Mr. Disraeli was not new to office, but he found himself in power for the first time. With a good working majority behind him in the House of Commons, a helpless Opposition before him, and a surplus of six millions at the Treasury, the natural question in everybody's mouth was "What will he do with it?" There were still many of his own party who mistrusted his love of display and his magnificent conception of empire as likely to impel him along some hazardous course of conquest abroad or legislation at home, but their apprehensions were soon allayed. In leading the House, Disraeli exchanged his formidable gifts of invective for a manner and speech conciliatory to men of all parties. The domestic programme of the Government for the sessions of 1874 and 1875 was unambitious but useful, and the only extension of British dominion abroad was the peaceful annexation of the Fiji Islands at the request of King Cakobau and his council. [Illustration: _Hon. John Collier._} {_By permission of the Linnean Society._ CHARLES R. DARWIN, LL.D., 1809-1882. Naturalist. Born at Shrewsbury; educated there and at Edinburgh and Cambridge. His researches into the "Origin of Species," "The Descent of Man," &c., have revolutionized modern ideas on these subjects.] [Illustration: _From a Photograph by Mayall, Piccadilly._ PROFESSOR SIR RICHARD OWEN, 1804-1892. Naturalist, and one of the greatest authorities on comparative anatomy and osteology. First Hunterian Professor of the Royal College of Surgeons (1836), and first Superintendent (1856-1883) of the Natural History Department of the British Museum, now housed in the building here shown, in the arrangement of which he was greatly interested. It was said of him that he could describe any animal from a single bone.] [Illustration: _From a Photograph_} {_by Valentine & Sons, Dundee._ THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM, SOUTH KENSINGTON. Built in 1873-1880 from designs by Mr. Alfred Waterhouse, R.A., at a cost of £352,000.] [Sidenote: Suez Canal Shares.]