he was chosen president in 1859. If he had devoted his whole life to the study and teaching of science, and had occupied a professor's chair, he could not have spoken more to the point, or more in the spirit of philosophy. But it was in connection with the Great Exhibition of 1851, with which his name will be for ever associated in history, that he became more especially the exponent of social progress. On the 21st of March, 1850, the Lord Mayor of London, Thomas Farncomb, gave a banquet to Her Majesty's Ministers, the Foreign Ambassadors, the Royal Commissioners of the Exhibition of 1851, and the mayors of 180 towns. In responding to the toast of his health on that occasion, the Prince said: "Nobody who has paid any attention to the peculiar features of our present era, will doubt for a moment that we are living at a period of most wonderful transition, which tends rapidly to accomplish that great end to which, indeed, all history points-the realisation of the unity of mankind: not a unity which breaks down the limits and levels the peculiar characteristics of the different nations of the earth, but rather a unity the result and product of those very national varieties and antagonistic qualities. The distances which separated the different nations and parts of the globe are rapidly vanishing before the achievements of modern invention, and we can traverse them with incredible ease; the languages of all nations are known, and their requirements placed within the reach of everybody; thought is communicated with the rapidity, and even by the power, of lightning. On the other hand, the great principle of the division of labour, which may be called the moving power of civilisation, is being extended to all branches of science, industry, and art.

cannot be too grateful for the advantages afforded by the fact that Christian ministers not only preach the doctrines of Christianity, but live among their congregations, an example for the discharge of every Christian duty, as husbands, fathers, and masters of families, themselves capable of fathoming the whole depth of human feelings, desires, and difficulties."* Alluding on the same occasion to the progress of civilisation, the Prince remarked: “And this civilisation rests on Christianity-could only be raised on Christianity-can only be maintained by Christianity!" In a History of England for the People, we cannot better close this sketch of the Prince's character than by quoting the concluding sentences of his speech on national education. After eloquently enforcing the duty of every man to develop his faculties, and place himself in harmony with the Divine prototype, so as to attain that happiness which is offered to him on earth, to be completed hereafter in entire union with him, through the mercy of Christ, he said: "But he can also leave these faculties unimproved, and miss his mission on earth. He will then sink to the level of the lower animals, forfeit happiness, and separate from his God, whom he did not know how to find. I say man has no right to do this; he has no right to throw off the task which is laid upon him for his happiness; it is his duty to fulfil his mission to the utmost of his power; but it is our duty, the duty of those whom Providence has removed from this awful struggle, and placed beyond this fearful danger, manfully, unceasingly, and untiringly to aid, by advice, assistance, and example, the great battle of the people, who, without such aid, must almost inevitably ..succumb to the difficulty of their task. They will not cast from them the aiding hand, and the Almighty will bless the labours of those who work in his cause.”†

So man is approaching a more complete fulfilment of that great and sacred mission which he has to perform in this world. His reason being created after the image of God, he has to use it to discover the laws by which the Almighty governs his creation; and by making these laws his standard of action, to conquer Nature to his use, himself a Divine instrument." *

Nor was the Prince less enlightened or less earnest as a Christian man than as a philosopher and a political economist. Referring, on one occasion, to dissensions in the Church, he said: "I have no fear, however, for her safety and ultimate welfare, so long as she holds fast to what our ancestors gained for us at the Reformationthe Gospel and the unfettered right of its use." Again, at the anniversary of the Corporation of the Sons of the Clergy, in 1854, he remarked: "When our ancestors purified the Christian faith, and shook off the yoke of a domineering priesthood, they felt that the key-stone of that wonderful fabric which had grown up in the dark times of the Middle Ages was the celibacy of the clergy, and shrewdly foresaw that their reformed faith and newly-won religious liberty would, on the contrary, only be secure in the hands of a clergy united with the people by every sympathy-national, personal, and domestic. This nation has enjoyed for 300 years the blessing of a church establishment which rests upon this basis, and

Speeches, pp. 113–112,

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CHAPTER II.

