he sent down to Parliament Papers containing evidence on which he demanded that a Bill of Pains and Penalties should be brought in against her. Canning opposed the measure; he had been the Queen's neighbour, had often seen her, had a kindly feeling for her, declared in Parliament that nothing should induce him to take part against her, and sent in his resignation. The king begged him to remain in office, and he went on a visit to Paris. The Bill was carried in the Lords by nine votes only, and the Government withdrew it; but it was still before the Cabinet; Canning felt that he must either abstain from Cabinet meetings or oppose his colleagues; he again tendered his resignation and it was accepted, but the king was bitterly offended; and, when in the following year, after the unfortunate Queen's death, Lord Liverpool urged his re-admission, the king would not hear of it. The doors of office seemed for ever closed against him, and the East India Directors offered him the post of Governor General of India. He accepted it; prepared to sail, and visited Liverpool to take leave of his warmly attached constituents, who presented him with a piece of plate of enormous value and hideous ugliness. During this visit to Liverpool, as on all previous occasions, he was the guest of an eminent merchant, whose home was near the town. He was wont to occupy a room overlooking the sea, and would sit for hours gazing on it, while the son of his host, a boy of twelve years old, played on the sands below. These two, the veteran politician and the holiday making boy, were linked together by a tie which neither knew. The boy was destined to take up and to expand the foreign and domestic policy of his father's guest, and to rival in years to come even his reputation as an orator and a statesman; for the name of Canning's host was Gladstone; and his young son was to become the present Prime Minister of England. The farewells were uttered and he was on the point of sailing, when Lord Castlereagh died by his own hand, and the Foreign Secretaryship was vacant. Public feeling designated Canning as his successor; and the Annual Register informs us that this expression of the general opinion 'found an echo in the royal breast'! Historical gossip, less dignified and less respectful, reveals the emotions that perturbed the royal breast; how its owner declared on his honour as a gentleman that he would never accept 'that fellow' as Secretary; and was at last forced to eat the leek by the Duke of Wellington, the only man who knew how to manage him. It adds that six weeks afterwards the king was asked how he liked his new Foreign Secretary. "Like him?" was the answer; "it is too weak a word; I love him!” The new Secretary's first foreign act was a momentous one; he broke up the Holy Alliance. Rarely in the history of the world has such an opportunity been given to its rulers of redeeming time-honoured injustice and of meeting righteous natural aspirations as fell to the diplomatists and sovereigns who met at the Congress of Vienna. Napoleon's conquests had absorbed the iniquities of centuries; the crimes and annexations of Russia in Poland, of Prussia in Saxony, of Austria in Italy, were swallowed up and cancelled by the Titan who cut and carved alike conquerors and conquered to suit his own views of universal Empire. His fall left the field of Europe clear of all prescriptions, open to just restitutions; it bequeathed to the congress two obligations, as matters of ultimate prudence and immediate honesty; the rearrangement of the map in accordance with national desires historically just; and the establishment of constitutional governments. One power there was able to insist on this, and to her all nations looked. England's hands were clean; her influence was paramount; had she spoken on the side of right, right must have been done. In an evil hour Lord Castlereagh was sent out as her representative. He was not a coward, but he was blinded by his vanity; proud of being the associate of Emperors and Kings, loath to oppose companions so august. He used the name of England to sanction every crime of the Congress: assisted in giving back Genoa to Sardinia, Saxony to Prussia, Venice to Austria; defended these spoliations in Parliament on the principle that great military monarchies must have lines of strategic defence,"flanks and rears he called them-"Scientific frontiers," is, I believe, the name assigned to them at the present day ;-assisted finally, after a feeble protest, at a third partition of Poland. Blood and treasure had been lavished for twenty years, that the freedom of millions should be rescued from one despot, and placed in the hands of three. The three had rectified their frontiers, gained their flanks and rears, divided Europe according to their fancies; it remained that they should rivet the power they had obtained. They formed the "Holy Alliance;" bound themselves to assist each other in checking all attempts on the part of their subjects or those of any other European Sovereign to secure constitutional Government; to trample out all efforts at popular liberty. Soon discontent burst out; in Spain, Naples, Piedmont, Portugal, the army backed by the people demanded and extorted constitutional liberty. The Alliance held congresses at Troppau and Laybach ; marched armies into Naples and Sardinia to restore absolutism, and summoned a third congress at Vienna to agree in applying the same treatment