at the door may be lifted by the poorest child of Adam's kin, the emigrant is not allowed to walk into the country and become a citizen and a voter all at once. He has to put in a cer- tain period of residence, or a certain amount of active service. But in the United States the prospect is clear. Every immigrant who enters the States knows that he has only to pass through a certain period of probation 366 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES to become naturalized in the regular way, and then he is a citizen and a Toter, Just as if he were a born Ameri- can. But in the Transvaal Eepublic there was no period of probation. A stranger was, as the constitution stood, to be a stranger always, and only in the latest years was there the faintest hope held out that this condition of things might be altered at some future time, and that the settler might be recognized as a resident and a citi- zen. The case on both sides could be yery simply and clearly stated. The Boers said, " We do not want any of you among us. We have broken up our camp and shifted our ground more than once to escape from foreign in- terlopers. We do not want to have the mineral re- sources of the country developed. We do not care if they were never developed. You have now become the majority, we admit, even within our own frontier lines, but you shall not make laws for us, and disturb our familiar and cherished arrangements." That, roughly speaking, was the case for the Boers. The case for the Outlanders was equally clear. They said, "We are de- veloping the resources of the country ; we are making all this region, yours as well as ours, rich and prosperous. We are drawing the attention of the whole civilized world to its vast resources. We have created a new country, and we claim to be allowed to take part in the government of it." One thing will probably seem clear to the uncon- cerned and impartial observer— that the Outlanders will be sure to have their way in the end. They are, f orthe most part, men of energy, of enterprise, of courage, experience, and resource, and it would be impossible to keep such men, even were they but a minority, from having some share in the government of any country in which they choose to settle. The Boers could not even plead the right of long possession so far as the Transvaal region was concerned. Their ownership was but a thing of the VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 367 day before yesterday, if we may be allowed to put the matter in this easy and colloquial form. President Kruger would certainly have been well advised if he had frankly admitted that there was a claim to be made for the Out- landers, and that those of them who actually lived in the Transvaal must be allowed, on some conditions or other, to become citizens and voters there. All this controversy raised a great agitation over the whole of South Africa. The Boers, no doubt, got it into their minds that the object of the Outlanders was to take possession of the Transvaal, and annex it in some form to the British Empire, with Mr. Cecil Ehodes as a sort of dictator. How far that idea was founded upon accurate knowledge and on observation it is yet too early to say. In the meantime, there can be no doubt that preparations were actively made for an invasion of the Transvaal in the interests of what was called the Eeform cause. How far the ruling spirits of the Chartered Company had con- nived at, inspired, or helped such an enterprise is not yet quite known. Dr. Jameson, who held high position in the Company, and who had an inborn love of soldiering, put himself suddenly at the head of a little army, some of whose oflBcers were men in the regular military service of England, with the avowed purpose of crossing the Trans- vaal frontier-land in order to compel President Kruger and his government to do justice to the claims of the settlers. Some mysterious telegraph seems also to have reached the hands of Dr. Jameson and his co-partners, tell- ing them that their instant interposition was needed in order to secure the safety of the wives and children of settlers in Johannesburg, the great business city of the Ee- public. The news of the meditated raid suddenly reached this country. Mr. Chamberlain was Secretary of State for the Colonies, and he certainly acted with all the energy and promptitude that might have been expected from a 368 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES man endowed with his force of character. He at once telegraphed to the High Commissioner of South Africa, Sir Hercules Robinson (now Lord Rosmead), authoriz- ing him to take every step in his power to preTsnt the invasion. Dr. Jameson refused to be stopped on his march, and he endeavored to go his way ; but he was utterly defeated by the Boer forces, and he and his officers and men had to surrender, and were made pris- oners. President Kruger acted with wise clemency, and spared the lives of all the invaders, allowing the leaders to be sent off to England in order to be tried here for an act of rebellion against the authority of the Crown. Dr. Jameson became for a time a sort of popular hero with certain classes of persons in England. But the more the whole subject came to be looked into and thought over the more it became clear that his action was rash, impolitic, lawless, and disastrous. Nobody sus- pected him of any evil purpose or of any selfish pur- pose whatever. He was a brave man, and was not in any sense a money-seeking adventurer. There was, how- ever, a strong doubt in many minds whether he had not been made the instrument of more self-seeking and un- scrupulous men, who were glad to urge him to run any risk, in the hope that England and the Transvaal might again become engaged in war, and that the complete annexation of the South African Republic might thus be accomplished. The prisoners in due time were tried and found guilty, and sentences of imprisonment, not very long in any instance, were passed. Dr. Jameson's health had suffered so much that it was found necessary to release him after a few months of incarceration, and nobody in England or in Africa was sorry that he had been dealt with in a kindly spirit. Of course the whole subject was a question of debate in the House of Commons. The Government agreed VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 369 that a Committee of that House should be appointed to inquire into the whole chapter of history and report upon it, and it was generally understood that one of the most important subjects of inquiry was to be the part which had been played by the Chartered Company. The Chartered Company had been set up by royal warrant as a body controlling its own soldiers for defensive pur- poses. Given a chartered company at all, under such conditions, it was clear that it must be allowed so much of military power. It was surrounded by hostile races, and it had, in fact, to carry on several fierce wars. It was in these struggles that Dr. Jameson won his repute as a leader of men in battle. For a long time, all but unknown to the vast majority of Englishmen at home, the Chartered Company was writing out a new volume of history with a big pen, sometimes, it must be allowed, dipped in very red ink. But it certainly never was in- tended when the charter of the Company was given that the armed force it was to manage should be used for the purpose of invading a friendly State. The good faith of the Imperial Government, the honor of the empire, Avere felt to be involved in the question whether the Chartered Company had or had not authorized, or backed up, or deliberately connived at the extraordinary expedition conducted by Dr. Jameson. The Committee was decidedly a strong court of in- quiry. It contained among its members some of the most distinguished representatives of every party and section and group in the House of Commons. Meantime a whole flood of literature had spread over the doings in South Africa. The newspapers of the world wrote every day on the subject. Pamphlets and volumes came out without intermission — each pamphlet and each volume by somebody who claimed an especial right to know the facts of every incident and the meaning of every fact. 16* 370 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES The new Poet Laureate, Mr. Alfred Austin, who had succeeded Alfred Tennyson in office and in name, at all events, came out with a poem in honor of Dr. Jameson ; but it is only fair to say that he did not profess to have any personal knowledge of what he was rhyming about. It may be that he was not the first Poet Laureate who glorified some military achievement about the rights and wrongs of which he did not pretend to have any knowl- edge whatever. But again let it be said, in justice to Mr. Alfred Austin, that while greater Laureates than he had only had to glorify successful undertakings, he of his own motion smote the chords of the lyre in honor of an enterprise which had been an utter fail- ure, a mere miscalculation — not only a defeat, but a dis- comfiture. Some time later on, when people have leisure to think impartially over the whole of this chapter of South African history, it will certainly begin to be observed that in all written or said upon the subject in the House of Commons, in the Parliament of Cape Colony, in the Blue Books, in the newspapers, hardly any account is taken of the position of the African native. He appears to count for nothing in the whole controversy. The Boers, as we have said, made him a mere beast of burden. The Chartered Company seem to have regarded him as if he were some pestilent interloper, who must be got out of the way as quickly as possible, by whatever proc- ess of removal. Perhaps, when a full and calm inquiry comes to be made into the whole history of South Africa in our recent days, it may be found that in the unceasing wars between the settlers and tlje natives the settlers were not always in the right, and the poor benighted heathens were not invariably in the wrong. Perhaps, too, it may come to be thought that the settlers might have -done better, even among themselves, if they had VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 371 been more considerate for the ignorant, dark-skinned native populations. It would not be possible to close this part of the chapter of history without saying something about the message of congratulation sent by the German Emperor to President Kruger on the defeat of Dr. Jameson and his raiders. Something too much, we think, was made of this by the English press and public in general. ObTiously it was an indiscretion. The German Em- peror telegraphed to President Kruger his congratula- tions on the victory which the President's soldiers had obtained over the invaders. Now there was not the slightest necessity for the German Emperor to send any message of this kind. All civilized States are supposed to be on friendly terms with each other, and every civi- lized State is understood to be glad that trouble has been averted from every other civilized State. But it was assumed in England, very naturally, that the Ger- man Emperor's telegram implied some special interest in the welfare of the Transvaal Eepublic, and some special objection to any danger to that Eepublic com- ing from Englishmen. Therefore the message of the German Emperor was regarded almost all over England as a compliment to President Kruger and a snub to the English Government. There was, of course, some reason for such an opinion. No other leader of a State had offered any congratulation to President Kruger. The Emperor of Austria had expressed no opinion. The President of the French Eepublic had not thought it necessary to send any message of congratulation. The President of the United States had occupied himself with his own business, and had not felt it his duty to convey any special congratulations to his brother-Presi- dent, the Chief of the Transvaal Eepublic. The Em- peror of Eussia had been silent. The King of Sweden 373 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES and Norway had made no remark, and the Sultan of Turkey, much engrossed, no doubt, with other affairs more intimately concerning himself and his dynasty, had uttered no words of gratnlation or condolence. Therefore it was not unreasonable that the English press and the English public should have attached some special significance to the message addressed by the Ger- man Emperor to President Kruger. There had been troubles already between England and Germany in South Africa, and the message of the German Emperor seemed to many people here to have been purposely meant to accentuate the bearing of those troubles. The writer of this History is not inclined to interpret the matter in that way. The German Emperor has a peculiar per- sonality of his own. The great German poet, Schiller, makes the hero of one of his finest plays say, "If I were cool and cautious I should not be William Tell." If the present German Emperor were cool and cautious he could not possibly be the sort of man that he has shown himself in .political life. An English writer has described him as an emperor taken out of the second part of "Faust." He delights in surprises, in acting on impulses, and in following the bent of any sudden in- clination. But it is hardly possible to believe that he had any hostile purpose to England when he sent his mes- sage to President Kruger. He is a grandson of Queen Victoria, and he has never really shown any want of kindly feeling towards the English people. But he is fond of making sensational speeches, he is fond of writing letters, and fond of sending telegraphic mes- sages, and to one who has such a passion much must be excused. The message to President Kruger made a great sensation for the moment; but when Eng- lish people began to pull themselves together, they agreed amongst each other that it was only one more VENEZUELA AND SOUTH AFRICA 373 of the odd performances of the young German Em- peror. In the meanwhile the treaty for arbitration between England and the United States undoubtedly hung fire. It came at an unlucky time. It came at a season when the Presidential election was going on, and when the minds of men in the States were narrowed down into mere partisan issues. There is still in the United States, as every one knows, a considerable mass of the popula- lation among whom, after all that has come and gone, a lingering dislike of Great Britain remains. No such feeling exists among the largest proportion of the Ameri- can population, but still the feelifig finds representation enough in the United States Senate to encourage a great deal of obstruction on the part of the minority of the Sen- ators. The treaty of arbitration was, therefore, obstructed for a time. It may be said, without the slightest chance of contradiction, that the intelligence of the United States, through their public men, their newspapers, and their people, was absolutely in favor of the Treaty. A principle so far supported on both sides of the ocean can- not possibly be long prevented from coming into agree- ment and into action. CHAPTER XX DEATH — AKD DTKAMITB The year 1896 dealt devastation among celebrities of all orders. lu its earlier days died Lord Leighton, the President of the Koyal Academy. Lord Leighton had undoubtedly maintained with ease and force the high position of the British painter's art. His style was peculiar. There is, perhaps, no other word to describe it so well as to call it, in the Latin sense, exquisite. Per- haps it wanted strength ; at all events, that want is cer- tainly the fault which would be found with it by those who are inclined to underestimate Leighton's art. But it had beauty of outline and color and tone. It was full of poetic suggestion. It brought out all the lovelier touches and tints of life ; and if it did not deal with the great emotions and passions of humanity, it at least wrought with consummate skill the work which the artist had set out for himself to do. Some of his earlier pictures, especially that of Olytemnestra from the battle- ments of Argos watching for the beacon-fires which are to announce the return of Agamemnon, did seem to con- vey the idea of that strength of art which not every one was willing to regard as the possession of Lord Leighton. The painter, however, probably understood his own limi- tations as nobody else could have understood them, and kept himself to his own path in art, to illustrate the poetic and beautiful. He was a man of rare accomplish- ments. As an ornamental speaker, if we may use that DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 375 phrase, he ranked among the best in England. Ths work was elaborate, no doubt, and was even thought over- labored by many critics. But if a man can turn out a beautiful speech, or a beautiful picture, or a beautiful statue, it does not much matter by what process, quick or slow, the accomplishment has been achieved. Lord Leighton was a sculptor as well as a painter, and could make statues almost as successfully as he could make pictures or speeches. He was a singularly handsome man, of courtly manner, who had a charming word for everybody he met, and who could talk to most Continen- tal visitors in their own tongues. When he died there was some little doubt as to his successor in the Presi- dent's chair of the Eoyal Academy. There was no doubt whatever as to the merits of the man who ought to be chosen as his successor. We believe we have good au- thority for saying that as to the merits of the man there never was the slightest doubt among the Eoyal Academi- cians. Sir John Millais was beyond all dispute the greatest English painter left after Leighton's death, and in the opinion of many well-qualified critics he had car- ried English art in painting higher than ever Leighton had done. But there were some doubts and difficulties about the election. Millais was in failing health ; his sight was much impaired; nothing was more certain than the fact that his great career was drawing to a close ; and the outer public wondered whether there would be any use in electing a President of the Eoyal Academy who could not possibly fulfil any of the active duties of his office. The Eoyal Academy, however, decided, generously and wisely, that the position which he had long been earning must be offered to Sir John Millais, and that, whether he lived or whether he died, his place in English art must be recognized, not for his sake merely, but for the honor of the Academy itself. 376 A HISTORY OP OUR OWN TIMES So Sir John Millais was elected President of the Royal Academy ; and in August, 1896, too soon after his elec- tion, he justified all the melancholy forebodings, and died before his time, but not too soon for his fame. He was succeeded in the place of President of the Royal Academy by Mr. Edward Poynter — Sir Edward Poynter, as he naturally became. Art had lost much also by the death of Mr. George Richmond. Later on the gayety of nations was eclipsed by the death of Mr. George du Maurier. Du Maurier stood amongst the very highest of the artists who illus- trated in genial satire that form of British humor which Punch has introduced to the world. It is not a scathing form of humor. It does not deal much with those terrible problems of social life which so many writers of later years have been thrusting under our eyes with futile persistency, as if we could possibly settle them in any case ; but it dealt with what we may call the lighter pleasantries and shams and follies of social life, and it did its work — its own work — to absolute perfection. The place of George du Maurier in English art will be hard indeed to fill. It is curious to remember that by far his greatest public success was made by. a story to which he himself attached no manner of literary im- portance. He threw off the story of " Trilby " because it embodied and illustrated some delightful memories of his as a young student-painter in the Quartier Latin of Paris. It was undoubtedly a pretty, a touching, and a charming story, but he himself and most of his friends were amazed at the hold it took on the mind of the gen- eral public. In England its success, although surpris- ing, was nothing to the fame which it made in the United States. No book in our time since the days of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe and "Uncle Tom's Cabin" ever had the same run in America, where one might have DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 37'7 thought that the very fact of poor Trilby sitting as a model for the "altogether" would have alarmed all the households of New England. Du Maurier took his suc- cess with a blending of amazement and composure. It did not put him out for a moment. It never occurred to him to believe that as a novelist he was the equal of Dickens and of Thackeray. He was a good deal amused, not a little annoyed, but on the whole quite master of himself. No man could have been more loved by his friends than George du Maurier was. No one felt jeal- ous of or grudged him his great success. There was nothing that fortune could do for George du Maurier in the way of good luck which would not have gladdened the hearts of all who knew him. In January, 1896, died Mr. Hugh Ohilders, who had been a colleague of Mr. Gladstone in several Liberal Ad- ministrations. Mr. Ohilders was a man of great ability, who only failed to rise to his full level because he had not always the physical health which enables a statesman to endure with ease and success the stress and strain of Cabinet office. Like Eobert Lowe, afterwards Lord Sherbrooke, he had made a reputation for himself in Australia before he came into the House of Commons. His first remarkable speech in that House was made on the question of the ballot, in which he gave his Austra- lian experiences in a manner that made it evident to the House of Commons that a new, a clear-headed, a strong, and a capable man had come into the assembly. He rose steadily in the House. He held various offices. He be- came First Lord of the Admiralty ; he became "War Min- ister ; he became Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was an excellent "all-round man," and he served as a mem- ber of every Liberal Administration until, as we have mentioned in a former chapter, his state of health com- pelled him, or condemned him, to seek for rest. The S'J'S A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES final rest came not very long afterwards. His last pub- lic seryice was conferred when he acted as Chairman of the Commission appointed by the Conservative Gov- ernment to inqnire into the system of Irish taxation. Mr. Childers had unnumbered friends, and enemies that could not be numbered, for the plain reason that they did not exist. Nor was the fact that he had no enemies owing to any lack of force of character in him, for he followed his own way thoroughly and strenuously when he saw it ; and every one recognized the fact that he was sincere and above reproach, and he died regretted by all the great parties in the State. The literary world had to lament the loss of Mr. Will- iam Morris, one of the sweetest poets and one of the truest artists of modern English life. We have long since borne tribute to his genius in these volumes. We have quite lately mentioned his name as one of the men best qualified for the position of Poet Laureate, so far as imagination and melody were concerned, but as a man who certainly would not himself have cared about or ac- cepted the office. He had done much for English art and for English life in many ways ; and, indeed, it would be hardly possible to imagine a career more honorable and more exalted, within its limits, than that of William Morris. Mr. Coventry Patmore, author of " The Angel in the House," died at the age of seventy-three, in 1896, still loved as a poet by " those who in their spring-time knew him," and reverenced even by a younger genera- tion, with whom, as a rule, the works of past poets do not count for much. "Tom Hughes" passed away in 1896, once famous through all the English-speaking world as the author of "Tom Brown's School-days." There was a time when no name in England was more popular than that of Thomas Hughes. He was a great Eadical reformer, and he sat in the House of Commons DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 379 for many years, and he manfully stood up for the cause of the North in the American Civil War. Of late years he had faded almost out of recollection. He accepted the post of a county-court judge, and he seemed to have forgotten all his early fame. Certainly, he made no effort to recover it, and the news of his death reminded most people that he once had lived. The death of Dr. Benson, Archbishop of Canterbury, in October, 1896, gave an occasion for the revival of a once-famous, long-forgotten controversy. Dr. Benson at the time of his death was staying with Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden, and