The common impression everywhere is that the Conservative Government, as it is now constituted, cannot last very long. The sands of the present Parliament are running out; the next general election may be postponed for some time yet, but it cannot be very far off. Are the Liberals to come back to power with Lord Rosebery at their head? Can the Liberal party become so thoroughly reunited again, Jingoes and Little Englanders, as to make the formation of a Liberal Government a possible event so soon? Or is it possible, as many observers believe, that Lord Rosebery may find himself at the head of an administration composed of Imperialist Liberals and the more enlightened and generally respected members of the present Government? I shall not venture upon any prediction, having seen the unexpected too often happen in politics to have much faith in political prophecy. I note it as an evidence of the position Lord Rosebery has won for himself that, although he became Prime Minister only to be defeated, and leader of the Liberal party only to resign, he is still one of the public men in England about whom people are asking each other whether the time for him to take his real position has not come at last. [Illustration: Photograph copyright by Elliott & Fry JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN] JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN Mr. Chamberlain was once described by an unfriendly critic as the Rabagas of English political life. We all remember Rabagas, the hero of Sardou's masterpiece of dramatic satire, who begins his public career and wins fame among certain classes as a leveler and a demagogue of the most advanced views, an unsparing enemy of the aristocracy, a man who will make no terms with the privileged orders, and will bow to no sovereign but the sovereign people. Now, I have said that it was an unfriendly critic who likened Mr. Chamberlain to Sardou's creation, but it was not in the earlier career of the real or the imaginary politician that the resemblance was especially to be traced. Rabagas is brought by tempting conditions under the influence of the privileged classes, the aristocracy, and the reigning sovereign of the small state in which he lives; and his leveling and revolutionary tendencies melt away under the genial influence of his new associations. He becomes, before long, the admirer of the aristocracy and the Prime Minister of the Prince, and is ready to devote all his energies to the defense of the privileged orders, to the repression of the vile democracy, and the silencing of Radical orators.