political aspect of the new ideas,' which triumphed over hatred to the 'auld enemy,' and brought about a union alike of self-interest and of moral enthusiasm between the two great sections of the Anglo-Saxon middle class, we need not attempt to unravel the tangle of miserable intrigue which cost Beaton his life and sent Knox to the galleys. Mr. Lang attempts to place Beaton beside the Kennedys, the Frasers, and the Lambertons on the bench of patriotic prelates. The attempt is at least chivalrous; the question whether Beaton forged his master's will or not is but a problem in the minor ethics of clerical dissimulation. The weakness of Beaton lay not so much in want of character-though there he was lamentably deficient as in lack of statesmanlike capacity. He was unable to measure the strength of the forces which on both sides of the Tweed were making for union, or to gauge that anti-Gallic tendency in Scotland which the very closeness of the alliance between Scotland and France had stimulated, and which the brutality of Henry the Eighth's attempts to bend Scotland to his will failed to neutralise. No doubt the claim of England to the overlordship of the smaller country was asserted by strong kings like Henry IV and Edward IV; every traitorous Scottish noble was willing to accept it; it was never put more extravagantly than by Henry the Eighth. But no resolutely continuous attempt was made to conquer Scotland after the time of Edward the Third; the most devastating invasions were but Border-raids on a colossal scale. The real union as of brother and brother, not a false and merely semblant one as of slave and master,' of which Carlyle speaks, was, it is true, a long way off even when Beaton was stabbed to death in the Castle of St. Andrews. But it was so inevitable that no attempts to give that criminal blunder the character of a patriotic martyrdom had other than a momentary success.

ART. IX. THE COMING PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

A History of the Presidency. By Edward Stanwood. New York: Houghton, Mifflin, and Co.

【ARDLY had the smoke of battle cleared away after the Presidental election in 1896, when Mr. Bryan waved his truncheon and summoned his defeated followers to a renewal of the conflict. The canvass now in progress began then and there. Mr. Bryan's authority to issue commands and to plan the next campaign was not challenged. Ordinarily, in America, a candidate is functus officio when he meets with defeat: the mandate of his party must be renewed before he may with propriety resume the leadership. But Mr. Bryan, although he sprang suddenly into prominence as a national character, has fully maintained his position. His vigour and endurance as a campaigner arouse admiration and excite enthusiasm. His imperious nature and self-confidence win for him that sort of hero-worship which finds expression in the phrase our matchless leader,' ensures subservience to his wishes regarding the conduct of the canvass, and wins toleration of his weaknesses and mistakes. His sincerity is not open to question. Although his nomination in 1896 seemed almost the result of accident, the event proved him to be an ideal leader of the mixed multitude that followed him. It is doubtful if any other captain could have rallied all these heterogeneous political forces and held them in battle array under one banner amid the stress of the most exciting canvass in American political history.

During the four years that have elapsed since the last election Mr. Bryan's ascendency over his party has never been seriously threatened. He failed in his first campaign because, while he gained numerous recruits, he was unable to retain the veterans. Those who could not follow the Democratic party in its new career have made many an effort to displace him, but the result of every such attempt has been merely to make more and more clear the hopelessness of substituting a new leader in his place. He has adhered to the principles of the Chicago platform with a persistence which is creditable at least to the solidity of his convictions; he has kept his mind on the alert for new opportunities and new issues; and now he has his reward in having won to his support a body of men who in 1896 distrusted him profoundly, and who still abhor every principle save one of the platform on which he stands.

On the Republican side the situation has been equally clear.

Mr. McKinley was destined, before his first election, to be nominated for a second term in the presidential office. The party to which he owes his position has fulfilled the two great promises it made to the people when it placed him in nomination. It has enacted a protective tariff, and has passed a law declaring gold to be the standard of value, in which legal provision is made for the maintenance at parity with gold of all money issued under authority of the Government. Nor has the present administration confined itself to making good its definite pledges. It has conducted a foreign war with success it has extended the domain of the Republic: it has greatly enlarged the prestige of the nation throughout the world. No President since Mr. Lincoln has had questions so many and so perplexing to consider and decide as have been pressed upon the attention of Mr. McKinley. That he has not satisfied all the people is an inevitable consequence of the system of government by party; but he has satisfied those who supported him in 1896 to a remarkable degree. At no time has there been a suggestion that it would be advisable to drop him and adopt another candidate at this election. The severest criticisms made upon him by members of his own party may be resolved into the complaint that he has studied to ascertain and to follow the will of his political supporters rather than to decide upon and carry out a policy of his own, regardless of opposition. In circumstances so unusual as those which confronted his administration his course was advantageous for the country and profitable to Mr. McKinley's own political fortunes. If it sometimes gave an air of indecision as well as of a lack of initiative to his policy, the people have not been left altogether unaware that the President could form a plan of action and adhere firmly to it when the occasion required promptness and decision. At all events, no rival for the Republican nomination has presented himself or has been proposed by others; nor has there been any faction in the party uneasily seeking for some means to depose the leader, as has been the case in the Democratic party. When Mr. McKinley was nominated for re-election, the unanimous vote of the Convention in his favour was an absolutely accurate reflection of the wish of his party that he should be its candidate.

