The Sun.
London, England, 1864-01-04 00:00:00

Sir Stafford H, Northcote on Art Progress
in England,

ever come when a foreigner could point to the map,
and drawing a line say, "?how, north of that line,
or east of that line, there is the energetic, the pro-
gressive, the enlightened part of England, and south
cr west of that line is the dark and unenergetic
and dull part of England." Such a period I hope
never to see. I hope rather to see all parts of Eng-
land, our own part especially, bearing their part in
that which is for the good of the nation. (Hear,)
And I venture to say this movement, which is now
claiming our sympathies, is one which has a very
strong claim upon the national interests. I venture
to say this because England has taken up art edu-
cation advisedly, and is reaping the most signal
benefits from it. (Hear.) When I say that I do
not wish to go back over the old ground over which
I have trodden before upon occasions of this sort,
and to tell you the old story how it was these
schools originally came to be supported. But I
would wish to call your attention for a moment to
the general results which this movement has, I be-
lieve, had upon the trade and industry of the country.
There is something very remarkable in the present
condition of the trade of the country. Yln are all
generally aware that there never has been a time in
which the trade of the country has flourished so
greatly as during the last 20 yeare. I dark say you
are aware that even at the present moment, under
circumstances of very great difficulty, under the
circumstances of the paralysis of that which is the
great branch of our whole industry, the cotton
trade, the trade of England is as great, or
,even
greater than it was before. (Hear.) I believe that
when the returns of 1863 come to be made up it
will be found that the exports of British produce
are larger in the past year than in any year on re-
cord. (Hear.) That is extremely satisfactory. But
what is the cause of it ? I do not wish to weary
you with analysing all the figures ; but I had the
other day occasion to look at some returns presented
to the House of Commons quite recently, out of
which I took some figures so remarkable that
I will request your permission to read them.
They are some figures comparing the exports
of England generally between the years 1840
and 1862. And I find this, that in the year
1840 the value of British manufactures exported in
a finished state was nearly £36,000,000, whereas in
1862 it was upwards of £82,000,000, the increase
being about 127 per cent. (Hear, hear.) That is
a story which we ail know, and very satisfactory
it is to the country at large. But I wished to go a
little further. I wanted to see how far that expor-
tation was due, or could in any way be attributed
to the exertions which have been made in England
of late years to improve the taste of our manufac-
tures, Therefore, I went a little carefully into those
statistics, and endeavoured to ascertain what had
been the increase in those articles in the production
of which taste is particularly required. It is not
very easy to separate those articles, because, of
course, we know in a great many cases with regard
to cotton goods and woollens and many other things
that they are all put together in the returns; and
yet a large number of them may be articles upon
which a great deal of labour and a groat deal of
taste have been bestowed. Therefore, all I could do
was to select from the list of general exports a few
artic:es which I believe you will admit are for the
moat part articles upon the production of which
taste is particularly employed. I took the articles
of carriages ; of earthenware and porcelain, which
is an item particularly interesting, because it is
in her earthenware and porcelain that England
has especially made progress of late years; furni-
ture, cabinet and upholstery wares ; glass manu-
factures, in which a great deal of beautiful work has
of late been done ; haberdashery and millinery,
which I suppose would depend a good deal upon the
taste of the country; pictures, plate, jewelry, and
watches: silk manufactures, paper hanging, and
toys—and taking these articles, upon which, as a
body, I presume our taste is particularly employed,
I found the value of those exported in 1840 was
I:2,700,000, whereas in 1862 it was just above
£8,000,000, showing an increase of £5,250,000, or
about 196 per cent—(hear, hear, and applause—so
that I discovered that whi'e the general advance of
our manufactures in these twenty years had been
rather more than 125 per cent., it had been very
nearly 200 per cent. in those particular articles
which demand the exercise of taste. Now, I think
. it is not a little remarkable that during the very
time in which we have admitted the goods of all
other nations who were supposed to be so much our
superiors in taste to compete freely with us—while
we admitted the goods of France and of all other
countries where art has been encouraged for so
many years to come in free competition with our
own, we, nevertheless, have been able to export
those particular goods in respect of which we com-
peted with them—goods in the production of which
taste enters so largely—able to meet our rivals,
and to beat them upon the open ground. (Applause.)
