tinued his intimacy with his fortunate successor, Mr. Rose persisted in believing that Mr. Addington had deliberately undermined his patron by flattering the prejudices of the King. His suspicions seem to have been unfounded, but his negative evidence may justify a suspension of judgment on the charge against Lord Auckland. The intemperate speech which gave just offence, would seem to indicate surprise and disappointment rather than gratification at the success of a recent intrigue. It is not impossible that the movers in the transaction may have calculated on a schism in the Government rather than on Mr. Pitt's resignation. The ejection of Mr. Dundas and of other friends of the Catholic cause, would have opened a vacancy for Lord Auckland, and might possibly have increased Lord Loughborough's influence in the Cabinet. It is at least certain that no cordiality existed between the Chancellor and the Speaker. Mr. Abbot in his conversation on the change of Government recommended Mr. Addington at once to get rid of the colleague whom he designated as Cardinal de Retz, and the new Minister replied without hesitation that the retirement of the Chancellor was already settled. Lord Loughborough had plotted for the benefit of a more plausible politician and a profounder lawyer than himself, but before he resigned the Seals he performed an act of characteristic audacity, in procuring the Royal assent to a Bill through the agency of the physician, at a time when the King was insane. Lord Eldon himself never bettered the example of his wily and daring predecessor.

Lord Auckland retained the place of Postmaster-General till the resignation of Addington, in 1804, and he was President of the Board of Trade, under Lord Grenville, in 1806. The loss of his eldest son in 1810 put an end to his interest in public affairs, and in 1814 he closed his busy and eventful life. Notwithstanding the considerable success of his career, he was probably a disappointed man. Though he was prominent among the second rank of politicians, he might reasonably feel that his knowledge, his abilities, and his large experience qualified him for a more considerable place in the Ministry. Few candidates for high promotion acquiesce in the dispensations of Fortune, which seldom coincide accurately with the claims of talent or of merit. If Mr. Eden had been contented, after the defeat of the Coalition, to remain in the ranks of the Opposition, his desire of eminence would have perhaps been gratified at the expense of his legitimate wish for active employment. He would not have negotiated the Commercial Treaty, but he would

have been the best economist and the ablest parliamentary tactician of the Whig party. In the schism of 1792 he would have been in a position to make terms with the Minister, and Mr. Pitt would have appreciated late as well as early talents and accomplishments which were eminently available for the public service. As compared with many other candidates for power, Lord Auckland seems to have enjoyed a prosperous career. Thirty years of political activity might alone reward the devotion of a life, and the younger son of a good family can scarcely have hoped for higher prizes than two embassies, a peerage, a seat in the Cabinet, and the confidence of the principal Minister. Less able men have been still more successful, and greater men have been compelled to content themselves with smaller rewards. Of the statesmen of his time, Mr. Pitt, Mr. Fox, and Lord Grenville may be regarded as superior to all competitors. Addington ranks below the mediocrity which Lord Liverpool barely attained, and Canning's eminence belongs to a later era. Lord Auckland, like Lord Melville, belonged to the class of useful and clearheaded politicians, who, while they serve the public efficiently, are always accused of serving themselves. In a biography of contemporary statesmen, he would deserve a respectable place.

The letters of Lord Auckland's correspondents naturally vary in merit and interest. Lord Loughborough's are remarkable beyond the rest for their spirit and vigour, and from the impression which they leave of the practical ability of the writer. Mr. Hugh Elliot, Lady Auckland's brother, contributes two or three lively and characteristic letters. Lord Sheffield, chiefly known as the friend of Gibbon, involuntarily draws his own. portrait as a clever, conceited, good-natured and blundering busy-body. Mr. Storer, a popular member of society, longing in vain for a share in public life, supplies agreeable notices of private and political gossip. All the correspondents concur in adopting that indefinable tone of friendly deference or recognition which is inspired by personal character and intellectual qualities rather than by social position. Lord Auckland's Letters and his Spanish Diary are pleasantly and sensibly written. In the Diary especially, there is a constant vein of that kindly playfulness which in domestic relations properly takes the place of humour. The Letters contain one or two good stories which deserve preservation. The Archbishop Elector of Mayence had a country-house called La Favorite, and also a German female friend, whose name Lord Auckland declares to be unpronounceable. 'At one of the late formal dinners his electoral highness

'said to a French officer of distinction, "Vous avez vu La Favorite, Monsieur; en êtes vous content?" Réponse: "Oui, monseigneur, j'ai eu l'honneur de faire ma cour à Madame 'ce matin; effectivement c'est une charmante femme, et bien 'digne du nom dont votre altesse l'honore."

