Recent papers from home fei ture the death of the Earl Balfour and give interesting resumes of his career. No politiefan of-recent times—though Arthur Balfour was a statesman rather than a politician—hag had an equally distinguished re-ord of service. it might be id of him, as was said David, King of Israel, when he heard'that Abner had been slain by Joab, his own Commander-in-now ye not that there isa Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel and 1 am, this day, weak though anointed King." There are Princea. who are not great men and there ave great men who are not Princes. Arthur Balfour was both. ie had chosen his ancestry well for he was related, on the English side, to the noble house of Salisbury' and on the Scottish to the great Argyll, He was born in 1849 and entered Parliament at the age of twenty six, He was almost. immediatoly "appointed private secretary to his uncle, the Marquess of Salisbury, and so gained an intimate knowledge of state affairs age when most youths are still in the callow stage. He accompanied Lord Salisbury and the Earl of Beaconsfield to the berlin Conference in 1878 when rear European war was averted by the narrowest ma xin. The Russian army was then camped on the heights overlooking Constantinople and the British fleet had passed the Dardanelles and was anchored Besika Ray, A rash descent of a Corporal's guard of Russian soldiers would have been answered by a salvo from the fleet and there would have been another Grimea, Lord Beaconsfield returned from the conference ant said he had brought buck "Peace with Honour," but Lord Salisbury lived to doubt whether on that occasion we had not "backed the wrong hors Tu 1880 the Conservative wore defeated at the polls and Mr. Gl ie into power with a ta ity. Disgusted with the pusillanimity of the Conservative leadership, Lord Randolph Churchill formed the "fourth party" which consisted of four members with Arthur Baffour as second-in-command, The young insurgents were a thorn in the side of their own leader as much asa menace to, the Government, In, those days the subject of this sketch we typical man about town, "The perfumed darling of the draw: ing rooms" and was contemptur ously nicknamed "Pretty Fanny' by the Radical members of the party then in But. in, 1887, the Conservatives were back" in power, Ireland. was. seething with rebellion andy amidst a chorus of disapproval, the erstwhile lackadaisical dandy was appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, then tie most difficult post in the gift of the British Government. A new:
Arthur Balfour appeared on the, scene. There was.an iron hand in the velvet glove and the mixture of justice and firmness restored, at least, a measure of tranquillity in the distressful country. Lord Balfour has. no juster claim to fame than his achievement in those dark years.
'The next grein step in his political career came when in 1902 he succeeded his uncle, the Marquess of Salisbury, in' the Premiership. It cannot be said that he was particularly happy, or fortunate in this position. Mr. Joseph Chamberlain w. then advocating fair trade and tariff reform in the face of strong opposition from the Liberals and with scanty support from his own party, Ther
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.