stances. But the temptation to a very young officer who finds himself able to write by direction of the Commander-in-chief' is too strong to be resisted. His tendency is to remember that Napoleon at his age was commanding the Army of Italy, and to forget that he is not Napoleon. That is due to a difference not of men but of circumstances; and now the circumstances favour him. He has for the purpose in hand the command of the Army. Accordingly, despite previous instructions, orders issue which are based on a wish for abstract uniformity often wholly incompatible with local conditions. This on a little inquiry will be found to be the cry that is raised from all parts of the Army, and to represent the basis that there was for the statements as to the dissatisfaction with the state of the War Office as such, which are put forward by Vetus' in his wellwritten but most unsound letters.

6

At the present moment 'The Times' has opposed itself to what we believe to be the practical experience of military men, as well as to the general current of thought on Army organization. The results might have been deplorable. When the present Government came into power, where were Ministers, wearied with a severe contest, hastily called on to speak in Parliament on a subject needing the most careful study and ample leisure, to look for guidance as to the current trend, of the best thought, which might at least relieve them from the danger of rashly committing themselves? Had they turned to 'The Times' for their inspiration, they would have found, expressed with all the literary skill for which that great journal is deservedly celebrated, views that are opposed to the opinion of the vast majority of experienced soldiers, and that are, with rare unanimity, disavowed by the Clubs and the City for which "The Times' usually speaks. All honour, therefore, to our present Ministers! The new Order in Council shows clearly enough, that what was by no fault of theirs said in haste has been most wisely repented at leisure. It is quite true that it is so worded that, by a perverse ingenuity in the actual working of the scheme, the language is susceptible of a double interpretation. For our own part, we confess that we should have preferred a more definite recognition of the fact that a greater unity in its relation with the districts, and certainly not a greater separation between its parts, is what is required within the walls of the War Office; that decentralization' means, allowing the blood and life to flow freely to the extremities instead of congesting it at the heart; and that it does not mean, dissecting the heart into five or more parts. Still, we are well content. The practical result of an effective centre has, we have no

doubt,

doubt, been secured. From it in good time the life-blood will flow, vivifying the limbs. If we could have had any doubt ourselves of our interpretation of the Order, 'Vetus' would have relieved our anxiety.

Rumours were current that the advocates of a Committee were by no means willing to accept their defeat, and hoped, by using their parliamentary influence, to carry out a new campaign when Parliament opens. In the strained condition of our relations with foreign Powers, it is not possible that such an effort will now be made. We are in mid-stream, and cannot change horses. At any other time we should welcome the debate without fear of the result. We ought to have some interesting discussions in which not a few of the wise sayings of all time will find their place in meeting the irrelevant flippancies of the hour. We might from many sources supply the debaters with valuable material of this sort. Moltke and Lord Roberts have been freely offered them by Mr. Spencer Wilkinson. We would further commend their attention to the passage which we have already quoted from Macaulay. This passage from John Stuart Mill, who, whatever else he did not understand, was at least familiar with the working of a public office, should find its place in the discussion :

There should not be several departments independent of one another, to superintend different parts of the same natural whole; as in our own military administration down to a recent period, and in a less degree even at present. Where the object to be attained is single (such as that of having an efficient army), the authority commissioned to attend to it should be single likewise. The entire aggregate of means provided for one end should be under one and the same control and responsibility . . . To maintain responsibility at its highest, there must be one person who receives the whole praise of what is well done, the whole blame of what is ill. It is enfeebled, when the concurrence of more than one functionary is required to the same act. . . . Things are much worse when the act itself is only that of a majority-a Board, deliberating with closed doors.... Responsibility in this case is a mere name. Boards," it is happily said by Bentham, are screens." What "the Board" does is the act of nobody, and nobody can be made to answer for it. . . Boards are not a fit instrument for executive business.'

66

66

Nevertheless, in strict accordance with the present Order in Council, he adds:

The military and naval Ministers . . . should be provided with a Council.' (J. S. Mill, 'Representative Government,' chap. 14.) Burke should contribute this :

"If "the Ruler" is not everything in the command of an Army, he is nothing. What is the effect of a power placed nominally at Vol. 183.-No. 365.

Р

the

the head of the Army, who to that Army is no object of gratitude or of fear? Such a cypher is not fit for the administration of an object, of all things the most delicate, the supreme command of military men. They must be constrained (and their inclinations lead them to what their recessities require) by a real, vigorous, effective, decided, personal authority. The authority of the Assembly itself suffers by passing through such a debilitating channel as they have chosen.' (Reflections on the Revolution in France': Works, vol. ii. p. 489.)

Other passages will be easily supplied when the hour comes. Indeed, those who join in the debates will find ample material for the support of the decisions of the Government.

