political economy to the spheres of his normal following of three. Sir Jupiter and Saturn, had proceeded to Michael Hicks-Beach threw in his lot lay Alexandria in smoking ruins, and with the "rapier and rozette" group had wound up by abandoning the gal- of the Opposition, and a minority of lant Gordon to his fate, there was thirty-five Conservatives, representing required a method of warfare far differ- the party on which Churchill had beent from the time-honored tactics of stowed the infelicitous title of "Toryparade. The devotion inspired among Democrat," went into the lobby against young Tory members by Lord Ran- three hundred and thirty-three followdolph's incessant watchfulness and skil- ers of Gladstone and Northcote. Men ful attacks far outweighed the misgiving were puzzled by this demonstration, sown by some of his sayings among the but it had the effect of showing that disciples of an older and more orthodox the member for Woodstock had made school. It had required, indeed, some- himself a powerful factor in his own thing more than the ordinary Con- party, and one that would have to be servative stomach to digest the speech taken into account in the formation delivered by him in the Edinburgh of any Conservative administration. Music Hall in December, 1883, largely Churchill had indeed rendered himself devoted to an exposition of the merits indispensable; his position was recogof the French Revolution. Had that nized by his admission, per saltum, to speech stood alone, not only would Lord Salisbury's Cabinet in July as Lord Randolph's sphere of influence secretary of state for India. Howbeit, been severely limited, but the Fourth not many people had realized the Party itself, had it ever come into ex- weight of Lord Randolph's influence istence, would have been reduced to upon the country till after his contest half its proportion. But that speech with Mr. John Bright for the represendid not stand alone. It was but one of tation of Birmingham at the general a series of brilliant platform perform- election of 1885. Many Conservatives ances, which secured to its author, regarded it as a piece of foolhardy first the attention, then the approval, bravado to beard the tribune of the and, lastly, the ungrudging devotion of a good half of the mass upon whom the franchise was about to be conferred.

people in the very cradle and close preserve of Radicalism. The result justified the daring. John Bright only held his own by 4,989 votes against 4,216 cast for the Tory champion.

A significant incident took place after the fall of Mr. Gladstone's administra- It was a rapid rise, but more surtion in June, 1885. Lord Salisbury had prising events were in store; not only undertaken the formation of a stop-gap had Lord Randolph made himself government to conclude the necessary dreaded by his opponents; he was business of the session and carry on also held in awe by his friends. He affairs till registration of the new con- had the knack of hitting off the weak stituencies had made an appeal to points in public men and crystallizthem possible. Before Parliament ad-ing them in epigram. It would perjourned for the interval necessary for haps be better to allow his pungent the re-election of Conservative minis- sneers at the "bourgeois placemen," ters, Mr. Gladstone, who still led the the "Tapers and Tadpoles," the " MarHouse, proposed to take into consid-shalls and Snelgroves," of his own eration the Lords' amendments to the party to sink into oblivion, were it Redistribution of Seats Bill. North- not that in any just estimate of the cote and the official Opposition supported him, and no surprise was caused by the resistance offered by the Fourth Party to the proposal. But it was speedily apparent that Lord Randolph Churchill was at the head of more than

remarkable rise of this man account must be taken of the means by which he overcame those forces of equal decency and density which oppose the progress of every free-lance. And every sarcasm which he poured on the

heads of his own party was atoned for tenfold by the ridicule with which he deluged his opponents. It was not till the following year, 1886, during the debate on the Home Rule Bill, that he fixed on Mr. Gladstone the indelible taunt of being "an old man in a hurry." But, indeed, he hardly ever rose in debate at this time, or appeared on a platform, without uttering some happy or stinging phrase, to be repeated next morning from ten thousand lips. How many of these were of his own coinage, or how many were minted in the elvish fancy of his close ally, Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, may be matter for speculation; the fact remains that these sayings contributed almost as much to his influence over what he irreverently termed "the old gang" Lord Beaconsfield's former colleagues as to the hold he acquired on the affection of the new electorate.

