left a widow who found speedy consolation for him upon earth. Cranmer regretted him bitterly and bad most cause; for, when Suffolk died, the arm fell which could have saved him in his need from that terrible but glorious death whereby he passed from the judgment-seat of men to the mercy-seat of heaven. Brandon's greatness died with him. The "sweating-sickness" had robbed him of his two sons; and his title was, some three or four months after his death, conferred on the Marquis of Dorset, the luckless father of a luckless daughter, Lady Jane Grey.

From the union of Mary of England with the Duke of Suffolk there survived two daughters-Elinor, married to Clifford, Earl of Cumberland; Frances, married to Grey, Marquis of Dorset. Lady Jane Grey was the most celebrated and least happy of the three daughters, the issue of this last marriage. The ducal title of Suffolk was given to the marquis in consequence of his having espoused Brandon's daughter. Frances bore calmly the destruction which visited her house through the ambition of those who would have forced greatness upon "the Lady Jane," and when a widow she gave her hand to Stokes, a man of low birth, who had been her master of the horse. When Elizabeth heard of the match, she exclaimed, "Why, the silly fool has married her horse-keeper!"-" And (remarked Cecil to a bystander, out of hearing of Leicester), our gracious mistress would not at all be sorry to do something very similar."

For the romantic adventures of Brandon's surviving widow, we must refer our readers to contemporary and later chronicles. Here it must suffice to say that she speedily married an obscure scholar named Bertie; and, on the accession of Mary, left England in hot haste before the blasting wrath of Gardiner. Herself and husband, with their little daughter, crossed the sea, for religion's sake, to find persecution and penury attend them through Flanders. So complete was their desolation that the wife of Bertie gave birth to a son beneath a church-porch in the town of Wesel, where snow, sleet, and rain fell heavily and drearily upon mother and child. And yet the mother was noble-daughter of the ninth Lord Willoughby: her mother, a Spanish lady of rank, had been maid of honour to Catherine of Arragon; and she herself had been the ward, and had slept (the last of his wives) on the bosom of Suffolk. The lady so softly nurtured passed through the terrible trials incident to persecution, want, and starvation, till with her husband and children she reached Poland. The King, Sigismund Augustus, the last male heir of the house of Jagelo, sheltered the fugi

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tives, and showered on them a more than princely hospitality; and when they returned to England, in the halcyon days of Elizabeth, their tale of diversified gladness and sorrow, storm and sunshine, was the theme at many an English hearth. Some years later, the little boy, born in bitter travail beneath the church-porch of Wesel, appeared at Copenhagen as the representative of Elizabeth. The Queen had restored him to his maternal grandfather's title on his undertaking to defray the expenses of the Danish mission out of his own purse; and, when a Dane enquired who was the Peregrine Bertie who represented so bravely the Majesty of England, answer was made"He is Earl Willoughby d'Eresby, and his mother was the widow of the man who erst married for love Mary of England, Queen Dowager of France."

ART. VIII.-Letter of the Right Honourable Benjamin Disraeli, M.P., Chancellor of the Exchequer, to his Constituents. June, 1852.

IN the most momentous conflicts recorded in the history of England, whether we regard those which have risen to the height of civil war, or those conducted in a more orderly manner within the limits of a free constitution, it may be reasonably doubted, whether the great mass of those, who have taken their places under the banners of one or other of the rival factions have understood the real nature of the cause for which they contended? Of many it might be said with truth, that they sought only some vent for their inherent ferocity, and chose their party by accident, or by the example of others, rather than as the result of pure deliberation. The partisans of the Red or White Rose fought and suffered, in perhaps most instances, rather for the badge, than for the great principle of which it was the symbol. Under the Commonwealth, although the participation of each of the contending parties was more intelligent, yet of those who filled the ranks of the Cavaliers or Roundheads there were not a few who did not enter into the grounds of the difference between Charles and his Parliament. Personal aversion towards individuals or classes-contempt on the one hand and a newly-awakened spirit of rivalry on the other-above all, the call of ambition-were more powerful motives of action, than a disinterested zeal for the welfare of the people, and a desire to maintain the old established laws and institutions of the realm.

In the more peaceful and moderate age in which we live the same description will be found, although in a lesser degree, applicable to the political contests, that are decided by the suffrages of the people, through their representatives in Parliament. A spectator, who, not interested himself, should visit a town or city where a contested election is in progress, cannot fail to be struck with the appearance of earnestness and even vehemence, sometimes proceeding to open violence and bloodshed, visible in the supporters of the rival candidates. At such a time he sees, in the strongest possible point of view, the appropriateness of the poetic figure, by which a large multitude is compared to the waves of the ocean tossing to and fro upon their bed; and, if he were a foreigner, he would conclude that some question of vital importance to the welfare of each person, touching the innermost springs of life, agitated every breast. Yet, if he were to draw one of the most impetuous from the crowd, and ask of him the cause of his excessive ardour, he would probably receive for reply that he was strongly interested for the success of the "blue or the "yellow," and that he was only standing by his "colour.” We do not mean to assert, that such a person would not have some idea of a principle involved in the contest; but for the most part his views would be found vague and undefined, or limited to some point of inferior importance.

