Died A.D. 1837. S. Wesley, Musician. 1838. Dr. Mavor (Education). Lady Hester Stanhope. Dr. Wm. Smith, Geologist. Lord Holland, Statesman. Sir David Wilkie, Painter. 1842. Marquis Wellesley, Statesm. R. Southey, Poet, etc. Lord Abinger(Sir J. Scarlett) Sir H. Halford. Physician, Vis. Sidmouth (Addington). Died A.D. 1845. Earl Grey, Statesman. T. Hood, Poet. A. W. von Schlegel, Scholar. Canon Barham ('Ingoldsby') 1846. Sir C. Wetherell, Lawyer. Sir N. C. Tindall, Chief Justic T. Clarkson, Philanthropist. R. B. Haydon, Painter. Louis Bonaparte (ex-King of Holland). R. Plumer Ward, Novelist. Bessel, Astronomer. J. Liston, Comedian, Palafox, Spanish Patriot. Musician. 1848. Lord Melbourne, Statesman. 1849. Lady Blessington, Novelist. Bernard Barton, Poet. Died A.D. 1950. Francis Lord Jeffrey, Essay. Sir Robert Peel, Statesman. Sir M. A. Shee. Painter. William Wordsworth, Poet. W. Kirby, Entomologist. A. Neander, Theologian. A. Oehlenschläger, Dram. Miss Jane Porter, Novelist. Gay-Lussac, Chemist. Louis Philippe, ex-King. 1851. Earl Cottenham, ex Chan. Dr. Lingard, Historian. T. Moore, Poet. D. Webster (American). 1853. Sir C. Napier, General. J. Martin, Painter. NAMES OF NOTE. Died A.D. 1855. Sir R. H. Inglis, Politician. 1856. Sir W. Hamilton, Metaphysician. Dr. Buckland, Geologist. R. Schumann, Musician. 1857. Dr. Kane, Traveller. C. Lucien Bonaparte, Prince of Canino, Naturalist. T. D. Hincks, Archæologist. Died A.D. 1858. H. Hallam, Historian. A. von Humboldt, Philos, Sir Jas. Stephen, Essayist, T. De Quincey, Essavist. Col. Leake, Geographer. Sir W. Napier, Historian. Earl of Aberdeen. H. H. Wilson, Orientalist. 1861. Dr. Donaldson, Philologist. Père Lacordaire, Preacher. Died A.D. 1862. T. H. Horne, D.D., Theol. J. B. Biot, Mathematician. Herm. Scheffer, Painter. Adm. Sir J. C. Ross, Navig. Duc de Pasquier, Statesmn. J. L. Ricardo, Economist. J. B. Sumner, Archbishop. Sir B. Brodie, Surgeon. L. Uhland, Poet. J. S. Knowles, Dramatist, Earl Canning. 1863. Horace Vernet, Painter. W. Dyce, Painter. N. W. Senior, Economist. P. J. Proudhon, Socialist. Sir W. J. Hooker, Botanist. Died A.D. 1866. Miss F. Bremer, Novelist. J. Gibson, Sculptor. W. T. Brande, Chemist. Dr. W. Whewell, Philosoph. S. Wilderspin, Promoter of Infant Schools. Rev. J. Keble, Poet. G. L. Craik, Eng. Scholar. A. F. Ville main. Author. 1868. John Doyle, Caricaturist. E. Jesse, Naturalist. Lord Cranworth, ex-Chan. J. van Lennep, Historian. AND THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. GOVERNMENT AND LAWS.-The great principles of the Constitution were finally established by the Revolution of 1688; but room was still left for the peaceful struggles of progress and order within the limits thus defined. The whole result has been the steady advance of popular power, tempered by loyalty to the sovereign, by the vast influence of the landed aristocracy and the clergy, and by the growing weight of a new plutocratic element. The personal power of the sovereign (in its direct form) has been replaced by the full establishment of ministerial responsibility. William III. was the last sovereign who used the veto which, though still a prerogative of the crown, is now practically impossible; for no measure passes the two Houses without being originated or consented to by Ministers; or else resisted by them, not by the veto, but by resignation or a dissolution. Though the constitution of Parliament, before the Reform of 1832, was such as to make the Government more dependent on the Crown and the nobility than on the people, still no Minister could long withstand a plain manifestation of the popular will. It is now admitted that the Premier must be the organ of the majority of the House of Commons, and that the Lords can only delay, and not finally refuse, their assent to measures deliberately sanctioned by the Lower House. A century and a half has been spent in working out, amidst frequent interruptions and re-actions, the principles of civil and religious liberty which prevailed in theory when George I. ascended the throne in spite of Jacobite intrigues; but the legislative fruit of those principles has been gathered almost entirely in the last fifty years, since the pacification of 1815; and the same period has given birth to ideas of commercial freedom, educational progress, and social amelioration, of which but a few of the men of the Commonwealth and Revolution had even a glimpse. The circumstances, under which the House of Hanover came to the throne, placed the Government in the hands of the Whigs during the reigns of the first two Georges; but the power of the Tory or Jacobite party (for the terms