deeper than these things. The decrees of God are as fixed to-day as they were two thousand years ago, but they can be worked to their conclusion by the weakness of men as well as by the strength of angels.

"There is a grey frontlet of rock far away in Strathspeyonce Gordon's home-whose name in bygone times gave a rallying-call to a kindred clan. The scattered firs and windswept heather on the lone summit of Craig Ellachie once whispered in Highland clansmen's ear the war-cry, 'Stand fast! Craig Ellachie.' Many a year has gone by since kith of Charles Gordon last heard from Highland hilltop the signal of battle, but never in Celtic hero's long record of honour has such answer been sent back to Highland or to Lowland as when this great heart stopped its beating, and lay steadfast unto death' in the dawn of Khartoum. The winds that moan through the pine trees on Craig Ellachie have far-off meanings in their voices. Perhaps on that dark January night there came a breath from heaven to whisper to the old Highland rock, 'He stood fast! Craig Ellachie.'

"The dust of Gordon is not laid in English earth, nor does even the ocean, which has been named Britannia's realm, hold in its vast and wandering grave' the bones of her latest hero. Somewhere, far out in the immense desert whose sands so often gave him rest in life, or by the shores of that river which was the scene of so much of his labour, his ashes now add their wind-swept atoms to the mighty waste of the Soudan. But if England, still true to the long line of her martyrs to duty, keep his memory precious in her heart-making of him no false idol or brazen image of glory, but holding him as he was, the mirror and measure of true knighthood-then better than in effigy or epitaph will his life be written, and his nameless tomb become a citadel to his nation."

Thus have art and letters combined to do honour to "this superb and knightly figure," and in so doing they have done honour to themselves.

CHAPTER LII

SENATOR GEORGE VEST AND BLAINE

It is not my intention in this book to cite examples of fine English prose written by citizens of the United States of America. I do not think I have at present sufficiently studied transatlantic writers adequately to deal with them as they deserve, and in any case there would not be room in this book for the adventure. But two short fragments I cannot forbear to quote as having long been familiar to me as very beautiful. The first is a passage on the dog as man's faithful friend, delivered by Senator George Vest, of Missouri, in a speech in the Law Courts:

"The best friend a man has in this world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or his daughter, that he has reared with loving care, may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith.

66 The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him perhaps when he needs it most.

"A man's reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honour when success is with us may be the first to throw stones of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads.

"The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous is his dog.

"A man's dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground,

where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be by his Master's side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer, he will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounter with the roughness of the world.

"He guards the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert he remains.

"When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journey through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth an outcast in the world, friendless, homeless, the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him to guard against danger, to fight against his enemies. And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace, and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the graveside will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even to death."

This book is not the appropriate place for humanitarian propaganda, but I may perhaps be permitted here to express a deep sorrow that any man can find it in his heart to inflict woeful sufferings on dogs in the pursuit of benefits for himself and his fellow-men.

The other passage I desire now to quote is an utterance of the American statesman Blaine on the tragic fate of President Garfield, who was wounded by an assassin and ultimately, after much suffering, died of the injury inflicted upon him :

"As the end drew near, his early craving for the sea returned. The stately mansion of power had been to him the wearisome hospital of pain, and he begged to be taken from its prison walls, from its oppressive stifling air, from its homelessness and its baselessness.

66

Gently, silently, the love of a great people bore the pale sufferer to the longed-for healing of the sea, to live or to die, as God should will, within sight of its heaving billows, within sound of its manifold voices.

66

With wan fevered face, tenderly lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked out wistfully upon the ocean's changing

wonders; on its far sails, whitening in the morning light; on its restless waves, rolling shoreward to break and die beneath the noon-day sun; on the red clouds of evening, arching low to the horizon; on the serene and shining pathway of the stars.

"Let us think that his dying eyes read a mystic meaning which only the rapt and parting soul may know. Let us believe that in the silence of the receding world he heard the great waves breaking on a farther shore, and felt upon his wasted brow the breath of the eternal morning."

These are but a couple of lovely flowers from a sumptuous garden, and if life and opportunity serve I may someday pluck a full basket of roses from it for my own and my readers' delight.

CHAPTER LIII

LORD MORLEY OF BLACKBURN

WITH diffidence I venture to speak of living writers who have contributed to the glory of English prose. Time is necessary for the just adjudication of any literary work. Posterity is our only true judge. Martin Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy was once on every one's table from Windsor Castle to the curate's parlour; it dominated the literary world as haughtily as did the crinoline the social world. are now in their proper place!

Both

Who among living writers will survive to the third and fourth generation few will have the temerity to foretell, but Lord Morley of Blackburn is, I think, an acknowledged master of English prose certain of future fame, and in his Life of Gladstone he has given the world a biography which can never disappear. He has not the passion of Carlyle, nor the music of Ruskin; a stately reserve veiling controlled power distinguishes his style; but in his description of Gladstone launching in the House of Commons his great Home Rule Bill for Ireland Lord Morley has drawn a vivid picture of the pomp and circumstance that surrounded that last heroic adventure of the greatest statesman of the age:

No such scene has ever been beheld in the House of Commons. Members came down at break of day to secure their places; before noon every seat was marked, and crowded benches were even arrayed on the floor of the House from the Mace to the Bar. Princes, ambassadors,