actually died in Mr. Gladstone's pew in the parish church. The controversy had nothing to do with the Archbishop of Canterbury himself. Dr. Ben- son had gone through his work as archbishop quietly and steadily. Everything that he had done was done well, but without show, or pretence, or fireworks of any kind. The beautiful grounds of Lambeth Palace, and the valuable collection of books which the Palace con- tained, were put freely at the service of any one who had the faintest claim to admission and recognition. But Dr. Benson was not a man in any way to magnify his office, and he simply attended to his work and went quietly on. An irreverent writer in a London daily paper once de- scribed him in a leading article as " the Archbishop of Canterbury, better know as the father of the author of ' Dodo ' " — a caricaturist novel of London social life. The controversy arose, or was revived, when the successor to Dr. Benson came to be nominated. Lord Salisbury gave the position of Archbishop of Canterbury to Dr. Temple, at that time Bishop of London, and formerly Bishop of Exeter. The nomination of Dr. Temple revived at once the old controversy about " Essays and Keviews." The present generation would probably otherwise have forgotten every- thing concerning "Essays and Eeviews." The book which 380 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES went by this name was written by six clergymen and one layman of the Church of England, and was published in the March of 1860. The first essay in the volume was the work of Dr. Frederick Temple. There were seven essays and reviews. Professor Baden-Powell, Dr. Kow- land Williams, Professor Jowett, Dr. H. B. Wilson, and Dr. Mark Pattison, with Mr. C. W. Goodwin, made up the authors of the collection. The book would not seem now one to excite much commotion. But at that time it created a vast excitement, and the ecclesiastical courts took up the question, and sentenced two of the writers to suspension from their clerical oflBce for one year, with the payment of costs. The sentenced men, however, ap- pealed to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and the condemnation of the ecclesiastical courts was upset and abolished. The fact that the final decision re- mained in the hands of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council had a good deal of the infiuence which the Gorham case of many years before had had, in urging loyal members of the English Church to consider whether under such conditions there could be a Church at all. We are not now discussing that question. We are only pointing to the undeniable fact that it did affect the minds of a great many thoroughly devoted Protestants. Who are the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council ? we can well imagine some such Protestant asking. Do they even profess to be, have they even the remotest notion of pro- fessing to be, enlightened by any guidance from a higher world? Yet they have it in their power to settle the doctrines of the Church of England. There was a good deal of controversy raised when Dr. Temple was made Bishop of Exeter, and the whole question came up again when Lord Salisbury made him Archbishop of Canter- bury. He was undoubtedly a man of great ability and of frank sincerity. He was somewhat rude in speech, DEATH— AND DYNAMITK 381 and had little of the art which conciliates opponents by blandishment, or even by deference. Whatever he felt he strongly felt, and he had not the least idea of putting his thoughts into half -meaning or faintly modulated tones of meaning. If you did not like what he said, you were free to dislike it, and there an end. But about the integrity of the man and about his capacity to perform his duties there could not be the smallest question. Some controversy was raised also with regard to his age. He was seventy-five years old when he was nomi- nated Archbishop of Canterbury. The objection seems to us to be entirely absurd. Possibly in the military service and the civil service there may be occasion for a general and average rule as to the time when a man had better retire from active life. But in the case of great func- tionaries like an archbishop, or a lord chancellor, or a commander-in-chief, it seems to us simply ridiculous to enforce such a rule. Dr. Temple was still eminently qual- ified for all the work that he could be called upon to do. If Count von Moltke had been withdrawn from active service according to the rule that is now favored in Eng- land, the world would never have known that he was the greatest Continental soldier since the First Napoleon. If Marshal Eadetski had been withdrawn from public service at the age of Archbishop Temple, the world would never have known what a splendid soldier he was. We have already mentioned in these volumes that if the ordinary rule had applied to Lord Palmerston, we should never have known that he was one of the great- est parliamentary debaters of his time. The English public in general approved of the ap- pointment of Dr. Temple, and had forgotten much about the past controversy. Nobody now reads the volume of "Essays and Eeviews." In any case, the scepticism of the volume was not an unwholesome curi- 382 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES osity, and merely tended, on the whole, to the recogni- tion or the reasonable consideration of certain scientific questions which the world was bound to take into ac- count. It was a question altogether between Broad Church and Narrow Church, and touched, so far as we can see, none of the issues that divide religious faith from unbelief. At the time when the " Essays and Ke- views" were published some -English Protestants wrote and stormed as though the whole world of religion were put on its trial, and must come to an end if the teaching of such writers were allowed to go free. The world went on, however, all the same. The Eoman Catholics and the Nonconformists concerned themselves little or nothing about the teaching of "Essays and Eeviews." Indeed, the whole principle and meaning of the English Established Church were identified with an admission of a certain freedom of individual opinion, and, where that freedom was not recognized, were bound up with the decisions of a court of law. Now the actual fact is, that amongst English Protestants the decision of the court of law is not, and never can be, recognized as binding on faith. One cannot help the decision. There it is. It may rebuke a bishop here, or chastise a curate there, on questions of belief, but no one really supposes that the courts of law have a direct inspiration from the powers above. Therefore the general public opinion of England approved of the elevation of Dr. Temple to the bishopric of Exeter, even while the question of contro- versy was still new; and more lately approved of his elevation by Lord Salisbury to the great place of Arch- bishop of Canterbury. Dr. Temple was known to be a hard-working man, who would never fail in any of the duties of his position, who might be trusted to work on as long as he felt equal to his business, and to give up the task the moment he felt unequal to its demands. DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 383 Therefore Lord Salisbury's action met with very gen- eral approval, and an old controversy, which at one time stirred up much bitterness, was regarded as revived anew, indeed, but also settled forever, by the nomina- tion of the new Archbishop of Canterbury. The year 1896 was much darkened — as, indeed, the year before had been here— on the Continent by accounts of dynamite explosions. Some of the accounts were mere wild rumors, and some of them were only too cruel facts. It became evident that on the European conti- nent there was a sudden recrudescence of the dynamite form of crime. In Paris, in other parts of France, in Spain, and in several other European countries the dyn- amite conspiracy broke out anew in full blaze. Of course, it could not possibly happen that the alarm caused by these atrocious crimes could long be kept out of England. About the middle of 1896 a thoroughly sensational report was started on the public. The Scot- land Yard police, it was announced, had got hold of a tremendous plot, concocted by Irish Americans and continental Socialists, against everybody and everything. It was proclaimed that there were men in Antwerp, in one or two of the cities of Holland, and in London it- self, who had entered into a conspiracy to shock civili- zation by the greatest crimes of assassination the world had ever known. The Sovereign of England, the Czar of Russia, who was expected in England about that time,- and all manner of imperial and royal personages, were to be assailed by this monstrous complot. Ifor was this merely a rumor in the London papers. The English police authorities at once proceeded to take measures for the capture and the punishment of the guilty mis- creants. Some of them were in France, others were in Belgium and Holland, others, again, were in the United States. The allegations were chiefly founded on the dis- 384 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES covery of a great mass of dynamite bombs in a house in Antwerp. One of the principal persons charged with this conspiracy was a man named Tynan, who was called in the Irish Fenian days by the title of "Number One." Tynan was an Irish American who, so far as the Irish Nationalist cause was concerned, had never had the slightest influence on this side of the Atlantic or the other. Most of the Irish Nationalists on this side re- garded him as a sort of feather-headed buffoon, hut there were amongst other men undoubtedly some darker suspicions about him. Tynan was then in France. An application was made for his extradition, which totally failed. The legal advisers of the French Government could find no reason to believe that any overt acta of his came within the meaning of the Extradition Treaty. There is a good deal of mistake in the pop- ular mind about the operation of the ordinary extra- dition treaty. In the first place, it applies only to a distinctly specified class of offences. It does not apply to political offences strictly so-called at all. That is to say, that if in George Washington's time the American cause had been wholly defeated, and Washington had es- caped to France, and if the Extradition Treaty had then been in existence, the French Government, any French Government, would have absolutely refused to listen to any demand for the surrender of Washington. Then, again, the Extradition Treaty, which applies only to specified classes of offences, does not bind any State to hand over a foreign refugee unless there is evidence enough against him to warrant his being put on his trial in the country where he has found a shelter, supposing his offence were committed in that country. Let us take an easy illustration. A man in London is accused of committing murder, and he manages to escape to France. A demand is made by England for his extradition, and DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 385 the French authorities require, before consenting to the demand, that there shall be sufficient evidence giyen, not, indeed, to convict him before a French court of law, but to warrant his being put on trial in the first instance be- fore a French court of lav. Nothing can be a more reasonable provision. Without such a provision the Ex- tradition Treaty would be impossible for states like Eng- land and the American Eepublic, which do not want to shelter criminals, but which do not either consent to hand over a man to the mercy of his enemies on no genuine evidence whatever. Then, again, another mis- take is commonly made. A State is not bound to refuse to hand over a man charged with crime, even though the crime may not be proved in the first instance before a coxirt of law. That State is not bound in honor or by the terms of the treaty to send such a man back to his own country, but she is free to do so if she thinks there are no substantial reasons for giving him protection. That, too, is a perfectly reasonable understanding, and has been acted upon more than once in modern times. Some notorious swindler takes refuge in a foreign State whither nobody invited him to come, and then there is a demand made for his extradition. The foreign State is quite entitled to say : we know nothing in favor of the man, we have heard and read a great deal in his disfavor, but it would be impossible to commit him for trial in this country ; the whole question is beyond our way and our reach, and all that we can do is to remit him for trial to his own coun- try, where, no doubt, the laws of the country will better understand how to deal with him than we could possibly do. Some criminals of the swindler kind have thought they were safe in escaping to a country where no extradi- tion treaty whatever existed between that State and the land of their birth, under the mistaken impression that where there was no extradition treaty there could be no 17 386 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES extradition. But they found out their mistake in many well-known instances. In the case of Tynan, however, the question was wholly different. First of all, was his a political ofEence in the generally accepted meaning of the words ? Next, was there evidence enough to justify his committal for trial before a French court of criminal law, supposing his conspiracy had been organized in France ? Anyhow, the French authorities refused to hand him over ; and the same was the case with those who were said to have been his fellow-couspirators in Holland and in Belgium. One man was brought for trial to England, a person who was sometimes called Ivory, and sometimes called Bell. He was brought before the magistrate at Bow Street, and evidence was taken, and he was for- mally committed for trial at a criminal court. But when the trial came on before Mr. Justice Hawkins, the Solicitor-General, who appeared for the prosecution, a man of high ability and legal standing, had to admit and to announce in the end that he had no evidence against the prisoner with which it would be worth while to trouble further the patience of the court. It ap- peared, in the first place, that the man, whether guilty or not guilty, had not been in Antwerp for a long time before the discovery of the store of bombs ; and in the second place, that the one principal witness against him was a man who, for one reason or another, could not be put into the witness-box. So the prosecution failed. Mr. Justice Hawkins ordered the release of the prisoner, advised him to keep better company for the rest of his life, and there was an end of the whole prosecution. Concerning all the vast dynamite scheme to assassinate everybody there was only one accused person put into the dock, and against him the law-officers of the Im- perial Government had to acknowledge that they could bring forward no substantial evidence whatever. Under DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 387 the essential conditions of British law we are bound to assume that this man was not guilty. But he had been kept in prison for several months, and it seems it had not occurred to the acute law-officers of the English crown to enter into any investigation of the evidence against him. Assuming Mr. Ivory, or Mr. Bell, or whatever his name may be, to be innocent of any dyn- amite conspiracy— which we are bound to do after the trial in the criminal court, we can only say that it is quite possible, after such a blunder, some man really involved in a genuine dynamite conspiracy may escape unpunished, for the simple reason that a distrust of all stories about dynamite conspiracy is certain to arise in most European countries, and in the American Eepub- lic. It is impossible to make loose charges, and to with- draw from them, without finding it difficult for a long time afterwards to get any public belief for serious and genuine accusations. The Tory Government was placed in a peculiarly em- barrassing position. It had lately released three men who had long been imprisoned on the charge of having taken part in a dynamite conspiracy. But it had done so, it is only fair to own, on the medical representations which made it clear that the condition of these men^s health was such as to render further imprisonment a sentence to death or to hopeless insanity. Two of the men, in fact, proved to be hopelessly insane. The Con- servative Home Secretary probably reasoned out the case humanely and wisely, and said, that if a man is not sen- tenced to death he ought not to be allowed to remain in prison until the imprisonment kills him ; and as there is no Judicial sentence known to this country which com- pels a man to be driven to insanity, a man ought not to be allowed to remain in prison after his frame of mind is threatening to drive him out of his reason. Their re- 388 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES lease, indeed, came too late in the case of the two men threatened with insanity; but it was, all the same, a reasonable and a humane act on the part of Sir Matthew White Ridley, the Conservative Home Secretary. He had but lately come into oifice, and on the medical re- ports furnished to him he made his decision. Some of his own party, however, were furious against him, and a debate was started in the House of Commons during the discussion on the address by some of his own politi- cal colleagues. The doctrine laid down by certain Conservatives was that the Home Secretary has no right to turn loose upon society either dynamiters or madmen. It does not take much trouble to see the futility of such an assertion. A man is sentenced to imprisonment for a certain num- ber of years. He is not sentenced to death. If he were sentenced to death, he ought to be put to death at once. It is a recognized part of our prison system, that if a man behaves himself well during his years of imprisonment he is to be released before the full expiration of his sen- tence. One of the men accused of the dynamite con- spiracy was, according to the medical reports, likely to die if the full number of his prison years were enforced ; and in the ordinary course of affairs the full number of years would not be enforced. It is hard to understand how any reasonable human being, not utterly controlled by party or partisan considerations, could say that Sir Matthew White Eidley was not justified in acting on the medical reports in that case. As regards the other cases, the British prisons are certainly not fitted for lunatic asylums, nor is it desirable to convert prisoners who have nearly served their appointed time, and who in the ordinary course of things would be soon released, into the fitting inhabitants of a lunatic asylum. The debate on the release of the dynamiter prisoners DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 389 in the House of Commons brought up once again, and directly, for public consideration two questions, at least, which had for a long time been discussed in the news- papers and on the platform, and by the public generally. The first question was, whether there ought to be a dif- ferent system of treatment with regard to political of- fenders, and what we may call private offenders. The second question was, whether the whole system of prison discipline in these countries did not require some modi- fication and some improvement. Now, with regard to the first question, as to whether political offenders ought to be treated on different conditions from private offend- ers, it seems to us that there can be no reasonable dif- ference of opinion whatever, if men will but calmly think the subject over. Some of the greatest and noblest of Englishmen were put to death as political offenders. Some of the greatest and noblest of Englishmen were tortured before death as political offenders. Some of the Englishmen whose names are most revered and are most enshrined in the affection of England were tortured and put to death as political offenders. In modern times, it is quite certain that men otherwise of the most stain- less character have passed years of suffering because they strove for some political purpose which they sincerely believed to be genuine, honest", and beneficent. In the debate on the address to which we have been referring an immense impression was undoubtedly cre- ated in all parts of the House of Commons by the speech of Mr. Michael Davitt. Mr. Michael Davitt was a man absolutely blameless in private character. As a London newspaper not committed to Irish ideas said of him, he was a man in whom the whole Irish race at home and abroad felt a just pride. He was in his youth con- cerned in the Fenian movement, and he was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment. In the House of Com- 390 A HISTORY OF OUK OWN TIMES mons he mentioned the fact that while he was in Port- land Prison it had been part of his work to be harnessed daily to a cart, as if he were a mule or a horse, and to drag stones this way and that for hour after hour, and that he had to sleep in a cell which only barely allowed him room to lie down. His words told on the House of Commons, which, to do it justice, is one of the fairest political assemblies in the world, and in which no mem- ber of any party felt anything but respect for Mr. Davitt. The question then naturally arose, whether a man like Mr. Davitt ought to haye been treated in that fashion; and, of course, with that doubt came the inquiry whether political offenders ought not to be treated on a differ- ent principle from the ordinary criminal offenders. No matter whether a man is right or wrong in his opinions, and in his way of carrying them into action, is there to be no difference made between the man who moves only on some personal and selfish purpose and passion, and the man who is moving only for a cause or a principle out of which he can obtain, and out of which he wants to obtain, no personal gain whatever ? Is Lord William Kussell, is Theobald Wolfe Tone, exactly on a level with Bill Sykes and Jack the Eipper, whoever that mysterious person may have been ? An American once said to the writer of these volumes, " I know nothing whatever of your Irish controversies with English Governments, ex- cept the fact that the English Governments put heavy sentences on Michael Davitt and John Boyle O'Eeilly, two of the noblest creatures I have ever met ; and that settles for me the whole question of your English Gov- ernment system in its dealings with Ireland." Of course we must all admit— every man in his senses is compelled to admit— that the Government of any country is bound to defend its own existence. It cannot allow the most virtuous man or the most patriotic man to endeavor to DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 39I overthrow it without taking strong measures to sustain it against overthrow. Therefore, as it seems to us, there is no reason that even an Irishman should complain against the fact that an English Government, after sentence in a court of law, consigned, let us say, Mr. Michael Davitt to imprisonment. But then, was it real- ly necessary that he should have been condemned to be yoked to a cart which dragged stones at Portland, and to sleep in a cell in which he hardly had room to lie down ? Was he really to be confounded with the ordi- nary class of miscreants who murder their wives, and who use brutal violence to old men in order to rob them of their money ? Can anybody on earth say that the greatness and the integrity of the empire are to be secured by means which confound a man like ,Theobald Wolfe Tone, or a man like John Mitchel, or a man like Michael Davitt, with Bill Sykes and Jack the Eipper ? In the same House of Commons when the debate on the address was going on sat with Mr. Davitt Mr. James F. X. O'Brien, who in his youth had also been concerned in a Fenian insurrection, and who had been sentenced to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. He had, in fact, the proud distinction of being the last man on whom such a sentence had been passed. The sentence, which of course was impossible to be carried out in our days, was commuted to penal servitude for life ; and that sen- tence, too, was commuted, on the ground that during an attack on a police barrack he had determinedly pro- tected the lives of the few poor policemen who had to give in. Calumny itself could never say a word against his character, and he was allowed by amnesty to return to his own country, and he became a member of the House of Commons, and a member of whom the bitter- est Conservative would not say a single word that was not a word of respect. The debate, therefore, on the 393 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES address in the opening of the session of 1897 brought this question into a concentrated form: Is it right to class men of this character, and this purpose, and this