manifold arts and graces as to persuade the people that the Tory party was the truly national, the truly progressive, the truly popular party. His rôle was to wean the popular ear from Bright and Cobden and Gladstone, who went storming through the provinces on what he derisively called "passionate pilgrimages," crying up the "nostrums" of liberty and equality, and preaching such perilous doctrines as man's moral right to the ballot, Italy's moral right to nationality, and England's moral duty toward peoples subject to the Turkish sword. His rôle was to teach the country to chant after him the new Tory catchwords: "The splendor of the Crown, the lustre of the Peerage, the privileges of the Commons, the rights of the poor."
It was his business also to give as much reality to these conceptions as possible. I fear it cannot be shown that he took a very effective interest in the "rights of the poor," though he had a hand in conceding their political enfranchisement, driven to the measure by the tactics of the Opposition. Much has been made of the sympathy he exhibited for the wretched condition of the miners by writing his novel "Sybil," what though he voted against mine inspection to show his sympathy for his friend Lord Londonderry, who was a mine owner. He proved his respect for talent by putting his private secretary and his solicitor into the peerage. But his really conspicuous masterpieces of statesmanship were performed to enhance the splendor of the Crown. By purchasing the Egyptian shares in the Suez Canal
