ondon County Council produced a poet of its
own. The first Council came to an end in March, 1892, and the second,
elected on the 5th of that month, gave the Progressives a greatly
increased majority. One of the newly-elected Councillors uttered his
triumphant joy in song.

"Here then you have your answer, you that thought
To find our London unawakened still,
A sleeping plunder for you, thought to fill
The gorge of private greed, and count for naught
The common good. Time unto her has brought
Her glorious hour, her strength of public will
Grown conscious, and a civic soul to thrill
The once dull mass that for your spoil you sought.
Lo, where the alert majestic city stands,
Dreaming her dream of golden days to be,
With shaded eyes beneath her arching hands
Scanning the forward pathway, like a seer
To whom the riven future has made clear
The marvel of some mighty destiny."[61]

Moved by the desire to gratify a young ambition, I introduced the poet
to Mr. Gladstone, and that great man, who never damned with faint
praise, pronounced that this was the finest thing written about London
since Wordsworth's Sonnet "Composed upon Westminster Bridge."

In August, 1892, Gladstone became Prime Minister for the fourth time. He
gave me a place in his Government; and for the next three years my
activities were limited to North Bedfordshire, which I then represented,
the House of Commons, and Whitehall. I was restored to liberty by the
dissolution of July, 1895. In my chapter about Oxford, I spoke of the
Rev. E. S. Talbot, then Warden of Keble, and now Bishop of Winchester,
as one of those whose friendship I had acquired in undergraduate days.
After serving for a while as Vicar of Leeds, he was appointed in 1895 to
the See of Rochester, which then included South London. Soon after he
had entered on his new work, he said to me, "Men of leisure are very
scarce in South London. Will you come across the Thames, and lend us a
hand?"

FOOTNOTES:

[55] Dr. Butler's Harrow Sermons. Series II.

[56] "Christianity without the Cross a Corruption of the Gospel of
Christ."

[57] Rev. H. Scott Holland, D.D.

[58] Honourable mention ought here to be made of "The Guild of St.
Matthew," founded by the Rev. Stewart Headlam in 1877. Its object was
"To justify God to the People," and it prepared the way for later
organizations.

[59] The Rev