ENGLAND and English Jews deserve indisputably to be placed in the forefront of Zionism. A great pioneer of Anglo-Jewish Zionism during the Palmerston period was Sir Moses Montefiore (1784‒1885). He was a man of great stability and magnanimity of character, and was much admired by Jew and Gentile alike. There have been few Jews in history who have been able to look back on a life of useful and beneficial activity with so much gratification as he, or who were so entitled to feel proud of the fact that throughout their lives they had done their duty not only to the country in which they lived, but to the ancient land of their fathers, to the English people as English patriots and to the Jewish nation as faithful sons of their race. Sir Moses was an enthusiastic supporter of “The Fund for the cultivation of the land in Palestine by the Jews.” This was the harmless name given to Zionism at the beginning of his activity. We read in the _Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore_¹:―― ¹ Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore ... Edited by Dr. L. Loewe,... In Two Volumes, With Illustrations. Vol. i. London ... 1890, _p._ 167. “Friday, May 24th (1839, Safed).... “The heads of the Portuguese and German congregations came to pay their respects to Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore (1784‒1862). Two of these gentlemen, the Rev. Abraham Shoshana and Samuel Aboo, were landowners in a neighbouring village, and gave their opinion on the subject of agriculture. Sir Moses, referring in his diary to the conversation, says:――