by the Duke of
Wellington, and the bill passed the House of Lords on the 4th of June.

The Reform Bill of 1832 was the protest of the middle classes against
evils which had been endured for centuries,--a protest to which the
aristocracy was compelled to listen. Amid terrible animosities and
fearful agitations, reaching to the extremities of the kingdom, the bill
was finally passed by the Liberal members, who set aside all other
matters, and acted with great unanimity and resolution.

As noted above, during this exciting parliamentary contest the great
figure of Henry Brougham had disappeared from the House of Commons; but
more than any other man, he had prepared the way for those reforms which
the nation had so clamorously demanded, and which in part they had now
achieved. From 1820 to 1831 he had incessantly labored in the lower
House, and but little was done without his aid. It would have been
better for his fame had he remained a commoner. He was great not only as
a parliamentary orator, but as a lawyer. His labors were prodigious.
Altogether, at this period he was the most prominent man in England, the
most popular among the friends of reform, and the most hated by his
political enemies,--a fierce, overbearing man, with great talent for
invective and sarcasm, eccentric, versatile, with varied rather than
profound learning. When Lord Melbourne succeeded Lord Grey as premier,
Brougham was left out of the cabinet, being found to be irascible,
mischievous, and unpractical; he retired, an embittered man, to private
life, but not to idleness, He continued to write popular and scientific
essays, articles for reviews, and biographical sketches, taking an
interest in educational movements, and in all questions of the day. He
was always a lion in society, and, next to Sir Walter Scott, was the
object of greatest curiosity to American travellers. Although great as
statesman, orator, lawyer, and judge, his posthumous influence is small
compared with that which he wielded in his lifetime,--which, indeed, may
be said of most statesmen, the most noted exception to the rule being
Lord Bacon.

With Brougham in the upper House, Lord John Russell had become the most
prominent man in the lower; but being comparatively a poor man, he was
contented to be only paymaster of the forces,--the most lucrative office
in the government. His successful conduct of the great Reform Bill gave
him considerable prestige. In the second ministry of Lo