If we had in any way increased our exports merely
by sending out raw materials, half manufactured
articles, or articles requiring no taste at all, but only
cheapness of production, we might have said that
England excels in having a greater quantity of coal
anti iron, and those other elements which conduce
to cheapness; but when we aro able to beat other
countries in articles dependent upon the taste be-
stowed upon their production, then I say you may
look with gratification on the work which we have
been doing in this country during the last 22 years
for the encouragement of the national taste.
hear.) lam taking up a period which exactly syn.
chronizes with the movement for the Schools o
Design. It was in 1840, as Sir John Bowring wil
tell you, that the first steps were taken for the esta-
blishment of Schools of Design in this country, and,
looking at what has been done since, I say the result
is not a little remarkable in that respect. It proves
that the work we have been doing has not been an
idle one; that it is a work not unsuited to the
genius of the English people; that the English
people, if fairly taught, are as capable of develop•
ing taste and of producing works of good taste as
any other people under the sun. (Hear, hear.) And
I maintain that we have bestowed our time and our
labour well upon this work which we have been
carrying on, and that there is every encouragement
for us to carry it on still further. (Hear, hear.) I
have ventured to put the matter before you in a
national point of view, and to appeal to you and the
citizens of Exeter to take your part in this great
national undertaking, which I am quite satisfied is
of very great importance to the nation at large ; but
if we come down from the general, the high ground,
the national good, I will appeal toyou also on behalf
of your own sons and daughters and the people of
your own city, and ask, is it not your duty to give
them the advantages of the educatipn here afforded
to them? Just consider what those advantages are;
what it is in your power to do for the children and
the young people of this city and neighbourhood.
We look upon the education in art in two points of
view: you look upon it as developing high genius,
which is given but to few ; you may look upon it
also as giving a very useful educatiOn to the great
bulk of mankind who have no claims to higher and
diviner genius ; but if you look at it under either
point of view you will see how great is its advantage
to young people. You will find in the lives of per-
sons possessed of real genius and who have struggled
and fought against great difficulties and have at-
tained to eminence in science or in artohow very
much they gained by the few aids which they did
hero and there receive; and you cannot help think-
ing, and sadly too, how many there must have been
who, perhaps with equal genius, have yet wanted
those few helps, those timely aids, and have thus
been lost to the country and to themselves. (Hear.)
And we say it is a great blessing that in schools like
these we may here and there be able to bold out to
the struggling genius a hand that may enable him
to climb the ladder. Even if that was all we were
able to do these institutions would be well worthy cur
encouragement and support. But, then, when you
consider that that is not all they do, but that they also
render great assistance by giving a good sound edd-
cation to the great mass of those who attend them, I
think you will see they are valuable ; for double
art education is by no means to be despised even in
the case of those who are never likely to become
great or distinguished artists. Because, what do
they gain ? In the first place many handicrafts-
men and others can by the training they receive
here become better workmen and better able to
execute deeigns set before them, They themselves

EXETER, Saturday.
At the annual meeting of the Exeter School of
Art, held last evening, the chair was taken by the
president, Sir Stafford Northcote, who delivered a
long and interesting address on the subject of art
education, and of the grants made by Government
to the schools of art throughout the country.