The Year 1862- Affair of the Nashville-Meeting of Parliament Speech of Mr. Disraeli on the death of the Prince Consort - The Revised Code Reasons for its introduction - Adopted with modifications Church Rates - -Debates on the Civil War in America Marriage of the Princess Alice State of things in China- New Game-law introduced by Sir Baldwin Leighton · Reflections on it- Mr. Cobden attacks the Ministry - Reply of Lord Palmerston Garrote robberies-Gift of Mr. PeabodyAffair of Aspromonte Revolution in Greece- Banishment of King Otho - Election of Prince George of Denmark - Cession of the Ionian Islands - War in America - Operations in Tennessee Battle of Pittsburg Landing - Campaign in Virginia — M'Lellan Commander-in-Chief Lands his army on the York peninsula - Advances on Richmond - Battles of the Chickahominy-M'Lellan retreats-The troops re-embarked-Jackson forces Pope back upon Washington - Lee invades Maryland Fall of Harper's Ferry- Battle of Antietam Lee retreats Burnside supersedes M'Lellan Battle of Fredericksburg Bragg's invasion of Kentucky Results in failure- Naval operations Taking of Roanoke - Exploits of the Merrimac Her fight with the Monitor - Farragut passes the forts and captures New Orleans- Butler is made Governor His famous proclamation - Execution of Mumford-Steps taken towards the emancipation of the slaves - Mr. Lincoln's message on the indivisibility of the United States-Reflections on it.

A.D. 1862.] SPEECH OF MR. DISRAELI ON THE DEATH OF THE PRINCE CONSORT.

of any pupil who might pass satisfactorily in any one of the three.

The plan of the Government was severely criticised by many Conservative members, and met with little favour out of doors among those who had been most active in the establishment, and continued most zealous in the support, of primary schools. Especially the clergy of the Church of England complained of the suddenness of the change, of the utter disregard which it showed to the

Committee of Council for Education in the preceding summer. Two great defects had gradually become apparent in the working of the system by which state aid was extended to primary schools-the one administrative; the other educational. The nature of the first will be apparent when it is stated that, till now, every teacher in a school receiving an annual grant, and every pupil teacher, had been separately recognised and dealt with by the Education department; and since the number of such schools had been enormously increased since the Com-claims and services of the pupil teachers, of the pecuniary mittee of Council commenced its operations, the strain on the organisation of the department had by this time become nearly intolerable. Conceive a department having to make out monthly or quarterly pay-warrants, often for ridiculously small sums, for twenty thousand pupil teachers! The other defect of the system of annual grants Mr. Lowe (then Vice-President of the Council) considered to be this, that, notwithstanding the check of Government inspection, it did not provide sufficient security for the economical application of the public money. The grants often. answered, he thought, showy rather than useful purposes. A large proportion of the teachers-such was his argument-concentrate their attention on their highest classes, their extra subjects, and their cleverest boys; the annual examination thus becomes an occasion for the display of carefully selected pupils, and for the gratification of their master's vanity, and ceases to be a careful scrutiny, probing into the state of the school from top to bottom, and testing the progress made by the younger and duller, no less than that made by the older and cleverer boys. Nor was it. in human nature, he thought, for the Government inspectors, though men of the highest character and ability, not to give in to some extent to this inevitable bias of teachers, and, however unconsciously, to be "carried away by their dissimulation." To inspectors also, it was a thousand times pleasanter to examine ten sharp boys than fifty stupid ones, and a saving of trouble to assume, without actually testing it, that the lower classes were relatively as far advanced and as well taught as the top class.

