shouting in scores all over the land | cation, or of ignorance, is inextricably every morning, every evening, and, warped into all of them. Take, for indeed, every hour of the day. We are example, our politics. Those of us who all, whether we will or not, full of a are Tories are hostile to the Radicals feverish haste to have our minds in- less because Radicalism errs in matters formed and made up on every subject of fact and in logic than because we within an hour after it has arisen. The resent the humorless, or splenetic, or weekly reviews have adapted them- highly moral temper of its average selves to those new conditions. They apostle; less because we distrust progused to state the geneses of the ques-ress than because we are instinctively tions which had to be discussed and averse from Roundheads, consuming decided. Nowadays, as we have noted, earnestness, and the Nonconformist the exposition of current topics is dif- conscience. Those of us who are Radfused by morning and evening journals icals are anti-Tory because our taste reso widely that the weeklies take it for pels us from Toryism. We are willing to granted that their readers know all the disintegrate the empire less because we facts. It might not be quite right to believe in Home Rule than because our say that they deal exclusively with the opponents are snobs or morally wicked. questions of taste which are involved in Our ecclesiastical attachments also are the political, social, and other matters determined by our taste. Protestants which the daily newspapers treat as are anti-Papists less because they have questions of practical reason. The fault to find with the exegesis of Catholweekly reviews do not lend themselves icism than for some such reason as that to definement and generalization. the influence which the peasant priests Nevertheless, we should, perhaps, wield in Ireland is a social affront. come as near the truth as is possible by Those of us who are disgusted when that means if we said that the reviews earnest Protestants rave at the pope are are now less concerned that their read-moved less by respect for the history of ers should hold sound opinions than the ancient Church, which is abomthat they should hold those opinions in inable, than by resentment of the arroa certain temper. Their manner, which gance of the Protestants, whose history, used to be that of the lecturer, expos- which is brief, is comparatively lacking itory, grave, is now that of the club in color and romance. Even our artistic gossip or other agreeable rattle, banter- opinions are determined by our taste. ing, cynical, distinguished. That is The many of us who know nothing of why, like Radical legislators raised to pictures worshipped Mr. Ruskin when the peerage, and like Pall Mall clubs his criticism held the field; we regard founded to promote reform, weekly re-him both in sorrow and in anger now, views inevitably end in Toryism. It is when Mr. Whistler's theories are in the in the nature of things impossible for ascendant, and the picture which tells men of brains, education, and character, a story or conveys a moral is out of to go into reflective detachment from "the wordy trucklings of the transient hour" and yet remain faithful to the Radicals. Our point, however, is that the new function of the reviews is to set the fashion in matters of intellectual moods and taste; and that that function is as important as their old one, which was primarily to keep the public free from error in matters of fact.

fashion. In short, practically all our opinions, whether they are sound or they are unsound, are the result less of cold judgment than of imperious prejudice. That seems a deplorable confession to make at the end of the nineteenth century; but, after all, we need not be very much ashamed of it. They err who suppose that in our warfare in behalf of opinions we are seeking after The saying that opinions are a matter truth with single eyes. The bald end of taste is more profoundly true than of any effort is never attractive. The we realize. The bias which comes of sportsman stalks the red deer because hereditary likes and dislikes, or of edu- of the joy of stalking; he has no joy

whatever in actually slaying the stag. | contributors to the Spectator have a Similarly, we know, on the testimony of uniformity in the processes of thought,

all philosophers, that as regards truth the fun of the thing lies wholly in the search for it; if we attained it, we should be bored to death. Our theoretical desire for truth, therefore, is wisely frustrated by a practical resolution, at the instance of our tastes, to have none of it, since it is likely to be disagreeable or uninteresting. To defend this state of affairs would be to defend human nature, and, therefore, as human nature is not assailed, to be battling with the wind; but one may remark, for the sake of lucidity, that we are sensuous as well as sensible beings, and that our sensuous instincts have as much right to be exercised as our purely practical appetite for fact has right to be appeased. Gentlemen of sovran intellect, like the calculating boy and the lamented Mr. Calvin, are quite as monstrous as gentlemen who have no intellect at all. The proper men, of course, are they in whom feeling, thought, and taste are blent in natural proportions.