Sir S. NORTHCOTE, after referring to circumstances
connected with the Exeter School, said,—There is
one other point which has been mentioned in the
report upon which I am bound to say a few words ;
but it is a point upon which I wish to touch as
lightly as possible. Your attention has been called
to a change which has taken place in the arrange-
ments which Government has made with regard to
this school; and there is no doubt the alteration of
the minutes of the Committee of Council with re-
gard to the schools of art throughout the kingdom
will tell very seriously upon many of the masters
of those schools, and especially, I am sorry to say,
it will tell upon those who are most deserving among
them. Especially it will tell upon such masters as
our own excellent master, Mr. Birkmyer, tecause
the old system was this—that the Government
required the masters to pass in one or more grades
of art. There were different grades, different
classes—for drawing, and for painting, and for
modelling, and so forth. If a master passed in
one grade he had a fee of ten guineas a year
allowed to him ; if ho passed in two grades, 20
guineas ; if in three grades, 30 guineas, and so forth.
But now the whole of that is swept away, and a
single uniform fee of 10 guineas is to be granted for
the report upon the school, and this will be given to
those who have passed in one grade in the examina-
tions as well as to those who have passed in four or
five grades. Now that certainly seems to be a hard-
ship, and it tells particularly hard upon such a mas-
ter as we have at present the good fortune to possess,
because Mr. Birkmyer has passed in several grades,
and the effect of this upon him will be very serious.
The Government also proposes to make certain alte-
rations with regard to the free students—to sweep
them away, in fact, very much in the same manner
in which they are sweeping away the pupil teachers
in a great many of our national schools. Tee change
is very much analogous to that taking place in na-
tional schools ; and it is, at the first moment at all
events, felt as a very great hardship by the teachers
that they are thrown out of that which they had
expected, and which they had been legitimately en-
titled to expect, from the arrangements made by the
Government. It is very hard upon them, and they
feel it to be so, that they should suddenly have their
position altered. At the same time there is a good
deal to be said on the side of the Government.
There is the necessity to introduce some economy
in the administration of this large grant which the
Government makes for the promotion of education
and of science and art ; and the time is coming when
it will be necessary that some alteration should be
made in the terms upon which these grants have
been given. Ido not wish now to enter into the
controversy which has arisen with respect to the
particular mode which they ought to adopt. I only
wish to remind you that it does fall very hardly,
whether it be right or not on the part of the
Government to take this step, upon such mas-
ters as our excellent master, Mr. Birkmyer.
And that circumstance affords an additional
reason for inducing Ds to make every effort to
prevent his being a sufferer. He and Mr. Wig-
zell (his predecessor) have done great things
for this school,—they have raised it to a highly
creditable position. They took it in hand at a
time when there was no it:ea in the city that we
could fill a school at all, or support anything of the
kind ; and they have shown that it is possible to
fill a school ; that it is possible to produce very cre-
ditable results; and they have produced a school
which, I am sure, Exeter ought to be proud of.
(Hear, hear.) We know, and Government will
probably tell us, that the change which they have
made in withdrawing acme of the support hitherto
granted has been made upon this principle—that
they gave a certain amount of support in order to
set going the system oC education throughout the
country ; but now that it had been sot going, and
now that the country is aware of its value, it is time
they should draw back their hands and leave the
country to support that which has been started
among them, and to carry it on by themselves.
They will s.:y also, no doubt, " We are proposing
to pay you by results; attain your results and you
wilt rectivn as much as you received before." Bat
in order to do that you must remember we want en_
ierared space; because you must be very well aware
that in this school we are quite cramped for room,
and that until we can be transplanted into a larger
room it will be impossible for theechool to devetope
itself as it ought to do. (Heir.) Now, lam in great
hopes that when this Museum and School of Art,
which we are always talking about, and which we
begin now to see dimly looming before us—when
we see that turned from a shadow into a reality—
then I think we shall begin to see better days for
the School of Art, because we then shall be able to
grow and expand ourselves as we ought to do. I
hope by that change we shall get into a position
that will enable us to overcome the difficulties of
our position ; but in the meantime you must help
us, It is impossible we can get over the next two
or three yeasts satisfactorily unless we receive
greater pecuniary assistance from the citizens of
Exeter than hitherto. (Hear.) We find everybody
is now willing to acknowledge the services of the
school, but when it comes to the practical point of
asking them to subscribe, then I am sorry to say we
find a weak part. I hope that by printing and circu-
lating this annual report we shall obtain a larger
measure of support than hitherto. I do hope that
when this matter is prominently brought before the
citizens of Exeter they will take a noble and liberal
view of the question. Ido hope they will not look
at it in the narrow way in which we sometimes
hear it spoken of—that we shall not hear it said,
" Well, Exeter is not a manufacturing town, Exeter
has not the same interest in the maintenance of a
school of art that Manchester, or Birmingham, or
any of the other great cities of industry in the
north have." I hope the citizens of Exeter will take
a larger and wider view of the question than that,
because this is a great national work. (Hear, hear.)