This appeal was repeated with greater emphasis and with amplified detail before an immense meeting at Manchester on March 3, 1886. In the interval Mr. Gladstone had once more become prime minister, had announced the conversion of himself and his party to the policy of Home Rule for Ireland, and had given notice of the introduction of a bill to carry it into effect. Churchill called on all patriotic Liberals to join their ancient enemies in the formation of a new political party, which he termed Unionist, to "combine all that is best of the Tory, the Whig, and the Liberal — combine them all, whether they be principles or whether they be men.' He warned his hearers against the separatist policy of Mr. Gladstone," which would be equivalent to a restoration of the heptarchy." As if conscious that it might be impossible to allay the animosity which his method of warfare had roused among Liberals against himself,

there were persons with whom the Whigs would decline to serve, "those persons would willingly stand aside " in the formation of a Unionist Cabinet.

It was at Sheffield, in 1885, that Lord Randolph made the first overtures towards that alliance between Cousti- he declared that if among the Tories tutional Liberals and the Tory party which he was to live to see so loyally cemented, and which was to have such far-reaching effects on the political destiny of his country. From this speech, as befitted the utterance of a The first fruits of this offer came a cabinet minister, much of the irrespon- few days later in the resignation by sible raillery, so characteristic of his Mr. (now Sir George) Trevelyan of his earlier manner, had disappeared. It seat in the Cabinet. Let it never be was pervaded instead by a grave and forgotten in any estimate of Lord Ranstatesmanlike note of warning. After dolph Churchill's career how great was sketching the headlong course on the part he played at this crisis, and which the Liberal party had entered, how largely he contributed to turning and analyzing the position of those who, like Lord Hartington, could not be suspected of approving of it, he

ended with these memorable tences:

the masses from the policy of separation. However much subsequent events may have obscured the just apsen-preciation of this, it was fully recog

nized at the time, and, on the return of the Unionists to power, public opinion endorsed the appointment of Churchill as chancellor of the exchequer and leader of the House of Commons. There were not wanting, indeed, mismembers of both Houses. They could trust and boding on the part of many not forget the bitter gibes which Lord Randolph had been wont to fling from below the gangway upon those who were now his colleagues in the Cabinet.

one who had broken up the very foundation on which it should rest.

Many of his public utterances had been so far at variance with Conservative habits of thought and principles that It is the gift of a great poet, without nothing but tremendous hazard could direct reference to, or narrative of, spebe discerned in entrusting the leader- cific circumstances, to cast into endurship to such young and rash hands. ing verse the ever-recurring phases of But these murmurings were soon human occasion. So Browning had hushed, overborne by plaudits won by written in his "Lost Leader" lines the new chancellor in his conduct of which ran at this time in the minds of business during the six weeks of ses- many of Churchill's dismayed followers. sion in the autumn of 1886. It would

be impossible to exaggerate the enthusiastic confidence Churchill had secured from his followers when Parliament

came to be prorogued on September

25th. Men went back to William Pitt for a parallel to this heaven - born leader. For the first time since 1832 it was possible to look with confidence on the future before the Conservative party.

Blot out his name! let him never come

back to us;

There would be doubt, hesitation, and pain;

False praise on our part, the glimmer of twilight,

Never glad, confident morning again.

This feeling was greatly intensified by a notable defect in Lord Randolph's character. He had never cultivated a Never was whole-hearted trust more certain faculty of intercourse which, at warmly given; never did it encounter this juncture of his career, would have colder or more sudden disappointment. stood him in good stead, of which his Late at night on December 22nd the neglect was the more remarkable bechancellor of the exchequer drove to cause it was a strong point in the party the Times office and handed in the an- leader on whom he modelled his whole nouncement of his resignation. The career. Disraeli was a consummate cause alleged was a disagreement with master of suavity and consideration his colleagues on ludicrously trivial towards his followers; Churchill was items in naval and military expendi- notoriously careless in this respect. ture. Let the cause have been far He would permit himself to behave more considerable, nothing could excuse the manner of the abdication. The queen, the Cabinet, the party, the nation — might all feel that they had His indifference to the rank and file received a scurvy return for their hand- of his party, outside the circle of his some treatment of the young states-intimate friends, had sown the seeds How the administration stood of resentment, which ripened into a

man.

with coldness, and even with rudeness, to those with whom he had been on cordial terms the day before.

