proposed substitution of her own harsh songs and stiff dances by the cadence and the grace of neighbouring Catalonia.

It is not surprising that the compilers of this little Historia 'de la Republica' found that their work was done when they had chronicled the external annals of the state. Its domestic government described once is described for aye; and a brief view of Andorre in the ninth century would have been almost equally pertinent to Andorre in the nineteenth. Here is a republic so literally without a road that it contains not a single machine upon wheels. Over the mountains and along the valleys there exists less than a bridle path; it is a mere track, here so faint as to be nearly imperceptible, there so overlaid with the débris of the rocks above as to be almost impassable. The highway to the capital at any rate is to be traversed only by men and by horses sure of foot. Hay and corn are carried in huge baskets strapped on horses' backs. The products and occupations of Andorre are soon told. The high lands are pastoral, the low lands arable, and the country is thus divided between its tillage and its flocks. Its manufactures are restricted to cloth and iron; the cloth the coarsest that can well exist, the iron wrought apparently by the first forges that ever were devised. And this is the national monument of six centuries of peace, and of a polity of ten centuries and a half. So much for the venerable illusion that stability is a pledge of progress!

Yet in spite of the isolation of this little commonwealth, it would not seem that nature had thrown in their path any other obstacles to wealth than such conditions as have been essential to their independence. A tract forming a distinct state, and equally walled off by mountains from France and Spain, is illconfigured for trade, but without these barriers it could never have continued free. In other respects the bounty of nature contrasts broadly with the poverty of art. No district throughout Europe, to the northward of the Pyrenees, yields the fruits of the earth with such abundance or variety. The flocks are hardly to be surpassed; the sheep are as large as Leicesters, more delicate than Southdowns; the mutton of Andorre is equal to that nearly extinct Welsh mountain mutton, which yet lingers around the shores of the classic Tegid. Trout streams and iron mines are plentiful; and though coal is wanting, the forests supply the whole population with firewood gratuitously.

It must be acknowledged that a country girt on either side by the frontiers of two nations equally jealous of their commercial rights, suffers a great artificial disadvantage. The heavy imposts levied on either frontier check legitimate trade, and sustain a smuggling system in its place. These regulations are

as needless to the surrounding states as they are injurious to Andorre; since free trade, if limited to the wants and exports of a population of eight thousand, would equally protect both against a contraband trade maintained through the instrumentality of the intervening state. Even British manufactures, introduced under a treaty of transit by way of Barcelona or Bordeaux, would be undersold by the goods of Catalonia. If some enterprising Englishman would buy a farm in Andorre, introduce English agriculture and English energy, he might be the light and the reformer of the commonwealth; but in comparison of these patricians of ten centuries, what a lamentable parvenu that enterprising Englishman would be!

Here then is a little commonwealth just populous enough to figure in schedule B of a reform bill, distinct in the terms of its representation and federation from any other federal or representative government, demarked by its political traditions, cut off from all communion or social sympathy both with France and Spain, and altogether unique. It seems to have flourished for a thousand years on its repudiation of every principle of government asserted by every ancient political philosopher, while every modern political philosopher appears to have passed it over in supercilious contempt. The anomaly at this day of such a commonwealth as Andorre has seemed to call for these few words of comment. If its past records be curious, more interesting perhaps is the spectacle of a petty nationality as distinct as its government is free; a laborious people and a torpid administration; a land unequalled for the beauty of its scenery and the simplicity of its race; a phenomenon of social poverty and conservative tradition; the perpetual infancy of the arts in unchanging antithesis with the everlasting luxuriance of nature. We commend, then, this little republic to the lovers of those insular liberties which are being daily wrecked by the growth of empires and the violence of power, believing that, in these days of encroaching uniformity and centralisation, no stronghold of medieval freedom can be so humble as to pass unregarded, and that a people who won by their sword in the age of Charlemagne the independence which they maintain in the age of the Buonapartes deserve at any rate to be known.

ART. III. 1. The Journal and Correspondence of William Lord Auckland: with a Preface and Introduction. By the Right Honourable and Right Reverend the Bishop of BATH and WELLS. 2 vols.

2. The Diary and Correspondence of Charles Abbot, Lord Colchester, Speaker of the House of Commons, 1802-1817. Edited by his son, CHARLES LORD COLCHESTER. 3 vols.

FOR

OR some readers every memoir and every letter which illustrates the reign of George III. possesses an unfailing interest. The pursuit of a favourite inquiry always suggests doubts and theories which may be partially solved or illustrated by any new fragment of evidence. Curiosity growing with increase of knowledge welcomes the reappearance of familiar names and topics as they are regarded from a peculiar point of view by each fresh informant. Every period of history has its inconsistent narratives, its disputed reputations, and its recognised controversies; and the interval which separates the American war from the Regency is both crowded with events and actors, and fertile in standing puzzles. The rise and fall of the Coalition, the disputes during the King's first illness, the Whig schism of 1792, the resignation of Pitt, and his subsequent return to office, still present questions as attractive to initiated students as they are probably stale and repulsive to the majority of readers. Those who publish the diaries of secondary politicians of the age of Pitt and Fox must content themselves with the same kind of limited and scientific appreciation which might attend a description of a new fern, or a monogram on the Crustacea of Heligoland. The facts and opinions which are added to the previous store of knowledge fit into vacant spaces, and their relative importance can only be understood by the aid of a familiar acquaintance with the existing fabric. Yet it must be admitted that memoirs and correspondence possess elements of popularity which can scarcely be found in a zoological treatise. Biography is human, even when it is trivial or dull, and it may be read without preparatory study or mental exertion. Something also of the natural love of gossip attaches to reminiscences of seventy or eighty years ago. The affairs of recent generations can never be wholly indifferent to their neighbours in time.