It is a work in which we are interested as members
of the English nation ; and I do feel there is a great
deal incumbent on us not to lose our place among
the people of this country—not to allow ourselves
to be put aside us ye.ing the unprogressive and nn-
interested par ts4f the nation—not to allow the
northern and midland counties, the great manufac-
turing counties, to take precedence of us and claim
a monopoly of interest in all that is interesting to
the nation. (Applause.) This matter is one that
often weighs upon me. I think there is a great
deal more in it than appears on the surface. You
remember
,some years ago there were persons, and
persona of some influence in this country, too, who
used to hold this sort of language; they would say
of England,- What is it you mean by England ?
England is the manufacturing counties—the nor.
them and midland counties ; as for the south and
west—the agricultural districts—we have nothing
to do with them." We heard that sort of language
used. There were persons who seemed disposed
actually to establish a separate community in the
northern and midland parts of England, and to
leave us in the south-west behind, as if we had no
interest in them. Now I soy that is a position in
which we in the south and west ought never to
acquiesce. (Hear, hear.) It would be suicidal on
our part, end most injurious io this country, if we
were at all to allow ourselves to be left behind in
any great improvement for the general good of the
nation. (Applause.) I say the great strength cf
this country depends upon the union of all classes
among us. It depends upon our being all energetic,
upon oar doing
what is good for the whole nation,
d ceasing to look merely to local and selfish in-
terests. (Hear, hear.) Remember this, we are all
Englishmen—eve are all interested in what is good
for the welfare and good of England. And if this
movement, or any other movement, is shown to be
good for the nation at large, we ought to consider.
ourselves equally interested in it as the people of
the north, or the manufacturing cr any
other part otEcgl and It will be a sad
end fatal day for England it the, time should

.ear,

may perhaps rise, without being vary great I
geniuses, to become designers or improvers of do- I
signs in the manufactures to which they devote I

themselves. Even where that is not directly the

While the best parts of Mr. Thackeray's regular novels
belong to the class of refined comedy, his Christmas stories
his contributions to Tune 4, and his minor writings in gene-
ral,oveiflow with the gayest and wildest humour. No mo-
dern parodies approach in excellence to the imitations of
Mr. Disraeli and Sir Bulwer Lytton in " Codlingsby" and
"George de Barnwell." The profound philosophy of the
interesting murderer's argument to prove that he had com-
mitted no crime because he felt no remorse, is the more ad-
mirable because it approaches the limits of possible sophistry.
