They, the brother and sister, were twins, and as children, they had loved one another. Indeed, in after life, although their paths led them apart, it was these days of childhood to which they looked back with the greatest pleasure and affection. There was nothing much to remember, of course, but that was one of the sources of their delight. The old nursery with the big screen, all covered with pictures clipped from better places and stuck on with an incoherent dreaminess. They remembered that, and the valance which hung down from the bed in which they slept, and which did for a front door to a play mansion or the bosky draping of a lion's den. They remembered the blowing fields of grass in which they could lie hidden from nurse, and over which the aircraft of the summer butterflies with painted wings went with uncertain flight, over which the larks went up and frittered away their stray notes in the morning sunshine. These were the pictures in the book of their memories. But there were dark and blotted pages too. The illness and death of Jessie, a sister a little older than the twins. The "hush" in the house. The delicate walking even of the servants, as if fear was behind them. The best tin soldiers, lancers with lances which would break off-which were seldom seen-had been given to them to play with, "to keep them quiet," and the "hush" had fallen on their little spirits, and they felt, even when playing with the soldiers, as if they were going to weep, but they didn't know why. But after that silent time they remembered a dull white morning when they were taken to the room where she was lying, whiter than the morning, on the bed. And they were held up in someone's arms to kiss her, and, after that, they

saw her on the same bed, but she was dead and cold, and some snowdrops lay on her breast. Then they saw the great hearse, with six black plumes which nodded grimly in the air, and they were at the window over the porch and saw the coffin put into the great black coach, and the horses wore black trailing skirts, and then it drove away, and somebody said, "You'll never see Jessie again," and the tears came, and even the lancers had no claims upon them that day. These were the sort of memories that they had in common.

But, of course, these were quite early in the book. Later there came the time when he went to school with a great knot in his throat and knuckles in his eyes-because he was not going to cry like a baby. Later it was college claimed him, and all these years he saw less and less of his sister, for although he was half of herself, he was the brave, clever half, and did well at school and college.

Then he entered the profession of the law, and married, and his wife, as wives will, looked down on his relations. She remembered her sister-in-law's birthday because it was the same day as her husband's, and sent her a gift, something that was of use, which was almost in the nature of a charity. These, and an occasional letter, which was gossipy but distant, was all the intercourse they had. He was so busy with his profession-he would have forgotten his wife if he had not met her at meals-but he was gratifying his ambition. He had a great practice, which took up all his time, and although he used to be a reader of books, he read nothing now but Briefs and papers. He used to delight in the theatre, and when a boy had had an idea of going on the stage himself.

Now he never went "to the play," or if on occasion his wife's persuasions prevailed and he went, he saw no fun or pathos in the tawdry piece.

But you see he was on the high-road to success. He thought of politics, not as a citizen's duty to his country, not as a science, but as a means to his end, a place on the Bench; but he was too busy for politics, and a time came when, for lack of someone who had "served his party," a Government recognized his position at the bar by promoting him. It was not very long after he was made a Judge that his wife died, while he was on circuit, and one of the things that surprised him was that his grief was not so poignant as he would have expected. He recalled their marriage of love or convenience, for her father was a solicitor; called her, as he blew his nose, an excellent woman; showed the outward form of grief, a broad hatband; and returned to circuit, and assured his colleague, who was with him, that it was a blessing at such a time to have work to take one's thoughts off one's irreparableand he repeated it-"irreparable loss."

It was when the circuit was over and he was back in London in his big house, with its gaunt, empty rooms, and stairs which echoed solemnly to one's steps, and a long table at meals, and no one but himself to sit at itthat he thought of his sister, his twin sister, and made up his mind to ask her to come to keep house for him. It would be a charity to her, he thought, and then, with better taste, he repudiated the word "charity" and said to himself "a kindness."

So the invitation was sent, and she, after praying over it-for she remembered the religion that he in his busy and useful life had forgotten-made up her mind that it was her duty to go to her brother, for he must be so lonely. Thus it came about that they were

reunited in their age. But it wasn't the same thing at all as they had anticipated. He had a feeling of tolerant pity for his provincial sister. She had a distant respect for her brother, the Judge. There was very little in common now. He sometimes spoke of an interesting case and she lent him her attentive ear, but a quite puzzled understanding, and although she echoed him when he said, "How interesting!" she did not know where the interest came in. He, on the other hand, had forgotten even the name of Mr. Sharpe, the country lawyer, who had recently died, and whose will in favor of a charity was being disputed by his greedy relations. Now that she thought interesting. He was quite polite when she asked if he remembered the Misses Blackstock, and how one of them had cancer and died, and another of them had the disease and kept all knowledge of it from the third sister for years, so as not to worry her. But, in truth, he had forgotten all about those prim old ladies, and when she told him how even now the third sister was dead and gone, he said, "How sad!" but really he thought it quite natural that a woman should die when she came to eighty.

