The Tories--or, as they must in future be called, the Conservatives--had been carried to power by a strong wave of reaction in 1841, but it was the destiny of their leader, Sir Robert Peel, to shake the fabric of the Party to its base. There was a story current, of dubious authenticity, about this statesman, how that in his early days his father, also Sir Robert, warned Lord Liverpool that if the young man did not get office immediately he would go over to the Whigs and be lost to his party, whereupon Liverpool immediately appointed him Irish Secretary. No doubt Peel was far more disposed for progress and reform than the average Whig, and there was something paradoxical in the fate that made him leader of the Tories. At first all went smoothly; the leader of the House of Commons was chief of the Ministerial forces and master of the Opposition also. But the first note of approaching storm was sounded on the eve of the meeting of Parliament in February, 1842. The Duke of Buckingham, Lord Privy Seal, resigned his office and seat in the Cabinet on January 31. The reason for this, as the Duke afterwards announced in Parliament, lay in the following expression in the Queen's Speech:--"I recommend to your consideration the state of the laws which affect the importation of corn, and of other articles, the produce of foreign countries." This little sentence, wedged in among the usual ceremonial or occasional paragraphs, contained the kernel of the Ministerial programme, and at once excited extraordinary interest in the country. On February 9, when Peel was to propound his scheme, the delegates of the Anti-Corn Law League marched down in procession to Westminster, and it required all the force of the police on duty to keep them from taking possession of the lobby of the House of Commons. [Illustration: _Lowes Dickinson._} {_National Portrait Gallery._ RICHARD COBDEN, 1804-1865. The son of a yeoman farmer in Sussex. Entered Parliament as Member for Stockport in 1841 and immediately took the lead in the House of Commons of the party identified with the cause of Free Trade, a cause he had already done much to strengthen. He opposed the Crimean War, and brought about the fall of the Palmerston Government in 1857, by carrying a vote condemning their action in regard to the Chinese War. He negotiated the commercial treaty with France in 1860.] [Illustration: _Frank Holl, R.A._} {_By permission of the Birmingham Liberal Association._ JOHN BRIGHT, 1811-1889. He was the son of a Rochdale cotton spinner; entered Parliament as M.P. for Durham in 1843, and represented Manchester 1847-54, and Birmingham from that date to his death. He was appointed President of the Board of Trade in 1868, and in 1873 and again in 1881 Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He was a member of the Society of Friends, and one of the most eloquent and convincing speakers of the century. He is principally remembered for his advocacy of the Repeal of the Corn Laws.]