o carry expenditure
back to the level of 1857. Naval expenditure rose until 1861, and then
began to fall; army expenditure rose until 1863, and then began to fall.
In 1859, when he went to the exchequer, the total under these two heads
was nearly twenty-six millions; when he quitted office in 1866 the total
was twenty-four millions. In the middle years it had swelled to
twenty-eight. After half a dozen years of panic and extravagance, all
sedulously fostered by a strong prime minister, that he should still have
left the cost of government little higher than he found it was no defeat,
but an extremely satisfactory performance. "We must follow the nature of
our affairs," Burke says, "and conform ourselves to our situation. Why
should we resolve to do nothing because what I propose to you may not be
the exact demand of the petition? If we cry, like children, for the moon,
like children we must cry on."(36)

III

(M17) Ruminating in the late evening of life over his legislative work,
Mr. Gladstone wrote: "Selecting the larger measures and looking only to
achieved results, I should take the following heads: 1. The Tariffs,
1842-60. 2. Oxford University Act. 3. Post Office Savings Banks. 4. Irish
Church Disestablishment. 5. Irish Land Acts. 6. Franchise Act. Although
this excludes the last of all the efforts, viz., the Irish Government
bill." The third item in the list belongs to the period (1861) at which we
have now arrived.

The points to be noted are three. 1. The whole of my action in
1859-65 was viewed with the utmost jealousy by a large minority
and a section of the very limited majority. It was an object to me
to get this bill passed _sub silentio_, a full statement of my
expectations from it would have been absolutely fatal. I admit
they have been more than realised. 2. The Trustee Savings Banks
were doubly defective, nay trebly, for they sometimes broke. (1)
Their principle was left in doubt--were the general funds in trust,
or cash at a banker's? This was vital. (2) They never got or could
get within the doors of the masses, for they smelt of class. It
was necessary to provide for the savings of the people with (_a_)
safety, (_b_) cheapness, (_c_) convenience. The banks _cost_ money
to the State. The Post Office Savings Banks bring in a revenue. 3.
Behind all this I had an object of first-rate importance, which
has been attained: to provide the