1880.

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of an eagerness and courage equal to his, and to echo in notes as little faltering as they could make them his call of defiance to Lord Beaconsfield. Thus the

winter passed on. Two or three elections which occurred meantime resulted in favour of the Conservatives. Constituencies became divided into unexpected sections or factions. In one remarkable case, that of the Southwark election, very little interest apparently was taken by the Liberals. The candidate they put forward was not a man to excite enthusiasm or even interest. The Conservative candidate, Mr. Clarke, was a man of ability, character, and influence, and the result was a remarkable victory for the Conservative side. About this time, then, there was a little renewal of confidence among the friends of Lord Beaconsfield, and a sudden sinking of the spirits among most of the Liberals. Parliament met in February, and the Government gave it to be understood that they intended to have what one of them called 'a fair working session.' Suddenly, however, they made up their minds that it would be convenient to accept Mr. Gladstone's challenge, and to dissolve in the Easter holidays. The dissolution took place on March 24, 1880, and the elections began.

The result cannot be better described than in the words of Lord Beaconsfield himself, in the celebrated speech which depicted a sudden breakdown of the Liberal party in an attack upon Lord Derby's Government. We have quoted the words before in the place to which they properly belong, but they will

bear repetition in their new application here. Only one word needs to be changed; we put in 'ministerial' where Lord Beaconsfield said 'opposition.' 'It was like a convulsion of nature rather than any ordinary transaction of human life. I can only liken it to one of those earthquakes which take place in Calabria or Peru. There was a rumbling murmur, a groan, a shriek, a sound of distant thunder. There was a rent, a fissure in the ground, and then a village disappeared; then a tall tower toppled down; and the whole of the ministerial benches became one great dissolving view of anarchy.' For with the very first day of the elections it was evident that the Conservative majority was already gone. Each succeeding day showed more and more the change that had taken place in public feeling. Defeat was turned into disaster. Disaster became utter rout and confusion. When the elections were over it was found that the Conservative party were nowhere. A majority of some hundred and twenty sent the Liberals back into power. No Liberal statesmen in our time ever before saw themselves sustained by such an army of followers. There was a moment or two of hesitation-of delay. The Queen sent for Lord Hartington, she then sent for Lord Granville; but everyone knew in advance who was to come into power at last. The strife lately carried on had been the old duel between two great men. Mr. Gladstone had stood up against Lord Beaconsfield for some years and fought him alone. He had dragged his party after him into many a danger. He had compelled them more than

1880. MR. GLADSTONE PRIME MINISTER AGAIN. 513

once to fight where many of them would fain have held back, and where none of them saw any chance of victory. Now, at last, the battle had been given to his hands, and it was a matter of necessity that the triumph should bring back to power the man whose energy and eloquence had inspired the struggle. The Queen sent for Mr. Gladstone, and a new chapter of English history opened, with the opening of which this work has to close.

CHAPTER LXVII.

THE LITERATURE OF THE REIGN; SECOND SURVEY.

THE later period which we have now to survey is more rich in scientific literature than that former period which we assumed to close with the Crimean war. In practical science, as we have already shown, the advance made during the reign of Queen Victoria has been greater in many ways than the advance made from the beginning of civilization to that time. Sir Robert Peel travelled from Rome to London to assume office as Prime Minister, exactly as Constantine travelled from York to Rome to become emperor. Each traveller had all that sails and horses could do for him, and no more. A few years later Peel might have reached London from Rome in some forty-eight hours. Something of the same kind may be said for economical, political, and what is now called social science. The whole of that system of legislative reform which is founded on a recognition of the principles of humanity may be said to belong to our own times. Our penal systems have undergone a thorough reform. More than once it seemed as if the reform were going too far, and as if the tenderness to criminals were likely to prove an encouragement to crime. But, although there have been for this reason little

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outbursts of reaction every now and then, the growth of the principle of humanity has been steady, and the principle has taken firm and fixed root in our systems of penal legislation. Flogging in the army and navy may be said to be now wholly abolished. The senseless and barbarous system of imprisonment for debt is abandoned. There is no more transportation of convicts. Care is taken of the lives and the health of women and children in all manner of employments. Schools are managed on systems of wise gentleness. Dotheboys Hall would be an impossible picture even for caricature in these later years. We are perhaps at the beginning of a movement of legislation which is about to try to the very utmost that right of State interference with individual action which at one time it was the object of most of our legislators to reduce to its very narrowest proportions. It may be that this straining of the right of the majority over the minority is destined to bring about in due course its reaction. But we do not think that the survival of the fittest,' the doctrine on which our forefathers acted more or less consciously in the education of children and the treatment of criminals, will ever again, within any time to which speculation can safely reach, be adopted as a principle of our legislation. Much of the healthier and more humane spirit prevailing in our social systems, in our criminal laws, in the management of our schools, in the care of the State for the working classes, for women, and for children, is undoubtedly due to the spread of that sound and practical scientific teaching which began