harm, and I may do good if I can show how the England of to-day is changed for the better since I first began to observe that working men and women are better off, that our middle and upper classes have clearer views of duty and responsibility, that we are the better for the political and social and religious reforms that have been achieved of late, that, in fact, . . . through the ages one increasing purpose runs, And the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns. The one great complaint I have to make with respect to my father and mother, to whom I owe so much, and whose memory I shall ever revere, was that they brought me into the world forty or fifty years too soon. In 1820, when I first saw the light of day, England was in a very poor way. It was what the late Earl of Derby used to call the pre-scientific era. Gross darkness covered the land. The excitement of war was over, and the lavish outlay it occasioned being stopped, life was stagnant, farmers and manufacturers alike were at low-water mark, and the social and religious and political reforms required by the times were as yet undreamed of. However, one good thing my parents did for me. They lived in a country village in the extreme east of Suffolk, not far from the sea, where I could lead a natural life, where I could grow healthy, if not wise, and be familiar with all the impulses which spring up in the heart under the influences of rural life. “Boyhood in the country,” writes William Howitt in his autobiography—“Paradise of opening existence! Up to the age of ten this life was all my own.” And thus it was with me. Existence was a pleasure, and the weather, I believe, was better then than it is now. We had summer in summer time. We had fine weather when harvest commenced, and to spend a day at one of the neighbouring farmers riding the fore horse was a delight which thrilled me with joy; and winter, with its sliding and snowballing, with its clear skies and its glittering snows, rendering the landscape lovelier than ever, made me forget the inevitable chilblains, which was the price we had to pay for all its glories and its charms.