Sir George Trevelyan, who almost alone of living men can compare from experience the House of Commons before the Reform Bill of 1867 and after, holds that it would be difficult to overstate the contrast. The House was no longer an arena for set combat between a few distinguished parliamentarians, whose displays were watched by followers on either side, either diffident of their ability to compete, or held silent by the unwritten rule which imposed strict reserve upon a new member. For the greater number promotion had come through slow and steady service in the lobbies. Charles Dilke from the first was always in his place--that corner seat below the gangway which became gradually his traditional possession; and from the first he assumed a responsible part in all Parliamentary business. "He was the true forerunner, in his processes, his industry, his constant attendance, and his frequent speaking, of Lord Randolph Churchill." The revolt against 'the old gang' began on the Liberal side, and Charles Dilke was the chief beginner of it. Although the new Reform Act had led to far-reaching change in the quality of the House of Commons, the choice by Mr. Gladstone of the members of the Ministry made it plain that no break with the past was contemplated by the leaders. Lowe, whose anti-democratic utterances on Reform had been denounced by Dilke at the Cambridge Union, was Chancellor of the Exchequer; and only half the Cabinet were commoners. Among these was indeed Bright; but the only other Minister whose name carried a hint of Radicalism was Forster, Vice- President of the Council of Education, and he was not in the Cabinet when it was first formed. On the other hand, Bright and Forster were to an exceptional degree responsible for the general trend of the Government policy. The dissolution and election had turned with more than usual definiteness on a clear issue--the proposal to conciliate Ireland by disestablishing the privileged Church of the minority; and behind this immediate proposal lay a less clearly defined scheme for giving security of tenure to Irish tenants. Ireland was the first business of Charles Dilke's first Parliament, and it was Bright more than any other man who had stirred English feeling with the sense that England had failed in her duty to the smaller country, and that an attempt to do justice must be made. Yet in both Church reform and land reform the actual brunt of the Parliamentary struggle fell upon Mr. Gladstone. Bright had a marvellous gift for rousing political emotion, but he had not the application necessary to give legislative effect to his aims; and Charles Dilke, though fully sensitive to the beauty of cadence in Bright's language, and enthusiastic for the music of "his unmatched voice," nevertheless inherited something of his grandfather's suspicion of "that old humbug Oratory"--at all events, when the oratorical gift was not allied with executive capacity.