period most seriously dislocated the machinery of party government.
But, in spite of all this, there are few statesmen who have carried so
large a number of measures of great and acknowledged importance, who
have impressed so deeply the sense of their superiority on the minds
of their contemporaries, or who were followed to the grave by a more
widespread and genuine regret.

It is this contrast between the leading incidents of Peel's life and
the impression which he made on the world that constitutes the great
interest of his career. The explanation is not difficult to discover.
It is the common story of extraordinary qualities balanced by
striking defects. He was not a great statesman, but he was a
supremely great administrator, a supremely great master of
parliamentary management and of parliamentary legislation. He had
little prescience; he often grossly misread the signs of the times, or
only recognised them when it was too late; but when he was once
convinced, he acted on his conviction with frankness and courage, and
when a thing had to be done, no one could do it like him. As Disraeli
said: 'In the course of time the method which was natural to Sir
Robert Peel matured into a habit of such expertness that no one in the
despatch of affairs ever adapted the means more fitly to the end.'[10]
In the words of Sir Cornewall Lewis: 'For concocting, producing,
explaining, and defending measures, he had no equal, or anything like
an equal.'[11]

In the interesting volumes which were published by Lord Mahon and Mr.
Cardwell in 1856 we have Peel's own explanation of his conduct
relating to the removal of the Catholic disabilities in 1829, and to
the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846; but the publication of his
confidential correspondence has been long delayed, and the volume
before us only carries the work down to 1827. It has been edited by
Mr. Parker with great care and accuracy, and with undeviating good
sense and good taste, and it throws much curious light upon a corner
of history which has been but little explored.

Peel started in life with great advantages. The eldest son of a very
wealthy manufacturer who had long occupied a respectable place in
Parliament, and who was closely attached to the dominant party in the
State, he was from his earliest youth destined by his father to be a
statesman. Under such circumstances he was certain in the pre-Reform
period to have not only all the advantages which the best school a