It now began to be apparent that the policy of the prime minister was reform wherever reform was needed.  There was no telling what he would do next.  Had he been the prime minister of an absolute monarch he would have been unfettered, and could have carried out any reform which his royal master approved.  But the English are conservative and slow to change, no matter what party they belong to.  It seemed to many that the premier was iconoclastic, and was bent on demolishing anything and everything which he disliked.  Consequently a reaction set in, and Mr. Gladstone’s popularity, by which he had ruled almost as dictator, began to wane.

The settlement of the Alabama Claims did not add to his popularity.  Everybody knows what these were, and I shall merely allude to them.  During our Civil War, injuries had been inflicted on the commerce of the United States by cruisers built, armed, and manned in Great Britain, not only destroying seventy of our vessels, but by reason of the fear of shippers, resulting in a transfer of trade from American to British ships.  It having been admitted by commissioners sent by Mr. Gladstone to Washington, that Great Britain was to blame for these and other injuries of like character, the amount of damages for which she was justly liable was submitted to arbitration; and the International Court at Geneva decided that England was bound to pay to the United States more than fifteen million dollars in gold.  The English government promptly paid the money, although regarding the award as excessive; but while the judicious rejoiced to see an arbitrament of reason instead of a resort to war, the pugnacious British populace was discontented, and again Gladstone lost popularity.

And here it may be said that the foreign policy of Mr. Gladstone was pacific from first to last.  He opposed the Crimean war; he kept clear of entangling alliances; he maintained a strict neutrality in Eastern complications, and in the Franco-German embroilment; he never stimulated the passion of military glory; he ever maintained that—­

     “There is a higher than the warrior’s excellence.”

He was devoted to the development of national resources and the removal of evils which militated against justice as well as domestic prosperity.  His administration, fortunately, was marked by no foreign war.  Under his guidance the nation had steadily advanced in wealth, and was not oppressed by taxation; he had promoted education as wall as material thrift; he had attempted to heal disorders in Ireland by benefiting the tenant class.  But he at last proposed a comprehensive scheme for enlarging higher education in Ireland, which ended his administration.