Sir Robert Peel
resumed direction of a government pledged to repeal the corn laws of
1815. As the Duke of Newcastle was a zealous protectionist, under whose
influence Mr. Gladstone had been elected member of Parliament, the
latter now resigned his seat as member for Newark, and consequently
remained without a seat in that memorable session of 1846 which repealed
the corn laws.

The ministry of Sir Robert Peel, though successful in passing the most
important bill since that of Parliamentary reform in 1832, was doomed;
as we have already noted in the Lecture on that great leader, it fell on
the Irish question, and Lord John Russell became the head of the
government. In the meantime, Mr. Gladstone was chosen to represent the
University of Oxford in Parliament,--one of the most distinguished
honors which he ever received, and which he duly prized. As the champion
of the English Church represented by the University, and as one of its
greatest scholars, he richly deserved the coveted prize.

On the accidental death of Sir Robert Peel in 1850 the conservative
party became disintegrated, and Mr. Gladstone held himself aloof both
from Whigs and Tories, learning wisdom from Sir James Graham (one of the
best educated and most accomplished statesman of the day), and devoting
himself to the study of parliamentary tactics, and of all great
political questions. It was then that in the interval of public business
he again visited Italy, in the winter of 1850-51; this time not for mere
amusement and recreation, but for the health of a beloved daughter.
While in Naples he was led to examine its prisons (with philanthropic
aim), and to study the general policy and condition of the Neapolitan
government. The result was his famous letters to Lord Aberdeen on the
awful despotism under which the kingdom of the Two Sicilies groaned,
where over twenty thousand political prisoners were incarcerated, and
one-half of the Deputies were driven into exile in defiance of all law;
where the prisons were dens of filth and horror, and all sorts of unjust
charges were fabricated in order to get rid of inconvenient persons. I
have read nothing from the pen of Mr. Gladstone superior in the way of
style to these letters,--earnest and straightforward, almost fierce in
their invective, reminding one in many respects of Brougham's defence of
Queen Caroline, but with a greater array of facts, so clearly and
forcibly put as not only to produce conviction but to