Major Gahagan, "the slayer of elephants," furnishes a
subject for one of the wittiest of burlesque romances. In
"Rebecca and Rowena," where Mr. Thackeray vented his
humorous irritation against the heroine of "Ivanhoe," his
unfailing dislike to famouswarriors is expressed in the melo-
dramatic ferocity of Richard Coeur de Lion. Like all great
comic writers, he derived a special amusement from certain
favourite types of character. Of the mendacious Irish ad-
venturer he was never tired, and Barry Lyndon was only the
possible or credible forerunner of The Mulligan. The
Jeames of the " Diary" and the Charles of the "Yellow-
plash Papers" are still more fabulous representatives of
the imaginary London footman; but Mr. Thackeray knew
how to produce the most amusing results by adopting the
gratuitous supposition that uneducated magniloquence was
combined with a practice of phonetic spelling. He always
took pleasure in playing with the language of which he had
obtained perfect mastery. His puns and his unexpected
rhymes were surprisingly ingenious, and the flowing metre
of his humorous ballads was not far removed from the music
of genuine poetry. His ordinary style was in a high degree
pure and idiomatic, and his habitual cultivation of the nice-
ties of language taught him to appreciate, in his maturer
years, the classical studies which he had too much under-
valued in his youth. He sometimes said that his highest
aspiration would be to produce a few short poems as finished
and perfect as the Odes of Horace.—Saturday _Review.
HIS LAST ILLNESS.
As there are many stories in circulation respecting the
circumstances which immediately preceeded Mr. Thackeray's
death, the following facts, which were obligingly given us
by one of his most intimate personal friends, may not prove
uninteresting. It appears that although generally enjoying
good health, he was at intervals subject to severe spasms of
the stomach, which caused violent retching and nausea, and
lett him in a state of utter prostration often for hours after
the first violence of the attack had passed away. On the
night of his death, his mother, who slept overhead, heard
him got up and walk about his room, but was not alarmed,
as this was a habit with her son when he felt any symptoms
of an attack coming on. In the morning his valet came into
Mr. Thackeray's bedroom as usual, and saw him lying on
his back quite still, withhis arms spread over the coverlet, bu
he took nonotice, as he also was accustomed to see his mas-
ter thus after one of his stomach attacks. He brought some
coffee and set it down beside the bed, and it was only when
he returned after an interval and found that the cup had not
been tasted, that a sudden alarm seized him, and he disco-
vered that his master was dead. Mr. Thackeray had in
fact been seized when his mother heard him get up in the
night and walk about the room, and the violence of the
attack, it is supposed, brought on the effusion en the brain,
which, as the post-mortem examination showed, was the
immediate cause of death. Mr. Joseph Durham, the emi-
nent sculptor, has undertaken to preserve the likeness of his
deceased friend in a marble bust, which he means to pre-
sent to the Garrick Club.—Daily News.
THE PUBLICATION OF " VANITY FAIR,"
At last, set Thacseray in his place among the first
novelists of Europe, and among the men of letters
most sought after by opulent and titled personages
at home and abroad. It is instructive to observe
how the class of persons whom writers like Thackery love
to anslyze and to satirize---fools of quality—rich, idle folk
who want to be amused—free-living men and women,
whose morals would the least bear exposure, have alway
been the most eager to welcome, to cherish, and to admit
into the fold of intimacy the very guests and observers,
" those authors," whom they have the most reason to dread .
—4 henceum.
"AND THERE CAME tip A LION OUT OF JUDAH,'
were Miss Bront first words after standing for some time
before Lawrence's likeness of Thackeray. She meant that
the face expressed first to her mind a deep " rage " at the
treachery of human nature, in which a generous nobility
and also a destructive fever of almost animal spite were
blended in equal proportions. And she spoke with a true
literary instinct. The peculiar power of Thackeray's genius
lies in the strange effervescence of these widely different
elements,—a profound tenderness of feeling, a pathos of
more than feminine delicacy and more than masculine com-
prehensiveness, with a power of cynical fury which is always
impelling him to spring upon the selfishness and duplicities
of human nature and tear them to pieces before our eyes in
that animal transport of retributive passion which the lion
symbolises to the imagination.
HIS MELANCHOLY

case I am quite satisfied there is no kind of educa-
tion that is better for the general education of man.