were then almost synonymous) was sufficient to limit Stanhope's attempts to repeal the enactments of Charles II. against religious liberty, and to cut short Walpole's career of peaceful and economic administration. Nor must it be forgotten that the leading Whigs had to bear the odium of being an aristocratic clique, who had contrived to secure the Government for themselves in the name of constitutional liberty. For nearly forty years after the accession of the Hanoverian dynasty, the nation was chiefly occupied with the efforts of the exiled Stuarts, and the continental wars which were more or less connected with their intrigues. Scarcely had this unquiet period been ended by the defeat of Prince Charles and the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, when the outbreak of the Seven Years' War gave opportunity for the gigantic schemes of the elder Pitt for the aggrandisement of England. It would need a genius like his own to strike the balance of loss and gain between the consequent postponement of internal reforms and the increased power of making them fruitful when their time came. The accession of a young King, the first Englishman of his race, possessed of a strong will and a high notion of his prerogatives, diverted the traditional faith of the Tories for their lost cause into the channel of loyalty to the reigning sovereign; and the "King's party" inherited some of the spirit of the old Cavaliers. On the other hand, the jealousy of royal favourites and despotic tendencies revived, and a small section of the liberal party began to exhibit the phase of modern Radicalism. The character of John Wilkes and the venom of Junius threw much discredit on their cause; but the cry for freedom was raised too vigorously to be ever again silenced; and the conflict produced the one additional security for personal freedom, the abolition of general warrants. The American Rebellion tended to define the new position of the two parties in the State, by its assertion of the abstract "rights of man," and by the vehement part taken by the King; and after the short interval, during which the younger Pitt emulated the economic reforms of Walpole, and foreshadowed those of Peel and Gladstone, the catastrophe of 1789 and the ensuing democratic excesses in France rallied the nation round the throne and confounded reform with revolution. Peace brought back the desire and the opportunity for progress; and the latter years of George IV. produced the Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, and the great measure of Catholic Emancipation. The demand for Parliamentary Reform-that is, for a system of representation which should make the lower House the true organ of the Commonalty of Great Britain-had already made head irresistibly, when the French Revolution of 1830 gave an impulse which burst all barriers; and the last great conflict between the possessors and the claimants of political power issued in the Reform Act of 1832. That event ushered in what may be distinguished as an Era of Freedom, in the widest sense, political and personal, commercial and religious; differing from the epoch so-called by the French Revolutionists of 1793, chiefly because checked by a Conservative opposition, the new name of which indicated its new spirit. The Reform of 1832 was not only a step in constitutional progress, but a means of giving practical effect to longdiscussed theories of improvement. Its first fruits were the Abolition of Colonial Slavery, the freedom of trade to India, the amendment of the Poor Law, the Reform of Municipal Corporations, the Commutation of Tithes, the re-distribution of Ecclesiastical Revenues, besides a number of legal and economical improvements. The fear of too rapid a progress was soon allayed by a Conservative reaction; but with the practical result, that measures in which the one party failed were adopted and carried by the other. The principles of commercial and industrial freedom, hitherto regarded as the Utopian dreams of political economists, were realised in the Repeal of the Corn and Navigation Laws, and the remission of a multitude of Customs' and Excise Duties; and the last political privation on religious grounds was removed by the Jewish Relief Act. Faith in popular principles has grown, with their extension, to such a degree, that the Reform Acts of 1867-68 were passed by a Conservative Government almost without a warning of those democratic dangers, any remaining fear of which was dissipated by the new elections. That the administration should be conducted for the good of the governed, rather than the gain of the governors, is a