far more adapted to exposition than attack, found no scope; his moderation kept him unnoticed among men more bold, more captious, or more unscrupulous than himself: altogether, he gained respect, rather than influence, and came to be considered rather as a useful adviser than a capable leader.

The Revolution of 1848 came. Tocqueville had predicted a similar event a month before, but he was not deceived as to its factitious nature. The more we examine this "sham Revolution," the more perfect an instance it appears of the irony of history. Never were causes more disproportionate to effects. It was the mere sound of the names "French" and "Revolution" combined that shook the thrones of Europe; the resemblance between the different movements of the year is thoroughly superficial. The cry for social reform at Paris is echoed by a cry for national union at Berlin, a cry for national independence at Pesth and Milan; and this Parisian cry for social reform was steadily repudiated by France. "The nation," says Tocqueville, in a letter to Mr. Grote, "did not wish for a revolution, much less for a republic." And he argues, "That the whole of the "year 1848 has been one long and pain"ful effort on the part of the nation to recover what it was robbed of by the "surprise of February." He shows that it was only by a decision and rapidity of action worthy of a better cause that the house of Orleans contrived to lose the throne. The monarchy yielded to an émeute far less formidable than that which the feeble and ephemeral Provisional Government quelled in June. Tocqueville describes, from his own experience, how an hour's delay might have saved it.

66

With a heavy heart, but with undiminished zeal, Tocqueville addressed himself to the task of supporting the republic. Grieved and disgusted as he was with the Revolution and the follies of the Provisional Government, he saw in the Republic the last chance of constitutional freedom. He was not slow in estimating how fatal a wound the

country. The revolution, executed in the name of the masses, had stirred among those masses only a feeling of dull distrust and languid fear, hardly chequered by a little vague hope and curiosity. Had the Provisional Government had any real work to do, any desired social improvement to effect, it might have regained public confidence. But, as it was unable at all to counterbalance the necessary evils of a revolution, while it shewed marked incompetence in the ordinary business of administration, affairs grew daily and worse. The peasant proprietors of France, to whom appeal had to be made, have the ordinary characteristics of their class. They are well-meaning and intelligent, but selfish and narrow: very shrewd on all matters within their ken, very ignorant upon all without; entirely absorbed in their individual struggle for prosperity, and desiring peace, order, stability, above all other goods. They had never appreciated the advantages of government by parties: before the close of 1848 they were decidedly prejudiced against it, and longing to repose on one strong arm. Such were the men to whom universal suffrage confided the fate of France.

It is melancholy to follow, under Tocqueville's guidance, the details of the long death-struggle of French freedom. He had the pain of seeing clearly the present and future evils, while totally unable to heal the one or prevent the other. Even had he possessed more influence, his peculiar talents were hardly fitted for such troublous times: he would always have shrunk from the slightest violation of forms, though hampered by one of the worst constitutions ever framed, and face to face with an unscrupulous foe. In truth, the struggle was most unequal. On the one side were the debris of old parties, disunited by long habit, disorganized by the entire change in their position, stunned by the rapid succession of political shocks, confused by the working of their new constitution, vacillating between the desire to deal fairly with their President and the desire to protect themselves from his

distrusted by the nation. To the uncertain and inconsequent action of this heterogeneous body, Louis Napoleon opposed an egotism pure and simple, a calm and complete self-confidence, chequered by no doubts, and hampered by no scruples. The constitution brought him into continual collisions with the Assembly, in which he had all the advantage given by singleness of will and purpose. The patience and dissimulation which his exile had sufficiently taught him were all he required for the development. He had but to profess the profoundest unselfishness, and seize every opportunity for self-aggrandizement: he could thus, while gradually consolidating his own power, and bringing the Assembly into contempt, contrive always to be or appear in the right. Perhaps the greatest blot in his selfish policy was the dismissal in October, 1849, of the ministry in which Tocqueville held a portfolio. The step was necessary for his ends: but it was impossible to find a plausible excuse for it. The ministry had passed successfully through a period of great difficulty: and, as Tocqueville says, there was actually a danger of constitutional government again becoming popular. Imperialist writers tell us, that "the "elected one responded to the national "wish that he should have more freedom "of action "- -a reason at once felicitous and frank.

At length Tocqueville's worst expectations were realized by the 2d of December. He was at his post in the National Assembly on that day: and from a letter he wrote to the Times soon after (republished in the English edition), supplemented by his conversations, we get a vivid idea of those memorable scenes. The noble indignation he expresses in the letter at that signal outrage to law and liberty, was shared by many but there were few who mourned its effects so deeply and so long He complains affectingly in his later letters

of the state of moral isolation in which he finds himself: that his contemporaries have ceased to care for what he still loves passionately: that they solace themselves for its loss with tranquillity and material comfort, while he is destitute even of sympathy in his sadness-sympathy, which was to him almost a necessity of life. It moved him especially to see the coldness with which England, the nurse of liberty, looked on the enslavement of France: the arrogant contempt of his countrymen, as though unworthy to be free, or even happier as slaves: the selfish indifference at the tyranny, followed in a year or two by blind approval and applause of the tyrant. Et tu, Brute," is the tone of several of Tocque ville's later letters to England.

