any other occurrence, awakened the zeal of the people of England. They had very shortly after an opportunity of expressing at a general election their wishes about Reform; for in the midst of the summer George IV. died, and a king believed to be friendly to the people reigned in his stead.

The Year 1830, an epoch in English History, and in Brougham's Career-His Popularity at its Height-Elected for YorkshireHis Reform Measure- The Grey Ministry - Brougham Lord Chancellor The First Reform Bill-Thrown Out by the PeersThe Parliament Dissolved-The Second Reform Bill - Great Speech of Brougham-Eulogium on the Middle Classes-Proposed Creation of Peers-The Reform Bill becomes Law.

THE year 1830 is a definite line of demarcation in the political history of England. No less signally does it mark an epoch in the career of Brougham. From 1830 we trace the course of thorough Reform in all the departments of the State and of policy; the ten previous years having constituted the period of what we may call progressive Conservatism. The Reform Bill was but the prelude-the changes it caused but the means—of a long series of further reforms. It marked an era in respect of its direct effects; it was also the commencement of a radical change in the whole plan of our legislation, and the nature of our public life.

The year 1830 changed Harry Brougham into Baron Brougham and Vaux. While admission into the hereditary order of nobility is in England the appropriate and merited reward of certain classes of services rendered to the State, and, at the same time, the expedient by

which the State turns the continuance of these services to more effective account, the honour is to its recipient, in the majority of cases, attended with very heavy penalties. In no case more than that of Brougham were such penalties sooner enforced or more painfully endured. It is but natural that the commonalty should entertain an immediate regret and jealousy when a man recognised by them as their very Tribune, is withdrawn from their own order and its sympathies, and by an instantaneous act of the favour of a Court admitted into that body which is regarded as the compact antagonist of those claims for the possession of which the people and their Tribunes strive. Brougham had been lifted up, step by step, to the very pinnacle of popularity. Already popular before 1820, public admiration had risen to the most unqualified enthusiasm while the Queen was on her trial; and in the interval of years between the death of the consort and the death of her cruel spouse, Brougham had become still more emphatically every year the most prominent and most popular man in England. At the point in our narrative at which we have now arrived, his popularity culminated. On its height he stood but for a short time. A variety of causes co-operated to make him specially singled out as the chief object of the disappointment which the acts of the Whigs, subsequently to their passing of the Reform Bill, evoked. His downfall in popular esteem was tenfold more rapid than had been his rise, and tenfold more rapid than that restoration of the calm approbation of the public which a dispassionate sense of justice produced-but which, to the once idol of the homes of the empire, was but a poor substitute for the enthusiastic

admiration of his earlier days. We have thus indicated in a few sentences the fluctuations of Brougham's public position during the years we have now to chronicle. The events comprised within them are so important and so numerous as to compel us not only to dispense at each stage with the obtrusion of our own opinions and comments, but to content ourselves with a very brief and rapid survey of these events only as they directly bore upon Brougham. We do no more than we have a fair right to do, when we presuppose on the part of the reader a general acquaintance with the leading events of the final Reform struggle and the triumph of the Reformers.

William IV., liberal though he had been esteemed, retained his brother's Tory Ministers. When routine business had been transacted, the dissolution of Parliament, which constitutionally succeeds the death of every sovereign, occurred. The hustings' cry was "Reform !" The people were thoroughly in earnest on the subject. The recent Revolution in Paris, and the sister movements in other parts of Europe, greatly increased the enthusiasm. It was remembered that Wellington was the friend of Polignac, and there was a general desire to oust from office the friend of the despotic minister of the bigoted Bourbon. Almost every large constituency sent Reformers. The Tories had endeavoured to effect a coalition with the Canningites. With this view an interview had been brought about between Wellington and Huskisson, at the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Huskisson, already near his natural death, was killed by being run over by a locomotive. The negotiation proved unsuccessful, when

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overtures were made to other Canningites. The Canningites coalesced with the Whigs, furnishing to the Ministry which they were soon in unison to form, such valuable aid as that represented by the names of Melbourne, Palmerston, and Glenelg. By the Conservatives of the opposite pole, too-the bigoted Eldonites-Ministers were deserted. The boroughs under their control sent members to sit on the benches of the Opposition. A large requisition, signed by many thousands of freeholders, had been sent to Brougham, inviting him to stand for the county of York. He accepted, and was returned triumphantly and free of expense, second only to Lord Morpeth, who headed the poll. When the House met, it was clear that there was a large majority against Ministers.

Brougham, as member for Yorkshire, represented the premier constituency of the land; at what value he estimated the honour of his position, was made manifest by many expressions of manly and touching regret which fell from his lips after he was for ever removed from the stirring life of the House of Commons. He rose to the responsibilities of his situation. The King's speech, which contained no allusion to Reform, and was unsatisfactory in general respects, was succeeded by this memorable declaration of Wellington :—

I am fully convinced that the country possesses at the present moment a legislature which answers all the good purposes of legislation, and that to a greater degree than any legislature of any age or any country whatever. am, therefore, not only not prepared to bring forward any measure of the description alluded to by the noble lord, but I will at once declare that, as far as I am concerned, and as long as I hold any station in the government of the country, I shall feel it my duty to resist such measures when proposed by others.