one of the universities, he became a clerk in his
father's banking-house. Early imbued with a taste for Greek literature, he
continued his studies with great zeal; and was for many years collecting
the material for a history of Greece. The subject was quietly and
thoroughly digested in his mind before he began to write. A member of
Parliament from 1832 to 1841, he was always a strong Whig, and was
specially noted for his championship of the vote by ballot. There was no
department of wholesome reform which he did not sustain. He opposed the
corn laws, which had become oppressive; he favored the political rights of
the Jews, and denounced prescriptive evils of every kind.

HISTORY OF GREECE.--In 1846 he published the first volume of his _History
of Greece from the Earliest Period to the Death of Alexander the Great_:
the remaining volumes appeared between that time and 1856. The work was
well received by critics of all political opinions; and the world was
astonished that such a labor should have been performed by any writer who
was not a university man. It was a luminous ancient history, in a fresh
and racy modern style: the review of the mythology is grand; the political
conditions, the manners and customs of the people, the military art, the
progress of law, the schools of philosophy, are treated with remarkable
learning and clearness. But he as clearly exhibits the political condition
of his own age, by the sympathy which he displays towards the democracy of
Athens in their struggles against the tenets and actions of the
aristocracy. The historian writes from his own political point of view;
and Grote's history exhibits his own views of reform as plainly as that of
Mitford sets forth his aristocratic proclivities. Thus the English
politics of the age play a part in the Grecian history.

There were several histories of Greece written not long before that of
Grote, which may be considered as now set aside by his greater accuracy
and better style. Among these the principal are that of JOHN GILLIES,
1747-1836, which is learned, but statistical and dry; that of CONNOP
THIRLWALL, born 1797, Bishop of St. David's, which was greatly esteemed by
Grote himself; and that of WILLIAM MITFORD, 1744-1827, to correct the
errors and supply the deficiencies of which, Grote's work was written.

LORD MACAULAY.--Thomas Babington Macaulay was born at Rothley, in
Leicestershire, on the 25th of October, 1800. His father, Zachary
Macaul