difficulties in which they themselves as managers would in many cases be involved by it. There were some who went so far as to say that the teachers and pupil teachers had obtained a kind of vested right in their annual grants; but this was soon shown to be a mistaken opinion. Mr. Walpole moved, on the 11th March, a series of resolutions, declaring it to be inexpedient to adopt the principle of payment by results exclusively, and censuring many other portions of the Code. The House, however, went into Committee; but shortly before the Easter recess the Government took into its serious consideration the objections which had been raised to their plan, and resolved to introduce such modifications as would disarm the opposition of the more influential and reasonable objectors. The chief concession was the re-introduction of a small establishment grant, having nothing to do with " payment by results," to the extent of 4s. per annum for each child in daily attendance; something also was done for the pupil teachers. The opposition was satisfied, and Mr. Walpole withdrew his resolutions; and the scheme thus sanctioned by Parliament regulates to this day the apportionment of the public grant in aid of primary schools.

The attempt made in 1861 to pass a bill for the abolition of Church rates was renewed by Sir John Trelawny in the present year, but fared rather worse than before, the bill being rejected on the second reading by a majority of one in a full House.

The progress of the civil war in America-of which a connected account will be given farther on-excited a restless feeling in England, which naturally found its expression within the walls of Parliament. The tidings of It was on the strength of considerations such as these that sanguinary conflicts occurring along the whole frontier Mr. Lowe drew up his Revised Code, which was at once territory, from the west of Missouri to the shores of Virto relieve the strain on the administrative machinery of ginia-of cities in flames, industry wrecked, hundreds of the department, and to introduce the principle of "pay-persons arrested under martial law and languishing in ment by results." All recognition of, and all grants to, state prisons, relentless executions, and wholesale plunder teachers and pupil teachers were to cease, and the de--shook the mind of England to its inmost depths, and, partment was henceforward to have dealings with none but the managers of schools. Secondly, the establishment grants for fixed cums, which had been hitherto made to teachers and pupil teachers certified to be efficient by the Government inspector, were to be replaced by capitation grants, regulated in the following manner :-On the day of the annual examination, all pupils who during the previous twelve months had attended school at least one hundred times, might be presented by the teacher to be examined by the inspector in reading, writing, and arithmetic. Six "standards," varying in difficulty with the age of the pupils, were settled in each of these subjects; and a certain small grant was to be obtainable in respect

according to the pre-conceived sympathies of different characters and classes, were variously judged and interpreted. Merchants, impatient at the cotton famine, found spokesmen in Parliament to inveigh against the fitfulness and inefficiency of the blockade of the Southern ports, and to urge the Government to interfere. But since, to say nothing of the strong evidence produced on the other side proving that the blockade was as effective as was possible under the circumstances, the very fact that there was a cotton famine established the point to any reasonable mind without more ado, the advocates of English interference on this ground took nothing by their motion. The language used by General Butler in his

miles of Shang-hai, the great port near the mouth of the Yang-tse Kiang. But the Tae-pings broke this treaty, and spread terror and confusion almost to the gates of Shang-hai; trade was consequently deranged; and the British authorities, with the full sanction of the Chinese Government, raised an armed force, retook Ning-po from the Tae-pings, and made permanent and effectual arrangements for the defence of all the treaty ports. If events do not take in China the turn that they have taken in India, it will be rather owing to the mutual surveillance and jealousy of the Western Powers, than because the process of gradual subjugation would in itself present much difficulty.

Snipe, being barbarously described in the Act as "snipes," may be said to be made game of in a double sense. Further, rabbits, which have never before come within the scope of the Game Laws, any more than sparrows, are made game for the purposes of this Act.

But the sting of the Act was in the second clause; in it could be seen, it was said, the motive of the large and sweeping definition contained in the first. Under this second clause, it is lawful "for any constable or peaceofficer, in any county, borough, or place in Great Britain and Ireland, in any highway, street, or public place, to search any person whom he may have good cause to suspect of coming from any land where he shall have been unlawfully in search or pursuit of game, or any person aiding or abetting such person, and having in his possession any game unlawfully obtained, or any gun, part of gun, or nets or engines used for the killing or taking of game, and also to stop and search any cart or other conveyance in or on which such constable or peace-officer shall have good cause to suspect that any such game or any such article or thing is being carried by any such person, and should there be found any game or any such article upon such person, cart, &c., to seize and detain" the same, and apply to some magistrate for a warrant. The said magistrate may, upon conviction, fine the delinquent to the extent of five pounds.

