zjames Stephen on _Parliamentary Government_, not
wizard-like. (No. 2.) 6.--Read _The Parisians_, vol. iv., Muir's
beautiful version of Gray's _Elegy_, and the Dizzy pamphlet on the
crisis. 8.--Revised and sent off the long letter to Lord Granville
on the political situation which I wrote yesterday. Axe work.
9.--Tree-cutting with Herbert. Sent off with some final touches my
version of the Shield and preface. 10.--Mr. Burnett [his agent]
died at one A.M. Requiescat. I grieve over this good and able man
sincerely, apart from the heavy care and responsibility of
replacing him, which must fall on me of necessity. 15.--Worked with
Herbert; we finished gravelling the path. It rather strains my
chest. 16.--Off to town after an early breakfast. Reached C. H. T.
about 3 P.M. Saw Lord Granville and others.

Chapter XIV. The Dissolution. (1874)

... Cette pretendue sagacite qui se croit profonde, quand elle
suppose partout des intrigues savantes, et met de petits drames
arranges a la place de la verite. II n'y a pas tant de
premeditation dans les affaires humaines, et leur cours est plus
naturel, que ne le croit le vulgaire.--GUIZOT.

The spurious sagacity that thinks itself deep, because it
everywhere takes for granted all sorts of knowing intrigues, and
puts little artful dramas in the place of truth. There is less
premeditation in human affairs, and their course is more natural
than people commonly believe.

I

In the summer of 1873 before leaving London for Hawarden, Mr. Gladstone
sent for the chairman of the board of inland revenue and for the head of
the finance department of the treasury; he directed them to get certain
information into order for him. His requests at once struck these
experienced officers with a surmise that he was nursing some design of
dealing with the income-tax. Here are two entries from his diary:--

_Aug. 11, 1873._--Saw Mr. Cardwell, to whom at the war office I
told in deep secrecy my ideas of the _possible_ finance of next
year, based upon the abolition of income-tax and sugar duties,
with partial compensation from spirit and death duties. _Sept.
29._--Wrote a rough mem. and computation for budget of next year. I
want eight millions to handle!

So much for the charitable tale that he only bethought him of the
income-tax, when desperately hunting for a card to pla