Cynics who are of opinion that the publication of Lord Auckland's Correspondence is insufficiently justified either by its personal interest or by its historical value, must nevertheless admit that the popular appetite for biographical collections seems to be inexhaustible. The journals and correspondence of a respectable and common-place lady, who was formerly known as Mrs. Delany, are twice as voluminous, incomparably more trivial, and absolutely uncalled for. The writers and their friends are private and obscure persons of the most moderate abilities, and Mrs. Delany herself appears never to have said or done, or written anything remarkable. Yet the record of insignificant events has found numerous and eager readers, who are attracted by the obsolete manners and natural emotions which once really belonged to a little fragment of life. The pleasure which is derived from miscellaneous biography scarcely admits of being measured by a literary standard. Like the actual intercourse of society, it supplies materials for thought and varied associations, rather than definite conclusions. When it happens, as in the case of Lord Auckland's Correspondence, also to gratify historical curiosity, criticism, yielding perhaps to an undue bias, inclines to admit the expediency of the publication.

ART. IV.-1. Some Account of the Foundation of Eton College, and of the Past and Present Condition of the School. By E. S. CREASY, M.A., Professor of History in University College, London. London: 1848.

2. Public School Education. A Lecture delivered at Tiverton, by the Right Honorable Sir JOHN J. COLERIDGE. 1860. 3. Eton Reform. By WILLIAM JOHNSON. London: 1861. IT is now exactly fifty years since Sydney Smith, in the pages of this Review, entered his earnest protest against the system upon which the public schools of England were at that time conducted,-against a system of education avowedly based upon the dangerous principle of rearing a maximum of lambs with a minimum of shepherds. He vehemently denounced the excessive abuse of classical learning which then obtained to the absolute exclusion of more useful and practical branches of knowledge, and had even the hardihood to propound a dictum held to be little less than blasphemous by English scholars and gentlemen, viz. that in our upper class education there was 'too much Latin and Greek.' Conscious of, and readily admitting, the very great benefits which have resulted to society in all ages from the cultivation of classical literature, Sydney Smith urged, that an aptitude for mastering those difficult studies is not given to all men; and that there are other branches of knowledge, more readily attainable by average capacities, which, in the every day business of life, would prove far more valuable than the imperfect smattering of the dead languages usually brought away from our public schools by nine boys out of ten, as the sole result of six or eight years' expensive schooling. Without denying that the composition of poetry in any language which we may be learning, must be of considerable use in familiarising ourselves with its niceties, he affirmed that in our public school education too much time is devoted to the manufacture of Latin and Greek verses; the price paid for such an accomplishment - the best part of those years during which the mind is most susceptible of instruction,-being, in his opinion, altogether disproportionate to the value of the acquirement.

It was the fashion in Sydney Smith's day-it is so still-to maintain that the neglect to which boys are necessarily exposed at our public schools in consequence of the insufficient number of assistant masters, renders them self-reliant and manly; and that the premature initiation into vice which too often results from that cause, imparts to them an early knowledge of

what are apologetically termed the ways of the world,' and prevents their running riot when subsequently exposed at the universities to still greater temptations than those offered to them in their boyhood by the public houses and slums of Eton and Windsor. Against such monstrous doctrines the good sense and good feeling of Sydney Smith waged stern battle. He scouted the idea of preventing young men from being corrupted at college by conniving at their previous corruption at school. He contended that it never could have been the intention of a great public foundation to render the splendid more splendid, or to lavish care and instruction upon those only whose natural gifts would enable them to thrive without any care or instruction at all; and he objected that our public school system, avowedly disdaining the cultivation of mediocrity, leaves the idle as idle, and the dull as dull, as it finds them.

'Yet,' observed he, the mediocre, i. e. the mass of boys, come to school for the express purpose not of being left to themselves, for that could be done anywhere - but in order that their wavering tastes and propensities may be directed and decided by the intervention of a master. The very meaning of education seems to me to be that the old should direct the young, and the wise the weak; that men who profess to instruct should get amongst their pupils, study their characters, gain their affections, and form their inclinations and aversions. In our public schools the comparative numbers of masters and pupils render this impossible: it is impossible that sufficient time should be found for this useful and affectionate purpose. Boys, therefore, are left to their own crude conceptions and ill-formed propensities, and this neglect is called "a spirited "and manly education."

Fifty years, as we have said, have elapsed since Sydney Smith put forth these wise and brave words, and many more equally brave and wise on the same subject which we have not space either to quote or to condense. During that period, education has been elevated into a science, and all classes of Englishmen, save the wealthiest and highest, have largely benefited by its influence. When he wrote, bad as our public schools were, they were probably the best schools to be found in the kingdom; at the time at which we are writing, we are very much inclined to suspect that they are nearly the worst. The salutary revolution which has been so happily effected in our lower and middle class education, has not yet reached them; and although the time is not far distant at which they also will be constrained to move onwards, it is to be feared that the vested interests by which they are overgrown will not be eradicated without considerable resistance.

We have had it in contemplation, for some time past, to call