might be supposed to be on the watch for the first occasion that should present itself for their removal. The large and hopeless minority of their supporters in the Ilouse of Lords proved a still more substantial difficulty in the way of their government. Whatever measures they might originate as ministers, they could command the success of none. Not a bill could pass the legislature but by the sufferance of their opponents, who had it thus in their power to reject, or mutilate, or remodel every measure of the government as it came before them. This was, perhaps, the most material result of the dissolution of the first reformed parliament. The House of Lords was thus restored to the full exercise of its functions; and as long as it was supported by a similar proportion of the popular branch of the legislature, its efficiency might be surely depended upon for the adequate protection of all the great interests and establishments of the country.

The opposition of the House of Lords was, indeed, the great difficulty in the march of the government, and the most humiliating circumstance in their situation. It is the first time in the constitutional history of the country that any men have consented to administer the government without the means of generally commanding the success of those measures which they thought it their duty to bring forward in either branch of the legislature. Nor did there appear any outlet for their escape from the difficulty. The majority against them in the upper House was so large as to make impossible the resource of overcoming it by new creations, could they even depend upon the consent of the crown to

its adoption. Under other circumstances, a cabinet in finding it could no longer carry on the government on their own principles, would have resigned; and, in the case of the reform bill, it will be remembered, the whigs did resort to this extremity in an emergency apparently much less urgent. In that instance, however, they felt that they were supported by so large a majority of the House of Commons; and still more, by so decided an expression of public feeling without doors, that they had no apprehension that any other set of men would venture to take up the reins which they affected to abandon. The state of things was very dif ferent at present; so nice was the division both of numbers within the House, and of opinions without; and so evident was the growing indifference of the country in general to their cause, that the ministers felt a voluntary resignation on their own part was all that their opponents were waiting for to hurry forward as candidates to succeed them. It was calculated that many would stand by the crown, if deserted by the whigs, who might not be equally disposed to lend it assistance in directly dismissing them from office; and the effect of this distinction, nice as it was, might be sufficient to decide the success of either experiment.

Among the people generally, the change would have been regarded with little excitement of feeling on any side. The property, and, we may say, the professions of the country, were, upon the whole, decidedly inclined to conservative principles. The strength of the ministers lay with the numerous masses inhabiting towns, and more particularly with the dissenting

interests a body still more formidable by their union and discipline, than by their numbers and wealth. As far as any particular measures were concerned, there was, perhaps, no very great difference of opinion between the more moderate men of either party. Where Sir Robert Peel differed from Lord John Russell, it was not so much in respect of the particular reforms to be effected, as of the principles on which they were brought forward. We may add that, if, on the whole, the conservatives were less popular, they had a decided advantage in the eyes of the country in the superiority of political and parliamentary talent, which distinguished them over the actual occupants of the treasury bench. In respect of Sir Robert Peel, in particular, no one could question his superior fitness, both as a speaker and man of business, to conduct the government, beyond any one of his contemporaries. Those who approached him nearest in this respect were certainly not to be sought among the ministers. Indeed, their best friends could not pretend that Lord Melbourne, Lord John Russell, or Mr. Spring Rice evinced any portion of that ascendancy of talent or character which should mark them out as the leaders of a great party; still less as the ministers of the first country in the world.

The balance of party strength, therefore, at this moment, was singularly nice and even. If the whigs had a small superiority in the House of Commons, the Crown and the Lords were decidedly favourable to their adversaries. The strength of one party lay in the counties; that of the other in the towns. Numbers were the sup port of one side; property and

