In January, 1888, Stephen launched a weekly magazine called _The Reflector_. It was the year in which Maitland exchanged Brookside for Downing, the year of the first publication of the Selden Society, and finally the year of Mr Ritchie's County Council Act. Being invited to contribute a paper to the new periodical Maitland chose as his theme the impending revolution in English local government. The administrative functions of the Justices of the Peace were to be transferred to elective County Councils. In a charming essay full of ripe wisdom and pleasant wit Maitland bade farewell to the old order and expressed some of the misgivings which the inevitable change aroused in his mind. Master Shallow and Master Silence were to be stripped of half their functions and might come to the conclusion that the other half was not worth preserving. That which was "perhaps the most distinctively English part of all our institutions," the Commission of the Peace, was attacked in a vital part, not because the Justices had been corrupt or extravagant, but because the spirit of the age condemned them. "The average Justice of the Peace is a far more capable man than the average alderman, or the average guardian of the poor; consequently he requires much less official supervision. As a governor he is doomed; but there has been no accusation. He is cheap, he is pure, he is capable, but he is doomed; he is to be sacrificed to a theory, on the altar of the spirit of the age." Regrets, however, were vain. On the contrary, since the control of the central Government was already vested in the people, it was best that the people should gain political experience in local affairs, that the local authorities should be given a free hand to manage and to mismanage, and that care should be taken to invest them with such a degree of dignity and independence as should attract the best men into the public service. Maitland did not often express himself on public affairs; but he watched them closely and took no conclusions at second-hand.