to the new Government of Spain. This congress Lord Castlereagh was preparing to attend as English plenipotentiary, when the malady attacked him which caused his suicide, and power passed into the hands of Canning. He sent the Duke of Wellington to the Congress, with explicit instructions, which the Duke faithfully executed. The Alliance proposed to march an army into Spain; the Duke in the name of England protested against the step; and on the Sovereigns persisting withdrew publicly from the Congress. The Alliance tottered under the blow, accentuated as it was by Canning's words in Parliament, and the enthusiasm with which the House received them; from his next move it received its death blow. That move was the recognition of the Spanish Colonies in America. These were five in number, Mexico, Columbia, Buenos Ayres, Peru, Chili. During the Peninsular War, perplexed by the rival claims of the provincial Spanish Juntas, and hating the authority of Napoleon, they had established provincial Governments of their own until such times as the affairs of the mother country should be settled. On his restoration, Ferdinand treated their actions as disloyal, and unwise severity goaded the colonists into a declaration of absolute independence, followed by a war between themselves and Spain. Meanwhile, an extensive commerce had sprung up between the Colonies and this country, with which Spain now interfered, capturing our merchant ships and imprisoning their crews when they were found trading with the insurgent colonies. Lastly, it became evident that the Holy Alliance, indignant at the republicanism of so large a portion of the quasi-European world, were preparing to interfere and reduce the colonies to submission; an invitation being actually sent to England to attend a congress for this purpose. Canning replied by the recognition of the independence of the Colonies. He convinced the reluctant Cabinet, and the more reluctant King; the formal announcement of the step was approved in the House, and enthusiastically received outside; the three great powers contented themselves with angry letters; and the Holy Alliance disappeared from history. It would be wrong to pass over without notice Canning's share in the Commercial legislation consequent on the panic of 1825. The Act of 1820 known as Peel's Bill had fixed Feb. 1, 1826, as the day on which the circulation of £1 notes should cease. The Bankers consequently began at once to contract their issues; and an unparalleled harvest occurring at the same time, agricultural prices fell, and the country gentlemen forced the Government to keep the notes in circulation until 1833. An immediate extension of Paper issues caused a rapid rise in prices. Increase of profits led to speculation; the Banks discounted at a low rate; invest. ments more advantageous than the funds were sought; a gambling mania set in, and reached its height in the Spring of 1825. Then came the reaction. The Bank of England, alarmed at the drain of its gold, began to contract its issues; a run on other Banks took place; panic began with the failure of a large House in the West of England, spread to London, and became universal; Stock itself was for a time not convertible into money; seven large Banks failed in London, twenty in the country. The Government interposed so far as to prohibit all issue of £1 notes after 1829, and refused to meddle further. The City thought this not enough, and demanded the issue of Exchequer Bills. Canning took the lead in the debate which followed, a lead due to his exhaustive study of the subject in 1808, and his singular power of lucid statement. The Banks combined against the Government, and the House was with the Banks; but Canning answered that the Government would resign if beaten, and carried his point by large majorities. Though never Chancellor of the Exchequer, he became the mouthpiece of the Government on all commercial questions. His speeches on the Shipping Laws, on the Alien Bill, on the Silk Trade, on the Reciprocity Act, on the graduated scale of duties upon corn, paved the way for the completed measure of Free Trade which it yet took twenty more years to mature. ment. One great triumph more remained to him in his own departThe Sovereign of Portugal, Don Pedro, had given a Charter to his subjects. This was resented by his brother, Don Miguel, who gathered round him an insurgent band, and crossed the frontier into Spain. The Spanish Government, backed by Austria, fed, clothed, and reinforced the rebels, and sent them into Portugal to fight against the established Government, which in great alarm implored the help of England. In a thin House, on Monday, December 11th, the few members present were startled by the appearance of Mr. Canning at the Bar, with a message from the King, which noticed briefly the aggression of the Spaniards, and expressed confidence in the support of the faithful Commons. On the next day Canning stated to a crowded House the facts, which in these days of slowly spreading news were known to most members imperfectly or not at all. He detailed our treaty obligations to Portugal and our forbearance towards Spain; claimed the sympathy of his audience for a nation which had won Constitutional liberty, and was threatened with its destruction by foreigners; and then to a house wound up and excited he announced the invasion of the country, and summarised the proceedings of the Government. "Our information arrived |