There is, however, one suggestion which has been thrown out; it can hardly be dignified with the name of an argument. It has been said that the Government's scheme is all very well so long as the present Commander-in-chief is at the helm, but that we have to provide for future contingencies. Moltke's great merit was not that he admirably ruled the German Army whilst he was at its head, but that he developed an organization which retains its vitality now that he has joined the majority. True! And how did Moltke secure this result? By careful selection of the men whom he gathered about him; by carefully training them in his own views; by seeing that they had scope for showing their capacity or incapacity in relatively important positions. He has himself emphatically declared that the distinction which some writers have attempted to draw between the necessities in these respects of an army in peace time and an army in war is a delusion. We are justified by his letter to Mr. Wilkinson in applying Macaulay's dictum to peace conditions as the necessary preparation for war. Should the English race have become so sterile in the production of great soldiers that no proper successor for Lord Wolseley can be found a proposition the mere statement of which sufficiently condemns it—then better far that we should trust to some inferior man than to a Committee. Armies have triumphed and may triumph again under leaders who possessed no very exceptional qualifications, though the difference between the right man and the wrong is usually the difference between victory and defeat. The record of the government by committee is unbroken. The debating club command has never escaped discomfiture and disgrace.'

Statesmen like Mr. Balfour and Lord Lansdowne, when once that issue was plainly before them,-when, with the facts cleared by the ample discussion which has gone on outside the columns of the press, they could not but see that it was a question

tion between such an issue as that and some trifling sacrifice of personal consistency,—were to be safely trusted to choose, as they have chosen, the path of patriotism.

Their decision, in a crisis like that in which we stand, will receive the loyal support even of those who are most dubious of its wisdom. From an unexpected quarter in the Old World a sudden peril has arisen. No party-we might say no individual-in England or Scotland would wish, by word or deed, to embarrass the action of the Government. Patriotism calls us with no uncertain voice to sink our differences, and present towards Europe the resolute front of an united nation. Exactly a century ago, we were confronted by greater difficulties than any by which we are now menaced. From that ordeal we emerged with triumph. Our spirit remains the same: our resources are greater. We still hope for peace: but it must be a peace with honour. If war should come, it is well that our cause is just, and that the quarrel is not of our seeking, but has been fastened upon us by the planned insult of a treacherous friend.

In the hands of the present Government the dignity and safety of the Empire are, we believe, assured. Lord Salisbury has behind him a vast parliamentary majority. He has more. He has Great Britain as one man. He can rely on the most formidable Navy that any Power has ever possessed, and on an Army which is already more efficiently organized than at any previous period in the history of the nation. With reference to the special subject of the present article, we have but one remark to make in conclusion. We have shown what persistent energy, divorced from official power, has accomplished for our military forces in the face of many obstacles. Now that those obstacles are removed, and official power is concentrated in his hands, we have every confidence in the present Commander-inchief and in the system which has placed him at the head of the British Army.

ART. IX.-The Life of Sir Henry Halford, Bart., G.C.H., M.D., F.R.S., President of the Royal College of Physicians; Physician to George 111., George IV., William IV., and to Her Majesty Queen Victoria. By William Munk, M.D., Fellow and late Vice-President of the Royal College of Physicians in London. London, 1895.

THE

THE eminent physician whose biography stands at the head of this article has been dead more than fifty years, and the rust of oblivion had already begun to creep over his memory, when the College of Physicians requested Dr. Munk to write the Life of their former President, certainly not the least distinguished man who has held that dignified position. Dr. Munk has visited Wistow, the seat of the Halford family in Leicestershire, where all the letters and papers remaining in the possession of the present baronet were placed at his disposal. Of the earlier correspondence relating to members of the Royal Family, a portion, agreeably to the Queen's request, has been transferred to Her Majesty's possession. In this particular element of interest, therefore, the work is necessarily deficient. But sufficient materials remained to have enabled the author to make a somewhat better book than he has given us. Sir Henry Halford was a many-sided man, He united in his own person the characters of physician, courtier, scholar, and country gentleman. He was the professional attendant of four successive English sovereigns. He was for some years the physician par excellence of the Royal Family and the English aristocracy, and was a welcome guest in their houses. His classical scholarship was extolled by such men as Lord Grenville, Lord Wellesley, Dean Milman, that fine writer of Latin verse, Mr. Baron Parke, and last, but not least, Sir Robert Peel. As a country gentleman he occupied a leading place in Leicestershire society for a quarter of a century, and Wistow from July to November was constantly filled with a succession of distinguished guests.

In so wide a field we should have expected that Dr. Munk would have culled more flowers. We are, however, indebted to him for a good account of Sir Henry's position in medicine, and of the estimates which leading members of his profession formed of his capacity. This part of the book is well done, and in a short compass tells us all that we want to know. But though this, as Macaulay said of Courtenay's Life of Sir W. Temple,' is enough to make a book valuable, it is not enough to make it readable. What we miss so greatly in Dr. Munk's pages is the human element, and this defect is all the more to be regretted because Sir Henry was not merely a medical