principle established by the reform of the Civil List, begun by Burke, and completed under William IV. and Victoria; by various measures affecting official duties and emoluments; by the bringing of every item of revenue and expenditure to account before the House of Commons, and by the system of examinations for appointments in the Civil and Military Services. But nothing has so much tended at once to increase the political power of the people, and to place it on the secure basis of open discussion, as the liberty of speech and of the press. We have seen that the last act for licensing printed works was suffered to expire under William III.; but this concession fell far short of the great argument of the Areopagitica, that (saving certain outrages which the law must punish) the press itself should correct the evil influence of the press. Government prosecutions for seditious and blasphemous libels were among the chief measures of resistance opposed by the Government of George III. to the principles of the radicals; but they at length failed, not only before the eloquence of Erskine and the untiring pertinacity of William Hone, but chiefly through the resolute deafness of juries to the judicial doctrine, that they were to find only on the fact of publication and leave the judge to decide the character of the libel. The liberty of reporting the debates in Parliament was conceded, after a vehement struggle, in 1771; but the immunity of a fair report, as against a person alleging himself to be injured by it, was only established by the Court of Queen's Bench, in Wason v. Walter, at the end of 1868. The last legislative restraints on free publication were removed by the repeal of the newspaper stamp-duty in 1855, and of the duty on paper in 1861; and the establishment of the Book Post in 1855 has increased the facilities for the universal extension of political discussion. ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE.-The Act of 13 Will. III., c. 2 (1702) made the judges independent of the royal pleasure, and that of 1 Geo. III., c. 23 (1761) made their commissions survive the demise of the crown. The result has been an almost perfect freedom from judicial corruption. The growth of litigation, with population and commerce, has required an increased judicial staff. Each of the three English Courts of Common Law (the Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer) received a fourth judge in 1784, a fifth in 1830, and a sixth in 1868 (specially for the trial of election petitions); and all three courts have been opened to all classes of suits. The Court of Exchequer Chamber, composed of judges from all three courts, for appeals at common and criminal law, was organised in 1830 and 1848. In Equity (with the exception of the equitable jurisdiction of the Court of Exchequer, abolished in 1841) the Lord High Chancellor and the Master of the Rolls were the sole judges till 1813, when the office of Vice-Chancellor of England was established. In 1841 two new Vice-chancellors were appointed; and in 1851 the three were placed on an equality. At the same time two Lords Justices were appointed, to form, with the Chancellor, the Court of Appeal in Equity. In 1857 the Ecclesiastical Courts were deprived of their jurisdiction over wills and matrimonial causes; and a new Judge of Probate was appointed, and also a Court of Divorce and matrimonial causes, of which the 8 Judge of Probate is the Ordinary Judge (the Chancellor and one of the Chief Justices making up the full court). It is needless to recount the numerous improvements in the regulation of procedure. Among the examples of emancipation from needless trammels, special notice is due to the reception of the evidence of the parties to a suit in Equity (1843) and at Common Law (1851); and the abolition of the old forms of scholastic pleading (1833 and onwards). The improvements in the law of real property are of too technical a nature to be stated here. A great step was taken towards bringing cheap and speedy justice within the reach of all the people, by Lord Brougham's revival of the ancient County Courts for the recovery of small debts, in 1846. Their powers have been subsequently extended to cases of tort, equity, admiralty jurisdiction and bankruptcy. The amount awarded by the judgment of these courts in 1867 was £1,151,629; the costs being £47,184, and the court fees £311,835; while of 942,161 plaints, four-ninths were settled without coming into court. In the same year £514,627 were recovered in the superior courts. Successive changes, from 1832 to 1861, have left the Law of Bankruptcy in a condition which has