on

Reduced to political inaction, Tocqueville adopted the only method left him of serving his country. He chose a period of the past, fraught with instruction for the present, and devoted to its study all the powers of his ripened intellect. The result of this work, the volume "L'Ancien Régime," is but a fragment yet it shows a decided improvement on his former book, both in style and matter, and is equally likely to have an enduring reputation. From the midst. of this work he was snatched away by a sudden illness, in the spring of 1859. He left behind him, besides his writings, an example bright in itself, and especially valuable to the present generation-the example of one who combined the merits of the man of thought and the man of action; of one who, possessing all the graces and refinements of modern civilization, its enlarged knowledge, its enlightened moderation, its universal tolerant philanthropy, yet fashioned his life according to an ideal with mediæval constancy and singleness of purpose, and displayed a passionate patriotism and an ardent love of freedom worthy of a hero of antiquity.

far more adapted to exposition than attack, found no scope; his moderation kept him unnoticed among men more bold, more captious, or more unscrupulous than himself: altogether, he gained respect, rather than influence, and came to be considered rather as a useful adviser than a capable leader.

The Revolution of 1848 came. Tocqueville had predicted a similar event a month before, but he was not deceived as to its factitious nature. The more we examine this "sham Revolution," the more perfect an instance it appears of the irony of history. Never were causes more disproportionate to effects. It was the mere sound of the names "French" and "Revolution" combined that shook the thrones of Europe; the resemblance between the different movements of the year is thoroughly superficial. The cry for social reform at Paris is echoed by a cry for national union at Berlin, a cry for national independence at Pesth and Milan; and this Parisian cry for social reform was steadily repudiated by France. "The nation," says Tocqueville, in a letter to Mr. Grote, "did not wish for a revolution, much less for a republic." And he argues, "That the whole of the 66 year 1848 has been one long and pain"ful effort on the part of the nation to recover what it was robbed of by the "surprise of February." He shows that it was only by a decision and rapidity of action worthy of a better cause that the house of Orleans contrived to lose the throne. The monarchy yielded to an émeute far less formidable than that which the feeble and ephemeral Provisional Government quelled in June. Tocqueville describes, from his own experience, how an hour's delay might have saved it.

66

With a heavy heart, but with undiminished zeal, Tocqueville addressed himself to the task of supporting the republic. Grieved and disgusted as he was with the Revolution and the follies of the Provisional Government, he saw in the Republic the last chance of constitutional freedom. He was not slow in estimating how fatal a wound the

country. The revolution, executed in the name of the masses, had stirred among those masses only a feeling of dull distrust and languid fear, hardly chequered by a little vague hope and curiosity. Had the Provisional Government had any real work to do, any desired social improvement to effect, it might have regained public confidence. But, as it was unable at all to counterbalance the necessary evils of a revolution, while it shewed marked incompetence in the ordinary business of administration, affairs grew daily and worse. The peasant proprietors of France, to whom appeal had to be made, have the ordinary characteristics of their class. They are well-meaning and intelligent, but selfish and narrow: very shrewd on all matters within their ken, very ignorant upon all without; entirely absorbed in their individual struggle for prosperity, and desiring peace, order, stability, above all other goods. They had never appreciated the advantages of government by parties before the close of 1848 they were decidedly prejudiced against it, and longing to repose on one strong arm. Such were the men to whom universal suffrage confided the fate of France.

It is melancholy to follow, under Tocqueville's guidance, the details of the long death-struggle of French freedom. He had the pain of seeing clearly the present and future evils, while totally unable to heal the one or prevent the other. Even had he possessed more influence, his peculiar talents were hardly fitted for such troublous times: he would always have shrunk from the slightest violation of forms, though hampered by one of the worst constitutions ever framed, and face to face with an unscrupulous foe. In truth, the struggle was most unequal. On the one side were the débris of old parties, disunited by long habit, disorganized by the entire change in their position, stunned by the rapid succession of political shocks, confused by the working of their new constitution, vacillating between the desire to deal fairly with their President and the desire to protect themselves from his

distrusted by the nation. To the uncertain and inconsequent action of this heterogeneous body, Louis Napoleon opposed an egotism pure and simple, a calm and complete self-confidence, chequered by no doubts, and hampered by no scruples. The constitution brought him into continual collisions with the Assembly, in which he had all the advantage given by singleness of will and purpose. The patience and dissimulation which his exile had sufficiently taught him were all he required for the development. He had but to profess the profoundest unselfishness, and seize every opportunity for self-aggrandizement: he could thus, while gradually consolidating his own power, and bringing the Assembly into contempt, contrive always to be or appear in the right. Perhaps the greatest blot in his selfish policy was the dismissal in October, 1849, of the ministry in which Tocqueville held a portfolio. The step was necessary for his ends: but it was impossible to find a plausible excuse for it. The ministry had passed successfully through a period of great difficulty: and, as Tocqueville says, there was actually a danger of constitutional government again becoming popular. Imperialist writers tell us, that "the "elected one responded to the national "wish that he should have more freedom "of action". -a reason at once felicitous and frank.