In our study of the canvass, stress is laid thus early upon the personal traits of Mr. Bryan and Mr. McKinley because the contest is in a peculiar sense one between the two candidates. Each party can rely in any circumstances upon the loyal support of all but a mere fraction of its members, and, since the two parties are not very unevenly matched, upon a certain

number of the electoral votes of the States. In the broadest view of the matter, therefore, the issue is to be decided upon a consideration of the respective policies of the parties. But inasmuch as the party which wins the Presidency may fail to obtain a majority in Congress, the character and tendencies of the man who is to appoint the Cabinet, to manage the national finances, to direct the movements of the army, to conduct the foreign relations, and to give tone to the civil service, become matters of great importance. Consequently we find that great numbers of voters who reject almost every one of the historic Republican principles give their support to Mr. McKinley as a safe man, and that others who reject every plank' in the Democratic platform,' except opposition to Imperialism,' adhere to Mr. Bryan because they confidently expect him, with or without the consent of Congress, to reverse the national policy regarding the Philippines.

It is necessary nevertheless, in order to obtain the fullest and most accurate view of the situation, to consider the parties, which, after all, are greater and stronger than the candidates who for the moment personify them. There is a bewildering list of parties, and many tickets have been placed in the field. First, there are three factions of Socialists. Socialism is rife in the United States; but those who have adopted its principles sincerely will not follow leaders whose chief motive seems to be notoriety and political preferment. The United Christian Party is a little coterie of well-meaning men, somewhat too good for this wicked world, who think they know how Christ would govern the country.' The Prohibitionists have been in existence as a separate national party since 1872, and in the seven presidential canvasses in which they have taken part have never gained an electoral vote for one of their candidates, nor, so far as is known, cast a majority of votes at any precinct in the country at any election. This party refuses to recognise or to discuss any political question, at home or abroad, until the sale of intoxicating liquor has been suppressed. 'Imperialism' offends its members less than does the failure to abolish the army-canteen; and the existence of American drinking 'saloons' in Manila arouses them to warmer indignation than is excited by the war against the Filipinos. The Prohibitionist ticket may be disregarded in a study of the canvass. It will be supported by the perverse and eccentric voters only those who are always at odds with society.

The People's Party,' commonly known as the Populists, is ten years old. It originated in the Western States. The organisation which called itself the Farmers' Alliance' was

formed primarily to wage war against the railway companies. The sentiment was wide-spread in the grain-growing prairie States that transport charges upon farm produce were oppressively high and arbitrarily irregular; that the companies were too powerful in the State legislatures; and that landgrants in aid of the building of railways had placed the companies in possession of the most desirable tracts of land. The Alliance was not at first a separate political organisation. Its members endeavoured to promote its objects by seeking control of the parties with which they were associated. Failure to obtain what was desired, the thirst for public office, and other causes, soon led to an abandonment of the original plan; and the new party was born. Its leaders were not men trained in affairs; its members were 'plain people' who had made a study of social and economic conditions only so far as they concerned themselves. It was quite natural, therefore, that their demands for a reconstitution of the social fabric should be crude, radical, and reckless to a high degree. The Populists were from the beginning in favour of the free coinage of silver, frankly upon the ground that debtors would be enabled thereby to discharge obligations already incurred in money cheaper than gold dollars. The discontinuance of the coinage of silver dollars by the Act of 1873 they denounced as a crime. To it they attributed the decline in the prices of commodities, which they held to be merely a rise in the price of gold; and they maintained that the restoration of free coinage of silver and the consequent cheapening of money was but a tardy act of justice to the debtor.

The party achieved some notable successes in State elections. In 1892 it held a national convention and presented a candidate for President. The new organisation drew to itself the remnants of the defunct Greenback' party and those generally who felt that things were not as they should be so long as some men were rich while they themselves were not. It was not inaptly termed the 'Calamity' party. In the canvass of 1892 more than a million votes were given to its candidates; but this statement, without an explanation, is misleading. The Populists and Democrats practically coalesced in opposition to the Republicans. In many States, where there seemed to be a prospect that the Democrats and Populists combined might capture the electoral vote of a Republican State, the two parties adopted a joint electoral ticket. In a few States the Democrats simply retired from the field and supported the Populist candidates, whose aggregate vote was thereby caused to appear greater than it was. An alliance so close as was that of 1892