h, attract the attention
and fix the interest of the many who contribute in large measure to form
the public opinion of the time. For twenty years the few intervals of Lord
Elgin's residence in these islands were to be counted not by years, but by
months; and the majority of those who might be reckoned amongst his
friends and acquaintances, remembered him chiefly as the eager and
accomplished Oxford student at Christ Church or at Merton.'

The materials for supplying this blank were, in some respects, abundant.
Besides the official despatches and other communications which had passed
between himself and the Home Government during his successive absences in
Jamaica, Canada, China, and India, he had in the two latter positions kept
up a constant correspondence, almost of the nature of a journal, with Lady
Elgin, which combines with his reflections on public events the expression
of his more personal feelings, and thus reveals not only his own genial
and affectionate nature, but also indicates something of that singularly
poetic and philosophic turn of mind, that union of grace and power, which,
had his course lain in the more tranquil walks of life, would have
achieved no mean place amongst English thinkers and writers.

These materials his family, at my suggestion, committed to my friend Mr.
Theodore Walrond, whose sound judgment, comprehensive views, and official
experience are known to many besides myself, and who seemed not less
fitted to act as interpreter to the public at large of such a life and
character, because, not having been personally acquainted with Lord Elgin,
or connected with any of the public transactions recorded in the following
pages, he was able to speak with the sobriety of calm appreciation, rather
than the warmth of personal attachment. In this spirit he kindly
undertook, in the intervals of constant public occupations, to select from
the vast mass of materials placed at his disposal such extracts as most
vividly brought out the main features of Lord Elgin's career, adding such
illustrations as could be gleaned from private or published documents or
from the remembrance of friends. If the work has unavoidably been delayed
beyond the expected term, yet it is hoped that the interest in those great
colonial dependencies for which Lord Elgin laboured, has not diminished
with the lapse of years. It is believed also that there is no time when it
will not be good for his countrymen to have brought befor