kind, with Bill Sykes and Jack the Ripper ? It has to be remembered that America — that is to say, the conquering Northern States, after their great civil war, put no one to death, or even prolonged the period of imprisonment, except for two or three who were actually convicted of assassination. The great leader of the Southern civil war was allowed, after a very short period of impris- onment, to go his way unharmed. Mr. Swinburne, the English poet, published at the time when the Man- chester prisoners were under trial — the story is told al- ready in these volumes — a poem in which he said : " Lo ! How fair from afar, taintless of tyranny, stands, Thy mighty daughter for years who trod the winepress of •war — Shines with immaculate hands, Slays not a foe, neither fears. Stains not peace with a scar ;" and he added, speaking of vindictive punishments : " Neither is any land great whom in its fear-stricken mood, These things only can save." Lord John Russell had pointed out in the House of Commons a great many years before, that no death and no torture inflicted on any political patriot or any politi- cal fanatic ever prevented some other man of the same mood and of the same purpose from following just the same course. No doubt it is a difficult question to set- tle—that question as to the manner of dealing with political offenders. But to us, at least, it seems clear that there is nothing reasonable to be said for the hash- ing up in one system of Michael Davitt and Bill Sykes. The criminal laws of England stand in immense need SIK WILLTAM VERNON HAKCODKT DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 393 Of emendation. They press with terrible force on one class of offences, and they deal very lightly with another class. The rights of property are maintained even still with a ferocious vigor, and a poor man or a woman stealing a loaf of bread is punished with what might be called in proportion an extraordinary severity. On the other hand, we read every day in the papers of a drunken scoundrel who has kicked his wife almost to death get- ting off with something like six months' imprisonment. The whole general system needs a parliamentary review ; but, unfortunately. Parliament is busied mostly with for- eign affairs, and gives itself little time to look into the concerns of the inhabitants of these islands. When we get time enough — if we ever do — to think of domestic affairs, we may come to form and act upon some defi- nite opinion as to the scale of punishment for offences against property and offences against life, and likewise to arrange for some difference being made between the treatment of a high-minded and virtuous man who starts a rebellious movement against the existing authorities, and a man who amuses himself after the fashion of Jack the Kipper. The second question which came up con- cerned the general dealings of the authorities in the English prisons. To that we have already made some reference. The English prison system is beyond all question — and we are not now speaking of the relative guilt of the offenders — much more severe than that of the United States. In the American Eepublic there is every chance given to the convicted criminal to reform and become a better man. An English visitor to one of the State prisons in the American Eepublic is sometimes amazed at the sort of advantages placed within the reach of the convict. In some of the State prisons in America there is, no doubt, a stern severity in dealing with serious breaches 17* 394 A HISTOKY OF OUR OWN TIMES of discipline or witli attempts at escape or mutiny. In many of these prisons measures of punishment for such offences are allowed which would not be endured by public opinion in England. But, on the other hand, the ordinary life of a prisoner is in most of these States made much more endurable than the ordinary life of a prisoner in England. The idea in the United States is to give the imprisoned man or woman a fair chance of becoming reformed, and returning to society a bet- ter citizen. Of course it may be said, and it is said here every day, that we must not make prison life an agreeable experience for criminal offenders, and that if a man ought to be punished, he ought to be punished, and there an end. That argument, of course, however it may be expressed, is an argument pure and simple for the principle of torture. The man has done wrong ; he ought to be sent to prison ; he is sent to prison ; his life ought to be made miserable for him in prison, in order that when he comes out of prison he may take care not to go into prison again. As a matter of fact, it is quite cer- tain that in no country in the world is there created a regular jail-bird class as much as in Great Britain. Men and women pass their whole lives in getting into prison and getting out of it. Some of the restrictions imposed in the Irish prisons were positively grotesque, and especi- ally grotesque when they applied to political offenders. A short-sighted man was not allowed to wear spectacles ; a man with a severe cold in his head was not allowed the use of a pocket-handkerchief, lest perchance he should make use of it as a rope and hang himself ; and this in the case of men whose lives, as soon as they came out of prison, would be comfortable, happy, and even honored. But to return to the mere question of the common crim- inal, it is greatly to be doubted whether the severity of our prison system in these countries tends in the least to DEATH— AND DYNAMITE 395 make him a better man. Of course, we cannot carry on social arrangements on the generous principle of the bishop in Victor Hugo's " Les Miserables/' who, when Jean Valjean was found carrying off a silver candlestick, presented him with another, and bade him to go, and steal no more. That is a little too sentimental a kind of doctrine for the discipline of an English criminal class ; and yet, per- haps, if one were to think over it, it might be found that there was something in it not wholly unworthy of at least a moment's consideration. At any rate, the general prison discipline in Great Britain and Ireland has un- doubtedly become a matter for the most careful study. We seem to have now altogether let drop the notion of any reform in the criminal. Our idea apparently is, Keep him in solitude, make every hour and moment of his life disagreeable ; stint him as regards food ; feed him with monotony of food ; prevent him from haying a thorough sleep on any night of his wretched impris- onment ; and then, when his term is served, send him out upon the world again. A good many years ago a member of the House of Commons drew attention to the question of transportation to Norfolk Island, and quoted from the evidence in the report of a Royal Commission as to the system of transportation to that island. Nor- folk Island was what might be called a penal settlement of the Australian penal settleijients. A convict who was too bad for any other Australian penal settlement was relegated to Norfolk Island. The evidence of one con- vict thus relegated was that the heart of a man went out of him, and the heart of a beast came in. Some- thing of the same kind might be said of the prison disci- pline system in Great Britain and Ireland. It does seem to ordinary observation as if it were likely, although cer- tainly not so intended, to expel the heart of a man and 396 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES bring in the heart of a beast. Then, again, our laws, of course, seem to have a much deeper interest in prevent- ing attacks on property than in preventing attacks on life. " Proputty, proputty, proputty !" as Tennyson's farmer says, seems the one thing to the preservation of which the whole strength of British law ought to be directed. Therefore, even still, some miserable creature who steals out of poverty an article of goods from a shop is likely to be punished more heavily than the coster who, accord- ing to Mr. Gilbert's poem, gets " tired of jumping on his mother." The whole question is growing largely in the public mind. Eoughly speaking, it might be said that the point of the entire controversy is, whether we shall punish offenders with or without any reference to their possible return to social life, and whether offences against property are really more serious than offences against humanity. No doubt one might go on forever writing on either side of these questions, and in these countries we do not move very rapidly with any purpose of social and legal reform. Not a great many years have passed since a starving widow was hanged for stealing a loaf of bread. But the whole subject has been raised again, with in- terest and with effect, during the last two or three years, and it would be a curious result if the imprisonment and the prison treatment of men like Mr. Michael Davitt should be the indirect occasion for the improvement of the whole system of prison treatment in Great Britain and Ireland. CHAPTER XXI THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN- PARLIAMENT had opened on January 19, 1897. Before the opening of the House of Lords a meeting of the Lib- eral peers had been held — a meeting which, it need hardly be said, was not a very crowded gathering — at which Lord Kimberley was unanimously elected to the leadership of the Liberal peers in the hereditary cham- ber. Lord Kimberley had held the position before, and had done his work with steadfastness, ability, good tem- per, and success — so far as there could be any success for a party placed in such a pitiful minority. The Queen's Speech was not a very lengthy document, but it was emphatic on many subjects. " The appalling massacres," it said, "which have taken place in Con- stantinople and in other parts of the Ottoman dominions have called for the special attention of the Powers who were signatories to the Treaty of Paris. Papers will be laid before you showing the considerations which have induced the Powers to make the present condi- tion of the Ottoman Empire the subject of special consultation by their representatives at Constantinople. The conferences which the six Ambassadors have been instructed to hold are still proceeding." Beyond this assurance, of course, the Speech from the Throne could not be expected to go. The conferences were still pro- ceeding, and so, too, were the massacres. The mas- sacres seemed likely to go on for a long time before 398 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the conferences had taken any form of practical ac- tion. Then the speech went on to deal with recent movements in Egypt. "The action," it declared, "un- dertaken by his Highness the Khedive of Egypt against the Khalifa, with my approval and assistance, has so far been entirely successful. His forces, supported by my officers and troops, have won back the fertile province of Dongola to civilization by operations conducted with remarkable skill, and the way has been opened for a further advance whenever such a step shall be Judged to be desirable." Of course it was inevitable that such a statement would be made in a Speech from the Throne. Nobody, at least of the outer public, quite knew why the reconquest of Dongola had been undertaken, but everybody assumed that it was to be followed by a fur- ther conquest of territory. In "Walter Scott's ballad of " Bonnie Dundee," when Claverhouse is asked where he is going, he replies, " I go whither guides me the ghost of Montrose." The policy of the English Government evidently was to go in Africa whither guided the ghost of General Gordon. England is, as we all know, a great constitutional country, governed under a strict constitutional system —which nobody can deny. All the same, it would be hardly possible for the most despotic government on the European continent to conduct its foreign policy with more absolute lack of appeal to the opinions of the public than is the way of English administration. Not merely is the ordinary citizen left without any knowl- edge of what this or that government is going to do in matters of foreign policy, but the unofadal member of the House of Commons is left in just the same condi- tion of ignorance. The unofficial member of the House of Commons has, of course, the right to "rise in his place," as the phrase goes, and to put a question to the THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 399 Government as to their policy, let ns say, in Egypt. He usually gets a very evasive answer. He is told that it is not just the time when it would be quite for the public interest if her Majesty's Government were to make any explicit statement. Ho is quietly snubbed, in fact, and, if he is at all a sensitive person, he sits down with the depressing conviction that he has made rather a fool of himself. It is now perfectly certain, that if the Eng- lish public had been taken fully into counsel on some of the great and critical questions of modern foreign policy, England would have been saved from many a mistake of disastrous consequence. If the country had been consulted fully about the policy of the Crimean War, that war, which nobody now thinks of justifying, would never have been undertaken. The Queen is a thor- oughly constitutional sovereign, and has never failed to act upon the advice of her ministers; but we all know now that both she and her husband had the most serious doubts and misgivings as to the policy of that unhappy war. We also know that both she and her husband had very serious doubts as to the language spoken and the policy suggested by some of her ministers at the out- break of the great civil strife in America. Of course it will be said that no administration could consent to take the whole public of Great Britain and Ireland into con- sultation about foreign policy. Let that be granted, if it must be ; but then, let us frankly admit that, as regards foreign affairs, at all events, England is not governed on a constitutional system. We are led to these thoughts chiefly by the fact that in recent years the policy of the Imperial Government in Egypt exhibited several new and unexpected develop- ments, about the meaning of which the public of these islands knew no more than Balaam's donkey. The peo- ple of these countries are in general rather naturally in- 400 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES clined not to trouble their heads about difficult foreign questions. When one has to go looking for places on a map in order to understand the bearing of some move- ment, he is inclined to avoid the trouble by putting the whole subject away, and letting his betters do even as they will. This has, indeed, been the course taken by the English public for many years with regard to Egypt. At one time there was a sort of vague general idea that if we did not take possession of Egypt, France would come in and take it, or Eussia would come in and take it, and we should be cut off from our high-road to India. With that idea in their minds the people of these coun- tries were content to let administrations do just what- ever they liked. A Khedive of Egypt was set up or a Khedive was put down. Alexandria was bombarded. Arabi Pasha was sent into exile, and the public of Great Britain took no account ; in the words of Waiter Scott's Lowlander, it was "a.' ane to Dandie." This was true of the ordinary members of the House of Commons, as well as of the man in the streets or the man on the top of the omnibus. Great tragic events, such as the death of General Gordon, did, indeed, arouse the public feel- ing and make an impression all over these islands. But the impression was wholly personal— a feeling of ad- miration and sympathy for a good and great man who had perished in the discharge of what had been put upon him as a national duty. It aroused no general in- quiry into the course of policy which had sent Gordon to his doom. In the early sittings of the House of Com- mons in 1897 the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, made a new announcement as to the Imperial policy in Egypt. We have already spoken of the advance that was made along the Nile southward to Dongola, and the skill and the success of the expe- dition We have also told of the fact that the Mixed THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 401 Tribunals refused to allow the cost of the Dongola ex- pedition to be imposed upon the population of Egypt. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told the House of Commons that a further movement had been determined on, and suggested, though he did not make it quite clear, that the occupation of the Soudan was to be carried as far as Khartoum, the place where General Gordon met his death. "We are not going to be worried out of Egypt," said the Chancellor of the Exchequer; and although much fault was found with his words by lead- ing members of the Opposition, it does not seem at all likely that a great State like England, having occupied Egypt with what she believed to be definite duties and responsibilities, would allow herself to be worried out of the position by the grumblings of foreign gov- ernments. What seemed to ns peculiar in the whole matter — in the announcement of fresh and further an- nexation, of increased expense to the public of these countries, and of increased responsibility to the Govern- ment of the Sovereign — was the fact that the vast ma- jority of the English public knew no more about the rights and wrongs of the whole question than the vast majority of the people of China knew about the rights and wrongs of the quarrel with Japan. It seems to us that there must be certain danger in this almost absolute ignorance of the whole people concerning the foreign policy of their rulers. To the writer of this book it appears that if the intel- ligence of the English public could have been consulted or got at, Alexandria would never have been bombarded, and Arabi Pasha would never have been conquered and sent into exile. But, of course, the English public in general knew nothing at all about the matter, and were only told, not asked, what was to be done, and in some instances only knew when the things had been done. 402 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Of course, it would be hard to expect that the ordinary British householder should take the trouble to make himself acquainted with our policy in foreign countries. He has a good many other things to look after which come very much closer to his daily business and his daily life ; and he could not easily get to know much about the foreign questions, anyhow, for the leaders of a gov- ernment are not inclined to give him, or even his repre- sentatives in Parliament, any particular information. The only moral which we feel inclined to draw from the whole condition of things is that, as regards foreign policy, England is not much more of a constitutional country than most of her Continental neighbors, except for the fact that in some other States, as in Kussia, for example, or in Germany, the sovereign manages matters out of his own head, as the children say, and that in this country the Administration conducts the business. A crash or a calamity in foreign policy comes upon us in this country with the shock of an absolute surprise. We never knew what was going to happen. Let us return, however, to the Speech from the Throne at the opening of the session of ISQ?. The Queen men- tioned that the Government had discussed with the United States, " acting as the friend of Venezuela, the terms under which the pending questions of disputed frontier between that republic and my colony of Brit- ish Guiana may be equitably submitted to arbitration." Then came a much more important announcement. " It is with much gratification," the speech declared, "that I have concluded a Treaty for a general arbitration with the President of the United States, by which I trust that all differences that may arise between us will be peace- fully adjusted. I hope that this arrangement may have a further value in commending to other Powers the con- sideration of a principle by which the danger of war may THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 403 be notably abated." Too much importance could not possibly be attached to the closing words of the para- graph ; although, perhaps, the English of the paragraph is not all that might be desired, or that the Queen her- self would be likely to write with her own hand. It is much to be regretted that royal speeches are so sel- dom written in good Anglo-Saxon language. "Notably abated " is a vile phrase. It is certain, however, that no event of the Queen's long reign could be more happy or more auspicious than even the mere preliminary arrange- ment between England and the United States ; and, un- doubtedly, one of the great benefits of such a treaty would be that it might, and indeed must, commend to other-nations the consideration of a principle by which the danger of war might be made, indeed, the last re- source, the very last resource, of an international contro- versy. There was nothing in the speech about Ireland, except the announcement that Parliament was to be asked to consider a bill for the establishment of a Board of Agriculture in that country. This was all the more surprising because of the gen- eral interest which had been created by the appointment of a Eoyal Commission to inquire into the subject of the relative taxation of England and Ireland. The Com- mission was appointed in the first instance on the urgent appeal of Mr. Sexton, then a member of the House of Commons, and one of the most brilliant speakers of the Irish Nationalist party, or, indeed, of any party in the House. Mr. Sexton had an especial gift for finance and financial calculation, and he had long been convinced that Ireland was taxed beyond her reasonable share of liability as compared with England. The Commission was very strong, and was composed almost altogether of what might be called experts. Its first chairman was Mr. Childers, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer, 404 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES and had filled several high offices in administration, and he continued to be chairman np to the time of his death. Lord Farrer, who had long been Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, and who was one of the greatest financial authorities in the country, was a prominent member of the Commission. So was Mr. Sexton, and so was Mr. Blake, who had been the leader of the Liberal party in the Parliament of the Dominion of Canada for many years, and who had held a high position at the bar, and had pleaded many times, with great success, in Canadian causes before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Coun- cil. There was not, in fact, a single member of the Commission who could not be regarded as an author- ity on questions of finance. The Commission- sum- moned as witnesses all manner of men whose evidence could carry weight and infiuence. Among numbers of others was Sir Eobert GifEen, of the Board of Trade, then and now very commonly recognized as the great- est financial authority in England. The Commission sat for a long time, and during the course of its sittings Mr. Childers died. His place as chairman was taken by the O'Conor Don, who had sat in the House of Commons for many years as an Irish member, and had given up the greatest part of his life to the study of questions of finance. The Commission, as is usual in such cases, pre- sented a number of reports. No Eoyal Commission is ever absolutely unanimous in its report. It would be utterly impossible to get together a number of men, gathered from all sections of public life, who could be unanimous in their opinion upon any subject whatever. But, passing over questions of detail, with which it is not necessary in the least to trouble the reader, we may say that the Commission was as nearly as possible unan- imous in the opinion that Ireland had been taxed far beyond her due proportion. Her condition of poverty THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 405 rendered her only liable to pay a rate of one-twentieth of English taxation, and she was actually taxed to the amount of rather more than one-twelfth. Therefore, the net result of the inquiry was that for a great many years Ireland had paid annually more than two millions beyond her just proportion of taxation. The effect of this an- nouncement, which was, as has been said, almost unani- mous, was to arouse an immense amount of emotion in Ireland, and to bring together a union of Irishmen such as had never before been seen in our time. The Irish peers and landlords stood for the first time side by side with Irish ^Nationalist members on the same platform and for the same purpose. An Irish peer presided over a meet- ing at which a Nationalist imprisoned for many years on a charge of treason-felony was one of the prominent speak- ers. For the first time in the whole history of Irish agita- tion it seemed