education of the other. The English representation leant to the tories, but was more than balanced by the superiority of the whigs in Scottish and Irish members. If the ministers were more popular by their principles, the opposition leaders had a decided personal advantage in the reputation of talent. Under these circumstances of equipoise, the movement of the government, as far as concerned all general measures, had come to what in mechanics is called a dead lock. The ordinary detail of administration was suffered to take its course; but beyond that, the ministers could do nothing, either for public or party purposes. They were just strong enough to keep their hold of power, but impotent for any effective use of it. Considering what are the specific office and tendencies of the two parties, the advantage of relative situation seems to lie with the conservatives. They were thus enabled most effectually to exercise their proper function in arresting the progress of the spirit of change: still there was something discreditable as well as inconvenient to the government in such a complication of position; and the manner of its probable unravelling became matter of anxious speculation. Unless a political crisis should arise, to give a more determinate excitement of one kind or other to the public mind, the only visible solution of the problem was, a coalition. Upon the ground of principle there appeared no great difficulty in the way of such a consummation. As we have said, upon all practical measures there was little difference of opinion or principles between the ostensible leaders of either party. In respect of organic or constitutional change,

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the one side professed to be satisfied with what had been effected in the reform bill, and the other to be reconciled to the necessity of it. Lord John Russell disclaimed all intention to go further, as Sir Robert Peel did any desire to go back. Every measure of practical or administrative reform called for by the country, had been advocated by the conservative leader as decidedly as it could be by the whigs themselves. Indeed, such had been his activity in the short course of his late administration, that he had really left very little in that respect for his opponents to originate on their return. In regard to the foreign policy of the country, much as the conservatives had disapproved of some of the engagements which had been entered into, they had never questioned the duty of strictly fulfilling them. In fact, so slight was the practical divergence between the two parties, that at the commencement of the last session it had tasked all the ingenuity of the whigs to concoct in the clause for the secular appropriation of a possible surplus of church property in Ireland, a pledge of opinion which they had reason to believe it would be impossible for their adversaries

to assent to.

The difficulty in the way of a combination of parties, therefore, did not lie in the principles or the measures to which their leaders had severally committed them selves; it consisted much rather in the persons to whom they had virtually and severally pledged their faith. They could not have consented to retain office on the condition of abandoning their Irish friends, who had, in fact, but lately helped them into it; and it would perhaps have been still more

difficult to have included Mr. O'Connell and his tail in any new ministerial combination, however liberal or comprehensive. Some difficulty, too, would have arisen in arranging the personal pretensions of the members of a coalition cabinet. The mere fact of the very decided superiority of the tory leaders in this respect was a serious obstacle to their combination with the others on anything like equal terms. It was impossible but that men like Wellington and Lyndhurst, Peel and Stanley, in any cabinet of which they formed a part, must take an ascendency which it might be supposed their new allies would be very little disposed to admit.

Although, as we have observed, a coalition of parties seemed the only probable outlet to the embarrassment resulting from their present equality, the resource would hardly have been popular with the people, or perhaps desirable in itself. Coalitions of men who have been long opposed to each other are seldom effected without some compromise of principle, and even of personal consideration; a sacrifice which perhaps more than balances in its ill effect upon the public mind the temporary political conveniency afforded by the arrangement. The ingenious distinctions by which statesmen endeavour to reconcile their new language and conduct with that they had hitherto maintained, is commonly too refined to hit the popular sense; and an impression remains unfavourable to the integrity of public men, in general, and the tendency of which is really to lower the standard of political morality among them.

Upon the whole, there was nothing in the state of public affairs,

or the tendency of popular opinion, at this period to excite either alarm or dejection. The elemental agitation of the time of the reform bill had passed over, and certainly with less damage than might have been apprehended. No doubt the change then effected had considerably loosened the ancient holdings of the constitution; on the other hand, much of comfort was to be derived from the fact, that the people had shewn themselves less disposed than might have been feared, to abuse the power which was thus placed in their hands. As far as concerned the great mass of the English people, it was evident, that their former principles and prejudices remained unimpaired. The monarchy was still popular the church an object of attachment; a strong disposi tion indeed existed to get rid of what seemed to be abuses in the administrative parts of our public institutions; and so far as it had awakened more general attention to these defects, and shaken the obstinacy that so uniformly opposed itself to their removal, we do not know that the reform bill had done much harm. The effects of that revolution, however, are not to be appreciated in times like the present, of comparative prosperity and peace. The constitution is no doubt still strong enough for the ordinary march of events. It is the season of excitement and embarrassment, such as from time to time occurs in every country, which will put the adequacy of its diminished resources to the proof. If another storm like that which carried the reform bill should beset the vessel of the constitution, would it outlive the shock? We do not, however, suggest this as despairing of the event of such a