At length Tocqueville's worst expectations were realized by the 2d of December. He was at his post in the National Assembly on that day: and from a letter he wrote to the Times soon after (republished in the English edition), supplemented by his conversations, we get a vivid idea of those memorable scenes. The noble indignation he expresses in the letter at that signal outrage to law and liberty, was shared by many but there were few who mourned its effects so deeply and so long He complains affectingly in his later letters

of the state of moral isolation in which he finds himself: that his contemporaries have ceased to care for what he still loves passionately: that they solace themselves for its loss with tranquillity and material comfort, while he is destitute even of sympathy in his sadness-sympathy, which was to him almost a necessity of life. It moved him especially to see the coldness with which England, the nurse of liberty, looked on the enslavement of France: the arrogant contempt of his countrymen, as though unworthy to be free, or even happier as slaves: the selfish indifference at the tyranny, followed in a year or two by blind approval and applause of the tyrant. "Et tu, Brute," is the tone of several of Tocqueville's later letters to England.

Reduced to political inaction, Tocqueville adopted the only method left him of serving his country. He chose a period of the past, fraught with instruction for the present, and devoted to its study all the powers of his ripened intellect. The result of this work, the volume on "L'Ancien Régime," is but a fragment yet it shows a decided improvement on his former book, both in style and matter, and is equally likely to have an enduring reputation. From the midst of this work he was snatched away by a sudden illness, in the spring of 1859. He left behind him, besides his writings, an example bright in itself, and especially valuable to the present generation-the example of one who combined the merits of the man of thought and the man of action; of one who, possessing all the graces and refinements of modern civilization, its enlarged knowledge, its enlightened moderation, its universal tolerant philanthropy, yet fashioned his life according to an ideal with mediæval constancy and singleness of purpose, and displayed a passionate patriotism and an ardent love of freedom worthy of a hero of antiquity.

LORD DERBY remarked lately that he hardly knew a session of parliament without its Salmon Bill. No fewer than three bills of this class were brought forward during last session : each of the Three Kingdoms appealing to senatorial wisdom to improve the laws of salmon fishing.

This tentative legislation is as ancient as it is incessant, dating so far back as Magna Charta, which forbade the use of the apparatus of that rude age for taking salmon in rivers. Of late years, salmonfishery legislation has proved successful to a considerable degree in the instance of Ireland; and it will be but justice to Great Britain that "Green Erin of Streams" shall not have the monopoly of any valuable law. The present movement in the question under consideration is based on the proposal to adapt the Irish system to the British and Scottish river fisheries.

Obviously, legislation about the salmo salar has been unceasing because of the uncertainty and, therefore, the errors and controversies respecting both the habits of the animal and the best modes

of taking it for, owing to the general ignorance of the natural causes on which production of this fish depends, our laws concerning it were made, on some points, antagonistic to nature; and, moreover, the lawyers, on whom the framing of the enactments devolved, seem to have thought more of preserving rights in private piscaries than of preserving and increasing the brood of salmon for the benefit of the public. Again, the antagonism of the sea salmonfishery interest to the river one increased the confusion, by contradictory statements. Thus, some savans on the one side styled the salmon a sea fish, because it feeds in salt water-though, on the same principle, a Highland stot, bred in

might be called an English bullock. Narrowly viewed, the quarrel closely resembles the famous fabled dispute as to the oyster, being a question as to right of property in a fish ; and, thus regarded, is seen to lie in a nutshell, which, however, is hard to crack. For, in point of fact, and therefore of law, a salmon is no man's property until it is caught. It is one of the feræ naturæ. According to Gaelic law, every unmarked animal was considered wild, and as such free and fair game. English law, from the time of the Great Charter, has always favoured the natural law of freedom, which is manifestly best adapted for the multiplication of the creature under contemplation; and that law refused to consider even river fishes as annexis or connexis terræ, or to sanction an exclusive right to them. The justice of this abstention from giving a personal title to what may be called aquatic gameunattached to land-is so clear that one hardly need support it by adducing the analogy that a partridge cannot be said to be a natural pertinent of water. The fish's power of motion gives her a freedom analogous to that of the bird's-for, at every swell of the river, unless a very trifling one, she moves upwards nearer the spawning places; so that no landowner on a river like the Tweed, the Shannon, or the Severn, can reckon upon preserving his particular part of the stream. By no stretch of prerogative can a landlord, as owner of the soil which forms the bed of an unnavigable river, be deemed proprietor of the finny tribes within his limits of the superincumbent water; and there is not even an amphibious claim to them when they are found wherever the public can fish from a boat.

For the present, however, we do not propose to dwell on this minor matter