The curiosity of political inquirers has been largely gratified through the activity of modern biographical editors. Two or three professed histories may be collated with the experiences

of almost every conspicuous person who flourished towards the end of the eighteenth century. The accumulation of memoirs proceeds with increasing rapidity as the demand for further information might seem to be exhausted. Moore's 'Life of 'Sheridan' appeared more than thirty years ago, and half that interval has passed since the publication of Wilberforce's Diary.', The Life of Lord Eldon,' The Memoirs of Romilly,' • The Diary and Letters of Lord Malmesbury,' and The Life ' of Lord Sidmouth' were followed by The Letters,'' The Me'morials,' and the incomplete Life of Fox,' and by the ample Correspondence of the Grenville Family.' Within two or three years Mr. Macknight has produced a meritorious and voluminous Life of Burke. Lord Cornwallis's Correspondence' and Mr. Rose's Diary' are of equally recent date; and now the well-known road is twice more to be traversed in the company of Lord Auckland, and again in that of Lord Colchester. A skilful writer might condense the vast mass of materials into a valuable collection of political biographies which would form an almost complete history of the time. Lord Macaulay's Life of Pitt' may serve as a model of treatment and composition, and his generous impartiality is only disturbed by the antithetic turn of mind which displays itself in an overstrained contrast between the earlier and later portions of the minister's career. Unfortunately little is known of Pitt except as he appeared in public, although Lady Hester Stanhope, Mr. Wilberforce, and Mr. Rose supply in some degree the uncommunicative dulness of Bishop Tomline. had no time to write familiar letters, and his friends have preserved few fragments of his private conversation. Lord Macaulay seems to have forgotten that Lord Wellesley describes the austere man of business as the gayest and most sanguine companion whom he had ever known. The editor of Lord Auckland's Letters' excites and baffles curiosity by confirming the report that Pitt was at one time deeply attached to Miss Eleanor Eden. He was perhaps not inferior, even in social qualities, to the great rival with whom he must share the central place in the biographical group. The judicious historian of Pitt and of Fox would make a sparing use of the ample details which illustrate the lives and characters of their followers and contemporaries. We hope, however, that these abundant materials for biography will at length be reduced to a more complete and connected form by Lord Stanhope, who has already announced for publication the first portion of his long-expectedLife of Mr. Pitt;' and we shall suspend our remarks on this subject until this important work is before us.

He

Lord Colchester was one of those prudent and prosperous men who attain the highest elevation of which they are capable, and aspire to nothing beyond it. His character and his position as Speaker gave him abundant opportunities of observation, and the results are recorded in his Diary with trustworthy brevity and dryness. The good fortune of his career may be attributed principally to his own industry and merit, although many rivals of far higher capacity must have envied his easy success. Born in 1757, he was educated at Westminster and at Oxford, and at the age of thirty-nine he had attained considerable practice at the bar. The death of his elder brother in 1794 opened to him a lucrative office in the King's Bench, and in 1795 Mr. Abbot was returned by the Duke of Leeds as member for Helston. The patron, who had sat for many years in Mr. Pitt's Cabinet, had finally quarrelled with his leader, and his inclinations were sufficiently indicated by the selection of Mr. Fox to move for the writ. No more direct communication was made to the new member, and Mr. Abbot entered the House with the odd determination to support any government which might be in office. The Duke of Leeds, though he once or twice remonstrated against the votes of his nominee, ultimately acquiesced with commendable liberality in his steady adherence to the Minister. Politics occupied only a secondary place in Mr. Abbot's attention. From his first entrance into the House he rested his hopes of personal advancement on the steady pursuit of definite objects of public utility. Both parties possessed abundant oratorical power, and several effective men of business were engaged in the service of the Government. There was ample room for the services of an independent member who would devote indefatigable labour to minor legislative improvements, to administrative reforms, and to Parliamentary details. Within a few months from his first election Mr. Abbot obtained a Committee on the mode of dealing with Expiring Laws, and he afterwards carried a measure for the Promulgation of Acts of Parliament, which had previously been found only in private collections. His diligence and good sense soon attracted the notice of Pitt, who placed him in the chair of the Finance Committee of 1797 and 1798. In this capacity he drew up, in numerous reports, a complete body of statistics on revenue, expenditure, public establishments, and official incomes. He took a leading part in Committees on waste lands, on harbours and docks, and on metropolitan improvements; and he was the first to provide for the careful preservation of the public records, and for the census which has since been decennially taken. His ambition was probably directed at any early period to the