which is a much stranger phenomenon than any uniformity in manner of expression. All of them write gravely, decorously, almost as if playfulness were a cardinal sin; they have a trick of pulling us up, frequently, by some striking parenthesis relevant to a subject other than that which is under discussion; and a luminous haze of metaphysics is over all. The Speaker, which is young, has its character still to form. At present its airs and graces resemble those of the Spectator; but the similarity is outward only. The Speaker gives one the impression of being highly self-conscious that weekly reviewers who can make modern Radicalism presentable must be very superior persons indeed. The National Observer also is at a very interesting stage of development. Like all journals of its class, it has a style of its own, a style unmistakable; but it is not yet quite certain what principles the style is to enshrine. Paganism, which is the National Observer's creed for the moment, is not incompatible with Toryism in the abstract. Indeed, Toryism being based on the theory that the people have to be governed, and that their say in the matter should be the smallest possible, a pagan autocracy, an autocracy troubled by no scruples such as are apt to arise in the minds of religious politicians, would exemplify Toryism in its best estate. England, however, hapOf course, the manner and the tone pens to be traditionally anti-pagan, and of each of the reviews are in certain our leading Tories happen to be Highcharacteristic respects its own. The Churchmen. This complicates the probSaturday, so similar is the style of each lem of life for the National Observer, article in it to that of every other, reads which, if it were to speak its mind with as if it had been written from begin- unshackled pen, would become indistinning to end by the same pen. Every guishable from the National Reformer sentence is like a dart; every paragraph of Mr. Bradlaugh. That is only one of has rapid movement; and every article the difficulties from which the Tory has the air of having been written for review suffers in its lusty youth. The the amusement of the writer's learned spirit of the National Observer is that of leisure rather than for the consideration revolt against convention. The middle of anybody else. The individuality of class, therefore, has to be seen to. the Spectator is equally definitive. The Twenty years ago the seeing-to could homogeneity of the writing in that jour- have been gone about in what Mr. Jim nal is even more wonderful than that Pinkerton would call whole-souled thorof the writing in the Saturday. The oughness, for at that time the middle

To these, after a week of the Times, the Standard, the Daily News, and other daily journals, with their strenuous outpourings of practical instruction on the questions of the day, the weekly reviews are grateful. They have a different manner, a different tone. They are in a more soothing accord with our mental nature; for, with their cynical gaiety, they are more nearly in accord with the whole of it.

ing the brutal truth with frankness, and making the best of the situation. Toryism and Conservatism are fundamentally different; but they are at one for practical purposes, and, after all, it is not vain to hope that by and by the truth of things may be clearly seen, and that the National party will become the Tory party in spirit as well as in name.

