uine constitutional government, such as we know, had not yet been tried. The very manner in which the Reform Bill had been carried, the political stratagem which had been resorted to when further resistance seemed dangerous, was not likely to exalt in popular estimate the value of what was then gracefully called constitutional government. Only a short time before, the country had seen Catholic emancipation conceded, not from a sense of justice on the part of ministers, but avowedly because further resistance must lead to civil disturbance. There was not much in all this to impress an intelligent and independent people with a sense of the great wisdom of the rulers of the country, or of the indis, pensable advantages of the system which they represented. Social discontent prevailed almost everywhere. Economic laws were hardly understood by the country in general. Class interests were fiercely arrayed against each other. The cause of each man's class filled him with a positive fanaticism. He was not a mere selfish and grasping partisan, but he sincerely believed that each other class was arrayed against his, and that the natural duty of self-defence and self-preservation compelled him to stand firmly by his own.

CHAPTER II.

STATESMEN AND PARTIES.

LORD MELBOURNE was the First Minister of the Crown when the Queen succeeded to the throne. He was a man who then and always after made himself particularly dear to the Queen, and for whom she had the strongest regard. He was of kindly, somewhat indolent nature; fair and even generous toward his political opponents; of the most genial disposition toward his friends. He was emphatically not a strong man. He was not a man to make good grow where it was not already growing, to adopt the expression of a great author. Long before that time his eccentric wife, Lady Caroline Lamb, had excused herself for some of her follies and frailties by pleading that her husband was not a man to watch over any one's morals. He was a kindly counsellor to a young Queen; and, happily for herself, the young Queen

in this case had strong, clear sense enough of her own not to be absolutely dependent on any counsel. Lord Melbourne was not a statesman. His best qualities, personal kindness and good-nature apart, were purely negative. He was unfortunately not content even with the reputation for a sort of indolent good-nature which he might have well deserved: he strove to make himself appear hopelessly idle, trivial, and careless. When he really was serious and earnest, he seemed to make it his business to look like one in whom no human affairs could call up a gleam of interest. He became the fanfaron of levities which he never had. We have amusing pictures of him as he occupied himself in blowing a feather or nursing a sofa-cushion while receiving an important and perhaps highly sensitive deputation from this or that commercial "interest." Those who knew him insisted that he really was listening with all his might and main; that he had sat up the whole night before, studying the question which he seemed to think so unworthy of any attention; and that, so far from being, like Horace, wholly absorbed in his trifles, he was at very great pains to keep up the appearance of a trifler. A brilliant critic has made a lively and amusing attack on this alleged peculiarity. "If the truth must be told," says Sydney Smith, our viscount is somewhat of an impostor. Everything about him seems to betoken careless desolation; any one would suppose from his manner that he was playing at chuck-farthing with human happiness; that he was always on the heel of pastime; that he would giggle away the Great Charter, and decide by the method of teetotum whether my lords the bishops should or should not retain their seats in the House of Lords. All this is but the mere vanity of surprising, and making us believe that he can play with kingdoms as other men can with ninepins.... I am sorry to hurt any man's feelings, and to brush away the magnificent fabric of levity and gaycty he has reared; but I accuse our minister of honesty and diligence; I deny that he is careless or rash: he is nothing more than a man of good understanding and good principle disguised in the eternal and somewhat wearisome affectation of a political roué."

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Such a masquerading might perhaps have been excusable, or even attractive, in the case of a man of really brilliant

and commanding talents. Lookers-on are always rather apt to be fascinated by the spectacle of a man of well recognized strength and force of character playing for the moment the part of an indolent trifler. The contrast is charming in a brilliant Prince Hal or such a Sardanapalus as Byron drew. In our own time a considerable amount of the popularity of Lord Palmerston was inspired by the amusing antagonism between his assumed levity and his well-known force of intellect and strength of will. But in Lord Melbourne's case the affectation had no such excuse or happy effect. He was not by any means a Palmerston. He was only fitted to rule in the quietest times. He was a poor speaker, utterly unable to encounter the keen, penetrating criticisms of Lyndhurst or the vehement and remorseless invectives of Brougham. Debates were then conducted with a bitterness of personality unknown, or at all events very rarely known, in our days. Even in the House of Lords language was often interchanged of the most virulent hostility. The rushing impetuosity and fury of Brougham's style had done much then to inflame the atmosphere which in our days is usually so cool and moderate.