Education in drawing conduces to make men cer-
tain and correct in what they do. It induces them
to do that in the general education which writing
does in their intellectual education. It conduces
to make what a man does know certain. How often
do we see that a man if you explain anything to
him thinks he understands you, and that he
would perhaps give you a tolerably good answer if
you put questions to him; and yet if you ask him
to write down the matter upon which you have been
discoursing it appears that he does not thoroughly
understand it. Just in the same way is it with
drawing. A man takes notice of an object, and
thinking he knows all about it, goes away. But if
he tries to draw it, then he finds that there are
many points of it which he had not noticed, or of
which he has taken an inc3rrect impression. Draw •
ing, therefore, gives a man correctness of observa-
tion, which is one of the most valuable qualities of

education. (Hear, hear.) This view is confirmed
by the opinion of others who are better able to judge
than myself. I was very much struck, not long
ago, in the course of an inquiry which I and others
have been carrying on as to the public schools of

the country, by the answer of the very distin-
guished head master of a very celebrated school.
He was asked with regard to drawing, whether it
was taught in hie school. On his replying that a
number of boys had learnt drawing, he was asked
whether he found that the boys who had done so
were iu any way assisted in their classical studies
by it. That was a question which seemed rather
curious at first, because it was thought that drawing
might take them from their classical studies. The
answer was that he had not the slightest doubt they
were assisted in their classical studies, because it
enabled them to realise to themselves many of those
things of which the classical poets wrote; that they
were accustomed to draw them from descriptions br
from pictures which were set before them ; and that
they thus obtained a much more accurate knowledge
than others not able to draw. That is the case with
all those studies which conduce to greater accuracy
of observation : they improve the mind—they im-
prove the intelligence of those who prosecute them.
(Hear, hear.) Therefore, I say, this is a study
which upon every ground deserves our support and
assistance; and I do hope the time is now long gone
by when people would look down with a contemp•
tuous sneer at drawing, as if it were no real part of
education. (Hear, hear.) I hope it is assuming a
serious and important place in the course of English
education which it will never lose. I hope that
what we have done will never go back, but rather
go on gaining ground. (Loud cheers.)

THE SON. LONDON, MONDAY EVEMNG, JANUARY' 4, 1864,

creates him no enemies, for he does nothing with He has resigned ease and privacy and the social
sourness or obstinacy; and his being unconfined to delight of reigning supreme in his own sphere, not
modes and forms, make him but the readier and that he may effect a great and glorious end, or asto-
more capable to oblige and please all who know nish his cournrymen by any signal
at he and etriking
a.
aim." In this temper of universal benevolence Dr. benefits conferred on them, but th may do
14e cometenced his speech by bowing profoundly to work which will be almost unnoticed, which will
T4O iadie49 fplie.ev, for he is an advocate of wcman's force him into many petty contests, and will only
ve the gentler sexvoters as in a minute degree, and by slow steps, do ar.y good.
rights, and would L.:
..,,,:sems them as fit to sit in His reward is the knowledge that this is all that he
well as tax-payers, Frankly admitting can do for his country, and that what he can do for
St. Stephen's as on a throne.
his antagonist to be a good Cann
thought Dr. Lee his country is precisely what his country happens
thought that the Tories ought not to n:onopolize most to need now, and what no one else could do
Buckinghamshire, and wished that there were anore for her.
candidates so as to give the constituency a wide:
choice, and make the election a sort of sweepstakes.
After this we do not need to be assured that the
worthy squire is not actuated by personal ambition,
has not a single paid agent, nor even " the Man in
the Moon" retained as a canvasser. On ordinary
subjects, such as the cession of the lonian Isles, the
reduction of expenditure, and excessive game-pre
serving, he spoke with moderation and good sense,
and if we trace something of the old whimsical sim-
plicity in the desire to make " S. G. 0." Bishop of
St. Alban's, we are more pleased to find that at the
present moment he has kept himself free from reli-
gious intolerance, is pleased with the elevation of a
Papist to the bench, and recognises " the fearless
outspokenness" of Dr. Coleuses, though he does not
share his conclusions. Dr. Lea is, we believe, a tee-
totaller, and if he confines his partisanship to an
attempt to induce all drunkards voluntarily to take
the pledge, there can be no harm in that ; and
even his pet anti tobacco theory is one which he
shares not only with King James 1., but with the
late Sir Benjamin Brodie. 'Dais, of course, was the
theme for all the witticisms, not only of the Tory
speakers but of the crowd before the hustings.
