of the ritualists, was under the impression that the England which had repelled her advances since the days of Cardinal Pole was ripe to receive those views which she had rejected at the Reformation. During the last few years the English Papists had been appealing to Rome to be placed on the same footing as their brethren across St. George's Channel. Instead of the vicars apostolic who then superintended their spiritual condition, the English Roman Catholics wished, as in Ireland, to have the country parcelled out into sees, and bishops openly acknowledged once more to rule over the land of A'Becket and Pole.

This desire was now to be gratified. A Bull was issued by Pius IX. ordaining the re-establishment in England of a hierarchy of bishops deriving their titles from their own sees. The whole country was mapped out into dioceses and placed under the spiritual jurisdiction of Cardinal Wiseman as Archbishop of Westminster. The excitement

created throughout England by this proceeding was intense. Meetings were held denouncing in the strongest language the Pope's Bull and the intruding archbishop. Addresses poured in upon the Queen from all parties and from all institutions, breathing the most fervid loyalty. The one cry throughout the country was No Popery!' Lord John Russell was far too combative a man and too great a tactician

to allow such an opportunity to be ignored. The Whigs-owing to the failure of their budgets, their foreign policy, and their system of taxation-were daily becoming more and more unpopular. The Prime Minister now thought he saw his way to appeal to the passions of the hour and improve his political position. He wrote his celebrated Durham letter,' and on the meeting of Parliament introduced a Bill to prevent the assumption of certain ecclesiastical titles in respect of places in the United Kingdom.' The measure gave rise to much and varied discussion. Napier, in common with the rest of the members of the National Club, warmly approved of the Bill.

It was no question (he said, Feb. 12, 1851) of theological controversy. Let them strip it of all the verbiage and all the excitement that had been thrown around it, and what had they? They had at one side the claim of a foreign prelate to exercise ecclesiastical jurisdiction in the territory of their sovereign, and they opposed to that the fixed principles of the British constitution, and they said the claim was incompatible with their constitution. On that, issue was joined, and the Government asked to bring in a Bill, not to infringe religious liberty, but to raise a barrier against future aggression. In making that proposition they were backed by the feeling of the entire people of the country-the strength, the bone and sinew of the country-they were backed by the universities, by the Church, and by the bar of England, and also by an authority of great consideration-he meant Sir Edward Sugden, who in a speech of unparalleled clearness stated his calm

and deliberate opinion to be that the aggression of the Bishop of Rome was incompatible with the constitution of the country, and in direct collision with, and in antagonism to, the existing laws of the realm. If that be so-if the people of this country and the United Church of this country, if the Church in Scotland, and the different nonconformist bodies, with one voice and heart denounced this aggression, if the bar of England said it was opposed to the constitution, and if Sir Edward Sugden, coming calmly from the retirement of his closet, was of the same opinion-was it not right that they should pass such an enactment as was deemed necessary on the subject?

We know the fate of this measure. After much discussion the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill was enrolled on the statute-book; it was, however, a law which was never obeyed, and after being treated for several years with quiet contempt by the very party it was expected to suppress, was ignominiously repealed.

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CHAPTER III.

OFFICE.

In this country the depository of power is always unpopular; all combine against it; it always falls.-Coningsby.

THE Russell Government had long been tottering to its fall, and upon the occasion of the Prime Minister introducing his Militia Bill in the February of 1852, Lord Palmerston took his revenge of his old colleague by mercilessly criticising the measure, and thus causing ministers to find themselves in a minority of eleven votes. Thereupon Lord John Russell resigned. I have had my tit for tat with John Russell,' writes Lord Palmerston to his brother, and I turned him out on Friday last.' Lord Palmerston himself, we remember, had been compelled by his late chief to resign the seals as Foreign Secretary on account of his unconstitutional conduct in compromising the Foreign Office by a too free expression of his private opinions upon the ticklish question of the coup d'état. It was said that the real reason for the resignation of the Russell Government was the fear of being defeated on

G

a vote of censure as to the conduct of the Caffre War

which was on the eve of being moved. As it is,' writes Lord Palmerston, the late Government have gone out on a question which they have treated as a motion, merely asserting that they had lost the confidence of the House; whereas if they had gone out on a defeat upon the motion about the Cape, they would have carried with them the direct censure of the House of Commons.' On the resignation of Lord John Russell the Earl of Derby was commanded to form an administration, and expressed his readiness to attempt the task.

With the fall of the Russell Government and the accession of the Conservatives to power, Napier felt assured that the time had now arrived when the name he had made for himself in Parliament would be recognised by the offer of office from his party. The post of Attorney-General for Ireland was the one he specially coveted, and for which his legal attainments coupled with his practical experience of parliamentary life eminently qualified him.

The Whigs are out at last (he writes to his wife, Feb. 17, 1852), and it is probable that before this day week I shall be the Attorney-General for Ireland. It is generally thought that they feared to encounter the debate of Tuesday next on the Caffre war, and they availed themselves of the pretext of a beating last night to resign. May God, from whom all power is derived and all good counsels proceed, give us