likely that all ranks and classes of Irish- men were about to adopt a common policy. Everybody went about quoting Dr. Johnson's advice to an Irishman, never to consent to the principle of an Act of Union be- tween the two countries, "because if you do we shall certainly rob you." Everybody also who was on the Irish side of the question revived Lord Byron's declaration, that the union of England with Ireland is " the union of the shark with his prey." The important question was how to deal with the difficulty. "What was to be done ? Was the money to be given back, or was there to be some immediate remission in Irish taxation ? Mr. Arthur Balfour came to the front in an ingenious and amusing speech which showed an utter incapacity to understand the whole subject. The overwrought contribution of Ire- land, he contended, was involved entirely, or almost en- tirely, in indirect taxation. The duty on whiskey was very high. The duty on tobacco was very high. But he argued that an Irishman has the easiest and readiest escape from 406 A msrOEY OF OUR OWK TIMES such unfair taxation by not smoking tobacco and not drink- ing whiskey. On that same principle, as it was promptly pointed ont, an Englishman has the readiest way of avoid- ing taxation of any kind. He is not bound to drink wine or spirits. He can do without them of his own free wilL He is not bound to smoke tobacco ; and if he chooses he is not bound to earn an income which will bring him within the range of the income-tax. If he only makes up his mind, he can give away the great bulk of his property, supposing that he has any, to some public charity, and then he can live on one hun- dred a year, and drink no wine, and smoke no cigars, and pay no income-tax whateyer. Mr. Balfour had hardly considered this subject when he uttered opinions like these. It is not quite enough to say that an Irish- man who nerer drank wine, and never smoked cigars, and never indulged in luxuries of any kind, is exactly on the taxation level with an Englishman who likes his whisfcey-and-soda and his cigar, and who enjoys a com- fortable hotise to live in. Mr. Balfour's theory would really have brought us down to the times " when wild in woods the noble savage ran," only that the tlieory was applied strictly to the Irishman, and not to the Englishman. What does the Irishman want with to- bacco, or wine, or spirits ? it might perhaps fairly be asked. But then comes the other question, "What does the Englishman want of wine, or spirits, or cigars ?" It is quite clear that Mr. Balfour's attempt to deal with the report of the Commission did not touch the ques- tion in the very least. When it is proved that a country is overtaxed in indirect rating, it is no answer whatever to s;iv that if yon do not touch the articles which are indirectly overrated you escape the whole penalty. Men \v;vut to smoke. Men want to drink. It would be bet- ter, no doubt, if thev had not such wants. But while THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 4O7 life goes on as it is the great mass of humanity will have these desires, and the question raised by the Royal Com- mission was whether Ireland was or was not unfairly dealt with in the application of her taxation. The con- clusion of the Commission on the whole was very dis- tinct. The almost unanimous decision was that Ireland had been hardly dealt with. The argument for the Home Rule question became strengthened immensely by the result of the Commis- sion. To the ordinary impartial mind it was made as clear as light that Ireland under a local government could never have been subjected to such excessive taxa- tion. Not too much importance, perhaps, must be at- tached to the union of the landlords and the tenants on this question of over-taxation. Still it is a fact to be taken into account that for once in our time the peers and the peasants, the landlords and the tenants, the Orangemen and the Nationalists, came together on a common platform. There was a famine in India, and of course attention was directed to that fact in the Royal Speech, and to the necessity of an administrative and a national effort to relieve it; and there was something said about the provisions which, in the judgment of the military au- thorities, were required for adding to the defences of the Empire. The debate on the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne is, of course, always of a more or less perfunctory character. It is, in its earlier stages, at all events, a mere ceremonial. The mover and sec- onder of the address are always complimented on their speeches by the leader of the Opposition and the leader of the Government in either House of Parliament. In the House of Commons on this particular occasion the usual compliments were paid, but neither the leader of the Opposition nor the leader of the House took the oppor- 408 •*- HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tnnity of congratulating the seconder of the address on the fact that he had contrived to introduce into his speech the largest number of stale quotations which had been heard in that House for ever so many years. The Hotise as a rule is afEectionate to old quotations. It en- joy; them, as, Gteorge Eliot says, most people enjoy old, familiar aire. For that reason, amongst others, the speech of the seconder of the address was distinctly happy. There was not one of his quotations which must not have reached the mind of the most illiterate member of the House of Commons. As far as regards the ETst mght'i debate there was a certain half-hearted- nes made perceptible in the performance. In e-i-nsi-Iering the debate on the address the ques- ti on oatmaDT arises whether there ought to be any de- bate on the address at alL The reply to the address is, as Te have just said, a mere matter of ceremonial. A man ^ers up in a costume not worn in ordinary life, and prop-:sei the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne, and another man gets up after him in a costume also not worn in the common business of existence, and seconds the motion. Then the debate is opened, and it may go on for days and for weeks. It is certain to go on for days, and it may possibly go on for weeks. There is really no parliamentary rule which could legit- imately restrict the debate, and it might in a possible case, unless the Speaker should intervene, go on until the opening of the financial year. The debate on the address has really no influence whatever on the pohcy of the session. What the Government in power proposes to do it will do, without the slightest regard for the opinions expressed in the debate on the address. If it has got a strong majority, it will be of no consequence whatever to it how many members of the Opposition may have expressed in the debate on the address objec- XilJii ilUJNUULA UAJaFAItrN 409 tion to its policy. There it is, enthroned in power, and that is all that for the moment concerns it. No Govern- ment is likely to be turned out of power by an ordinary and commonplace debate on the address. The event has occurred, but only when the Government came into office without power, and when it was perfectly certain that a vote of want of confidence must upset it, and lift its opponents into office. But in the case of a Govern- ment with a good majority at its back it is quite certain that the debate on the address is practically a waste of time and space and words. Nobody is converted by it. Nobody gets any other ideas from it than those which are already in his mind, and it remains in the end merely a question of vapid voting. The result of the division is known to everybody long before the division takes place, and there seems, therefore, no rea- son whatever why the House of Commons should oc- cupy several days at the opening of each session by a long and various discussion over all questions of home and foreign politics which cannot possibly lead to any manner of practical result. The truth is that the House of Commons is not by any means a good assembly for the working of public business. It is fettered by old fash- ions, it is hampered by regulations which have nothing whatever to do with our present life or our way of carry- ing on public business. There is not a county council or a board of guardians in the Empire which could man- age its work on the principle, or the absence of principle, accepted by the House of Commons. As to the House of Lords, we have, of course, little or nothing to say. The peers have only the power of putting further im- pediment in the way of the House of Commons doing any business whatever. "When the House of Commons has, after great pains and trouble, succeeded, in spite of all the difficulties in its way, in getting some measure 18 410 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES passed throngli a third reading, then the House of Lords, which could not carry anything of its own motion, is enabled to come in and destroy the measure. Therefore the House of Commons, which is elected on the principle of popular representation, is always liable to have its own measures reduced to nothing by the non-representa- tive House of Lords. But there is more than that. The House of Commons itself is time-hampered by some of its own ridiculous usages, of which, we venture to think, the long debate on the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne is a remarkable illustration. There is not a single question brought up in the debate on the address in reply to the Queen's Speech which would not have to come up in the ordinary course of things at some right and appropriate moment. Macaulay, of course, has said that parliamentary government is government by talking. Unquestionably that is a fact. Parliamen- tary government in a kingdom like England and Ireland, and Scotland and Wales, is government by talking. It is nothing else, it can be nothing else. The beneficent- despot theory we have no longer with us. If John Stuart Mill had not killed it, it would have been killed of itself long ago. But Macaulay's theory does not make it quite clear that parliamentary government must be govern- ment by sempiternal talk. We have yet to meet the man who can sanely reason out the case that a great many days of debate on the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne are of any assistance whatever to the disposal of the session's business. If the House of Com- mons were "a little Academe," to use Shakespeare's phrase, then it might, indeed, be well to talk round and round a subject in the usual academic way, without any immediate reference to any instant question which had to be brought to an early practical test. But the debate on the address in 1897 had the effect of showing in a THE DONGOLA CAMPAIGN 411 very illustrative light how poor the progress was that could be made by such a discussion. One of the great questions which had to be postponed, and not unreason- ably postponed, was the question to which we have al- ready referred, of the financial relations between Great Britain and Ireland. Now the "ordinary human being would think that if anything wanted to be considered at once and during the debate on the address, it was Just that question : Had Ireland been overtaxed for two mill- ions and a half a year during a great number of years, or had she not ? But it was felt, and with the full con- currence of the Irish members, that the debate on the ad- dress was not a convenient time for discussing so great a question. The Government undertook to fix a definite date for discussing the subject, and also promised some further inquiry, and the Irish Nationalist members will- ingly accepted the promise for the date, but opposed the threatened further inquiry. But we have only to point out that this fact in itself is another illustration of the futility of the formal debate on the address. It was made clear in that debate that no subject of really great importance could possibly be discussed and settled in the course of that ceremonial conversation. Now when Parliaments are very busy with actual work, we think it will be admitted that the less they have of mere cere- monial debate the better. The discussion on the ad- dress in reply to the Eoyal Speech has now become a meaningless and a senseless performance. Every ques- tion talked over in the course of that long and generally wearisome debate will have to come up again, if it is worth coming up again, for practical settlement, or at all events for practical discussion. The days that are spent on the debate upon the address are absolutely wasted days. The greatest orator cannot possibly illu- mine them, and they are known by everybody to be sim- 412 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES ply SO many days taken away from the practical business of the House. Some time or other a change will no douht be made. The Speech from the Throne is essen- tial as our usages go. It is an announcement of policy past and present. But every single announcement it makes will have to be taken into consideration after- wards in the form of debate and in the form of legisla- tion. The wit of man would fail to show any reason for discussing its propositions in advance, and in the form of academic oratory, which can accomplish nothing ex- cept waste of time. CHAPTER XXII "THE CITY OF BLOOD" About the middle of January, 1897, England was startled by the news that an expedition of English offi- cials in the territory of Benin, in northern or almost in Equatorial Africa, had ended in the capture or the mas- sacre of nearly all the members of the force, British and native. Later news was a little, just a little, more sat- isfactory. Some two or three Englishmen and a very few natives had escaped. But the bulk of the force was undoubtedly captured or massacred, and capture and massacre would in that case certainly be synonymous terms. The King of Benin is one of the savage sover- eigns who might have been the horror of a boy's story- book. He, who is a fetish-worshipper, still keeps up the practice of human sacrifice, and his capital town, Benin, is commonly known as the " City of Blood." The terri- tory of Benin is near the Gold Coast and Dahomey, and is washed by that stretch of the sea which is called the Bight of Benin. " Bight " is a word taken from the An- glo-Saxon which signifies a bend, or round, of any kind which is soft, spreading, and gradual — signifies amongst other things a woman's breast — and is not geographically or otherwise any sharp or sudden indentation. The English occupation of the Niger Coast Protectorate brought on some hope of dealing on fair terms of trade with the murderous savage who is called the sovereign of Benin. Apparently it was thought a reasonable thing to send a sort of peaceful deputation to wait upon the King 414 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES of Benin, and to request for permission to pass freely thiongli his territory for the purposes of peaceful trade. The expedition was not armed except in the sense that one or two of its members carried the revolver which is habitnallv borne by all foreign travellers within an un- civilized conntiy. The expedition, in fact, disappeared but for Captain B iisragon and Mr. Locke, who managed somehow to es- cape. For the rest, with the exception of some natives, and very few even of these, the jaws of darkness did de- Toar it np. These two men were wounded and had six days of wandering in the pestilential marshes of that ter- rible conntry. But they managed to pull through some- how with safety of their lives. Mr. Phillips, the head of the party. Major Crawford, Captain Maling, Mr. Camp- bell, Dr. Elliot, Mr. Powis, and Mr. Gordon were blotted out of existence. It unfortunately happened that Mr. M: ir. the Consul-General of the Xiger Coast Protecto- rate, was in England when the expedition was made and when the destruction of its members took place. Xo blame whatever conld be attached to Mr. Moor. Despite of some modem medical theories which insist that a weU-nurtuxed Englishman can stand any tropi- cal and pestilential climate better than a native can, there is still found a great deal of force in the old- fasiiioned idea that an Englishman stationed in some poisonous region of Africa must have an occasional visit to a happier climate if he wishes to live at all. Mr. Moor came home for rest and change of air; but as a London paper, the Pnily Xeics, observed, '• one of the strange eirvrnnistanees surrounding this unlucky enter- - risi-. and one wiiieh will have to be fully explaiued, is whv the Kiarcii wis made in the Consul -General's ab- s^rlv frv^m tiie ooss: on leave. Then, again, the ques- ::or. full of nivstcrr wMca astonished people in England "THE CITY OF BLOOD" 4I5 was why the expedition should have been strong in numbers and absolutely defenceless or almost defence- less in arms. If it was meant merely to impress the sovereign of Benin with the idea that some friendly Eng- lishmen were coming to consult with him on a purely peaceful mission, the fewer the number of the party the better. Two or three men must of course have taken their lives in their hands, as Englishmen have done at all times and in all places, and they might thus have impressed the King of Benin with the idea that they meant him no harm. Two or three men unarmed could not have captured even the mud-built capital of Benin. On the other hand there might have been reason why the sovereign of Benin should be compelled to leave his territory open to peaceful trade and to desist from his loathsome human sacrifices. But in such a case the ex- pedition ought to have been strong enough and well enough armed to take care of itself. "In that case," says the Daily JVews, " we should expect to find that a body of armed men supported by a gunboat or a cruiser had been despatched from Old Calabar." "The most mysterious part," adds the same paper, "of the whole story, is that, whereas the number of Mr. Phillips's band was large enough to excite the suspicions and arouse the hostility of the natives, they were not prepared to resist anything like an organized attack." It appears that on former occasions several British officers were allowed to enter the city of Benin without any difficulty or danger. " Nine or ten official whites," says the Daily Netvs, "and two or three hundred native followers pro- voked assault without inspiring alarm." During the early days when the news came the whole expedition was a question of mystery. Why was it started at all ? and why, if started at all, was it started in that way ? everybody kept asking. Of course the one 416 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES general opinion apart from all inquiries and all answers to inquiries was that the wrong done must be avenged and that the sovereign of Benin and his dominion must be blotted out of baneful existence. Now the writer of this book has never been very cordially in favor of civilizing missions, with civilized arms in the hands of civilization. The spread of British empire in tropical Africa seems rather dearly bought by so much sacrifice of British life. After all, it is wholly impossible that England or any other civilized country could civilize by force the whole human race. We must loathe the sacrifi,ces of men and women in the dominion of the King of Benin, but there are sad things happening every day in China, and there is cannibalism still in some parts of Africa and in certain of the South Sea Islands, and infant life is terribly unsafe in various re- gions where the infants seem to be in the way, and in- deed one's mind is never quite easy about all that is going on in the rowdy quarters of London and of Paris and of New York. It would hardly do for England, as Sydney Smith says, to undertake to be the armed cham- pion of the Decalogue all over the world. Still, as hu- man affairs and human feelings go, it would be quite impossible to expect that a country like England should allow the massacre of the men who had made the ex- pedition to Benin pass off without another expedition fully armed and determined on retaliation. If the sovereign of Benin and his rulership and his territory should come to be practically blotted out, the estate of the world would certainly be none the less happy for the event. An expedition was at once arranged for, to go out to Equatorial Africa without any profession what- ever of peaceful purpose, and to teach the master of Benin that he had made a great mistake when he let loose his assassin followers on the peaceful visitors to "THE CITY OF BLOOD" 417 his city of blood. The younger Pitt, in a famous pero- ration of his, spoke of the possibility of Africa, the latest called to civilization of the world, becoming the great harbinger of universal light and peace. Pitt's prophecy may yet be realized, but so far we only know that Africa is the great disturber and the great trouble of civilization. The so-called civilized States crowd down upon her. They wrangle for every available corner of her space. Even the smallest and poorest European States have in this way, if we might paraphrase the words of Burke, the vices of great empires. Portugal and Bel- gium must have their African possessions as well as England and France and Germany. Not a year passes but we hear of the chance of some war between European States because of various complications arising out of the difficulty about settling their boundary-lines in Africa. The quiet observer can only satisfy his mind, if he can thus satisfy it, by saying that all this cannot be helped. We have to put up with it, as men have to put up with the London fogs and the New York summer heat, and the pestilential marshes of many tropical countries. The philosophical observers are somewhat happy, who, while not always approving of all the means employed, yet look with complacency towards the end, and believe that after a while the civilized nations of Europe will have covered Africa with a sparkling net- work of European civilization. There, too, we might fondly believe, the civilization will be unlike that of Europe, absolutely peaceful, loving, and only rival in the arts of improvement and in forwarding the welfare of humanity. But it will certainly take a long time to come to that stage of human evolution, and in the meanwhile the alighting of all the European States on this part and that part of Africa is likely to lead to what in diplomatic correspondence would be called grave 18* 418 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES complications. Africa, after all, whatever her size, can hardly afford ample camping-ground for all the European Powers, especially when we remember that every Eu- ropean Power seems to have set its heart on making its territory and its Hintergrund large enough to crowd every other Power into the smallest possible space. Towards the end of January some full, or all but full, accounts reached London with regard to the disaster. The expedition, it appeared, was divided into two par- ties, the first being about four hours^ march ahead of the second. The first party was suddenly attacked by a strong force of the King's warriors who were lying in ambush front and rear in the forest swamp to await their arrival. The advance party fell victims to a man to the attack made on them, not one of them escaping. The second comjDany, not knowing anything of what had hap- pened, followed quietly in the track of its vanguard, and suddenly came upon the heaped-up corpses of their friends who had already been massacred by the savage Benin warriors. While the late comers were actually ex- amining this horrible scene of murder, they were them- selves attacked from the forest, and nearly all of them were shot down. Mr. Phillips, Major Crawford, Cap- tain Maling, Mr. Campbell, of the consular service, the trading agents, Mr. Powis and Mr. Gordon, and more than two hundred of the native carriers were killed. Commissioner Locke and Captain Boisragon were wound- ed, but, as we have already mentioned, were able to es- cape from the enemy and to hide themselves in the re- cesses of the swampy, sweltering forest. For five days they trod in that pathless bush, living on plantains, and with nothing to drink but the dew from the grass. They were found by a relief party which had been sent down the river in a canoe. It is officially stated that the ex- pedition, after landing at Gato Creek, were received in "THE CITY OF BLOOD" 419 every town and Tillage which they passed on their way to Benin with friendly greetings from the people and kindly messages from the King himself. On the day after their landing they had marched some fourteen miles — we are speaking now, of course, of the first expedition — when they were suddenly fired upon by an ambuscade, both in the front and in the rear. Mr. Phillips, Dr. Elliot, and Mr. Powis were killed at once ; Major Crawford was wounded, but was picked up by Captain Boisragon and Mr. Locke. Their help, however, was of no avail, for