The great railway king, Mr. G. Hudson, was, for a time, a money-making M.P., who rose from the linendraper’s shop at York, to be the observed of all observers, the lion of the day, to whom, while his money lasted, the oldest and the proudest aristocracy in the world stood cap in hand. Alas! however, he outlived his wealth. It took to itself wings, and flew away. The mother of Joseph Hume, M.P., kept a small crockery shop at Montrose; and yet her son went out to India, made a large fortune, and came back to his native land to be a distinguished member of parliament, and a leader in political and economical reform. Mr. I. Holden, when M.P. for the eastern division of the West Riding of Yorkshire, told a large meeting of the electors at Leeds about his earlier years. “I began life,” he said, “as an operative. I was a worker in a cotton-mill, and when I had worked fourteen hours a-day, I spent two in the evening school. I educated myself by that means till I was able to continue my education by assisting in the education of others; and I sometimes remember with intense emotion, entering, upon a stage-coach, the town of Leeds, unknown, and a perfect stranger, at twenty years of age, in order to be the mathematical master in one of the first schools then in Yorkshire, and almost one of the first in England. I spent many happy months in the town of Leeds.” When he began to take an interest in politics, he watched the course of the two great parties on the subject of Catholic emancipation and the emancipation of the slaves, and became a Liberal. Edward Baines, who became M.P. for Leeds, and the proprietor of one of the most valuable newspaper properties in the kingdom, the _Leeds Mercury_, set off to make his fortune in 1793. His son writes:—“There was at that time no public conveyance on the direct route from Preston to Leeds, and the journey by coach, through Manchester, would have occupied two days. The frugal apprentice, stout of heart and limb, performed the journey on foot, with his bundle on his arm. A friend accompanied him to Clithero; but he crossed the hill into Yorkshire with no companion but his staff, and all his worldly wealth in his pocket. Wayworn he entered the town of Leeds, and, finding the shop of Messrs. Binns and Brown, he inquired if they had room for an apprentice to finish his time. The stranger was carelessly referred to the foreman; and, as he entered the _Mercury_ office, he internally resolved that, if he should obtain admission there, he would never leave it.” And he kept his word. A man does what he wills. To succeed in life—to be even a rich man or an M.P.—is mainly the result of the effort of the indomitable will of a resolute and persevering man.