called for the new measure now (1869) before Parliament, involving the final abolition of imprisonment for debt, towards which steps were taken in 1838 and 1861. The amelioration of Criminal Law, begun in the last years of George III., has at length been carried so far that death is only inflicted for murder; public executions have been abolished; and the corruption of the very seed of our colonies by transportation has ceased. In proportion to the mitigation of punishment has been its greater certainty. In London, this has been especially promoted by the establishment of the Central Criminal Court (1834), and the enlarged powers given to the police magistrates. Parliament is now (1869) attempting to deal with the social plague and danger of a class of habitual criminals; but the pressing demands for a public prosecutor and a court of criminal appeal still remain unsatisfied. The old medieval relics of the wager of battle, and the benefit of peerage and of the clergy, only yielded to the reductio ad absurdum of actual cases, those of Thornton in 1818, and of Lord Cardigan in 1841. In 1861 the criminal law was consolidated into Six Acts, which may be regarded as the foundation of a Code. GROWTH OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE.—The first Hanoverian sovereign was called to reign over two kingdoms, of which Ireland was disunited from her sister in spirit as well as form, while Northern Britain herself was disaffected to the new dynasty. He possessed the colonies in America, which his great-grandson lost, and a few dependencies, of which the future fortunes were as yet unsuspected. A century and a half has produced a growth, at home and abroad, exceeding the whole previous progress of the nation; and of this growth the most striking part belongs to the last third of the whole period. POPULATION.-The population of England and Wales is estimated to have been from 1,500,000 to 2,000,000 at the Conquest, and to have been reduced one-third under the Norman Kings. It was reckoned at 2,092,978 at the accession of Richard II. (1377); 4,689,000 at that of Richard III. (1483); about 5,000,000 at the death of Elizabeth; 5,250,000 at the death of Charles II. (1685); and 5,475,000, in 1700. In the first 30 years of this century (1801-1831) the increase was 8,297,231, or 52 per cent.; in the second 30 years (1831-1861) it was 4,942,303, or only 20 per cent., a result due to emigration. The number of inhabited houses decreased from 4,792,846, in 1841, to 4,717,172 in 1851 (owing to a decrease in Ireland of 281,104); but increased again to 5,154,985, in 1861, this increase of 9-3 per cent. being more than half as much again as the rate of increase in the population. The growth thus shown has been most conspicuous in the northern seats of industry, and in the great manufacturing towns and sea-ports, such as Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Liverpool, Glasgow, besides other places created by modern trade and commerce. We have only space to give the details for LONDON, where a population of 674,350, in 1700, having only increased to 676,250 in 1750, grew to 900,000 in 1801, to 1,050,000 in 1811, to 1,274,800 in 1821, to 2,362,236 in 1851, and to 2,803,034 in 1861; of whom only 112,247 were within the limits of the "City." Vastly at this population exceeds that of the greatest provincial towns, the relative greatness of London is not in so high a proportion as it was at the Revolution. The population, which is now between six and seven times that of Liverpool or Glasgow or Manchester, was then more than seventeen times that of Bristol or Norwich. CONQUESTS.-The continental wars of William, Anne, and the first two Georges, restored to Britain a power which bore fruit in the conquests organised by Chatham in America and achieved by Clive in India, and established her maritime ascendancy, of which Gibraltar was the trophy and seal. Her only other European possession (the Channel Islands) was the last remnant of the heritage of her Norman Kings. The conquest of Canada (1759-60) compensated, by anticipation, for the loss of the North American colonies, which was itself gain to her true interests. The great French war of 1793—1815 added to our possessions some islands in the West Indies, the Cape of Good Hope, the Mauritius, and Ceylon; and, in Europe, Malta, besides the protectorate of the Ionian Islands, which were resigned to Greece in 1864. The successful struggle against Napoleon's attempt to make Egypt his stepping-stone to the mastery of the East, though involving no conquest, gave a prestige that secured the ancient route to India, by the Red Sea, which, however, was only re-opened in the present reign. Our establishments at Aden, in the Malay Archipelago, and at Hong-Kong, serve as the outposts of our Eastern power and commerce, and those on the West Coast of Africa bear witness to more disinterested efforts for the suppression of the slave trade. BRITISH EMPIRE IN INDIA.-The first steps, by which the commercial adventures of the East India Company were developed into a career of conquest, had their springs in European as well as Indian politics. The Mogul Empire was thoroughly established about the time when Vasco de Gama discovered the passage round the Cape (1497) and founded the first Portuguese settlement at Cochin (1502). The first English adventure was made in 1591;* the Dutch followed in 1601; the Danes obtained Tranquebar in 1619; the French East India Company was established in 1664, and their settlement at Pondicherry was made in 1668. English factories were established at Surat in 1612, at Madras (Fort St. George) in 1643, at Bombay (the dowry of Charles II.'s Portuguese queen) in 1668; and Calcutta was purchased and Fort William built in 1698. The first presidency was that of Madras (1658), from which that of Calcutta was separated in 1701; and Bombay was made a presidency in 1707. In the same year died Aurungzebe, the last of the great Mogul emperors, and their dominion, having received repeated blows from the successful rebellion of the Nizam of the Deccan, in 1723, the rise of the Mahrattas, in 1730, and the invasion of the Persian Nadir Shah, in 1739, became almost nominal on the death of Mohammed Shah, in 1748. The only European settlers in India that retained the power to profit by her disorganisation were the French and English, who were then in the heat of the war of the Austrian succession. The former planned an able scheme for driving their rivals out of India; but their conquest of Fort St. George had to be given back after the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle (1749). But, at this very juncture, a disputed succession, upon the death of the Nizam of the Deccan, gave occasion to the renewal of the war, and called forth the two champions, Dupleix and Clive. The former, by placing puppets of his own on the thrones of the Deccan and the Carnatic, was already threatening Madras, when Clive recovered the Carnatic for the prince friendly to the British by his marvellous capture of Arcot (1751). See the " Remarks" on the Tudor and Stuart Lines. Our next struggle was with the new ruler of Bengal, Surajah Dowla, who, abandoning the friendly policy of his predecessors, took Calcutta and Fort William, and smothered his 146 English prisoners (excepting only 23 survivors) in the horrible "Black Hole" (20th June, 1756). Clive, who had landed at Madras on the very same day after an absence in England, retook Calcutta on the 2nd January, 1757; and from his wonderful victory over Surajah Dowla, at Plassey, may be dated the beginning of the British Empire in India (23rd June, 1757). The epochs of its growth can only be briefly indicated. The defeat of the French governor, Lally, by Sir Eyre Coote, at Wandewash, gained the Carnatic (1760); and Pondicherry was taken in 1761. Munro's victory at Buxar (1764) reduced the Mogul Shah Alum II. to dependency on the British; and he ceded to Clive the virtual sovereignty of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa (1765). Under the India Bill of 1773, Warren Hastings became the first Governor-General. Seven years later, Hyder Ali, who had usurped the throne of the Mysore (1761), and whose invasion of the Carnatic (1769) had already led to one war with the British, overran the Carnatic for the second time, took Arcot (1784), and threatened to expel us from Southern India; but Sir Eyre Coote's two victories over him and his French allies (1781, 1782) were followed by Hyder's death (1782). In 1780, Pitt placed India under the double government of the Company and the Board of Control, and in the same year a disgraceful peace was made with Tippoo Sahib, the son of Hyder Ali, whose renewed attacks were only ended by his death at the storming of Seringapatam in 1799. The Carnatic was conquered in the following year. Pondicherry, which had been restored to France in 1783, retaken in 1793, and restored in 1801, was finally retaken in 1803; and the French power in India came to an end. In the same year SIR ARTHUR WELLESLEY gave the omen of his future greatness by his brilliant victory over the Mahrattas at Assaye. The long war with Holkar, and the Pindaree war, ended in 1818, were followed by the first Burmese War, in which the province of Arracan was gained (1824-26: Pegu was the fruit of the second Burmese War, 1851-52). In 1833, the trade to India, and the tea trade with China, were thrown open. The wars in Afghanistan, the Punjab and Seinde, the acquisition of Oude and the Indian Mutiny, with its consequence in the transference of the dominion over India to the British crown, have already been related; but the opening of the first Indian railway in 1853 is an equally memorable epoch. COLONISATION.