rapher says: "He quietly took up the burden which his father was unable to bear, and before many years had elapsed the fortunes of all for whose welfare he considered himself responsible were abundantly assured. In the course of the efforts which he expended on the accomplishment of this result he unlearned the very notion of framing his method of life with a view to his own pleasure; and such was his high and simple nature that it may well be doubted whether it ever crossed his mind that to live wholly for others was a sacrifice at all." His sister's tribute is, "Those were years of intense happiness; if there were money troubles, they did not touch us. We traversed every part of the city, Islington, Clerkenwell, and the parks, returning just in time for a six o'clock dinner. What anecdotes he used to pour out about every street and court and square and alley! Then after dinner he always walked up and down the drawing-room between us, chatting till tea-time. Our noisy mirth, his wretched puns, so many a minute, so many an hour!"

The other change was of political opinion. He, like his father, was a Tory, but before the end of his first year at Cambridge he had been converted to Whig principles. It was a time of extreme views, when riots were occurring in all the large cities; the cry was "Bread or Blood," and the famous "Six Acts"

had been passed; but though Macaulay had always been a reformer and had now turned Whig, his mind was cool and well balanced, so that at no time was he a revolutionist.

It was during his college life that his contributions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine began. These earliest writings show the essential features of that direct, lucid "style" which has since come to be famous. The Battle of Ivry, The Battle of Naseby, and The Conversation of Mr. Abraham Cowley and Mr. John Milton touching the Great Civil War were published in this magazine. His father disapproved of such light literature as poetry and essays, and he very strongly disapproved of Knight's Quarterly Magazine. Macaulay's answers to his father's letters of remonstrance are gentle and respectful. Occasionally, though, he breaks forth, as in one letter: "Consistency with a vengeance! The reading of modern poetry and novels is complained of as exciting a worldly disposition and preventing ladies from reading Dryden's Fables!" Still, the disapproval of those he loved pained him, and it must have been relief as well as pride that made him promise his father a "piece of secret history." The editors of the Edinburgh Review, a liberal publication which wielded the greatest power in social, political, and literary circles, had been looking about for a new writer who should be young, clever,

and not a Tory. Macaulay's writings in Knight's Quarterly Magazine attracted them, and the "piece of secret history was the news of an invitation from the editors of the Edinburgh Review to write for them. His first contribution, the essay on Milton, made him famous. Its very youthful exuberance of enthusiasm for Milton, whom he loved and admired, was warmly welcomed by the friends of the great poet, for they felt the need at that time of some appreciative partisan to contest the harsh judgment set forth in Dr. Johnson's Life of Milton. We still read and admire this brilliant essay, but it is only by remembering the lack of popular reading in Macaulay's time and comparing this essay on Milton with the other essays and biographies of the day that we can understand the surprise and pleasure it gave to the reading public. The grudging compliment of Jeffrey, the reviewer, "The more I think, the less I can conceive where you picked up that style!" shows the impression it made on the critics. From the publication of the Milton in 1825 Macaulay was for twenty years a steady contributor to the Edinburgh Review. In it were first published over forty of his best-known poems and essays, written regularly through all the years that were apparently full of the public duties of a member of Parliament.

Macaulay was called to the bar in 1826, but took

little interest in law, preferring to spend his time under the gallery of the House of Commons. He seems always to have thrown all his tremendous energy into the subject in which he had a present interest, and he refused to dissipate his power even in what at times appeared to others as the things he ought to do. Thus at this time, when he was ostensibly preparing himself to be an advocate, he did little reading in law; but later, when he was sent to India and knew that he was to be a lawgiver there, he mastered on his voyage the necessary branches of the law in principle and minutest detail. One who knew him best said of him: "Throughout life he never really applied himself to any pursuit that was against the grain."

Though he had but little law practice, his fellowship, his writings for the Edinburgh Review, and the Commissionership of Bankruptcy that a friend had secured for him brought him almost one thousand pounds a year, sufficient for the needs of himself and the family, but no more. He was now thirty years old, and all his life he had had a keen interest in political questions. This was the exciting time of the "Rotten Boroughs," when the "Test Act" had just been repealed and the "Reform Bill" was seething, and it is not to be wondered at that Macaulay felt his strength and longed for an opportunity to take an active part;

but it seemed a hopeless longing, as he had no money to buy a seat in Parliament, and among politicians he was almost unknown. Fortunately his writings had made him a friend, Lord Lansdowne, who said: "The Milton and especially the articles on Mill have so impressed me that I wish to be the one to introduce their author to public life by offering him a seat in Parliament for the borough of Calne, and as it is his high moral and private character which has determined me to make the offer, I wish in no respect to influence his votes, but to leave him quite at liberty to act according to his conscience." So in 1830 the House of Commons received one of its great orators and far-seeing statesmen, and Macaulay's wish was gratified.

His first speech was in favor of removing all civil disabilities from the Jews. In this his maiden effort in Parliament he used with great skill his favorite device for overpowering an opponent. Placing his adversary's statements on one side of the scales, he heaps his own counter-statements and deductions on the other, until the listener or reader who is following his argument feels that Macaulay's side of the scales. is weighted to the ground, while his opponent's is left in mid-air. This first speech called forth many compliments from the older members, which might have emboldened another man; but though Macaulay loved