It probably added to the warmth of the attacks on the ministry of Lord Melbourne that the Prime-minister was supposed to be an especial favorite with the young Queen. When Victoria came to the throne the Duke of Wellington gave frank expression to his feelings as to the future of his party. He was of opinion that the Tories would never have any chance with a young woman for sovereign. "I have no small-talk," he said, "and Peel has no manners.' "It had probably not occurred to the Duke of Wellington to think that a woman could be capable of as sound a constitutional policy, and could show as little regard for personal predilections in the busines of government, as any man. All this, however, only tended to embitter the feeling against the Whig government. Lord Melbourne's constant attendance on the young Queen was regarded with keen jealousy and dissatisfaction. According to some critics, the Primeminister was endeavoring to inspire her with all his own gay heedlessness of character and temperament. According to others, Lord Melbourne's purpose was to make himself agreeable and indispensable to the Queen; to surround

her with his friends, relations, and creatures, and thus get a lifelong hold of power in England, in defiance of political changes and parties. It is curious now to look back on much that was said in the political and personal heats and bitternesses of the time. If Lord Melbourne had been a French mayor of the palace, whose real object was to make himself virtual ruler of the State, and to hold the sovereign as a puppet in his hands, there could not have been greater anger, fear, and jealousy. Since that time we have all learned on the very best authority that Lord Melbourne actually was himself the person to advise the Queen to show some confidence in the Tories-to "hold out the olive-branch a little to them," as he expressed it. He does not appear to have been greedy of power, or to have used any unfair means of getting or keeping it. The character of the young sovereign seems to have impressed him deeply. His real or affected levity gave way to a genuine and lasting desire to make her life as happy, and her reign as successful, as he could. The Queen always felt the warmest affection and gratitude for him, and showed it long after the public had given up the suspicion that she could be a puppet in the hands of a minister.

Still, it is certain that the Queen's Prime-minister was by no means a popular man at the time of her accession. Even observers who had no political or personal interest whatever in the conditions of cabinets were displeased to see the opening of the new reign so much, to all appearance, under the influence of one who either was or tried to be a mere lounger. The deputations went away offended and disgusted when Lord Melbourne played with feathers or dandled sofa-cushions in their presence. The almost fierce energy and strenuousness of a man like Brougham showed in overwhelming contrast to the happy-go-lucky airs and graces of the Premier. It is likely that there was quite as much of affectation in the one case as in the other; but the affectation of a devouring zeal for the public service told at least far better than the other in the heat and stress of debate. When the new reign began, the ministry had two enemies or critics in the House of Lords of the most formidable character. Either alone would have been a trouble to a minister of far stronger mould than Lord Melbourne;

but circumstances threw them both, for the moment, into a chance alliance against him.

One of these was Lord Brougham. No stronger and stranger a figure than his is described in the modern history of England. He was gifted with the most varied and striking talents, and with a capacity for labor which sometimes seemed almost superhuman. Not merely had he the capacity for labor, but he appeared to have a positive passion for work. His restless energy seemed as if it must stretch itself out on every side seeking new fields of conquest. The study that was enough to occupy the whole time and wear out the frame of other men was only recreation to him. He might have been described as one possessed by a very demon of work. His physical strength never gave way. Ilis high spirits never deserted him. His self-confidence was boundless. He thought he knew everything, and could do everything better than any other man. He delighted in giving evidence that he understood the business of the specialist better than the specialist himself. His vanity was overweening, and made him ridiculous almost as often and as much as his genius made him admired. The comic literature of more than a generation had no subject more fruitful than the vanity and restlessness of Lord Brougham. He was beyond doubt a great Parliamentary orator. His style was too diffuse and sometimes too uncouth to suit a day like our own, when form counts for more than substance, when passion seems out of place in debate, and not to exaggerate is far more the object than to try to be great. Brougham's action was wild, and sometimes even furious; his gestures were singularly ungraceful; his manners were grotesque; but of his power over his hearers there could be no doubt. That power remained with him until a far later date; and long after the years when men usually continue to take part in political debate, Lord Brougham could be impassioned, impressive, and even overwhelming. He was not an orator of the highest class: his speeches have not stood the test of time. Apart from the circumstances of the hour and the personal power of the speaker, they could hardly arouse any great delight, or even interest; for they are by no means models of English style, and they have little of that profound philosophical interest, that pregnancy