ess of the
working classes, who needed time to adjust themselves to the rapid
changes in industry. Even the middle classes suffered, and the poor
could only meet such trouble by 'clemming' or self-starvation. A noble
duke, speaking in all good faith, advised them to 'try a pinch of curry
powder in hot water', as making the pangs of hunger less intolerable.
He met with little thanks for his advice from the sufferers, who
demanded a radical cure. Parliament as a whole showed few signs of
wishing to probe the question more deeply, and shut its eyes to the
evidence of distress, whether shown in peaceful petitions or in
disorderly riots. Many of the members were personally humane men and
good landlords; but there were no powerful newspapers to enlighten them,
and they knew little of the state of the manufacturing districts.

The cause had now found its appropriate champions. We in this day are
familiar with appeals to the great mass of the people: we know the story
of Midlothian campaigns and Belfast reviews; we hear the distant thunder
from Liverpool, Manchester, or Birmingham, when the great men of
Parliament go down from London to thrill vast audiences in the
provincial towns. But the agitation of the Anti-Corn-Law League was a
new thing. It was initiated by men unknown outside the Manchester
district; few of the thousands to whom it was directed possessed the
vote; and yet it wrought one of the greatest changes of the nineteenth
century, a change of which the influence is perhaps not yet spent. In
this campaign, Cobden and Bright were, without doubt, the leading
spirits.

The movement filled five years of Bright's life. His hopes and fears
might alternate--at one moment he was stirred to exultation over
success, at another to regrets at the break-up of his home life, at
another to bitter complaints and hatred of the landed interest--but his
exertions never relaxed. As he was so often absent, the business at
Rochdale had to be entrusted to his brother. Whenever he could be there,
Bright was at his home with his little motherless daughter; but his
efforts on the platform were more and more appreciated each year, and
the campaign made heavy demands upon him.

At the opening of the Free Trade Hall in Manchester, on the site of the
'Peterloo' riots, he won a signal triumph. The vast audience was
enthusiastic: several of them also were discriminating in their praise.
One lady said that the chief charm of Mr. Bright was in t