he was wounded again as he was actually lifted ofE the ground by his two companions, and he died almost immediately ; but before his death he found a voice to implore his two comrades to leave him behind and to look to their own safety, as he knew that his own case was hopeless. Mr. Campbell was taken prisoner and carried to Benin, where the King refused to allow him to be received, and he was brought to a neighboring village and killed there. Mr. Locke, who, with Captain Boisragon, escaped into the bush, was armed with a revolver and was able to shoot down several of the natives who attacked him and his companions during their terrible wanderings. Strange to say, that after all this they came into a Benin village where the natives received them kindly and conveyed them down the creek in a covered canoe. All the Euro- peans who were killed were instantly beheaded by the natives. The treatment, however, given to Captain Bois- ragon and Mr. Locke would seem to show that there was no national feeling against the expedition or its pur- pose. The King, apparently, like the king in "Ham- let," was alone to blame. According to an account received from Lagos, there had been some difficulties regarding facilities for internal trade, and Acting-Con- sul-General Phillips had sent a request to the King for a peaceful and friendly interview. The King at first 420 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES asked for a delay of one month, but immediately after sent a message to say that he would receive Mr. Phillips and his companions in two days. On the faith of this seemingly friendly assurance it was arranged that the expedition should go into movement at once, and after much consideration it was agreed that, in order to make the peaceful nature of the expedition apparent, its Eng- lish members should go practically unarmed. Native carriers were taken for the purpose of propelling the canoes over the creeks and rivers which indent the whole region, and to carry the luggage of the English- men and various gifts to be presented to the King. The first expedition set out from Xew Benin, at the mouth of the river, and went twenty-five miles by steamer, then they went in canoes paddled by natives for twenty miles farrher np the Ologi Creek. Then they had, as has al- ready been mentioned, some fourteen miles to go through a dense forest which makes the approach to the city of Benin a :ask of terrible difficulty, even under the most feroirable circumstances. The native carriers were mur- dered ;::5r as the Europeans were. Guns, spears, clubs, a::d eutl.'isses were used in the massacre. The spectacle which the second part of the expedition came upon is said to have been, and must have been, horrible to see. Very few, however, of the members of the second party were alk^wed much time to look upon it. All but the two we have mentioned were added to the ranks of the mnrdored, and it would seem from the latest accounts t b.st only one or two of the native carriers escaped. So far ;-.s one could judge, it must have been an act of deliberate treachery on the part of the sovereign of Benin. One is reluctant to write a single word in criticism of the brave men who started the expedition, but it is sadly to be rtted thut such an expedition under such conditions should over have been started. The charapter and the AETHtJE JAMES BALPOUK "THE CITY OF BLOOD" 421 doings of the sovereign of Benin must have been pretty- well known to Europeans in that region of Africa, and especially to some of the experienced men who organized the expedition and took part in it. But, however one may question their policy, no one can question their courage or their patriotic purpose, and no one could say that they did not deserve well of their country. The greatest devotee of peace could hardly expect that the English Government would take no steps to avenge the deeds of the King of Benin. It is impossible to be- lieve that there was not deliberate treachery on his part ; for no company of sane Europeans experienced in the ways of that region of Africa would have ventured on an unarmed movement to the city of Benin without some assurance of peaceful welcome from the sovereign. The bravest men do not go out to die for no purpose what- ever, and these men who died so bravely must have set out with some assurance that their peaceful offers were to be met in a peaceful way. Therefore, of course, it be- came absolutely essential that the Imperial Government should take the quickest and the sternest measures to punish the King of Benin for a course of treachery and murder which apparently had not all the sympathy of even his own subjects. The "punitive expedition," as it was called, to Benin was of course a complete success. It only wanted time and men to accomplish it. The time came, and the men came, and the city was captured without the slightest difficulty. It was found to be " full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness." It was made sickening by the corroding corpses of men and women, victims to the loathsome system of human sacrifice. The expedition was recalled. The King himself escaped. His Majesty preferred, on the whole, not to meet the fellow-soldiers of the men whom he deceived, betrayed, and murdered. CHAPTER XXIII PITMAN— SPENCER WELLS— THE APPEAL OF THE PRINCE OF WALES We often hear of a man who has a life-theory which he is enabled to bring to success^ and we hear of many men who have life-theories out of which nothing comes for all their efforts and labor. On January 22, 1897, there died a man who had occupied his whole quiet, noble life with two theories, one of which was a complete success, and the -other, up to this time, an absolute failure. We are speaking of Sir Isaac Pitman, who died in his eighty- fourth year. Not long before his death he wrote to a friend a beautiful, touching, and cheery letter, in which he told that his heart was becoming physically a failure, but that he hoped to start again on a new career in an- other world. The whole idea was characteristic of the man. All his life long he worked at the realization of his two theories, in the full belief that he was thereby doing some good for the human race. He remained faithful to his purpose through his life. It was a modest purpose seemingly, quite unlike the heroic enterprises of the con- querors and the imperialist spirits whose ambition is to annex new territory, or of the men who start out to found great speculative enterprises and to make money. By no conceivable chances known to practical human beings could Sir Isaac Pitman have made a great fortune out of either of his theories, one of which was an absolute suc- cess and the other an absolute failure. Nor was he even PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OF THE PRINCE OF WALES 433 like the men who discover great principles in surgery or in medicine which tend to prolong human life and to mitigate human suffering. For such men their work is its own full and best reward. They find out how to make life better worth living and to reduce the agonies of physical trouble ; and to have accomplished anything in that way is a crown to any man of feeling and of gen- ius. But Sir Isaac Pitman's was a very modest sort of work. He did not aim at being a conqueror or a million- aire or a man who could to any serious extent " lighten the load of the heavily laden." His two ideas were to invent a new system of shorthand which should surpass all its predecessors in accuracy and in intelligibility, and also to reconstruct the spelling of the English language on what he called the phonetic system. Sir Isaac Pitman's system of shorthand was a complete success. His principle of phonetic spelling had not ad- vanced one single step since he first tried to set it into movement. He invented his new system of shorthand in the year of Queen Victoria's accession to the throne, and it may be doubted whether many of the glories of that long reign are really better worthy of record than Sir Isaac Pitman's system of shorthand. Shorthand, of course, has been going on in the world for ages. As soon as men begin to make speeches and want to have their speeches published in some sort of form, shorthand comes in as a matter of necessity. It was undoubtedly known in the classic days of Rome. There is an epigram of Martial's which, if we had not scores of other testi- monials, would make the fact certain. Martial's joke describes a shorthand writer who was such a master of his craft that he had finished his notes long before the orator had finished his speech. So far as we can know of modern times. Sir Isaac Pitman's was the first really satisfactory system. How the shorthand writers in Mar- 434 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES tial's days got down their notes we cannot have any yery really clear and accurate idea. But those of us whose memories can go clearly back over fifty years or so will understand the difEerence between the system introduced into England by Sir Isaac Pitman and the system exist- ing in Great Britain and Ireland before that time. Sir Isaac Pitman's system was slow in growing, and even men who could not possibly be called old are able to re- member the days before it came into universal or almost universal use. The earliest systems of shorthand in these countries were simply the omission of all the vowels and the invention of a few arbitrary signs which represented the continuation of a word like " various," for example, or like " incomprehensibilities.'" The shorthand writer left out all the vowels and put in only the consonants and these few arbitrary terminations which we have just mentioned. Of course, if he was a man of any in- telligence or invention he devised some few marks and signs for himself which he could bear in mind and which were for him intelligible. But all the same he wrote under the great difficulty that he could not sometimes translate offhand with accuracy the notes he himself had made. The trouble is that when a reporter is taking a verbatim note of a speech his whole mental faculties are usually absorbed in the merely mechanical perform- ance, and when the speech is over his mere memory can afford him but little help in his translation. Lord Palmerston once said good-humoredly that he had taken great pains to learn shorthand, and that he had arrived at the success of being able to make a note of every word that any orator spoke, but the serious difiBculty was that he could not afterwards read a single line of his shorthand. Of course there were some men more happy than Lord Palmerston, and before Pitman's invention had taken hold of the world of journalists there were PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OF THE PRINCE OF WALES 435 great reporters. There was Charles Dickens^ for one, who neyer had the advantage of knowing Pitman's sys- tem, and who during his few sessions in the Eeporters' Gallery of the House of Commons was recognized as one of the best reporters who ever held a seat in that place. Still the system was very capricious, not always to be trusted, and one great trouble was that no reporter could count on being able to transcribe with accuracy the notes of any other reporter. Isaac Pitman proposed to reform all that system. He started the principle that short- hand must be written according to sound ; that is to say, that the shorthand writer must be instructed to repre- sent the sound and not the spelling of the words. It may seem hard to convey to the mind of the general public the immense difference between these two prin- ciples. But it is quite certain that Pitman's system got a complete hold of the reporters of English newspapers and that no rival system has yet come up. Pitman's other idea was that the English language ought to be spelled as it sounded. He started a spelling reform according to his principle of phonography or writing by sound. But one can tinlj say that so far that principle has been a total failure. Some of the objections to it are no doubt purely superficial. To the minds of most people it looks ridiculous to spell pho- netic, "fonetic." To most people, too, it seems in- tolerable to spell philosophy, "filosofy." But ridicule kills in many other countries besides Erance. So ridicule killed the phonetic system. Some more serious objections were raised by learned and scholarly men. It was asked what becomes of the history of the language if you alter all its spelling and so blot out all guides to the original meaning of the words. It was pointed out that even already, and without the help of the Pitman system, the average Englishman, and perhaps 426 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES especially the average English, jonrnalist, was getting to use words in the most inaccurate way. But then, on the other hand, this objection might be said to cut in both directions. The Italians spell their word for philosophy with an " i," but none of their cultured writers seem to hate forgotten for the moment what is the derivation of the word. In this country, even writ- ers who must be supposed to have had some fair educa- tion constantly speak of a "phenomenon" as of some- thing out of the common occurrence of things and quite marvellous. But the word could not be more often mis- used if it had been spelled "fenomenon." However that may be, nothing is more certain than that Sir Isaac Pit- man's shorthand reform was a splendid success, and that his spelling reform has been so far a total failure. N'oth- ing, too, can be more certain than that his life was one of noble purpose and perseverance. He had had the rare good fortune to find his path and his place in existence, and to act on his convictions whether they won or lost. He came in for some public recognition and honor tow- ards the close of his really noble life ; but' those who knew anything of him personally had long recognized the thorough honesty of his ambition to serve mankind in his own way, and the modesty with which he refused to go beyond the tasks which, according to his own Judg- ment, had been set out for him. Perhaps it would be too much to call such a life, half failure, half success, a great achievement in the ordinary and vulgar sense of the words. Pitman had done nothing' for which he could possibly expect to be created a Duke, even if we can imagine his having the slightest ambition for such a title. He could not even be made a Poet Laureate, for so far as we know he had never written any poems. But he had worked to the very utmost the faculties that nature had conferred on him, and he had used them ac- PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OF THE PRINCE OF WALES 427 cording to his judgment for the benefit of public educa- tion, and it is reasonable to hope that his country will not soon forget him. At the opening of February, 1897, the career of a great English surgeon — one of the greatest English surgeons, one of the greatest surgeons of any time or any country — came to a close with the death of Sir Spencer Wells. Sir Spencer Wells, at all events, had lived his life. He was in his seventy-ninth year when he died. His life might be divided, as it was well said at the time, into three parts — the years of his early struggles, the years during which he fought his way to success as a genuine benefactor of hu- manity, and the years of well-earned honors and rewards. The honor and reward which he prized more than any other was the knowledge that he had saved the lives of thousands of women who, but for his courage, his skill, and his genius, must have untimely perished. The pecul- iar operation with which the name of Sir Spencer Wells will forever be associated was not a discovery of his own. It had come down to him as an idea from other great sur- geons, who, however, had not the courage or the skill to carry it into regular practice. Spencer Wells studied the subject thoroughly, and he made up his mind that he had the brain, the nerve, and the hand to carry it to suc- cess. He was at first denounced in many of the English medical journals as if he were either a quack or a wanton experimenter on the frames of women. One can hardly imagine a more thoroughly heroic courage than that which enables a man to persevere with his beneficient purpose in the face of such opposition. It is easy to die on the battle-field ; any fellow can die on the battle-field ; but to persevere in a course of surgery which even one's own professional brothers declare to be futile and wanton torture needs indomitable courage and strength of mind indeed. Spencer Wells persevered, and soon, to quote 428 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the words of Punch, applied to a different man, "he heard the hisses turn to cheers." He not only saved the lives of hundreds of womenj but he showed the way by which the lives of countless thousands of women were to be saved. In all branches of his profession he took the deepest interest, and he might indeed have risen to supreme success in any department of surgery which he had made up his mind to follow. He died quietly on the Eiviera, having accomplished all the work he wanted to do, and having made a new epoch in the art of the surgeon. On Saturday, February 6, 1897, the London morning papers contained an account of a most interesting and touching appeal made by the Prince of Wales to the public in general on the subject of a becoming and ap- propriate method to celebrate the sixtieth year of the Queen's reign. " Having ascertained from the Queen," said the Prince of Wales, " that she has no wish to ex- press a preference for any one of the many proposals loy- ally suggested for commemorating, nationally or locally, the sixtieth year of her reign, I feel at liberty to bring to the notice of the inhabitants of the metropolis a proj- ect lying very near my heart, its object being to attach the sentiment of gratitude for the blessings which the country has enjoyed during the last sixty years to a scheme of permanent beneficence." That scheme, as the Prince went on to say, concerned the finances of the hospitals of London, which had long been a source of deep anxiety. There are in London 123 hospitals and convalescent homes. " An analysis furnished me of the audited statements of account for the year 1895 of 122 metropolitan hospitals and convalescent homes shows a deficiency of £70,000 as compared with the ordinary ex- penditure ; while if we limit the figures to institutions which failed to meet their outgoings the deficiency is PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OP THE PRINCE OF WALES 429 increased to £103^500. The contributors, it appears, to the funds of the London hospitals number less than one in a hundred of the London population. If," said the Prince, "we divide the population of the metro- politan district into two portions and agree that one moiety is unable to contribute anything, there still re- main 3,000,000 persons, representing (say) 500,000 house- holds. Of these, 450,000 households, at least so far as can be ascertained, do not contribute anything towards the support of hospitals. If we then assume that one- half are unwilling or unable to acknowledge either priv- ilege or duty in this matter, an average annual subscrip- tion of no more than 10s. each from the remainder will suffice." With this prelude the Prince came to his point. " I have asked the co-operation of the representative Committee whose names are appended, and I propose with their assistance to invite subscriptions of Is. per annum and upwards from all, classes for ' The Prince of Wales's Hospital Fund for London to Commemorate the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Queen's Eeign.'" Certainly it seems to us that no happier form could be found for the celebration of such a jubilee. Pageants and street processions and the marching of regiments and the waving of banners and the clangor of military music and the adornment of houses and the blaze of illuminations make altogether a very natural and popu- lar form of celebrating a great event in the history of a nation or a State. But the appeal from the Prince of Wales for a metropolitan or national contribution to the metropolitan hospitals and convalescent homes seems to us quietly to outshine all these brilliant demonstrations of national gratitude. It is impossible to imagine that the powers above, if we may look at the whole question from that point of view, would not be better pleased with the maintenance of hospitals for the poor and sick, the 430 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES dying and the recorering, than with any amount of splendor in semi-barbaric processions. The almost uni- versal feeling of the country went out in answer to the appeal of the Prince of Wales. It was felt also, that although the appeal was only made on behalf of the hos- pitals of London, it would find a ready and cordial answer from all the great provincial cities and towns of Great Britain. Some of these cities and towns are, with regard to the proportionate numbers of their population, much more advanced and energetic than vast, divided, half- apathetic London could claim to be. The general idea, therefore, was that the sounding note struck by the Prince of "Wales in the metropolis would be a call to arms in the philanthropic sense to all the great English and Scotch and Welsh communities. There were, however, some few notes of criticism and even of dissent. Certain critics contended that the whole system on which our hospital arrangements were founded was in itself a thorough mistake and a failure. There ought to be no question of charity and of beggary, these writers — there were very few of them — contended. The hospitals ought to be all under the control of the exist- ing authorities and ought to be sustained out of public funds, whether taxes or rates. They ought to be public institutions whose managers would be held responsible by Parliament and by Government for the proper man- agement of their affairs. Now there is no doubt that if we come to consider merely a fundamental principle there is a good deal to be said for this theory. Some public hospitals are very badly managed ; many have to be badly managed because of the want of money wherewith to manage them well. The public in gen- eral is inclined to be lax as regards charitable con- tributions. Here and there every now and then some rich and benevolent man or woman contributes largely PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OP THE PRINCE OF WALES 431 to the support of this or that hospital. But the or- dinary man or woman is commonly absorbed in the duties and obligations which are nearest and imme- diate^ and is apt to think that a contribution to some East-end hospital might be thought of at a future date. Then, again, there is in the minds of many people a sort of sensitive objection to any kind of hospital sup- ported merely by private charity. The present writer was once shown over a great asylum for the reception of the deaf and dumb in one of the smaller cities of Canada. The governor or manager of the asylum, who was taking the pains to point out its merits, wound up by saying, "And the great thing is, that there is not a rag of charity about it. It is a public institution, supported by the public rates, and every one who has to come here feels that he has a perfect right to come without depend- ing on the favor or the mercy of anybody." There is a great deal to be said for this sort of feeling, and we in these countries have long left behind the old days of the early Manchester School, when the theory was that everything, not merely the care of the sick and the blind and the deaf and the dumb, but even the delivery of letters by the post-oflBce, ought to be left to private enterprise and private energy. All the same, it seems to us that the Prince of Wales's appeal was timely and appropriate, and was sure to meet with a genuine na- tional response. After all, the great metropolitan and provincial hospitals cannot be allowed to fall into ruin or even to fail in any of their great duties while we are considering the best manner of revolutionizing the whole of the hospital system. How long should we, as a peo- ple, be intermittently discussing this question before we came to any decision of a general character upon it, and how long would it be, even after we had come to a gen- eral decision, before we found time to carry that decision 432 A HISTORY OF CUE OWN TIMES into parliamentary efEect ? There are reforms about which it would hardly be too much to say that the whole country is agreed and have nevertheless been waiting for a quarter of a century or even half a century to get a chance of being brought into operation. Besides, it has fairly to be said that the greater interest we can rouse, the larger the amount of sympathy we can attract to the manner in which our hospitals are crippled by want of sufficient funds, the more likely