t of a sacrifice being required, the officers on
the spot would be devoted: and so it happened.

In closing the session (September, 1845) Sir E. Wilmot announced his
recall. Although not usual then to address the council, he stated that
he could not permit the members to disperse without acknowledging their
assistance. A delusion for a time might expose a public man to popular
injustice; but however misjudged, either during his life-time or after
death, his character would require no other vindication than truth would
afford. He informed them that his recall was not occasioned by his
differences with the late members, but was ascribed to an imputed
neglect of the moral and religious welfare of the prisoners; and he
added, that the memory of their kindness would remain with him during
the short remainder of his life.

Mr. Gladstone, who had received the seals of office, conveyed to Wilmot
the notice of his removal. The despatch is a singular example of its
author's mental habits. While he complained that the governor's
statements were obscure, he gave his own views in odd and scarcely
intelligible terms. Thus, the governor had adverted to the moral
condition of the convicts "in a manner too little penetrating:" he had
not made it a point of his duty "to examine the inner world of their
mental, moral, and spiritual state." Mr. Gladstone charged him with
neglecting the vices of the stations--an error in judgment so serious as
to render his removal imperative. These whimsical terms of reprobation
excited universal astonishment. Practical men felt that the knowledge of
the thirty thousand prisoners except by their conduct, to be ascertained
by collating statistics, was rather more difficult than the hopeless
task of similar investigations in ordinary life. The English press, with
some truth and bitterness, described such demands as an encouragement of
hypocrisy and religious pretence. No wise or good man will discredit
religious teaching, but all such will look with suspicion, if not dread,
and even disgust, on the statistics of prison piety--generally false and
designing, in proportion as it is loud and ostentatious. The defects of
the governor as a legislator were not taken into account. Mr. Gladstone
indeed attempted to balance with much precision the merits of the
patriotic six. He admitted that advice and assistance to the Queen might
sometimes take the form of strenuous opposition to the executive. He
denied the disti