the shock, how Mr. Goschen's acces- formidable aggregate of hostile feeling sion to the Cabinet proved in the end after he had divested himself of power. to be an ample compensation for what Men who had been confident in, and it had lost and a contribution to its proud of, his ability as a leader, found stability are matters of recent history, that when their faith in that was shatwhich Lord Randolph certainly did not tered, there was no fund of warmer foresee. He had reckoned on a one- feelings to fall back upon. He was man Cabinet, with himself as the man. feared rather than loved by the party. He made no secret among his friends Had it been otherwise had Churchill of his confident belief that he would be gained half the hold on the affections in office again in a few weeks. But of the House, which his immeasurably he had not calculated on the impossi- less brilliant colleague, W. H. Smith, bility of restoring confidence so rudely secured one of two things must have shaken. Men might still admire him happened: either he must have reand hold him in affection, but they turned speedily to office, or the Unioncould never again replace their trust in ist party must have split into two

camps. As things were, however, it became evident, as soon as Parliament reassembled, that the supporters who were ready to back Lord Randolph in any course he might take could almost be numbered on the fingers of one hand, and even this small band was soon to be reduced in numbers by reason of his inconsiderate dealings with them. Hereafter Lord' Randolph was to fill the melancholy rôle of a young man with a brilliant future behind him.

You have to fight two battles — one in Ireland against crime, the other in ParliaYou must win ment against disorder. both. The loss of one entails the loss of the other. As you are firm with respect to firm with respect to the rigid preservation matters in Ireland, so you should be equally of order in the House of Commons. . . . Excuse this lengthy letter. It deals with a general matter on which I feel much anxiety, and I greatly prefer communicating with you beforehand to expressing any difference of opinion with you in the House itself.

In the following year, when the government determined on the appointment of the Parnell Commission, Lord Randolph drew up a memorandum, dated July 17, 1888, containing his reasons for strongly objecting to such a course. The paper was ably drawn and temperately expressed, thoroughly statesmanlike, warning the government against proceeding in a manner "utterly repugnant to our English ideas of legal justice and wholly unconstitutional," and based on arguments of which the soundness was, in great measure, made manifest by the result.

The hopes of the Opposition for a rupture within the Unionist party were fanned by the speech in which the late chancellor of the exchequer explained his resignation. He told the House that it would be idle to deny that, beyond the question of naval expenditure, which was the immediate and ostensible cause for his giving up the seals of his office, there were other matters of grave importance on which be held opinions differing from those of Lord Salisbury. A twitter of anticipation ran through the Gladstonian ranks, already sanguine as to the outcome of the Round Table Conference then sitting. From both sources they Two years later, in March, 1890, were destined to drink disappointment. when the report of the Commission Churchill, had he chosen, might have was brought up for consideration, Lord given the government serious trouble Randolph vindicated his opinion in a as a watchful and bitter critic on their powerful speech, in which he was not flank. He did not so choose. It must careful to spare the feelings of minisbe admitted that, although at rare in- ters. He taunted them with the fact tervals he did attack his former col- that the majority of one hundred with leagues, he did so only when they were which he had led the House had now taking a course to which he was con- sunk to seventy, and he enforced his scientiously opposed. No rupture of arguments by imagery of a kind which the magnitude of that which had sev- public speakers, fortunately for their ered him from his colleagues could, audience, rarely resort to. The appallindeed, fail to leave some traces of ing horror of the metaphor applied to bitterness in personal intercourse; the miscreant Pigott spread a chill these, and the incidents they gave rise to, may now be dismissed forever from memory. What may be recorded to Churchill's honor is that he lent himself to no factious attacks on the gov-diate effect on the ministerialists was ernment policy. Writing privately to W. H. Smith during the debates on the Coercion Bill, four months after his resignation, on April 16th, 1887, he expressed himself thus sympathetically:

along the benches on both sides of the House. Nevertheless, the greater part of the speech won rapturous applause from the Opposition. The only imme

the subtraction of one from Churchill's compact following. The late Mr. Louis Jennings, then member for Stockport, who had clung to his idol through sunshine and storm, sprang to his feet and exclaimed: