the rival armies were about to close in the shock of battle. We quote M. Cousin's felicitous description :

'The battle had already almost commenced. Toiras had marched out of the citadel with two or three hundred horse and as many foot soldiers to see what service he could render. The Spanish and Imperial army was marshalled in formidable lines that showed like fortresses. Within was seen the Marquis of Santa Croce with the artillery, in the midst of his staff; Galas was at the head of his veteran infantry, and Piccolomini of the German cavalry, on whom had devolved the first onset, Schomberg was in the French centre; on the right wing was Marshal de la Force, on the left Marshal de Marillac. All three were in motion on the front of the army. When within range the soldiers knelt down; prayers were said, and afterwards a few words were addressed to them to arouse their courage. Never," wrote Richelieu, " was there a finer day. It was as "if the sun had multiplied his light to illustrate with peculiar dis"tinctness every feature of such an important action." It was now about four in the afternoon. The cavalry rode, sword and pistol in hand, the infantry marched with an even step, and with a resolute and cheerful countenance. The Spanish cannon had opened its fire; and was making ravages in our ranks, but without shaking them or causing disquiet. The sentiment of the approach of great danger produced on all sides a solemn silence. Piccolomini, who had moved from his station, to reconnoitre and ascertain if the moment to charge had come, had had a horse shot under him. The forlorn hope and the volunteers who had been told off for the first attack had reached the foot of the Spanish entrenchments. On a sudden a cavalier was seen to ride from those entrenchments at a gallop, to make his way through the volleying shot, and with his cap in one hand and a crucifix in the other, to cry out with a loud voice, "Peace! "Peace!" It was Mazarin, who, approaching Schomberg, informed that general that he had been sent by Santa Croce to assent to the proposition on which that morning they had made an agreement. The French astounded had come to a halt, when two discharges of cannon exasperated our soldiers, and they rushed forward to engage the enemy. Mazarin set off to the Spanish camp, put an end to the firing, and hastening back, implored the generals, in his alarm lest some new accident might occur, to hold a conference upon that instant. They agreed: Santa Croce, with his principal officers, Don Philip Spinola, the Count Serbellone, the Duke of Lerma, the Duke of Nocera and some others, left the Spanish camp; Galas, Piccolomini, and the Imperial commander proceeded from their own lines; and the French marshals having done the same, the conference took place on the field of battle.'

From this time the reputation of Mazarin was established in the councils of Europe. In looking back at the complicated drama in which he played so eminent a part, we agree with M. Cousin that he displayed the very highest diplomatic ability. Some circumstances, indeed, were much in his

favour--the reverence which, even in that age, was felt for an envoy of the Pope by the representatives of the Catholic monarchies, the jealousies and weaknesses of a coalition which paralysed the arm of Spain and Austria, and the series of accidents which prevented Richelieu from carrying out his warlike policy. For these sufficient allowance, perhaps, has not been made in the present volume. Yet Mazarin's splendid and hard-won success was caused in the main by his own genius'; by his singular power of influencing men; by his exquisite tact, urbanity, and persuasiveness; by his clear perception in forming his designs, and his admirable energy and skill in pursuing them. It is astonishing that a youthful subordinate, hitherto unknown in the political sphere, should in a few months have gained the respect and confidence of so many great men; should have acted with such acuteness and wisdom, such firmness of purpose, such wonderful ingenuity, in a situation of so difficult a kind; should, in spite of continual obstacles and mischances, have conducted to a triumphant issue negotiations so intricate and arduous. Were this episode all that history could record of the character of Mazarin, it would show that his was one of those minds that are formed to direct the councils of kings, and to leave their traces on the fate of empires. Yet, as we have said, we do not think that Mazarin as a statesman deserves the unqualified and extreme praise which M. Cousin is inclined to give him. If he added noble provinces to France, and crowned the work of his great predecessor, he developed those schemes of French aggression which have hitherto always ended in disaster; and, in aggrandising the monarchy, he stifled some germs of national liberty. Even in the actual condition of France-when the foreign policy of Richelieu and Mazarin is perhaps covertly revived, when the annexation of Savoy and Nice has rewarded the services of France to Italy, and when the Empire, without the dignity, aspires to the position of the Bourbon Monarchy in the days of its supremacy in Europe-a writer of M. Cousin's powers may remember that territorial extension costs an enormous price; that the splendour and the glory of a government are no true test of a people's greatness; and that the acquisition of territory and influence abroad does not, in reality, lighten the burden of internal despotism. We do not question M. Cousin's sincere adherence to those liberal principles, both in France and in Italy, which are not less honourable to him than his philosophy and his eloquence and we trust that no one will attempt to draw from his pages an apology for foreign aggressions or wars adverse to the cause of national independence and public freedom.

ART. III.-Irresponsible Boards. A Speech delivered by Lord HENRY GORDON LENNOX, M.P., in the House of Commons, on Tuesday, 18th March, 1862. Chichester and London: 1862.

IT was not until some time after the passing of the Reform Bill that the nation began to interest itself actively in demanding public institutions for promoting science, art, and education. The contrast between the positive apathy on these subjects which existed half a century ago and the feeling which is now shown both in and out of Parliament will appear very striking when we recall a few of the circumstances of the last fifty years. At the beginning of that period the sole public repository which existed for preserving objects of art and science, the property of the nation and supported by Parliament, was the British Museum. It is only about thirty years since the late Mr. John Wilson Croker and others, when the British Museum was discussed in Parliament, used to jeer at Bloomsbury as a terra incognita, and Charles Buller's wit sparkled in an article describing a voyage to those parts and the manners and customs of the natives. About a hundred visitors a day on an average, in parties of five persons only, were admitted to gape at the unlabelled 'rarities and curiosities deposited in Montague House. A very small public, indeed, studied or even regarded them as illustrations of the fine arts, or of science and of human culture and intelligence. The state of things outside the British Museum was analogous. Westminster Abbey was closed except for divine service and to show a closet of wax-work. Admittance to the public monuments in St. Paul's and other churches was irksome to obtain and costly even the Tower of London could not be seen for less than six shillings. The private picture-galleries were most difficult of access, and, for those not belonging to the upper ten thousand, it might be a work of years to get a sight of the Grosvenor or Stafford Collections. No National Gallery existed, and Lord Liverpool's Government refused to accept the pictures offered by Sir Francis Bourgeois, now at Dulwich, even on the condition of merely housing them. The National Portrait Gallery, the South Kensington Museum, and the Geological Museum were not even conceived. Kew Gardens were shabby and neglected, and possessed no Museum. Hampton Court Palace was shown, by a fee to the housekeeper, one day in the week. No public Schools of Art or

Science existed in the metropolis or the seats of manufacture. The Royal Academy had its annual exhibition of modern art on the first and second floors of Somerset House, in rooms now used by the Registrar-General, whose functions had then no existence. It was only at the British Institution, or at Christie's auction rooms, that a youthful artist like Mulready could chance to see the work of an old master, as he has often told us. Dr. Birkbeck had not founded the present Mechanic's Institute in Southampton Buildings, and the first stone of the London University in Gower-Street was not laid. Not a penny of the public taxes was devoted to national education, which was only a bone of contention between churchmen and dissenters. Architecture, the mother of the arts, had not raised itself from the bald meanness of Baker Street even to the stucco conceits of Regent Street; and the inspiration of architectural genius had only arrived at the invention of transferring the portico of a Greek temple from a hill like the Acropolis, indiscriminately to adorn a St. Pancras Church or a Unitarian Chapel, a General Post Office or a British Museum. Mr. Savage's new Chelsea Church, the first of the revivals of Gothic art, was not erected till 1820. Very few were the facilities of locomotion to induce the public to visit the exhibitions of art which existed. Cabs and omnibuses had not been invented to compete with the lumbering two-horse hackney coaches and chariots. No steamer had ascended the Thames even so far as the rapids of old London Bridge. Gas had not penetrated St. James's Park, and did not reach Grosvenor Square till 1842. The average postage of a letter was sevenpence, and penny postage was not even a theory. It was life' in London, as represented by Toms' and Jerries,' to floor old Charlies,' whom Peel's Police had not yet superseded. Hard drinking was as much a qualification for membership of the Dilettanti Society as the nominal one of a tour in Italy. Men's minds were more anxiously engaged with Bread-riots and Corn-laws, Thistlewood's Conspiracy and Peterloo Massacres, Catholic Emancipation and Rotten Boroughs, than with the arts and sciences, for the advancement of which, in truth, there was hardly any public liking, thought, or opportunity.

But an immense change has taken place within a recent time. No topics excite such warm and animated debates in Parliament as the purchase and preservation of pictures and sites of museums, and the public give manifestations of their wishes throughout the country which are apparently in advance of the temper of Parliament. Above thirty members of Par

liament introduced by a future Chancellor of the Exchequer, last year appealed to the Lord President of the Council for greatly increased public expenditure in aid of local efforts to promote Art. The exhibitions of works of art of spontaneous growth over the whole kingdom, during the past year, have been numerous, and many provincial towns have desired to seek aid from the possessions of the Crown, or the national collections in the metropolis.

There has been an International Exhibition of Works of Fine Art and Industry at Dublin, which obtained some of its resources from the munificence of the Queen, from the National Gallery and the South Kensington Museum. Other exhibitions of a like sort, to which have been added specimens especially of art by working-men, have lately taken place, at Lambeth, Islington, Bow, the Tower Hamlets, and Greenwich, in the metropolis; at Alton Towers, Birmingham, Bristol, Dorchester, Nottingham, Reading, Wakefield, Tonbridge Wells, &c. None of these obtained any superfluous objects from the British Museum or National Gallery; but Alton Towers, Dorchester, Nottingham, and Reading procured some additions from South Kensington. This movement, so spontaneous and widely spread over the whole of the United Kingdom, will undoubtedly increase, and it betokens that at some period our principal cities and towns will have their local museums and galleries, as in France and Germany, in friendly connexion with the national institutions as the parent establishments. Before such an union can be effected, great changes must take place in the constitutional government of the principal institutions, which is altogether behind the requirements of the times. The several national institutions, although necessarily planted in the metropolis, ought to be so organised as to help local museums throughout the United Kingdom, and be the culmination of a whole system. Fine works of art and science are limited in number, and are not to be created like food and raiment according to the ordinary principles of supply and demand. The British Museum, the National Gallery, the Kew Museum and Gardens, the South Kensington Museum, the Geological Museum, the Patent Museum, the National Portrait Gallery, and others which may be established, should each be centres for rendering assistance to local museums of a like nature.

In briefly noticing the history of each of these institutions seriatim we shall purposely abstain from minute comment on their numerous abuses and defects: our object is to establish the proposition that these abuses and defects are in every