on the history of their own land.  He had visited most of the British Colonies, and promoted to the best of his ability the Federation of South Africa.  Few men had seen more, or read more, or enjoyed a wider experience of the world.  What were the lessons which after such a life he chiefly desired to teach young Englishmen who were studying the past?  The value of their religious reformation, and the achievements of their naval heroes.  The Authorised Version and the Navy were in his mind the symbols of England’s greatness.  Greater Britain, including Britain beyond the seas, was the goal of his hopes for the future progress of the race.  There were in Oxford more learned men than Froude, Max Muller for one.  There was not a single Professor, or tutor, who could compare with him for the multitude and variety of his experience.  Undergraduates were fascinated by him, as everybody else was.  The dignitaries of the place, except a stray Freemanite here and there, recognised the advantage of having so distinguished a personage in so conspicuous a Chair.  Even in a Professor other qualities are required besides erudition.  Stubbs’s Constitutional History of England may be a useful book for students.  Unless or until it is rewritten, it can have no existence for the general reader; and if the test of impartiality be applied, Stubbs is as much for the Church against the State as Froude is for the State against the Church.  When Mr. Goldwin Smith resigned the Professorship of Modern History, or contemplated resigning it Stubbs wrote to Freeman, “It would be painful to have Froude, and worse still to have anybody else.”  He received the appointment himself, and held it for eighteen years, when he gave way to Freeman, and more than a quarter of century elapsed before the painful event occurred.  By that time Stubbs was Bishop of Oxford, translated from Chester, and had shown what a fatal combination for a modern prelate is learning with humour.  If Froude had been appointed twenty years earlier, on the completion of his twelve volumes, he might have made Oxford the great historical school of England.  But it was too late.  The aftermath was wonderful, and the lectures he delivered at Oxford show him at his best.  But the effort was too much tor him, and hastened his end.

—­ * Dr. Jackson. + Mr. Monro. ^ Dr. Paget. # Mr. Warren. —­

It must not be supposed that Froude felt only the burden.  His powers of enjoyment were great, and he thoroughly enjoyed Oxford.  He had left it forty years ago under a cloud.  He came back in a dignified character with an assured position.  He liked the familiar buildings and the society of scholars.  The young men interested and amused him.  Ironical as he might be at times, and pessimistic, his talk was intellectually stimulating.  His strong convictions, even his inveterate prejudices, prevented his irony from degenerating into cynicism.  History, said Carlyle, is the quintessence of innumerable biographies, and it was always the human side of history