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There is only one criminal who vies with Charley Peace in that genial popular regard which makes Charles "Charley" and John "Jack," and that is Jack Sheppard. What Jack was to the eighteenth century, that Charley was to the nineteenth. And each one is in a sense typical of his period. Lecky has said that the eighteenth century is richer than any other in the romance of crime.
Of most interest to me were talks with Lecky, the historian. He especially lamented Goldwin Smith's expatriation, and referred to his admirable style, though regretting his lack of continuity in historical work. Though an Irishman devoted most heartily to Ireland, Lecky thought Gladstone's home rule policy suicidal.
Lecky, in his "Democracy and Liberty," "in which the political votes of the police force, of the P.O. officials, of the civil service clerks have been avowedly marshalled for the purpose of obtaining particular class advantages a disintegrated majority is strongly tempted to conciliate every detached group of votes."
Lecky has testified to their importance in a reconstruction of the past by placing "Amelia" among his authorities. Squire Allworthy, Squire Western, Tom Jones, Parson Adams, are characters to be studied by whoever would understand social life in the eighteenth century.
Lecky has given us a book replete with interesting matter; and yet, owing to some lack of intellectual mastery in him over his materials, it leaves a singularly vague and dispiriting impression on the mind in reading it.
Lecky thought Americans more prone to give themselves up to a purely literary life than are the English, and cited Prescott, Irving, and others. He spoke of "The Club," of which he is a member. It is that to which Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Johnson, Burke, and Goldsmith belonged; its members dine together every fortnight; one black ball excludes.
In other parts of his work, where he attempts to trace the action of the same conditions on the acceptance of miracles and on other chief phases of our historical development, Mr. Lecky has laid himself open to considerable criticism.
Lecky well observes that the Irish case supplied "one of the most striking examples upon record" of an unconquerable efficacy in even the most defective Parliament. I am, however, doubtful whether in this proposition we have before us the whole case. This efficacy is not invariably found even in tolerably constructed Parliaments.
In his "History of the Eighteenth Century" Mr. Lecky has done for the Ireland of one century what it is much to be desired some one would hasten to do for the Ireland of all.
Lecky, W. E. H.: History of England in the Eighteenth Century, Vol. VI, Chap. 23. Baines, E.: History of the Cotton Manufacture in Great Britain. Cooke-Taylor, R. W.: The Modern Factory System. Levi, L.: History of British Commerce and of the Economic Progress of the British Nation. Prothero, R. E.: The Pioneers and Progress of English Farming. Rogers, J. E. T.: Industrial and Commercial History.
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