Sir Baldwin Leighton's Act, the object of which was to enlist the services of the county police as assistant gamekeepers to the country gentlemen, deserves our particular attention; for the time will come, and that speedily, when the enactment of such a law by the Parliament of a civilised nation, in the latter half of the nineteenth century, will appear something monstrous and incredible. The numerous opponents of the bill asked, Is this for England, or for Turkey? is it a law passed for the public good by the representatives of a free people, or a forest edict framed in the interest of his own pleasures by a Norman tyrant? The measure had been originally introduced in the Upper House by Lord Berners, but the Lords were too sensible to entertain it, and turned it out of doors with ignominy. The bill was then adopted by Sir Baldwin Leighton in the Lower House, and by careful tactics, and arranging that a sufficient number of its friends should always be within call so as to ensure a superiority of force at the decisive moment, the country gentlemen carried it through all its stages and passed it. The Lords then had no scruple about accepting a bill which naturally could not but command their sympathies, and the kill became law. This result was the more singular, inasmuch as the Government and all the sincere Liberals opposed the bill on every stage. Mr. W. E. Forster moved that it be read a second time that day three months, saying that, although it might not be the object of the promoters of the bill, it was certainly regarded out of doors as a proposal to turn the county police into gamekeepers, a service which would prove very detrimental to the execution of their other duties. Sir George Grey, the Home Secretary, warmly opposed the measure, both in principle and details; and stated that twenty-eight chief constables had signed a memorial the year before against the employment of the police in the preservation of game. But, owing to the apathy of the borough members (an apathy proved by the smallness of the numbers on the division lists), the opposition failed. Let us now examine the Act itself, which is extremely short, because its promoters had no other thought but that of protecting their own pleasures; to introduce safeguards and provisoes tending to preserve the rights and dignity of free English-nents, who were then in power without the responsibility men from encroachment, was a matter about which they do not appear to have troubled themselves in the least. The first clause gives a new definition of "Game." According to this, a pheasant's or a partridge's eggs are as much "game" as the pheasant or partridge itself.

Although, in the debates of the session there had been, according to that joint understanding with which it was begun, little exhibition of party heat or rancour, yet the spectacle of a large section of the Tory party almost openly avowing their sympathy with Lord Palmerston and his policy, and the evident congeniality between him and them, were not suffered to pass without observation. Towards the close of the session, Mr. Cobden, in a carefully prepared and powerful speech, arraigned the policy of the Prime Minister as that of a man who was fighting, or pretending to fight, under a banner not his own, and whose acts were nicely calculated to gain the approval of his ostensible adversaries, and carry discouragement into the ranks of his nominal adherents. He asked, What had been the professed principles of the Liberal party? They were economy, non-intervention, and reform. But the present was the most extravagant Government which had administered the affairs of the country in time of peace during the present generation. This assertion he supported by an elaborate comparison, and proceeded to ascribe the whole of this increased expenditure to Lord Palmerston, who himself represented a policy, and who had cost the country no less a sum than £100,000,000. After adverting to the wars with China as instances of the departure of the Ministry from the policy of non-intervention, he turned to the state of great Liberal questions and of parties in the house, which, he said, was not an honest state. Lord Palmerston was not governing the country by his own party, but with the aid of his political oppo

of office. He analysed Lord Palmerston's liberalism by his acts. The ballot, and other questions in which members on that side of the house took an interest, were going back under the noble lord's leadership. Rather than continue as they were, he would prefer being in opposi