As a way of escape from the disasters which afflicted the Republic, there emerged in natural process of evolution, first, the dictatorship of Sylla, then the triumph of Marius, afterwards the ascendency of Cæsar, which led directly to the foundation of the Empire by Augustus. We are not within sight of the Augustan Empire in the United States, but the same causes which in the natural course of time ripened the Empire of the Cæsars are to be seen in full operation on the banks of the Hudson. The United States is happily at present without the legionaries whose supremacy enabled a succession of military commanders to establish the Roman Empire upon the grave of the Roman Republic. That element of danger may not be wanting in time to come. The growth of imperial ambitions at Washington is one of the most plainly marked signs of the times. A spirit which to-day annexes Hawaii, threatens Spain, and defies Europe with the Monroe Doctrine, will certainly be driven to increase its armaments or to abate its ambitions. These things, however, belong to the next century. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. The system of the Tsar-Mayor first came into operation at Brooklyn in 1882. It sprang, as did the Second Empire, from the timidity of the citizens. Mr. Seth Low, the first Tsar-Mayor, writing in the last edition of Bryce’s “American Commonwealth,” points out this very clearly. He said:-- The aim of the Americans for many years deliberately was to make a city government where no officer by himself could have power enough to do much harm. The natural result of this was to create a situation where no officer had power to do good. The idea of allowing citizens in their wards to elect representatives, who should wield all the powers vested in English, French or German town councils, was regarded by Americans as savouring of suicidal recklessness. To trust the elected representatives of the people in an American city, as we trust the town councils of Birmingham and Glasgow, seems rash and reckless to the American statesman. A very thoughtful writer in the _Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science_ four years ago, singled out the English municipal system as one which no sane American would dream of applying to a great American city. He said:-- It may be safely said that this whole organisation of the Birmingham government is an exaggeration of the features which have had the worst effects in the United States. It must make the mouth of a Tammany chief water to think of such a simplification of his labours and increase of the opportunities for plunder.