is it that the public conscience will ask itself whether the present precarious and eleemosynary conditions are the best on which such institutions ought to have to rely. For ourselves, we are convinced that if one looks at the whole question only from that comparatively narrow point of view, the appeal of the Prince of Wales is likely to do immense public service. The question for the moment is how to obtain accommodation enough for the sick and the maimed who can find no suitable accommodation in their own homes, and let us all think out the while whether there is not some better system which could be established in the future. The spread of the hospital system, whether it be supported by taxes or by rates or by private charity, is one of the greatest public blessings of modern times. Its benefit does not apply to the very poor only — to those, for instance, who live in squalid garrets or hovels, and who must either go to the work- house or die in their miserable sick beds at home. It applies also to a vast number of households where actual pauperism does not exist, but where there is no possi- bility of giving to an invalid the nourishment, the medi- cine, and the skilled care and nursing which he absolutely needs in order to insure his recovery. Therefore, from whatever side of the question we regard it, the appeal of the Prince of Wales seems to have been conceived in a wise as well as in a sympathetic spirit, and no way could PITMAN— WELLS— APPEAL OF THE PRINCE OF WALES 433 surely be found of doing better honor to the sixtieth year of Queen Victoria's reign than by obtaining gener- ous and munificent public support for institutions which, in the words of Goethe, already quoted, "lighten the load of the heavily laden." CHAPTER XXIV THE SOUTH AFRICA COMMITTEE On Tuesday, February 16, 1897, the South Africa Committee, as it was called — that is, the Parliamentary Committee appointed by the House of Commons to inquire into the circumstances attending the Jameson Kaid and the disturbances in British South Africa — was opened for actual business in a great room ofE West- minster Hall. The members of the Committee were : Mr. William L. Jackson, who had held important ofBce in Conservative Governments, as chairman; Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, Colonial Secretary ; Sir Michael Hicks- Beach, Chancellor of the Exchequer ; Sir William Har- court. Leader of the Opposition in the House of Com- mons ; Sir Richard Webster, Attorney - General ; Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, Mr. Labouchere, Sir Will- iam Hart Dyke, Mr. John Ellis, Mr. Sydney Buxton, Mr. Edward Blake, Mr. Bigham, Mr. Cripps, Mr. Whar- ton, and Mr. George Wyndham. The terms of refer- ence adopted by the House were : " To inquire into the origin and circumstances of the incursion into the South African Eepublic by an armed force, and into the administration of the British South Africa Company, and to report thereon ; and, further, to report what al- terations are desirable in the government of the terri- tories under the control of the Company." The Com- mittee were allowed to hear counsel to such extent as they should see fit, and did, in fact, allow counsel to at- THE SOUTH AFRICA COMMITTEE 435 tend on behalf of those most directly interested in the in- quiry ; and, of course, power was given to the Commit- tee, according to the technical parliamentary phrase, to send for "persons, papers, and records." It must be re- membered that there had been an inquiry by the Cape Colony Parliament into the circumstances affecting the Colony in connection with Dr. Jameson's raid. Naturally the main object of that inquiry was directed to the part taken by Mr. Rhodes, who was then Prime-minister of the Colony. It is^ of some importance to set out pre- cisely the finding of this Parliamentary Committee. The Committee declared that, " As regards the Right Honorable C. J. Rhodes, he was thoroughly acquainted with the preparations that led to the inroad, and that in his capacity as controller of the three great joint- stock companies — the British South Africa Company, the De Beers Consolidated Mines, and the Gold Fields of South Africa — he directed and controlled the combi- nation which rendered such a proceeding as the Jameson Raid possible. It still remains to consider Mr. Rhodes's position with regard to Dr. Jameson's entry into the South African Republic at the precise time when he did. There is no evidence that Mr. Rhodes ever contemplated that the force of Pitsani Camp should at any time in- vade the Transvaal uninvited. It appears rather to have been intended to support a movement from within, and Dr. Jameson was repeatedly counselled to wait until the arrangements wore complete. At the same time there is an absence of any such peremptory command from Mr. Rhodes direct to Dr. Jameson, not on any account to take action, as might reasonably have been expected from one resolutely determined to do all in his power to prevent a subordinate officer from committing a gross breach of the law. It would appear that Mr. Rhodes did not direct or approve of Dr. Jameson's entering the 436 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES territory of the South African Eepublic at the precise time when he did do so, but your Committee cannot find that that fact relieves Mr. Ehodes from responsibility for the unfortunate occurrences which took place. Even if Dr. Jameson be primarily responsible for the last fatal step, Mr. Ehodes cannot escape the responsibility of a movement which had been arranged, with his concur- rence, to take place at the precise time it did, if circum- stances had been favorable at Johannesburg." The Committee of the Cape Parliament did not di- rectly make inquiries into the relations of the Colonial Office, the Chartered Company, and what we may call " the party of action " in Johannesburg. The allegation made about the Colonial Office was that the Colonial Secretary and his officials knew more about the intended invasion of the South African Eepublic than was made known to Parliament. As regards the Chartered Com- pany, the inquiry would, of course, deal with the ques- tion whether the power of such a company should be al- lowed any longer to exist, and whether her Majesty's Government ought not to take upon itself the right, the duty, and the responsibility of administering the affairs of that part of South Africa over which the Chartered Company's Jurisdiction at present extends. It will be seen, therefore, that the keenest possible interest was felt by the public in the opening of the South Africa Committee. The interest, of course, was deepened by the fact that the first witness called was Mr. Cecil Ehodes himself. The difficulty of writing history, even contemporary his- tory, with perfect fidelity to fact and nature may be il- lustrated by the different opinions which were formed by persons, apparently alike competent and impartial, as to the bearing of Mr. Ehodes under the first examina- tion of Sir William Harcourt. Some of those who were THE SOUTH ATIJICA COMMITTEE 437 present and have put their views on record described his bearing as perfectly cool, collected, dignified, and statesmanlike. Others again spoke of him, so far as his bearing and manner were concerned, as petulant, un- derbred, eccentric, and sometimes even offensive. Mr. Rhodes, when sworn and having taken his seat at the witnesses' table, expressed a wish to read from a docu- ment which he said would practically cover his whole case. It is only fair that the whole of the document should be quoted here. " From the date," it said, " of the establishment of the gold industry on a large scale at Johannesburg, much discontent has been caused by the restrictions and impositions placed upon it by the Trans^ vaal Government ; by the corrupt administration of that Government ; and by the denial of civil rights to the rapidly growing Uitlander population. This discontent has gradually but steadily increased, and a considerable time ago I learned from my intercourse with many of the leading persons in Johannesburg that the position of affairs there had become intolerable. After long efforts they despaired of obtaining redress by constitutional means, and were resolved to seek by extra-constitutional means such a change in the government of the South Af- rican Eepublic as should give to the majority of the pop- ulation, possessing more than half the land, nine-tenths of the wealth, and paying nineteen-twentieths of the taxes in the country, a due share in its administration. I sympathized with, and, as one largely interested in the Transvaal, shared in these grievances ; and, further, as a citizen of the Cape Colony, I felt that the persistently unfriendly attitude of the Government of the South Af- rican Eepublic towards the Colony was the great obstacle to common action for practical purposes among the vari- ous States of South Africa. Under these circumstances I assisted the movement in Johannesburg with my purse 438 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES and influence. Further, acting within my rights, in the autumn of 1895 I placed on territory under the admin- istration of the British South Africa Company on the borders of the Transvaal, a body of troops under Dr. Jameson, prepared to act in the Transvaal in certain eventualities. I did not communicate these views to the Board of Directors of the British South Africa Company. With reference to the Jameson Kaid, I may state that Dr. Jameson went in without my authority. Having said this, I desire to add that I am willing generally to accept the finding as to facts contained in the report of the Committee of Cape Colony. I must add that in all my actions I was greatly influenced by my belief that the policy of the present Government of the South African Eepublic was to introduce the influence of another for- eign power into the already complicated system of South Africa, and thereby render more difficult in the future the closer union of the different States." Now, whatever one may come to think of the policy and the action of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, it must be owned that that statement seems to be full, clear, candid, and consistent. The Chairman of the Committee asked wheth- er there was anything else that Mr. Ehodes desired to add to that statement, and Mr. Rhodes quietly said no. He had indeed presented to the Committee what must be called a State paper of great historical importance. Of course there were other questions to be considered, as well as the question of Mr. Ehodes's own personal motive and action, but it cannot be doubted that the reading of that paper produced a decidedly favorable impression on the Committee. Mr. Rhodes, of course, had an immense number of worshippers in this country as well as in South Africa. On the other hand, for one reason or another, he had created a strong and bitter feeling against him. To the minds of many persons he showed simply as a self- THE SOUTH AFRICA COMMITTEE 439 seeking adventurer, inspired merely by the lust for gold and the passion of power. Fiction of the day had dealt somewhat harshly with him. In three or four popular novels at least, he had been presented as the central figure under the thinnest disguise, and one novel was only worse than another in picturing him as the reckless, heartless money-grabber and slave-driver. Dr. Jameson was afterwards examined as a witness, and he, too, handed in voluntarily a statement on his own behalf. The proceedings were followed with intense in- terest by the public ; and much wonder was excited by the frank recognition of the curious manner in which servants of the British Government at the Cape had al- lowed themselves to withhold from Lord Eosmead (then Sir Hercules Eobinson) all knowledge of the details, with which they were perfectly acquainted, concerning the movement of Dr. Jameson, and the more or less qualified encouragement given to it by Mr. Cecil Ehodes. The question, however, is still, and is likely to be for a long time, a matter of public inquiry, and this writer at least can only patiently await the result. CHAPTER XXV BLOlfDIK — NAKSBN — THE PENEHTN QUABBIES — THE EDUCATIOIT BILL The London journals of Tuesday, February 23, 1897, reported the death of Blondin, the famous rope-walker, at whom for a time all the world wondered. He had been for some later years living in his home, which he called Niagara House, at Ealing, near London, and he died in his seventy-third year. He stuck to his craft almost up to his death, and exhibited his tight -rope feats so lately as the August of 1896. "Whatever we may think of tight-rope feats we must all admit that it is something to be perfect master of one's craft, and there never was a tight-rope walker worthy to be named in the same breath with Blondin. It may be observed, by the way, that Blondin was not his real name. He was a Frenchman, born near Calais, the son of a pro- fessional acrobat, who had been a soldier of the Great Napoleon. Blondin's real name was Jean Francois Gravelot, but when he had made up his mind to follow a rope-walking career, and was invited to go on a pro- fessional tour in the United States, he and his friends thought it would be impossible to work such a name into an attractive programme. The shorter and simpler appellation of Blondin was therefore invented for him, and was suggested by his complexion and the color of his hair. His most daring feat was that of crossing the rapids at Niagara just where the great cataract takes its BLONDIN— HANSEN— THE PENRHYN QUAfiEIES, ETC. 441 plunge. He crossed Niagara, it is said, more than three hundred times, and even crossed his rope there on stilts. Then he began touring all over the world, establishing his fame wherever he went. He made his first appear- ance in London at the Crystal Palace, and he had al- ready won such a renown that people rushed to see him who- had never cared to look at a tight-rope walker be- fore. His earliest performances at the Crystal Palace were on a rope very high up from the floor, and a fall must have meant his death. It was not merely that he trod the tight-rope with perfect safety and success, but that he performed all manner of pranks in the course of his crossing. At his first exhibition in the Crystal Palace he created utter consternation amongst the vast audience, and brought out many cries of alarm and pity and horror, when he affected to slip off the rope and came sitting astride on it for a moment and then turned under it, head downwards, and leaped on to it again, and smiled and bowed to the audience and went his way as if nothing particular had happened. He often crossed the rope with a heavy sack over his head. He used to carry a stove and cook an omelette on his way across the narrow path of thread. He used to wheel people across in a barrow. He wheeled his little daughter once in this way while the child scattered flowers on the up-gazing crowd below. But the police interfered with this per- formance on the ground that, even if he had a right to risk his own limbs and life, he had no right to risk the limbs and life of one of his children. Indeed, in Lon- don there were restrictions put on his performance which were not imposed on him in many other places. Once in Liverpool, in the Zoological Gardens, he wheeled across his rope a lion made fast in his barrow, and he horrified the spectators by affecting at one moment to be losing his control of the cradle containing the king of 19* 442 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES the forests. Eeaders of the present day can have little idea of the sensation which all this sort of thing created in England and everywhere else. Such readers, how- ever, can find out enough about him if they will only turn back to the numbers of Punch published at the time, and there indeed they will find him, to use the colloquial phrase, "all over the place." He n.ever had a rival in modern days. It is not likely that he ever had a rival in the whole history of his craft. He loved the rope-walking business " with a love that was more than love." He was only happy and healthy when practising his profession. He declared that he had never felt fear, even when first crossing Niagara. He laid down the law that a man must be born a tight-rope walker ; that no training whatever could make him one. None of his children, he said, would ever be a tight-rope walker, be- cause none of them had been born with the gift. Every right-minded person, as the phrase goes, must feel regret that so much public delight should be felt in perform- ances merely intended to startle and shock and horrify. Yet we must take account of the fact that in all ages and in all countries the vast majority of people have de- lighted in such exhibitions. After all, there is some- thing naturally attractive, even to minds not vulgar, in seeing how a man can completely train his nerves, his strength, and his skill to accomplish in safety feats that to other men would be xitterly impossible. Then, of later years, even the most humane and sensitive persons became satisfied that Blondin, constituted as he was, put himself in no real danger at all. He never met with a serious accident. He never broke a bone. He never even hurt himself to any considerable extent. In his own business he stood absolutely alone. There is some- thing curious in the thought of this extraordinary man, living for years quietly in his home in a London suburb, BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PENRHYN QUARRIES, ETC. 443 and receiving his friends there, while a new generation of Londoners was coming up which knew of him only as a memory, and if it ever thought about him at all was uncertain whether he was dead or alive. He is probably the only man in history, not excepting Julius Caesar, or Michael Angelo, or Paganini, who never in his time had a rival in his own field of action. London in the early weeks of 1897 was favored by the presence of a lion of the season, the most leonine and commanding who had been seen there for many years, far more popularly attractive than Li Hung Chang, the Chinese statesman, who came to London in the dead sea- son of 1896. This was Dr. Fridtjof Nansen, the famous Norwegian explorer, on whose visit to the regions of the N"orth Pole the attention of Europe and all the civilized world had for a long time been riveted. Nansen was a born Viking, and he made the most successful raid upon the Polar regions that had been accomplished in our time. He did not, as a matter of fact, go out with the purpose of finding the exact position of the North Pole. That exact position seemed to him a matter of compara- tive unimportance. His main purpose was to explore the Polar seas, and to find out whether there was not a powerful current which would drive a vessel towards the Pole if only the vessel were built strongly enough to withstand the impact of the ice. He found that things were exactly as he had anticipated, and he therefore ac- complished the very work he had set forth to do. He had, of course, the most trying experience in the way of privation, want of food, cold, solitude, and what dis- tressed him as a cleanly Norwegian very much, the en- tire giving out of his supply of soap. He carried great qualities with him on his expedition. His heart, to be- gin with, was in his work. Then he had a thoroughly artistic love of the northern skies and the northern ice. 444 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES Some of his descriptions of the beautiful Arctic night which are contained in the record of his expedition are positively poetic. " The proud lines of thy throat," he says to the northern night, "thy shoulders' curves, are so noble, but oh ! so unbendingly cold : thy bosom's white chastity is feelingless as the snowy ice. Chaste, beauti- ful, and proud, thou floatest through ether over the frozen sea, thy glittering garment, woven of aurora beams, cov- ering the vault of heaven." One is reminded of a poet- ical and beautiful passage in Jean Paul Eichter, in which he apostrophizes the Arctic night which he never saw, and, in rapture of admiration, tells how, though the day be livid and colorless, yet the night brings back the poetry of existence and of color, and illumines the skies with stars and fire, and so reminds the men on the frozen earth of the bright heaven which arches above them. It is needless to say that Nansen had an enthusiastic recep- tion in London. He was entertained at many public dinners, and he delivered a lecture to the Koyal Geo- graphical Society, after which the Prince of Wales pre- sented him with the Society's gold medal, especially made in his honor. The meeting of the Geographical Society had to be held in the vast Albert Hall, as no other place in London could possibly accommodate the number of persons who were eager to see and hear the great northern explorer. The latest great gathering of the kind had been held in the same hall to welcome Mr. Henry M. Stanley on his return from his greatest African expedition. Dr. Nansen addressed his audi- ence in fluent and almost perfect English, only his accent here and there betraying his foreign birth and bringing up. He had addressed the Royal Geographi- cal Society some years before, just as he was about to start on his adventures, and he had then explained that his object was not merely to get to the exact BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PENRIIYN QUARRIES, ETC. 445 position of the North Pole, but to verify the theories which he had formed. He published a. book giving an account of all that he saw and found and felt and suffered, which had an enormous circulation in England, and, in- deed, it is needless to say, all over the world. He re- mained but a short time in London, and gave no indica- tion as to the plans of his life for the future. No stranger since the f ar-ofE days when Garibaldi visited England ever received a greater demonstration of welcome than Dr. Nansen did ; and of course in the case of Garibaldi there were popular sentiments and even passions which made his welcome a clamor and a tumult. In Dr. Nansen's case it was simply a popular and a national tribute to genius, patience, energy, daring, and success. There would seem to be a peculiar fascination about the explor- ing of the " boreal realms of the Pole," as Edgar Allan Poe puts it. Certainly such undertakings have always had a peculiar attraction for the people of these islands. Since the days of Sir John Franklin, and since long be- fore those days, no hero can get a more cordial welcome here than the hero of a Polar expedition. There is some- thing poetical, illusory, futile about the undertaking, which would appear to commend itself to the dreamier qualities of even the most prosaic mind. There is noth- ing in particular to come of it, even if we were to find the exact position of what we call the North Pole. There is no money to be made, there are no gold-mines nor dia- mond-mines to be got at. There are no territories to be annexed. There are no kingdoms to be conquered, as Carlyle says, from the barren realms of darkness. The world would remain practically just the same after we had ascertained the exact position of the North Pole as before we settled it. The settlement would have no more practical influence on our affairs than has the fact that astronomic science enables us now to watch the melting 446 A HISTORY OP OUR OWN TIMES of the snow around the poles of Mars. But there is some- thing on the whole elevating and inspiring in the thought that humanity can be thus profoundly interested in the pursuit of a knowledge which is not even supposed to bring the slightest practical gain. We have seldom had a lion of a season in London more worthy of the welcome he got than was Dr. Nansen. Some people could not help comparing the reception which Nansen got with that which was given in the former year to Li .Hung Chang, and which has been already noticed in this chapter. Both men came rather at a wrong time. Li Hung Chang came too late in that season and Dr. Hansen came too early in the season after. But the general feeling about the Chinese statesman was one rather of puzzle and amusement than of genuine admiration. Few people knew what he had done or cared whether he had or had not put down a rebellion in China. The papers recorded his movements and the public in general smiled a broad smile at the record. He did not appeal to us. We thought him rather an oddity and a figure of fun, and were much amused by the skill with which he baffled interviewers by putting all manner of questions himself and so leaving no time for any one to extract any manner of opinion from him. London rose at Wansen. His was the very sort of character and career which capti- vates a great sea-born nation. It has been said that the Greek poets and the English poets alone in literature are enraptured by the beauty