crisis. The public mind may improve in the understanding of its interests, in proportion to its increased influence in the management of them; though we confess we should not choose to have made ourselves responsible for the success of such an experiment.

There is one circumstance which will probably distinguish the future history of the country from the past.

We doubt whether another long war will ever be carried on by our government, subject as it will now more immediately become to the fluctuating impulse of public opinion. This consequence of the change would hardly be a matter of regret, were there not reason to fear, that the people may still be as ready to involve themselves in quarrels, as they will afterwards be unduly impatient to get out of them. Fortunately, however, there seems little ground of apprehension that we shall early be put to the trial. The foreign relations of the country, at this period, appeared as pacific in their tendency as at any former one of our history. It was evident, that peace had become the policy of all the leading powers of Europe. The very events which had so recently occurred to threaten a general combustion, bore witness in their result to this conclusion. If the revolutions of France and Belgium, and the civil wars of Poland and the Peninsula, could pass over without compelling a rccourse to arms on the part of the neighbouring powers, it was evident the catastrophe could only have been avoided by a general determination on their part by every possible means to avoid that extremity. And the longer peace has lasted, the longer is it likely to

last; the increasing connexion of interests and multiplication of relations, both commercial and intellectual, which grow out of a period of general tranquillity, are now the best guarantees of its continuance.

The politics of the continental governments, within the last twenty years, has indeed undergone an important change. Their jealousy is now less directed to their neighbours than to their subjects. They are not so ambitious to extend their territories abroad as they are anxious to maintain their power at home. The alarm of revolutionary movement has given them in a manner a common interest; to the comparative extinction of those feelings of mutual distrust or enmity which formerly prevailed among them. Every one feels, that the occurrence of a general war would let loose elements of internal agitation, the force or effect of which it would be as difficult to calculate as control. This sense of danger has produced a spirit of combination among the great northern powers, which if it suggest no happy augury to the prevalence of more liberal principles of government, at least affords the best security against the disturbance of the general peace. And by so doing it perhaps assures, less directly but not less certainly, the eventual ascendency of those very principles of which they would fain extinguish the force. It is by peace that all the fruits of human intelligence, as well as the resources of general wealth, are best developed and diffused. Every year of unbroken peace adds largely to the means, both mental and material, of the great mass of the people; and thus assures to them the pro

gressive increase both of their fitness for the functions of self-go. vernment, and of their power eventually to indicate their right to the exercise of it.

The assembly of parliament bad been assigned to the last day of January; but the business of political discussion did not await that time to commence its operations. Meetings took place in all parts of the country, under the auspices of the several parties which divided public opinion, for the purpose of arraying their strength, and declaring their views, preparatory to the more important struggle that was about to take place in Parliament. These meetings have their importance as indications of opinion; and public men, moreover, have often on the occasions of them, the opportunities of a more clear and decided expression of their sentiments and views than the objects and limits of a parliamentary debate will allow them. We think it desirable, therefore, to open our political annals for the year by a short account of the proceedings of some of them.

To begin from the bottom. In the first week of the year the reformers of Bath gave a dinner to the representatives for that city, which was remarkable not so much for the number of those present, as because it included most of the leading radicals of the country, who took the opportunity of renewing a public profession of their political faith. The principal speaker on this occasion was, of course, Mr. Roebuck. In defending the line of conduct which he had adopted towards the government, he declared, that all that he and his friends had asked was, that the members who compose the cabinet, and those who are in any way