A solemn appeal is now about to be made to the electors of the united kingdom, upon a subject of the greatest importance, which it would be, perhaps, impossible to exaggerate. The question proposed to them is-by whom, and according to what policy, is the administration of the British empire to be conducted? Never, perhaps, was the supreme authority of the people in the constitution so distinctly and unreservedly recognised-at no period were they invited to exercise their suffrages under circumstances of deeper responsibility. Under Providence, it may be said, that the nation holds its destinies in its own hands-a position most anxious, if most honourable. From the wide diffusion of knowledge of every sort, political, statistical, historical, and scientific, which has taken place within the last few years, especially the last twenty, a calm and dispassionate response to the appeal of the Sovereign ought reasonably to be expected, based rather upon sound and permanent principles, such as should be found in the hearts of a great and free people-free, not merely from external coercion, but also from false and erroneous views, which seldom work more deadly harm than upon prejudice and half-truths, such as most com.

monly govern mobs, who rush into action without taking any counsel of their understandings.

As a portion of the people thus appealed to, at once sensible of the importance of the crisis, and feeling that the welfare of a few cannot be separated from that of the whole nation to which we belong, we would venture to offer a few considerations, to our fellow countrymen of all classes, which, if seriously weighed, will we trust enable them to arrive at a sound and beneficial determination. In doing so, we render no more than due homage to the intelligence of those whom we address, by presenting before them reasonings, which call for calm and deliberate attention, rather than those more exciting topics and bitter personalities with which political discussions are too often disfigured.

The issue, about to be submitted to the verdict of the nation, is not merely whether the Earl of Derby or Lord John Russell shall be Prime Minister, as if it were a matter of choice between these two individuals, which men might determine according to their personal predilections or prejudices; but whether the principles of which each of them may be regarded as the representative should at the present time prevail in the administration of public affairs? To the nature of these principles we solicit attention.

In every country of civilized men, acknowledging the rights of property and united by common laws into one people, there are two opposite powers or interests of the State under which all other interests may be classed-namely, permanence and progression. If the institutions of any nation were to be subjected to a series of changes, whether from caprice or a desire of experiment, so that some alteration regularly appeared in each revolving year as if there was a necessary charm in novelty because it was new -if the fabric of the constitution were to be caused to go through the process which we have read of, with respect to the mansion-house of an eccentric man, who had no sooner built up a part of it, than he had it pulled down that he might build it up anew-it would prove utterly destitute of any beneficial effect upon those who lived in such a shifting scene of events. Such temporary institutions would hardly call forth temporary reverence, and would never prove adequate for the development or maintenance of national life. It is one of the principles-by some it may be called prejudices of man's nature-that he looks with respect upon that which has been hallowed by time, and contemplates a dura

* Coleridge, "Constitution of Church and State," chap, ii.

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bility in all that he may accomplish. Hence, in his estimate of individuals, the hoary head of age is looked up to as the symbol of a superior wisdom; and a long-established family with its illustrious ancestors, richly quartered armorial bearings, and long-descended titles, is regarded with a reverence which no new man," however great his merits, can expect either for himself or his immediate posterity. Even republics, which repudiate the idea of an aristocracy, will reckon among their citizens an upper ten thousand." The same feeling prevails with reference to institutions, which always have a greater weight and solidity, in proportion to the length of their existence, and their consequent capacity for moulding and directing the habits and views of the people. This is the case_especially in England, where, as has been declared by Mr. Burke, "It has been the uniform policy of our constitution to claim and assert our liberties, as an entailed inheritance derived to us from our forefathers and to be transmitted to our posterity :"

"This policy (he adds) appears to me to be the result of profound reflection, or rather the happy effect of following nature, which is wisdom without reflection and above it. A spirit of innovation is generally the result of a selfish temper and confined views. People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors. Besides, the people of England well know that the idea of inheritance furnishes a sure principle of conservation, and a sure principle of transmission, without at all excluding a principle of improvement. It leaves acquisition free, but it secures what it has acquired."

Without permanence, the institutions of a country would be destitute of that weight which long prescription brings with it, and without progress they would become obsolete, and a hindrance to the further development of the nation's life. Civilization admits of many degrees; the point of highest advancement at the time of the Norman conquest appeared a state of barbarism in the reign of Elizabeth; again, the era of Elizabeth would seem barbarous in the era of George the Fourth and Victoria; and, if the world should last so long, the present age may be regarded in a similar point of view, by those living in the twenty-second or twenty-third century after Christ. It is necessary, then, that our institutions should be adjusted to meet the altered circumstances of the times, and to harmonise with the new lights discovered in political science, and the new forms of combination in which society may present itself to the view-in short, that they should be brought into the same condition in which our forefathers would have constructed them, if they had been in our position. But they