and the delight of the sea. It has been well-declared of the Greeks of to-day that on the main -land and in the islands every man is a born sailor. But very much the same might surely be said of the Norseman. Sweden and Norway are full of the passion and the poetry of the sea. Therefore Nan- sen, the successful explorer of Arctic waters, found a sympathetic welcome from every heart in these coun- tries. Ancestral and reciprocal memories passed iiito BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PENEHYN QUARRIES, ETC. 447 that welcome, and Nan sen carried with him when he left this country the best wishes of all its population for his future career and for his future success. A very singular question, involving the relations be- tween capital and labor, came up in the year 1897. Per- haps nothing of exactly the same kind had been brought into the public notice in England before. Sir George .Osborne Morgan moved for a copy of the whole cor- respondence, and it tells the story better than the present writer can do. On January 20, 1897, there was issued a parliamentary paper from the Board of Trade called " Lord Penrhyn's Quarries " (correspondence), further stated to be a copy " of all correspondence be- tween the Board of Trade, Lord Penrhyn, and the workmen employed at his slate - quarries at Bethesda near Bangor, relating to the labor dispute which has arisen g,t_su«h slate -quarries." The first letter in the correspondence is to the secretary of the Labor Depart- ment of the Board of Trade, and comes from the organ- izing secretary of the North "Wales Quarrymen's Union. The letter sets out that at its meeting on the Saturday before, September 30, 1896, "the Council of the Union considered and adopted a resolution of the Penrhyn Quarry Committee asking that the attention of the Board of Trade be called to the dispute between them and their employer, the Eight Honorable Lord Penrhyn, with the view of seeking its intervention under the second clause of the Conciliation (Trades Disputes) Act, 1896. On Monday, before the above resolution had been forwarded to the Board of Trade, each member of the Committee (Penrhyn Quarry) that had hitherto car- ried on all the negotiations between the men and their employer, together with other persons, whose names had transpired in the correspondence, received a notice to the following efEect from the chief manager, Mr. B. A. 448 A HISTORY OF ODK OWN TIMES Young : ' I have to inform you that you are hereby suspended till further notice, as and from the end of this quarry month, namely, Tuesday night 38th instant.' The immediate effect of this has been to precipitate a conflict which the Committee had done all in its power to prevent. The men, looking upon this as a direct blow at the principle of combination, on Monday evening held a mass meeting, when the following resolution was passed unanimously : ' That this meeting of the work- men at Oae-braich-y-Cafn (Penrhyn Quarry), under- standing that our representatives on the Committee have been suspended from to-morrow night until an in- definite period, resolves that it is our duty also as work- men to cease work until we have received an explanation of this action on the part of the management.'" The men abided by their resolution, and the result of it was that nearly three thousand men were left idle. The whole question simply was one whether, according to the old formula, a man has a right to do whatever he likes with his own. Lord Penrhyn was the owner of the slate-quarries, and he could not quite get on with his working-men. He therefore fell back upon his right to close the slate-quarries, and to suspend their operation just as he thought fit. He could not agree to the terms which his workmen asked, and therefore he thought it was perfectly right to let the slate-quarries remain abso- lutely unworked. Now, it must be clear to everybody that no such natural right exists for any landlord whatever. Pass any laws you will, accumulate any stat- utes as you will, yet you cannot possibly put into the hands of any landlord the right to make barren the land over which he holds a nominal ownership. The first great claim in the world is the right that the resources of civilization shall be used to the uttermost for the benefit of the whole of humanity. Now, it seems BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PEXRHYN QUARRIES, ETC. 449 to US that the action of Lord Penrhyn was distinctly in opposition to this uniyersal law. Because Lord Penrhyn could not agree with his working hands as to the terms of their service, he appears to have made up his mind to close his works altogether, and to get rid not only of the slate-mining laborers but of the slate-mining labors themselves. This seems to us to carry the idea of pro- prietorship a great deal too far. Indeed, it appears to point, distantly, perhaps, but still not indistinctly, to a time when the State will have to step in and say that your claims as a proprietor are wholly opposed to the general law of the public, and that either you must give way or the rights of the State must give way. It is out- side the course of all reason to hold that a man who possesses slate -quarries, let us say, or coal-mines, as it might be, or diamond -mines, or any other treasures of civilization, should be entitled to shut ofE the whole public from the advantages he possesses, merely because he gets into a quarrel with his working-men. No so- ciety could hold together under conditions like that, and Lord Penrhyn's course seemed for a time as if it were directly carried on in the face of growing intelligence and civilization in England. The agitation was not very strong in the country, at least in those parts of the coun- try which the trouble did not directly afEect. People in general felt certain that Lord Penrhyn would have to submit himself in the end, and so the whole struggle -went on with a curious public interest but without much actual dismay. The question was new and peculiar, but it did not seem to involve much real practical difficulty. It seemed wholly impossible that Lord Penrhyn could set up an entirely new principle in economic afEairs, or that he could revolutionize the whole system of busi- ness relations between men and men. Therefore people waited patiently to see the break-down. 450 A HISTORY OF OUK OWN TIMES Lord Penrhyn was not accused by anybody of being a harsh or domineering master of workmen. The men themselves admitted that he was kindly, well-wishing, and earnest about the comfort of those whom he em- ployed, but he had got hold of certain ideas which he apparently regarded as conscientious principles and he stuck to these without any concession. So the principle dragged on and is dragging on still. Up to the adjournment for the Easter holidays the House of Commons had done little or nothing. The new Education Bill turned out to be but a small sort of measure. It was started with the name of "A Bill to proYide for a grant out of the Exchequer in aid of voluntary elementary schools and for the exemption from rates of those schools, and to repeal part of Sec- tion 19 of the Elementary Education Act, 1875." Some curious interest was roused by the fact that the bill was prepared and brought in by Mr. Balfour, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir John Gorst, and the Solicitor- General. The House of Commons found a good deal of fun in the fact that Sir John Gorst's name was on the back of the bill. Everybody in the House of Commons knew that Sir John Gorst did not care anything about the bill, and everybody also knew that he had been de- liberately shut out by his colleagues from taking any important part in the discussions on the measure. The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons had resolutely shoved — there is no other word for it — Sir John Gorst aside from any leading part in the de- bates upon the measure. The House of Commons was greatly amused and deeply interested for that reason, if for nothing else, in the whole progress of the de- bate. The bill proposed to provide for a grant out of the Exchequer in aid of voluntary elementary schools. The first clause of the bill provided that. BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PENEHYN QUARRIES, ETC. 45I for aiding voluntary schools, there should be annual- ly paid out of moneys provided by Parliament an aid grant, not exceeding in the aggregate five shillings per scholar for the whole number of scholars in those schools. The second clause provided that the grant should be distributed by the Education Depart- ment to such voluntary schools and in such manner and amounts as the Department think best for the purpose of helping necessitous schools, and increasing their eificiency, while at the same time keeping due regard to the maintenance of voluntary contributions. Another section declared that if associations of schools are constituted in such manner, in such areas, and with such governing bodies representative of the managers as are approved by the Education Department, there shall be allotted to each association while so approved a share of the aid grant to be computed according to the number of scholars at the rate of five shillings for each scholar, or if the Department should fix different rates for town and country schools, which they are by this measure empowered to do, then at those rates and a corresponding share of any sum which may be avail- able out of the aid grant after distribution has been made to unassociated schools. The share allotted to each such association was to be distributed by the Edu- cation Department. After consulting the governing body of the association, and in accordance with any scheme prepared by that body which the Department for the time being might approve, other parts of the measure provided that the Education Department might exclude a school from any share of the grant if, in the opinion of the Department, it unreasonably refused or failed to join such an association, but it was added that the refusal or failure should not be deemed unreason- able if the majority of schools in the association should 452 A HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES belong to a religious denomination to -which the one particular school did not itself belong. The bill defined that unless the context otherwise required, the expres- sion "voluntary school" means a public elementary day school not provided by a school board, and that the ex- pression "local rate "means a rate the proceeds of which are applicable to public local purposes and which is levi- able on the basis of an assessment in respect of the yearly value of property, and includes any sum which, though obtained in the first instance by a precept, certificate, or other instrument requiring payment from some authority or ofiScer, is or can be ultimately raised out of a local rate as before defined. The measure was not to extend to Scotland or Ireland. The measure was passed into law and was understood to be simply an instalment of other measures. Up to the time of Parliament's ad- journment for the Easter recess it was about the only serious accomplishment which legislation had achieved. There was, indeed, in the House of Commons one high- ly important debate on the financial relations of Great Britain and Ireland. Two speeches in that debate might fairly be described as important in the history of our modern Parliament. By a curious chance they happened to be both on the same side. One was by Mr. Edward Blake and the other by Sir Edward Clarke, who had time after time held office under a Tory Government. Mr. Blake had held a leading position for many years in the Dominion Parliament of Canada. He was of Irish origin and had given up his Canadian position, a really great position, to fight for the cause of Home Rule in the Imperial Parliament. Sir Edward Clarke, of course, as we know, had made all his distinction in Parliament as a Conservative, and was and is one of the most brill- iant debaters in the House of Commons. On this occa- sion Mr. Blake and Sir Edward Clarke found themselves BLONDIN— NANSEN— THE PENEHYN QJMffilES, ETC, 453 side by side. The whole afEaij^f^aiS'^Ji^^rlri the his- tory of the House of C9mmop%-a;fit3^ was naturally re- garded with the deepest interest. At least it formed a tribute to the occasional justice of feeling of the House of Commons which inspires a great debater on one side of the House to admit the justice of the case put forward by a great debater on the other side. This volume cannot be better closed than with the mention of the fact that all London, and, indeed, all Great Britain, went into joyous preparations for the celebration of the year — ^for the celebration of what, by some kind of sudden and common instinct, it was deter- mined to call the " Diamond Jubilee." There are events yet to occur in the reign of the Queen, a reign which we all hope may still be prolonged over many years. But the reign so far has given its measure, and no one can deny that on the whole it has been a reign of great suc- cess. It has been, as we have shown, a reign productive of reform in political, in economical, and in social life. Especially we should say it has been successful in do- mestic reform and in domestic advancement. About the policy of some of our foreign wars, our annexations, our expansions of territory, the writer of this book has never hesitated to express his full and frank opinion. But the advance of political and social reform has been so clear and so beneficent as to give little or no chance to the most carping controversialist. No one could pos- sibly say that Queen Victoria does not find a happier Great Britain now than she found when she came to the throne, hardly more than a child, in 1837. Never once during her time has the strength of the monarchy been shaken, or even threatened. Many monarchies, and even some republics, have gone down within that time. The French Republic of 1848 was upset by Louis Napoleon, 454 A HISTORY or OUR OWN TIMES and the empire of Louis Napoleon went down on tlie battle-field of Sedan. A German Empire has been founded, although not exactly on the ruins of the Holy Koman Empire ; and Austria has been driven outside the sphere of Germany. Italy has become one single kingdom, and Greece is at the present moment thrilling to complete what she not unnaturally thinks her national destiny. The Empire of Brazil is gone, and a sort of Eepublican Goyernment works along its way in the place of the deposed sovereignty. But the monarchical system of Great Britain has not been seriously threat- ened in the slightest way since Queen Victoria came to the throne. Of course, nobody could suppose for a moment that all this was owing to any inspiration or any effort of the Queen herself. But it may be assumed, and it must be assumed, that the wisdom with which, as a constitutional sovereign, she discharged her duties, and acted in the end on the advice of her ministers, has had much to do with the stability of the Empire and the rule. This is a history of a time, and not of a sovereign, but it would be unjust even to the history of the time not to give a word of praise to the steady, constitutional action of the sovereign. INDEX Abdubkahman Khan, claimant for Afghan crown, 47 ; favorite of Russia, 50. Aberdeen, Earl of, Lord Lieuten- ant for Ireland, 183. Acland, Arthur, Vice - President of Committee of Council on Education, 283. Adam, William, foretelling Lib- eral victory of 1880, 6. Afghanistan, Englisb troops oc- cupying Cabul, 47. African, native, position of, 362, 870. Afrikander, definition of, 362 ; treatment of natives, 362. Alabama, claims, 353. Albany, Duke of (Prince Leo- pold), character and death, 156 ; church at Cannes in mem- ory of, 157. Alcester, Lord, speech at Man- sion House on bombardment of Alexandria. 118. Alexandria, English and French vessels at, 98 ; riot, 99 ; French fleet leaves, 100 ; bombard- ment, 100, 116, 400, 401 ; mas- sacre, 101; Khedive reinstalled at, 101 ; policy of, 118. American State-prison discipline, 393. Arabi Pasha, leader of Egyptian National party, 97 ; character, 98; attitude towards England, 100; influence, 105; intrenched at Tel el Kebir, 108; defeat and exile, 108 ; exiled, 400, 401. Arbitration Treaty between Great Britain and United States, 353 ; articles of, 353 ; signature an important epoch, 356 ; wel- comed on both sides of Atlan- tic, 357 ; absurd criticisms of, 357, 358; secretary keeping pen that signed, 359 ; obstruct- ed 373 ; alluded to in Queen's Speech, 402. Argyll, Duke of. Lord Privy Seal (third time), 4 ; an orator, 5 ; opinions of, 195. Armenians massacre(i, 334, 339 ; their character, 334 ; outburst against, 335. Arnold, Dr., literary rank, 114. Arnold, Matthew, 260 ; literary rank, 114 ; appreciation of Celts, 187. Arnold, Sir Edwin, "The Light of Asia," 261. Ashley, Lord {see Shaftesbury, Lord), 175. Asquith moves vote of want of confidence in Tory Govern- ment, 281; majority in favor of amendment, 281; Home Secretary, 282 ; capacity for administration, 282; speech on second reading of second Home Rule Bill, 294 ; possible leader of House, 306. Athens, tumultuous national meetings in, 346. Austen, Jane, 83. Austin, Alfred, Poet Laureate, poem in honor of Dr. Jame- son, 370. 456 INDEX Austria, Emperor of, opinion of Gladstone's apology, 55. Austria, foreign policy, Glad- stone's opinion of, 52 ; outside German sphere, 453. Ayoob Khan, besieging Canda- har, 49 ; defeated by General Roberts, 50. Baden - Powell, Professor, au- thor of one of " Essays and Re- views," 380. Balfour, Arthur James, member of Fourth party, 33; Chief Secretary for Ireland, 339, 330 ; First Lord of Treasury and leader of House of Commons, 336 ; speech on Irish taxation, 405. Balfour, Gerald, Chief Secretary for Ireland, 337. Beaconsfield, Lord, death, 90, 94 ; career, 90 ; delight in parlia- mentary battle, 91, 93 ; oi'atory, 91 ; character, 94 ; idea of Tory democratic party inherited by Lord Randolph Churchill, 163; influencing peers, 310. Beckford, William, author of "Vatlielc,"240. Bell, alias Ivory, committed for trial — released, 386. Benin, "city of blood," 413. Benin, expedition, massacre of British and native force, 413 ; march to Benin, 414 ; Daily News on, 414, 415 ; account of, 418 ; lands at Gato Creek, 418. Benin, King of, 413 ; deputation to, 414, 415 ; willing to receive deputation, 430; escape of, 431. Benin punitive expedition, 416 ; success of, 431. Benson, Dr., Archbishop of Can- terbury, death at Hawarden, 379 ; character as Archbishop, 379. Berlin Treaty, conditions unful- filled by Turkey, 15. Bigliam, Mr., member of South Africa Committee, 434. Birmingham, disturbances in, 147. Bismarck, Prince, on interven- tion in Egypt, 107. Blake, Edward, member of South Africa Committee, 434 ; speech on financial relations of Great Britain and Ireland, 453 ; ca- reer, 453. Blondin, Jean Franpois Gravelot, career and death, 440 ; cross- ing Niagara, 441 ; no rival, 443. Boers, sketch of their character and views, 36, 43 ; deputation to England against annexation, 37 ; Gladstone's description of, 38 ; settling in Transvaal — their history and character, 361 ; changing quarters to es- cape English, 363. Boisragon, Captain, escape from Benin massacre, 414 ; wound- ed, 418 ; escape into bush, 419. Borrow, George, author of "La- vengro," death, 89. Boycott, origin of word, 75. Bradlaugli, career, 18, 19 ; claims to affirm instead of taking oath, 31 ; offers to take oath, 34, 38 ; organizer of propaganda of atlieism, 37 ; addresses House from Bar, 38 ; taken into cus- tody, 29 ; undignified scenes, 30-33 ; pai'liamentary career, 33-34 ; death, 34. Bradlaugh episode, 31-32 ; ques- tions involved in, 36; recom- mendation of committee — re- jected, 28 ; Arthur Peel's deci- sion, 32. Brand, Henry, elected Speaker of House of Commons, 19 ; resign- ing position of Speaker, 153, 155 ; his character, 154 ; coup d'etat, 154 ; in House of Lords as Lord Hampden, 155. Brazil, Empire of. United States not interfering with, 351 ; dis- appearance of, 454. Bright, John, not advocating rapid changes, 3 ; Chancellor of Duchy of Lancaster, 13 ; speech on Bradlaugh's claim, 37 ; " prairie value," 60 ; op- INDEX 457 posing Crimean "War, 85; opin- ion of Disraeli, 93 ; resignation, 102, 118 ; speech explaining res- ignation, 103 ; attitude to Irisli Nationalists, 119 ; scene in Com- mons, 131 ; Government sup- porting, 133 ; speech on Redis- tribution of Seats Bill, 150 ; account of Sir Charles Wood's speecli, 167 ; -views on State and labor question, 176 ; seces- sion from Liberal party, 193, 194 ; attitude towards Irish questions, 194; his "Apologia," 194 ; effects of his attitude, 195 ; his complaints of Irish Nation- alists, 196 ; death, 351 ; sltetch of life, 351 ; admiration of Mil- ton, 353 ; character, 353 ; as an orator, 353 ; tributes to his memory, 253 ; typical English- man, 253 ; attitude towards American Civil War, 254 ; ideal M.P., 354 ; severing connection ■with Morning Star, 286 ; views on intervention, 339. British Guiana and Venezuela, dispute about boundary - line, 848 ; {see also Venezuela Ques- tion). British Guiana taken from Dutch by Great Britain, 348. Broadhurst, Mr., opposing grant to Lord Wolseley, 117. Bronte, Charlotte, 83, 84 ; popu- larity of, 374. Browning, Robert, death, 355 ; conduct in private life, 355 ; de- scription of Edmund Kean's acting, 255 ; tardy appreciation by public, 356 ; his character, 256, 357 ; Lord Tennyson his only rival, 356 ; contrast be- tween Browning and Tenny- son, 258; his hero "ever a fighter," 269. Bryce, historian of "Holy Roman Empire," Chancellor of Duchy of Lancaster, 283. Bulwer Ly tton, literary M. P. , 139. Buike, "Edmund, renouncing friendship of Pox, 196 ; opin- ion of "indictment against a 20 nation," 230; paraphrase of sayings of, 417. Burke, Thomas, Permanent Un- der-Secretary for Ireland, mur- dered, 83. Burma, annexation of, 168 ; Lord Randolph Churchill's policy, 169. Burnaby, Colonel "Fred,"skelch of— death, 135. Burns, John, member of London County Council, 341. Burns, Robert, independence of, 361; monument in Ayr to, 276. Burt, Mr, , opposing grant to Lord "Wolseley, 117. Burton, John Hill, Scottish his- torian, death, 89. Burton, Sir Richard, death, 257 ; knowledge of Eastern races and languages, 357 ; character, 257. Butt, Isaac, leader of Irish party, 62 ; death, 63 ; Home Rule mo- tion — Gladstone's speech on, 179 ; scheme for Irish members voting in Imperial Parliament, 197 ; satirized by Robert Lowe, 197 ; agitating for Home Rule, 388. Buxton, Sydney,member of South Africa Committee, 434. Byrne, Frank, Parnell accused of aiding his escape, 323, 226. Byron, Lord, memory revered in Greece, 342; opinion of Union of England with Ireland, 405. Cairns, Lord, amendment to Franchise Bill, 144; carried, 146. Cambridge, Duke of, resignation proposed, 332. Campbell, massacred at Benin, 414, 418; taken prisoner and carried to Benin, 419. Campbell-Bannerman, Sir Henry, Secretary for "War, 283 ; scheme of army reform, 323 ; cordite debate, 338 ; member of South Africa Committee, 434. Canada, Imperial occupation of, 351. Candahar, English disaster at, 48 ; 458 INDEX besieged by Ayoob Kban, 49 ; siege raised, 50. Canning, George, policy of, 345, 346 ; principle of Monroe doc- trine, 351. Cardwell, Minister for War, opin- ion of Franco-German War, 6. Carlyle, Thoma.