ul witness, and that is the passing of the king and the advent of
the people. The world has grown more democratic than it knows. The
people engage attention now. We do not know so much of Queen Victoria;
but of the conquering, splendid race whose hereditary sovereign she is,
we know much, very much. The case used to be wholly otherwise, the
sovereign monopolizing attention; but that day is passed. So let it
be. This change is one needed, and waited for long, and longed for
eagerly. John Richard Green saw the demonetization of kings and a
remonetization of the people, and so wrote a revolutionary history,
calling it "A History of the English People," in which he subordinated
the intrigues of courts and the selfish wars of potentates to the quiet
growth of national spirit and the characteristics of domestic life, and
the development and solidification of social instincts into social
customs, and the framing of a literature, the reformation of religion,
and the direction of the thought of the many. These constituted, as he
believed, and as we believe, the genuine biography of a people; and
McMaster has done for the United States what Green has done for
England. His "History of the People of the United States" is so packed
with knowledge; so accurate in laying hold of those things which we did
not know, but wanted to know; so free in giving us the inside life of
our country, as to make us wonder what we did before our historian of
the people came to lend us knowledge. My conviction is, that a careful
reading of McMaster will suffice to cure most of our dyspeptic feelings
about national discontent in our time, and dispel the fabulous notion
of an older time in America, when everybody was happy and everybody was
contented. No such day ever existed. The kingdom of contentment is
within us, like the kingdom of God. McMaster tells us the unvarnished
tale of inflation and political and financial asininity in the former
days, so that when he is done we are less liable to that frailty of the
ignorant soul; namely, the moaning, "The former days were better than
these."

Thus far, those authors have been named who have chronicled the
discovery of America, the conquering of the Southern Hemisphere or the
Eastern territory of that era known as the United States. This was
done to keep a natural movement and logical progress. At this point,
however, must be mentioned those voluminous histories of the States and
Territories