-The progress of our colonies in North America has been rather steady than striking; and the policy pursued after the rebellion of 1837 has made them conspicuous for their loyalty. In 1867 was accomplished the fusion of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, into the "Dominion of Canada," with a territory of 377,075 square miles, and an estimated population of 3,879,885; and, at this very moment (April, 1869), the Hudson's Bay Company has accepted the proposal to cede to Canada the vast territory granted to Prince Rupert and his associates by Charles II., comprising one-third of the North American Continent. The settlement of British Columbia, on the Pacific Coast of North America, in 1858, was the result of discoveries of gold. But the chief field of our recent colonial enterprise has been in the vast insular continent of Australia. Captain Cook, the hero and martyr of Oceanic discovery, landed at Botany Bay in 1770, and gave to the land, already called New Holland by the Dutch, the name of New South Wales. Sydney was founded in 1788, and Hobart Town in Van Dieman's Land (now called Tasmania) in 1804. These were essentially penal settlements; but the liberated convicts formed the basis of a new community, which was re-inforced by free emigrants. In 1821 the population of New South Wales was 29,783, of whom three-fourths were convicts. The vast increase of population at home, during the first half of the present century, led to a vastly increased emigration, under a more systematic direction. The total of 2,081 emigrants, in 1815, rose, in 1820, to 25,729; in 1830, to 56,907; in 1840, to 90,743; and in 1850, to 280,843. Western Australia was formed into a province in 1829; South Australia in 1834; Port Phillip was colonised in 1835, and erected into the province of Victoria in 1850, and Queensland was made a province in 1859. The discovery of gold was made in 1851. The population of these colonies had risen to 130,000 in 1841; to 270,000 in 1851; and to 1,298,667 at the end of 1865. The systematic colonisation of New Zealand began in 1839; and, notwithstanding the frequent wars with the natives in the Northern Island, the European population reached 84,294 in 1860, and 190,607 at the end of 1865. All these Oceanic colonies have been placed under constitutional government, and the Of principle has been now established, that they should provide for their own defence. 195,953 emigrants (including 31,193 foreigners), who left Great Britain in 1866, 159,275 went to the United States, and the remainder to our various colonies. LIST OF THE BRITISH POSSESSIONS IN 1868.-A. In EUROPE.-The Channel Islands, Heligoland, Gibraltar, and Malta.-B. In ASIA.-British India, Ceylon, the Mauritius, Labuan (off Borneo); the "Straits Settlements" of Singapore, Penang, and Malacca ; Hong-Kong (China); and Aden, at the mouth of the Red Sea.-C. In AFRICA.-The Cape Colony and Natal; the west coast settlements of Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, Gambia, and Lagos; and the Islands of Ascension and St. Helena.-D. In NORTH AMERICA. The Dominion of Canada, Prince Edward's Island, Newfoundland, British Columbia and Vancouver's Island, the Hudson's Bay Territory, and the regions on the Arctic Ocean, except the N.W. corner from 141° W. longitude, which was lately Russian America, and is now the United States' territory of Alaska.-E. In the WEST INDIES.Antigua, the Bahamas, the Bermudas, with Turk's I. and Caicos (Keys), Dominica, Grenada Jamaica, Montserrat, St. Christopher's (or St. Kitt's), Anguilla, Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, Tobago, Trinidad, Tortola and some of the lesser Virgin Islands; also British Guiana (Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice) on the north coast of S. America; and British Honduras in Central America.-F. In AUSTRALASIA or OCEANIA.-The Australian colonies of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, and Western Australia; Tasmania; and New Zealand. Far removed from all the rest are the Falkland Islands in the Southern Atlantic, and the uninhabited Antarctic Continent (or Archipelago) discovered by Sir J. C. Ross in 1844. |