=i, deatli, 86. Carnarvon, Lord, sclieme for South African federation, 37 ; Viceroy of Ireland, 165, 166; statement of policy, 166 ; views on Home Rule, 173 ; resigna- tion, 181 ; interview willi Par- nell, 183 ; conduct in Dublin, 183. Carter, Brudenel 1, member of Lon- don County Council, 341. Cavendisli, Lord Frederick, mov- ing appointment of select com- mittee on Bradlaugii's claim, 31 ; Chief Secretary for Ire- land, 83 ; murdered, 83. Cetewayo, visiting England, 46. Chamberlain, Joseph, describes Lord Hartington as "late leader of Opposition," 3 ; regarded as pillar of democracy, 3, 8 ; early reputation, 10 ; as a debater, 10 ; and Sir Charles Dilke — friendship and policy, 11 ; alli- ance with Home Rule party, 12; President of Board of Trade, 13, 183 ; opinion of Par- nell, 70 ; designation of Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, 147 ; attitude towards Home Rule, 180,387; resignation — reasons for, 191 ; scheme for govern- ment of Ireland, 193 ; unac- ceptable to Irish, 193; "Pop- kin's plan," 193 ; address to constituents (1893), 379 ; Secre- tary of State for Colonies, try- ing to prevent raid into Trans- vaal, 367 ; member of South Africa Committee, 434. Chartered Company, founded by Rliodes, 364 ; action of, 369. Chiklers, Hugh, in Ministry of 1880, 5 ; Chancellor of Excheq- uer, budget (1885), 136 ; bud- get proposals, 161 ; conces- sions, 161; SirM. Hicks-Beach's amendment, 161 ; financial scheme accepted in part by Conservatives, 167 ; Home Sec- retary, 188 ; retiring from Par- liament owing to ill -health, 383 ; death, 377, 404 ; charac- ter, 377 ; reputation in Aus- tralia, 377 ; holding various offices, 377 ; chairman of Irisli Financial Commission, 403. Cliurcliill, Lord Randolph, form- ing Fourth party, 23, 34; leader of Fourlh party — tactics, 136 ; trying to make Mr. Cham- berlain responsible for dis- turbance at Birmingham, 147 ; bench-dance, 163; his popular- ity, 163 ; policy, 164 ; Secre- tary for India, 165 ; statement on Indian finance, 167 ; politi- cal career, 168, l'?0 ; Chancel- lor of Exchequer and leader of House of Commons, 199 ; suc- cess as Secretary of State for India, 199, 200 ; resignation of office of Chancellor of Ex- chequer, 300 ; announcing his resignation, 301 ; endeavoring to realize idea of Tory demo- crat, 301 ; his budget of rigid economy, 303 ; explaining rea- sons for resignation, 203; "as an official" — Sir Algernon West's article in Nineteenth Century on, quotations from, 203 ; martyr to his convictions, 304 ; his travels, 304 ; close of career, 205. Clarence, Duke of (Albert Victor Edward), death, 262 ; sketch of his life, 363 ; betrothal, 363. Clarke, Sir Edward, speech on financial relations of Great Britain and Ireland, 453. Cleveland, President, Message to Congress on Venezuela ques- tion, 348, 350, 351 ; effect in England, 350; cliaracter, 350; commending Arbitration 'Treaty to Senate, 356. Cobden, Miss, elected to County Council, 244, 347. INDEX 459 Cobden, Richard, opposing Cri- mean War, 85; without political ambition, 92 ; views on State and labor question, 176 ; on non-intervention, 339. Cockburn, Sir Alexander, career and death, 85. Coercion Bill for Ireland — Irish Nationalists struggling during Jubilee against, 333. Cole, Constable, injured by dj'u- amite explosion, 137. Coleridge, Hartley, liierary ranlj, 114. Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, liter- ary rank, 114. Colley, Sir George, killed at Ma- juba Hill, 39. Collier, Sir Robert, Lord Monks- well, 341. Collings, Jesse, " three acres and a cow " resolution, 183 ; car- ried, 183. Commons, House of, swearing in members, 19 ; Irish question occupying, 119, 126 ; dynamite explosion, 137; scene on eve of critical division, 161 ; posi- tion of parties, December, 1885, 174. Compensation for Disturbance Bill— rejected, 61, 71. Compton, Lord, member of Lon- don County Council, 241. Congress of Berlin, English poli- cy in, 388. Constantinople, Armenians mas- sacred in, 334 ; representatives of Great Powers consulting at, 339. Convention of London {see Lon- don Convention). Coppee, Franpois, on word " school," 112. Coppee, Fran9ois — ^R. L. Steven- son's essays equal to those of, 275. Cordite debate, result of, 323, 324. Courtney, Leonard, journalist M.?., 139 ; Financial Secre- tary for Treasury, resigning, 150; candidate for Speakership, 314 ; able Chairman of Com- mittees, 314 ; independent member, 314. Cowper, Lord, presiding at Unionist meeting, 193. Cranbrook, Lord, criticising Ex- plosives Bill, 133. Crawford, Major, massacred at Benin, 414, 418, 419. Cretans, desiring to belong to Greece, 345; fighting between Turks and, 345, Crete, description of, 341 ; Greek in sentiment, tradition, and purpose, 341 ; liistory of, 341 ; European policy for, 343 ; state of chronic insurrection, 341, 343; public opinion in Eng- land on subject of, 346 ; au- tonomy proposed for, 347. Crimean War, objects of, 335 ; policy of, 399. Crimes Act for Ireland, end of, 171. Criminal laws, need for reform in, 393. Cripps, Mr., member of South Africa Committee, 434. Cromwell, Oliver, proposed stat- ue in Westminster to, 320 ; feeling of Irish against, 331, 332. Cross, Mr., 126. Cross, Sir Richard, Home Secre- tary, 165. Cyprus, English occupation of, 336. Cyprus, Treat}', England's right to protect Christian subjects of Turkey, 338. Daewijt, Chables Bobbkt, death, 113; " Origin of Spe- cies," 113 ; burial in Westmin- ster Abbey, 114. Davis, Thomas, poem on evic- tion, 186. Davitt, Michael, career, 72 ; opin- ion of boycotting, 75 ; speech before Commission in his own defence, 225 ; imprisonment for share in Fenian movement (1867), 237 ; speech on prison 460 INDEX treatment, 390 ; sentence on, 391. Day, Mr. Justice, member of Parnell Commission, 316. Death duties. Sir William Har- court's scheme, 817. Debate on the address— discus- sion on, 407-413. Defoe — R. L. Stevenson's works like those of, 375. Derby, Lord, Colonial Secretary — receiving delegates from Transvaal, 41 ; winning fame in House of Commons, 306. Diamond Jubilee, preparations for, 458. Dickens, Charles, 88, 84 ; lectur- ing in America, 159 ; populari- ty of, 374 ; as a reporter, 435. Dilke, Ashton, retirement and death, 138. Dilke, Sir Charles, regarded as pillar of democracy, 3, 8 ; character — extensive knowl- edge, 9, 10; Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 13 ; opinion of Parnell, 70 ; refusing Cliief Secretaryship for Ireland, 81 ; announcing resolve of Cabinet — to stand or fall on result of division on Sir M. Hicks-Beach's amend- ment, 161 ; attitude to Home Kulo, 180. Dillon, John Blake, Home Rule Nationalist — sketch ^ of, 73 ; attempts to form alliance be- tween English Radicals and Irish Nationaislts, 73; impris- onment, 79 ; releiise, 81 ; im- prisonment — characler, 331. Disraeli, Benjamin, literary M.P., 139; describing Sir R. Peel's scheme for repeal of Corn Laws as " Popkin's plan," 193 ; resignation on Irish State Church question, 198 ; his idea of Tory democrat, 301 ; his wish to be in House of Lords, 307 ; not appreciating comedies of Ben Jonson, 309 ; manner of re- ceiving suggestion from oppo- nent, 309 ; acknowlfidging loy- alty of Irish, 333; sketch of Cardinal Manning as Cardinal Grandiaon in "Lothair," 364; instinct to discover capability, 383 ; on Sir Robert Peel's quo- tations, 308; saying on "the unforeseen," 333 ; calling Cy- prus " a place of arms," 336 ; (see also Beaconsfield, Lord). Dodson, Mr., raised to peerage as Lord Monk Bretton, 5. DoHgola, reconquest of, 898. Du Maurier, George, death, 376 ; sketches in Punch, 376; success of "Trilby," 376. Dufferin, Lord, British ambassa- dor at Constantinople, 103 ; an- nounces conquest of Burma, 169. Dulcisrno, cession to Montenegro, 15,- Dynamite outbreak, 136; con- spiracy on Continent, 383 ; sen- sational reports, 383 ; bombs found in Antwerp, 884. Dynamiters released from prison, 887 ; debate on, 388, 889. Eastekn Question — Armenian massacres, 384; difficulties in European Powers intervening, 335 Education Bill (1896), Govern- ment introduces, 339 ; inviting controversy, 330 ; withdrawn, 333. Educalion Bill (1897), brought in by Mr. Balfour and Sir John Gorst, 450 ; grant in aid of Vol- untary elementary schools, 451; not extending lo Scotland or Ireland, 453 ; bill passed, 453. Education Bill for Ireland — Na- tionalists and Irish Catholics opposing, 378. Egypt, Dual Control in, 95, 100 ; European officials in, 96 ; " in- suriection of colonels," 96 ; crisis, 98 ; armed intervention by England, 107 ; English pol- icy in, 104, 107 ; Radical senti- ments, 104 •; Dual Control — to be maiulaiued, 105 ; National INDEX 461 movement, 107 ; English occu- pation beneficial to population — object of, 109 ; expeditions to extend frontier, 110 ; French dislike to English occupation, 110; British troops withdraw- ing from, 116 ; expedition to relieve Gordon, 134 ; votes of censure on action of Liberal Government in, 160 ; ideas on English occupation of, 333 ; French suspicions of English occupation of, 336 ; English, troubles in, 350 ; policy of Im- perial Government in, 399. Eldon, Lord, 187. Electoral districts. United States system, 142 ; Gladstone's views on, 142. Elliot, Dr., massacred at Benin, 414, 419. Elliot, Sir Henry, Emperor of Austria's supposed speech to, 51, 53. Ellis, John, member of South Africa Committee, 434. Emerson, description of Wendell Phillips, 185. England, conduct of foreign pol- icy, 399 ; obligations to Chris- tian subjects of Porte, 335-339. English, difficulty with Russia on Eastern Question, 837 ; hatred of Russia, 340. English Ministry, various reasons for resignation, 131-133. English prison system, 393-396. "Essays and Reviews," decision of Judicial Committee of Privy Council, 379 ; influence of, 380. Euripides on "the unforeseen," 322. European concert, system of, 345 ; fleets blockading Crete, 345. European possessions in Africa, 417. Explosives Act, Sir William Har- court's measure, 123 ; defects of, 133. Extradition Treaty, operation of, 384. Factohibs Act (1844), 175. Parrer, Sir Thomas (Lord Farrer), Alderman of London County Council, 240 ; member of Irish Financial Commission, 404. Fawcett, Henry, Postmaster-Gen- eral, 5 ; death, 157 ; character, 158 ; pupil and friend of John Stuart Mill, 158. Fenians — breaking out in Ireland, 65 ; attitude towards Parnell, 69 ; policy, 134. Foreign policy, ignorance of pub- lic on, 333. Forster, William Edward, Chief Secretary to Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, sympathy with Ire- land, 6 ; appointment as Chief Secretary welcomed by Irish, 61; hostility of Irish members to, 71 ; unpopular in Ireland, 76 ; character, 77 ; measures of coercion, 78, 80 ; conspiracy to kill, 79 ; resignation, 81 ; char- acter and death, 186 ; Educa- tion Bill, 186, 329 ; failure in Ireland, 186 ; Irish Nationalists' opinion of, 187. Fourth party, members of, 23. Fowler, H. H., President of Local Government Board, 283 ; capac- ity for debate, 283. Fox, on governing Ireland ac- cording to Irish ideas, 194 ; story of his appreciation of a peerage, 307. Franchise Bill, Gladstone intro- ducing, 140 ; reform for Eng- land, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, 143 ; first reading, 144 ; third reading, 144; Lord Cairns's amendment, 144 ; carried, 146 ; Conservative peers' views, 145 ; Government negotiations with Opposition, 146, 148, 149; passed, 150 ; discussions inter- rupted by death of Duke of Albany, 156. Franchise — borough franchise, four kinds, 141. Franchise question, 139. Franklin, Sir John, welcome to, 445. Frederick, German Prince Im- 462 INDEX perial, at Jubilee celebratioD, 231. Freeman, Professor, death, 269; Regius Professor of History at Oxford, 269 ; cbaracter and de- meanor, 270 ; supporting Glad- stone in denouncing Bulgarian massacres, 335. Frencli Republic (1848), upset by Louis Napoleon, 453. Frere, Sir Bartle, opinion of Brit- ish rule in Transvaal, 37 ; death, 158 ; policy, 159. Froude, "Life of Carlyle," 87. Garibaldi, visit to England, 445. General election (1892), return of Liberals, 280. "George Eliot," death and fame, 83 ; popularity of, 274 ; on old familiar airs, 408. George of Greece, Prince, com- manding expedition to Crete, 344. George, Prince Regent, Irish en- thusiasm for, 233. German Emperor, message to President Kruger on Dr. Jame- son's defeat, 371 ; his character, 372. German Empire founded, 454. Giffen, Sir Robert, member of Irish Financial Commission, 404. Gilbert, quotation from his poem, 396. Gladslone, William Bwart, diflB- cullios in forming Ministry, 1- 4 ; denounces annexalion of Transvaal, 38 ; Transvaal poli- cy, 39, 40, 43 ; quotes Emperor of Austria, 51 ; on Austrian foreign policy, 51 ; on Russia as friend of Sclavonic freedom, 51 ; Prime-minister, 53 ; apol- ogy to Emperor of Austria, 54, 55 ; views of Tories on, 55 ; "magnificent indiscretions," 56 ; opinion of Irish land-ten- ure system, 59; return to pow- er welcomed \>y Irish, 60 ; ob- structs passing of Divorce Act, 67 ; new Land Bill for Ireland, 79 ; confidence in Mr. Forster, 80 ; attitude to Irish National- ists, 127; introduces Franchise Bill, 140 ; explains its nature, 141; views on redistribution of seats, 141 ; speech — reform for England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, 143; Redistribution of Seats Bill, 149, 150; Reform Bill (1866) defeated — scone in House, 163 ; resignation, 163, 165 ; declaration of Irish poli- cy, 173 ; manifesto addressed to electors of Midlothian, 171 ; speech in Edinburgh, 172 ; elected for Midlothian, 174 ; attitude on Home Rule, 177, 180 ; speech on Butt's motion, 179 ; consults John Morley on Home Rule, 179 ; Reform Bill of 1866, 180; forms Govern- ment (1886), 180 ; Prime-minis- ter, 188 ; address to electors of Midlothian, 185; policy of Home Rule, 186 ; introduces Bill for Better Government of Ireland, 188 ; new scheme of Home Rule, 197 ; Cabinet re- sign (1886), 198; Act of 1884 for reorganizing divisions of Lon- don, 236 ; messages of sympa- thy on Spurgeon's illness, 269 dependence on Irish National- ist vote (1892), 280 ; forms Ad ministration (1892), 283 ; sec- ond Home Rule Bill, 386, 288 passes Commons, 293; acknowl edgraent of Purnell's help, 394 rejected by Lords, 295, 302 continuance in office, 396, 297 opinion of House of Lords, 397 rumors of resignation, 298 withdrawal from leadership of Liberal party, 299 ; his last speech in the House, 399 ; House did not know, 300; Pali Mall Oaeette on his reasons for retiring, 301 ; resigns leader- ship of Liberal party, 308 ; last words to House of Commons, 313 ; denounces Armenian mas- sacres, 335 ; denounces Bulga- rian massacres, 335 ; Home INDEX 463 Rule Bill (1886), (see Home Rule Bill). Goethe, 113. Goodwin, C. W., siuthor of one of "Essays and Reviews," 380. Gordon, General, visiting Ire- land, 73 ; letter in Times on condition of Ireland, 73 ; at Khartoum — expedition to re- lieve, 134 ; death, 135, 400. Gordon, Mr., massacred at Ben- in, 414, 418. Gorham case, decision of Judi- cial Committee of Privy Coun- cil, 263. Gorst, Sir John, member of Fourth party, 23 ; Vice-Presi- dent of Committee of Council on Education, 326 ; manage- ment of Education Bill (1895), 330 ; speech on " Manipuring," 880. Goschen, ambassador to Con- stantinople, 14 ; services to British bondliolders of Egyp- tian debt, 14 ; speaking at Unionist meeting against Home Rule Bill, 193 ; Brigbt's pre- diction of, 193. Government — Liberal and Tory resignations (1885), 131, 133 ; (Gladstone), external troubles, 184 ; (Liberal), negotiations vrith leaders of Opposition, 146. Grant Duff, Under-Secretary for Colonies, sketch of, 5, 6 ; opin- ion of Franco-German War, 6. Granville, Lord, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 13 ; letter to Lord DufEerin on Egypt, 102; letter to Lord Lyons on Egypt, 103; an Eng- lish occupation of Egypt, 106, 107 ; on Turkish occupation, 106 ; Secretary for Colonies, 183. Greece, action in regard to Crete, 343,344; triumph of Canning's policy for, 345 ; eager for an- nexation of Crete, 846, 454. Greek Government, manifesto on Cretan question, 347. Greg, William Rathbone, "Cas- sandra " essayist, death, 89. Grey, Lord, Reform Bill, reasons of opposition to, 145. GrifBn, Sir Lepel, negotiates with Abdurrahman Khan, 48. Gully, William Court, elected Speaker, 815. Hall, Mrs. S. C, death, 89. Hampton, Lord (Sir John Pakington), career and death, 86. Hanbury, Mr., criticisms on ad- ministration of services, 327. Hannen, Sir James, president of Parnell Commission Court, 216. Harcourt, Sir William, Home Secretary, 5 ; Explosives Bill, 122 ; Chancellor of Exchequer, 188, 283 ; altitude towards Home Rule, 303; attitude of Liberals towards, 804 ; possi- ble leader of House, 306 ; his claims and character, 307 ; leader of Liberal party in House of Commons, 810 ; Chancellor of Exchequer, 317 ; death duties, 817 ; leader of Liberals in Commons, 827 ; position of, 328 ; obstructing Education Bill, 333 ; member of South Africa Committee, 434 ; examining Cecil Rhodes, 436. Harris, Augustus (Sir), member of London County Council, 241. Harrison, Frederic, aldennan of London County Council, 240 ; his character, 240. Hart Dyke, Sir William, Secre- tary to Lord Lieutenant of Ire- land, 165 ; member of South Africa Committee, 484. Hartington, Marquis of, as leader of Liberal.', 2; moves second reading of Franchise Bill, 157 ; attitude on Home Rule, 180 ; declining office, 183 ; speech at Unionist meeting against Home Rule Bill, 193; adverse to 464 INDEX Home Rule, 286 ; elected lead- er of Liberal party, 308. Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 84. Helen of Waldeck, Princess, Duchess of Albany, 156. Hellenes, King of the, conduct during Cretan disturbance, 346. Hennessy, Sir John Pope, Anli- ParnelliteM.P., 392. Herschell, Lord, Lord Chancellor, 283. Hiclts-Beach, Sir M., Chancellor of Exchequer and leader of House of Commons, 165 ; amendment to Childers's Bud- get Bill, 161 ; carried, 162; Chief Secretary to Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, 199 ; resignation, 229 ; character, 229 ; Chancel- lor of Exchequer, 326; an- nounces Imperial policy in Egypt, 400 ; member of South Africa Committee, 434. Hill, Prank H., question on Lord Halifax, 167. Hobhouse, Lord, alderman of London County Council, 340. Holland, Lord, criticism of Lord Macaulay, 208. Home Rule, in abeyance, 80 ; Gladstone's attitude, 177-180 ; Irish desire for, 179 ; Butt's motion, 179 ; arguments for, strengthened by report of Irish Financial Commission, 407. Home Rule Bill (1886), Gladstone introduces — scene in Commons, 188 ; principles of Gladstone's sclieme, 188 ; Grattan's Parlia- ment to be restored, 189 ; Irish Parliament acceptable to Na- tionalists, 189; Irish Parliament —two "orders," 189-191 ; buy- ing out Irish landlords, 190 ; objections of Radicids, 190 ; taxation without representa- tion, 190 ; federal idea, 190 ; objections to Irish being ex- cluded from Imperial Parlia- ment, 191 ; Irish contribution to Imperial excliequer, 191 ; property qualification, 193 ; Unionist meeting to oppose. 193 ; doomed, 195 ; change in public opinion on, 196 ; bill tlirown out, 197 ; rejected by Commons, 293. Home Rule Bill (second), 286; unlikeness to first bill, 286 ; Irish representatives at West- minster, 286 ; Gladstone intro- duces, 287; propositions of, 288 ; passes Commons, 293 ; re- jected by Lords, 298, 302. Home Rule party — strength of party, 178 ; disappearance of nominal Home Rulers, 178 ; di- visions in, 292, 293. Hope, Beresford, appeal against Lady Sandhurst's election to County Council, 344. Horne, R. H., death, 158 ; Poe's admiration for his "Orion," 158 ; burial at Margate, 159. Hospital Fund, Prince of Wales's, 438. Hospitals, management of, dis- cussion on, 430-483. Houghton, Lord (Richard Monck- ton Milnes), sketch of, 168 ; Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, 383. Hughes, Thomas, author of " Tom Brown's School-days," death, 378 ; a radical reformer, 379. Hunt, Holinan, connection with Pre-Raphaelite movement, 113. iDDESLBiair, Lord, sudden death, 206; Lord Randolph Church- ill's opinion of, 206 ; promotion to House of Lords, 206, 207 ; his character and abilities, 208- 210 ; not a successful leader, 308; an able financier, 208; his literary gifts, 309 ; his speeches, 209 ; mourned by " two hosts," 309. India, famine in, 407. Indian Midland Railway, forma- tion of, 169. Ireland, failure of crops, 1879-80, 60, 71 ; disappointment, 76, 77 ; emigration from, 124 ; Board of Agriculture, bill for establish- ing, 403 ; overtaxed, 404, 407, INDEX 465 411 ; Home Rule Bill (see Home Rule Bill). liisL- American dynamite plots riimois of, 123, 133. Irish Finiuicial Commission, 403 ■ report, 404-407. Irish Home Rule — majority in Parliament (1893) for, '280. Irish Land League (see Land League.) Irish Land question, S7 ; amend- ment to address proposed, 58 ; Gladstone's reply, 58; Porster'a reply, 58 ; Act of 1870 a com- promise, 59; eviction, 60; prin- ciple and provisions of Act, 60 ; emigration schemes, 134, 125 ; Pariiell's proposal for mi- gration, 135. Irish Nationalists — and Radicals fighting for abolition of flog- ging in army and navy, 3; Third party, 33, 62; amendment to ad- dress proposed by, 58 ; bill for compensation for disturbance, 61; manifesto denouncing Phoe- nix Park murders, 83; and Lib- eral Government — feud be- tween, 127 ; Sir Henry Brand in collision with, 154 ; action of party — key to position, 165, 174; impressions of attitude of, 174 ; manifesto, 172, 174 ; atti- tude towards Queen's Jubilee, 233-234 ; opposing Education Bill for Ireland, 278; re-elect- ing Parnell their leader, 2S9 ; attitude on Iiish taxation, 411. Irish party, dissension in, 336. Irish Whig Home Ruler, Glad- stone's definition of, 63. Italy becomes a single kingdom, ■ 454. Ivo.ry, alias Bell, committed for trial — released, 386. Jack the Ripper. 390, 893. Jackson, William L., chairman of South Africa Committee, 434. James, Sir Henry, in Ministry of 1880, 5 ; refusing office, 184 ; sketch of his career, 185. Jameson, Dr., Administrator of 20* Chartered Ccnnpany in South Africa — raid into Transvaal, 361, 367 ; defeated by Boers and made prisoner, 368 ; trial, sentence, and release, 368; state- ment before Committee of In- quiry, 439. Jiimeson raid, committee of in- qniryinto, 434; inquiry byCape Colony Parliament, 435. Johnson, Dr., advice to Irishmen on Act of Union, 405. Jowett, Professor, author of one of " EsPiiys and Reviews," 380. Jubilee relelirations of 1887, W. H, Smiili's proposal, 330 ; Jubi- lee coinage, 230 ; scene in Lon- don, 230 ; service in Westmin- ster Abbey, 231 ; celebrated in Canada, 232; Ireland silent, 232; Queen's letter, 235. Junior Carlton Club, dynamite explosion at, 136. Karolyi, Count, Austrian am- bassador to England, Glad- stone's correspondence with, 54 ; assurance to Gladstone on Treaty of Berlin, 54. Khartoum, fall of, 160. Khedive of Egypt, title conferred by Porte, 95 ; action against the Khalifa, 398. Kilmainham Treaty, 81 ; Tories reviving question of, 128. Kimberley, Lord, Secretary of State for Colonies, 5 ; Secre- tary for India, 183, 283; as Gladstone's possible successor, 305; leader of Liberal peers, 397. Kruger, President, typical Boer, 363 ; his character, 363 ; con- trast between him and Cecil Rhodes, 364 ; collision between his influence and Rliodes's, 364 ; suspicious of Uitlanders, 365 ; action towards invaders, 368. Kruger, Stephen John Paul, one of triumvirate, 39. Laboucherb, sketch of, 17 ; 466 INDEX founds Th-uth, 17 ; opposes grant to Lord Alcesler, 117 ; place in Liberal party, 285 ; character, 285 ; service done l)y Truth, 285 ; his cynicism, 285 ; member of South Africa Com- mittee, 434. Lamb, Charles, buried at Edmon- ton, 159. Lamb, Charles, R. L. Steven- son's essays equal to those of, 275. Land Act of 1870 (see under Irish Land Question). Land Bill for Ireland, passed, 79; inadequate to needs, 79. Land League, formation of, 62, 73 ; Stale prosecution of execu- tive body, 75. Lawson, Harry, member of Lon- don County Council, 241. Leighton, Lord, President of Royal . Academy, death. 374 ; style of painting, 874 ; a sculptor, 375 ; manners and accomplishments, 375. Lewis, Sir George Cornewall, opinion on government of London, 237. Li Hung Cliang, visiting Lon- don, 443, 446. Liberal Government, peculiar position of, 128 ; fall of (1885), 160, 162, 163 ; cause of, 160 ; resignation (1895), 324. Liberal Ministry of 1880, difB- culties In forming, 1-4 ; diffi- culties of Radical representa- tion, 8. Liberal peers, minority in House of Lords, 310. Lingen, Lord, alderman of Lon- don County Council, 240. Lobanoff, Prince, opposed to European Powers intervening to coerce the Porte, 337. Local Government Act, 244; Chamberlain on, 279. Local Veto Bill, introduced by Sir William Harcourt, 325. Locke, escape from Benin mas- sacre, 414 ; wounded, 418 ; es- cape into bush, 410. London alderman, popular idea of, 240, 241. Loudon Bridge — dynamite ex- plosion on, 136. London Convention, signed, 41; conditions of, 42 ; England re- taining suzerainty over Trans- vaal, 360. London County Council, cstab- blished, 239 ; its powers, 239 ; members elected, 240 ; chair- man, 240 ; aldermen, 240 ; meni- bei-s, 240, 241 ; representative men, 241 ; women members not allowed, 244, 245. London, government of, 235 ; City of London, 236 ; City of Westminster, 336 ; Finsbury, 236 ; Lambeth and Southwark, 236 ; government by vestries, 237 ; by Metropolitan Board of Works, 288 ; by County Coun- cil {see London County Coun- cil). Lord Penrhyn's quarries {see Penrhyn's, Lord, Quarries). Louis Napoleon, reasons for alli- ance with England, 336 ; Em- pire overthrown at Sedan, 454. Lowe, Robert, made Lord Sher- brooke, 14 ; death, 14 ; writing for Times, 129 ; definition of small liouseholders, 146 ; pithy answer of, 358 ; reputation in Australia, 377. Lubbock, Sir John, motion for instruction to transfer votes, 150 ; Chairman of London County Council, 240, 241. Lyons, Lord, English ambassa- dor in Paris, 105. Lytton, Lord, Viceroy of India, character — resignation, 6, 7. MACAtriiAT, Lord, 83 ; definition of parliamentary government, 410. Madox Brown, Eord, connection with pre - Raphaelite move- ment, 113, 371 ; death. 270 ; early education, 271 ; paintings appreciated in provinces, 271 ; INDEX 467 painting liistovical pictures for Manchester Town-liall, 271; character, 271-374; death of his son, 272 ; atypical Englisli- man, 273 ; no wish to found a school, 373. Madox Brown, Oliver, painter, and author of " Gahiiel Den- ver." death, 273. Mah