paragraph blacking daily, and editors who want to be “Sirs” and “Barts” will so demean themselves before him as to make him wonder, perchance, in an idle moment why God made such men! Unfortunately he cannot avoid this kind of thing, only it is devoutly to be wished that the people who read such gratuitous accounts of his Majesty’s doings would once for all understand that they are merely reading “smart” fiction, and that for news of the King which shall be correct and legitimate, they had best pin their faith on the _Court Circular_. Otherwise they will soon lose their way in the wonderful web of Fleet Street imaginings, which are more potent to transform a truth to a lie, and a wise man to a fool, than the most direful spells of Circe. A leading and popular journalist has lately penned the following:-- “That we have loved our Queen is beyond dispute, but the pretence that has been offered that her departure brings a great epoch to a close is ridiculous.” Nevertheless, “ridiculous” as it seems to this one individual, there can be no doubt that a great epoch has closed, and that it is particularly doubtful whether as great a one will ever dawn again. Nations have their lives and deaths like individuals, and in the opinion of many, both here and abroad, the more active life of England has already begun to decline. “For,” as Carlyle says, “never on this earth was the relation of man to man long carried on by Cash-payment alone. If at any time a philosophy of Laissez-faire, Competition, and Supply-and-demand start up as the exponent of human relations, expect that it will soon end.” We will not, however, shall not accept forebodings of disaster; and yet there are hints in the very air of a coming battle and a dawning change. “Great thoughts are heaving in the world’s wide breast; The time is labouring with a mighty birth; The old ideals fall. Men wander up and down in wild unrest; A sense of change preparing for the Earth Broods over all. There lies a gloom on all things under Heaven-- A gloom portentous to the quiet men, Who see no joy in being driven Onwards from change, ever to change again; Who never walk but on the beaten ways; And love the breath of yesterdays;-- Men who would rather sit and sleep Where sunbeams through the ivies creep, Each at his door-post all alone, Heedless of near or distant wars, Than wake and listen to the moan Of storm-vex’d forests nodding to the stars-- Or hear, far off, the melancholy roar Of billows, white with wrath, battling against the shore.