class was Liberal. It has to be gone | party has been inspired by motives of a about warily now, for the middle class kind which prevent the old Tory party has gone over to Conservatism. That from having any high opinion of its is for the National Observer a difficulty recruits. The Tories being mortal, are as grave as the other, and it creates not faultless; but theirs is the only a difficulty even more complex. The party of which it can be said that it has Tory review hates Conservatism as been animated by an intelligent ideal heartily as it hates the middle classes. and never by purely selfish consideraIf the conditions under which it flour- tions. Conservatism is merely Liberalishes were conditions under which free- ism scared out of its social narrowness. dom to speak the terrible truth in love Even so, however, it is not wholly bad; were possible, it would say that Con- and we may hope that, having in this servatism is as sordid, unromantic, and matter dotted the i's and stroked the unpleasing as Liberalism itself. It t's of the National Observer, we shall would have little difficulty in establish- | henceforth see that lively review speaking that painful proposition. Each successive secession from the Liberal mass has been at the bidding of a sordid fear. The landed Whigs were among the most tenacious of the anti-Tories until the Liberal party made practical politics of the "agrarian question." Then they suddenly discovered, without a blush, that the other party, which they had all their lives held up to the scorn of moral men, was respectable enough to join. The wealthy manufacturers were among the most zealous of Liberals until the beginning of their party's patronage of the "labor movements" which were destined to make the increase of riches difficult. Thereupon they too changed their minds, and most of them are knights of the Primrose League. Then," 'twas's," ""twere's," obsolete modes the Liberal party, having virtually ac- of the subjunctive, and other capers of cepted the doctrines of the Socialists, a similar kind, were such as could the shopkeepers, large and small, have not continue with success. They are abandoned their traditional allegiance, largely discarded now. The mannerism and are shouting for Church and State which has taken their place is one which with the enthusiasm of the Bull of should follow them with as little delay Bashan. Now the very Nonconform-as possible. Our allusion is to "preists are hiving off. Their marvellous ciousness" of diction. The apposite conscience was wont to find the holiest word is usually charming; but it is not sanctions for boycotting, murder, class always so. Young gentlemen whose robbery, sedition, and every other out- first purpose in writing is to show off rage perpetrated by or in league with their delicacy of diction are apt to wrong the party which encouraged them in the world by addressing it when they their civil and religious spites; but, have nothing to say. Occasionally, as now it has dawned upon them that the when Mr. Marriott Watson wrote "My flesh-pots of Protestantism are at stake, Lady, the Naiad," they delight us; but their revered leaders are writing sympa- it may be held that as a rule they are thetically to "the bloody Times," and given too much scope in the National the unctuous mass of them is merg- Observer. They are allowed to tell stoing into Conservative associations. In ries less because they have good stories short, every secession from the Liberal to tell than because they think they can

We have dealt thus fully with the National Observer, because, perhaps, owing to its youth, it is a peculiarly interesting representative of the weekly reviews. It is fresh to the work which they all do, and it goes about the common mission with originality and vigor. At first it was too original. Its mannerisms, which then consisted of "'tis's "

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tell stories of any kind deftly. That is "demonstrations" against the House surely a mistake on the part of the Na- of Lords were going on all over the tional Observer. A poor story set forth country, men felt sure that revolution with "preciousness" is as much of an and the breaking-up of laws were nigh affront as an overdressed woman, or at hand; but the trouble passed in University Extension, or Your Clap- peacefulness, and the Constitution is hamite, or any of the other pet aver- still unimpaired. A few months ago sions of the National Observer. It is many of us felt that if the ministry of essentially vulgar. Let us hope that Lord Salisbury were not returned the we shall see the last of it soon, and that direct consequences would have to be the National Observer's admirable in- faced; already, our immediate apprestinct for the right word will be exer- hension realized, we have ceased to cised exclusively on subjects worthy of fear that anything terrible is coming to being treated with artistic zeal. As pass. Like miracles in the eye of Mr. Canon Taylor remarked, the best style Huxley, political cataclysms do not is that which draws least attention to happen. Orderliness, which is so conitself. In the works of Mr. Stevenson, spicuous in politics, governs most other or of Mr. Mallock, or of Mr. Greenwood, human activities. Industry and comor of Mr. Henley, or of Mr. Quiller merce survive all menaces; democracy, Couch, or of Mr. Barrie, or of Mr. Kip- in the development of which social disling, or of any other master of the art tinctions were expected to disappear, of literature, one does not see that the serves to make caste and rank more mind of the writer is laboring at the obviously real and enduring than ever; task of word-choosing. Their "pre- morality, of which acute philosophers ciousness" of diction is woven with the were certain that it would be followed texture of their thought. Their work, by universal wrong-doing if its religious therefore, is art, and magical. All sanctions were removed, is in this hour other preciousness" is artifice, and of Agnosticism assured and influential. shoddy. These facts are lost sight of in the push Despite their differences of method and bustle and apprehensiveness of Lonand of manner, the great weekly re- don day by day, and of society at large views are, as we have said, essentially in the feverishness, the lack of the similar in character. They are similar sense of the greatness of time, with in that their view of affairs differs from which London and its fleeting alarms that of Parliament, of the platform, and infect it. That is why, instead of havof the daily press. It is leisurely, phil- ing disappeared, the weekly reviews, osophical, fastidious. In Parliament, which in their manner and temper repon the platform, and in the daily press, resent every mental, every social, and men are constantly excited, grave, and every moral force which excitable decertain that unless the majority of the mocracy is supposed to loathe, are nupeople are in favor of their particular merous and powerful. They meet a party the country is going headlong to need which is none the less real because ruin. That state of mind, which arises it is rarely realized. A week is not from the necessity of solving great much more than a day; but the view problems within an hour, and in an of things which is conscious that it will atmosphere of contagious mental ten- be regarded as the outcome of a week's sion, is fallacious. Events such as reflection is necessarily quickened by those of politics are never so serious as some small share of the soothing reposethey seem when they are impending. fulness of history, in which such of the Even as what appears at a distance to alarms of our forefathers as come to be a high hill often, when we reach it, anything at all make a very poor show turns out to be a gentle slope, the por- indeed. If, then, there is any occasion tents in politics are almost always more to account for the weekly reviews, we alarming than they need be. During may say that they are active and prosthe last Constitutional Crisis," when perous simply because very many of us