When Dr. Lee boldly avowed that he gave up Mr.
Gladstone because instead of abolishing the tea-duty
he had reduced that on tobacco, some wit in the
mob shouted out, " What would you give the poor
man in lieu of his beer and 'baccy ?" Promptly the
Doctor answered, smiling blandly as he spoke,
" Why what I now offer you, a tract," and imme-
diately began tendering his anti-tobacco tracts to
the High Sheriff and the gentlemen around. And
before the laughter, which this sally called out, had
died away, the venerable speaker completed his
victory by adding, with ineffable innocence and
sincerity, " And if any one present is ready to sub-
scribe to the anti-tobacco pledge, I shall be most
happy to take down his name. Tnat day, at least,
the Doctor was triumphant to the end, for the show
of hands was decided to be in his favour. Writing
before the result of the election is known, we are
not sanguine that this victory will be repeated
at the hustings. Yet it would be well that Buck-
inghamshire should not be quite given over to Tory-
ism, and if the electors would not quite so tamely
submit to the dictation of the great landowners.
Nor in days when men are ear nest and propor-
tionably hard, would the House of Commons be any
loser if a Sir Roger de Coverley were once again to
enter its walls. Dr. Lee's crotchets could do no
more harm than Colonel Sibthorp's violence, or Mr.
Drummond's apostleship; and the sight of that
generous courtesy, that kindly benevolente, that
naïve simplicity, coupled with learning, station, and
integrity, is something by which all may profit.
The Buckinghamshire election may, perhaps, in a
party sense, be a hollow thing, but it has at least
given the world a perfect specimen of how an elec-
tion should be conducted at Christmas.
SATURDAY REVIEW.—It is to the possibility of
avoiding henceforth the small wars which France
has on hand almost as surely and as constantly as
England has, that M. Thiers ostensibly directed his
efforts. He did not affect to be able to stop a big
war, and he was perhaps doing all he could when he
dimly hinted that the European war must be one of
singular magnitude and duration. Imperialists
coin(' scarcely quarrel with a speaker who promised
to pour all the treasures of the country into the lap
of its master, if a real occasion should call him to
lead France into a great struggle. At the same
time, they could do little to diminish the sobering
effect of an anticipation that such a war, if once
started, might last for years on years. If, however,
the Government would but limit the issue of Tree.
sury Bonds, it would not venture on little wars
which are so small that no one thinks much of them
when they are begun, but which throw the finances
into disorder and make the wisest of economists de-
spair. The Mexican war affords an inexhaustible
subject of attack on the Government, and as it is the
Mexican war that has deranged the plans of M.
Fould and swollen the floating debt once more in
spite of the extreme measures used to reduce it, no
one in the French Chamber can openly favour little
wars. The continued uncertainty which attends
the issue of the struggle in Mexico, and the
endless demands it makes on the resources of
France, preach a lesson of economy to which the
most ardent adherent of the Government cannot
pretend to be deaf. No one, in France or out of it,
out conjecture when the Mexican war will cease, or
when a, settled government can be expected to afford
the French an excuse for retiring, or to pay them
for staying. It is in vain to talk of limiting the
issue of treasury Bonds when money must be found
far so ceaseless a drain, and when fresh debt is being
necessarily incurred every minute' hat the champions
of ecouotny are speaking. The Government itself
cannot determine when little wars will cease, al-
though it may to a great extent determine when
they shall begin. -It seems a eN9mparatively harm-
less request that it should be asked henceforth not
to let them begin, and the evil consequences of the '
Mexican expedition made the Chamber acquiesce in
this being made by M. Thiers. But it is evident
that the Emperor would cerise to be Emperor if he
really gave up the power of making little wars at
his pleasure. It is because he can put the navies
and armies of France in motion when and where he
pleases, that his nod is watched for by the world,
and that he creates a sense of awe and expectation
in the breasts of millions. If he could not decide
whet her Catholicism was to triumph on the shores
of Cochin China, if he could not raise up
and cut down the hopes of the Maronites like
grass in summer, if he could not create little
Empires for foreign Princes, he would no
longer be the mysterious, magical, inscrutable
power he affects to be. He is very anxious not
to quarrel with France about Mexico, and he, there-
fore, is inclined that the Government should accept
with ostensible patience the doctrines as to little
wars which M. Thiers chooses to lay down. But
both ho and M. Thiers know perfectly well that it
is because in these minor matters, no one calculates
how he will act that he excites the hopes, the fears,
and the wonder of thousands ; and if he were to re-
nounce the power of forming and carrying out his
private and secret resolutions, he would speedily
sink into the miserable obscurity of a constitutional
Sovereign. The importance of the return of M.
Thiers to political life can be estimated with tolerable
accuracy when his speech on the loan is compared
with that of the other members of the Opposition..
M. Picard declined to vote for,the loan at all,because
to do so was to give an indirect sanction to the
Mexican expedition, of which he highly disape
proved; and as he was sure that the sum necessary
for the payment of past debts would he voted by
the majority, he could satisfy his conscience by
voting against the loan, and yet rely on other
people to take care that the satisfaction given to
his private conscience did no public harm. There is
always something respectable in conscientiousness
of any sort, and the liveliness of a Chamber is
augmented by the presence of some members who
will never admit of any compromise. But it is not
imparcticab!e enthusiast who offer any efficient op-
position to the daily working of the machinery of
despotism. Men like M. Picard keep alive the spirit
and courage of France, but they do not guide public
opinion towards definite results, the attainment of
which would alter in some degree, however slight,
the character of the Government, and the refusal of
which forces the Government to offer what seems
a harsh and unreflecting opposition to moderate
and sensible demands. Still less can the fanatics
who thick that democracy demands a war on
behalf of Poland, and that Democracy must
at all costs be obeyed, seriously hamper the action of
a powerful and coherent Government. The Em-
peror is too old a democrat to be frightened at "the
oracular utterings of a fictitious democracy. His
acquaintance with England, too, must enable him
to check the statements which the chief representa-
tive of democracy in the Chamber, M. Gueroult,
offers as aids to French reflection at the present
crisis, The enlightened readers of the Opinion Na-
tionale may be inclined to accept the assurances of
its conductor that France, if she embarks in a Con-
tinental war, need not fear a coalition against her
headed by England, as Mr. Pitt, who was the soul
of former coalitions, has lived to repent or his error,
and is now, at the age of eighty, as mach against
coalitions as he used to be for them. But the Em-
peror may safely trust that oven Frenchmen in gene-
ral know that this would be a brittle reed to leap
on ; and, if it were necessary, he could overwhelm
M, Gueroult's argument in the Chamber,by ordering
that the elements of modern history be made known
to him. Contrasted with men ',ike M. Gueroult,
M. Thiers has only that advantage which all men in
possession of sense and experience must have over
the ignorant spoutcrs of grand political phrases.
But when he is compared with the members of the
old Opposition, although he has perhaps no supe-
riority of character or aim, and although M. 011i-
vier in this debate has shown that be can take as
calm and rational and statesmanlike a view of
the position of France as any one, yet M. Thiers
brings a new element of opposition in his great
knowledge of Parliamentary contests, in his tact,
and in his sound judgment as to the amount of pre&
sure to which the Government can be eaposed with-
out doing more harm than good. H. has chosen in
bis old ago to oke OR biszthuuldun a ' icuv Lybatiks.