a very bad temper indeed, and me, I confess, a good Ideal shocked and mortified.

However, both Arminius and I got over it, and have now returned to London, where I hope we shall before 5 long have another good talk about educational matters. Whatever Arminius may say, I am still for going straight, with all our heart and soul, at compulsory education for the lower orders. Why, good heavens! Sir, with our present squeezable Ministry, Io we are evidently drifting fast to household suffrage, pure and simple; and I observe, moreover, a Jacobinical spirit growing up in some quarters which gives me more alarm than even household suffrage. My elevated position in Grub Street, Sir, where I sit com15 mercing with the stars, commands a view of a certain spacious and secluded back yard; and in that back yard, Sir, I tell you confidentially that I saw the other day with my own eyes that powerful young publicist, Mr. Frederic Harrison, in full evening costume, fur20 bishing up a guillotine. These things are very serious; and I say, if the masses are to have power, let them be instructed, and don't swamp with ignorance and unreason the education and intelligence which now bear rule amongst us. For my part, when I think 25 of Lumpington's estate, family, and connections, when I think of Hittall's shooting, and of the energy and self-reliance of Bottles, and when I see the unexampled pitch of splendour and security to which these have conducted us, I am bent, I own, on trying to 30 make the new elements of our political system worthy of the old; and I say kindly, but firmly, to the compound householder in the French poet's beau

tiful words,' slightly altered: "Be Great, O working class, for the middle and upper class are great! "

I am, Sir,

Your humble servant,

MATTHEW ARNOLD. 5

To the EDITOR of the PALL MALL GAZETTE.

(From the autumn of this year (1867) dates one of the most painful memories of my life. I have mentioned in the last letter but one how in the spring I was commencing the study of German philosophy 10 with Arminius. In the autumn of that year the celebrated young Comtist, Mr. Frederic Harrison, resenting some supposed irreverence of mine towards his master, permitted himself, in a squib, brilliant indeed, but unjustifiably severe, to make game of my inapti- 15 tude for philosophical pursuits. It was on this occasion he launched the damning sentence: "We seek vainly in Mr. A. a system of philosophy with principles coherent, interdependent, subordinate, and derivative." The blow came at an unlucky moment 20 for me. I was studying, as I have said, German philosophy with Arminius; we were then engaged on Hegel's "Phenomenology of Geist," and it was my habit to develop to Arminius, at great length, my views of the meaning of his great but difficult countryman. 25 One morning I had, perhaps, been a little fuller than usual over a very profound chapter. Arminius was suffering from dyspepsia (brought on, as I believe,

"Et tâchez d'être grand, car le peuple grandit."

by incessant smoking); his temper, always irritable, seemed suddenly to burst from all control,-he flung the Phänomenologie to the other end of the room, exclaiming "That smart young fellow is quite right! 5 it is impossible to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear!" This led to a rupture, in which I think I may fairly say that the chief blame was not on my side. But two invaluable years were thus lost; Arminius abandoned me for Mr. Frederic Harrison, who must Io certainly have many memoranda of his later conversations, but has never given them, as I always did mine of his earlier ones, to the world. A melancholy occasion brought Arminius and me together again in 1869; the sparkling pen of my friend Leo has luckily 15 preserved the record of what then passed.)—ED. Friendship's Garland, ed. 1896, pp. 266–273.

MON CHER,

"Life a Dream!”

VERSAILLES, November 26, 1870.

An event has just happened which I confess frankly will afflict others more than it does me, but which you ought to be informed of.

Early this morning I was passing between Rueil and 5 Bougival, opposite Mont Valérien. How came I in that place at that hour? Mon cher, forgive my folly! You have read Romeo and Juliet, you have seen me at Cremorne, and though Mars has just now this belle France in his gripe, yet you remember, I hope, enough 10 of your classics to know that, where Mars is, Venus is never very far off. Early this morning, then, I was between Rueil and Bougival, with Mont Valérien in grim proximity. On a bank by a poplar-tree at the roadside, I saw a knot of German soldiers, gathered evi- 15 dently round a wounded man. I approached and frankly tendered my help, in the name of British humanity. What answer I may have got I do not know; for, petrified with astonishment, I recognised in the wounded man our familiar acquaintance, Ar- 20 minius von Thunder-ten-Tronckh. A Prussian helmet was stuck on his head, but there was the old hassock of whity-brown hair,-there was the old square face,

there was the old blue pilot coat! He was shot through the chest, and evidently near his end. He had been on outpost duty;—the night had been quiet, but a few random shots had been fired. One of these 5 had struck Arminius in the breast, and gone right through his body. By this stray bullet, without glory, without a battle, without even a foe in sight, had fallen the last of the Von Thunder-ten-Tronckhs!

He knew me, and with a nod, "Ah," said he, "the 10 rowdy Philistine!" You know his turn, outré in my opinion, for flinging nicknames right and left. The present, however, was not a moment for resentment. The Germans saw that their comrade was in friendly hands, and gladly left him with me. He had evi15 dently but a few minutes to live. I sate down on the bank by him, and asked him if I could do anything to relieve him. He shook his head. Any message to his friends in England? He nodded. I ran over the most prominent names which occurred to me of the 20 old set. First, our Amphitryon, Mr. Bottles. "Say to Bottles from me," said Arminius coldly, "that I hope he will be comfortable with his dead wife's sister." Next, Mr. Frederic Harrison. "Tell him," says Arminius, "to do more in literature, he has a talent 25 for it; and to avoid Carlylese as he would the devil."

Then I mentioned a personage to whom Arminius had taken a great fancy last spring, and of whose witty writings some people had, absurdly enough, given Mr. Matthew Arnold the credit,-Azamat-Batuk. Both 30 writers are simple; but Azamat's is the simplicity of shrewdness, the other's of helplessness. At hearing the clever Turk's name, "Tell him only," whispers