The manager watched him as he retired, watched him through a transparent pane in the glass door after he had retired, watched him as he took his hat from a peg, and watched him with especial eagerness as he passed through the swing doors on his way out (no doubt) to dinner; and the expression in the face of the great man might have suggested to a witness, if there had been one, the existence of some grave suspicion regarding the security of the contents of the safe. After making an

require a mental relaxation after the febrile exhaustions of the flying day. We require a statement of affairs in which events are treated in their real proportions, and the best statement of that kind which is at our disposal is to be found in the weekly reviews. These periodicals are likely to go on in prosperity. The notion that the daily journals will render them useless is based upon a superficial observation. It is incompatible with the fact upon which we have been dwelling; the fact that there is a widespread and growing need examination of the papers shut in befor some corrective of the hasty opin-hind the iron door, in order to satisfy ions formed day by day, and hour by himself that they had or had not been hour, amid conditions of excitement so tampered with, and after transferring intense that they are necessarily out of some papers from the safe to a drawer proportion to the importance, or the of his writing-table, which he locked up insignificance, of the matters dealt with, again quickly, an occupation that seemed and utterly lacking in gaiety, humor, to suggest grave and moody reflections, artistic perception, and other qualities and during which he looked around of that kind, which are as essential in him frequently to see that he was alone all sound mental processes as ozone is the manager turned his attention to essential in a wholesome atmosphere. the slip which had been placed on his table by the young man who had just left the room.

W. EARL HODGSON.

The answer came from a pale and feeble-looking youth, standing before the open safe in the sanctum of the manager of the Continental Banking Corporation Limited, Old Broad Street, E.C.

The question had been put by the manager himself on re-entering his room after a momentary absence in the outer office. The clerk, for such was the young man's position in the bank, flushed to the roots of his hair, as the manager thrust him aside, and ostentatiously secured the door to the safe.

Nothing more passed between the two. The clerk laid a slip of paper with figures written upon it on the manager's table; and having thus apparently fulfilled the duty which brought him thither he went out, closing the door gently behind him.

Upon the slip were written these fig

ures:

"£10,000

to-morrow, Saturday. Messrs. Bulling & Co. will call for the second lot of bonds early on Monday."

"Ten thousand pounds!" he muttered. "Saturday. What an opportunity! this is Friday if I can wait till to-morrow!"

The manager pressed his hand to his forehead, and gave up his thoughts to some problem that weighed upon him. Presently he shook off this moodiness, and reaching out his arm, gave two sharp strokes to a hand-bell standing beside his inkstand. The double signal was a summons for the chief cashier, who answered it without delay.

"Come in, Mr. Price. Shut the door, if you please.”

The cashier did as he was bidden and came to the manager's table, to hear what that gentleman had to say. But the latter did not speak, he stood facing his colleague, and looking into his eyes with a scared expression of countenance. Mr. Price was startled.