Thus it was that the big house was rather empty still, and the long table, which was laid for dinner and glittered with silver as the candle flames, in their little petticoat shades, flickered, was very silent still. And the Judge kept wondering why it was that the companionship with his twin sister was not more intimate, why they couldn't be to each other now what they had been in their old days. He reasoned about it, and when one reasons about affections, it's like a coroner's jury sitting on a corpse.

But the Judge caught cold, and had to go to bed. Indeed, the cold became worse and ripened into pneumonia and pleurisy, and there were quite

lugubrious consultations over his case in the great library, which was doubly walled with lath and plaster, and with law books containing more than the wisdom of the ancients. Sir Boothby Brock was one of the consultants, and Sir Lowcock Jebb was another, and the Judge's ordinary doctor was quite flattered to be in consultation with such great men, who were perhaps behind the age in science, but were up to the times in aplomb. It was obvious to his anxious sister, who was jealous of the servants, for she would do everything for her brother, the Judge, herself, that the matter was serious. But the provincial woman was forgotten in the emergency, and a sister, the twin sister, was there beside his bed. Oh, how she pestered God with her prayers, but she did not let these interfere with her constant attendance at the sick bed. Indeed, when one of the doctors suggested a nurse, she was angry, and looked at him with a dagger glance which pricked his aplomb. When her brother's breath came slow and labored, any effort of the patient was a pain in her heart. She had forgotten that he was a Judge. She had dropped all her respect, and had her own way firmly as to the pillows and poultices. But she was not in the great gaunt house in the Square, but back in the old

nursery with its screen, and the hayfields and the spring days with their magic primroses and the first butterfly trying its callow white wings in the golden sunshine. And strange to say, when the disease got worse, when the poor put-upon lungs could not wash with air the blood that was galloping through the course of his pulses, his mind began to wander, but it too wandered back to the old days. All his great cases were forgotten. He might never have donned the black cap to the terror of the criminal trembling on the edge of a grave; he might never have been a successful lawyer with great fees and resounding reputation; no, all these poor memories gone from his blood-poisoned brain; and he was a boy again, and back at the old place. He wept over the white dawn and Jessie's death, he shivered at the ominous shaking of the plumes of the dreary ebony hearse; but then he remembered his twin sister, and the days roofed with larks or the nights pierced with prickly stars, and he called for her, in his delirium they called it by her old nursery name. And then-was he light-headed?-he cried, "Kiss me! kiss me!" and she bent down and kissed him, and a hot tear fell on his face which was beginning to get cold-so cold.

were

Guy Fleming.

[Will you permit me to suggest to your readers that the time is now ripe, and that it would be a thing agreeable to our friends and Allies, the Republican democracies of France, Russia, the United States, and Portugal, to give some clear expression to the great volume of Republican feeling that has always existed in the British community?—Mr. H. G. Wells, The Times, April 21, 1917.]

It is not easy to understand the opening of a discussion in the critical days of a great war on the position occupied by the sovereign in our constitutional system. The question of monarchy has not been debated for many years. On the last occasion-some forty-five years ago-when the House of Commons tested the exact level to which republican sentiment had risen

in English political society, only three members acknowledged their preference for the republican form of Government. Mr. John Bright was asked at the time what he thought of republicanism, and the reply of that doughty demagogue is worth quotation. To a correspondent he wrote as follows: "As to opinions on the question of monarchy or republicanism I hope and believe it will be a long time before we are asked to give our opinion. Our ancestors decided the matter a good while since, and I suggest that you leave any further decision to our posterity." The answer was complete. The time had not arrived. There was then no practical issue as to the relative advantages of monarchy and republic. To those whose memories do not reach into this past history, it may be of interest to learn that there had been an agitation in the great towns of the country in favor of the logical superiority of the republican theory, and that the flame had been fanned into a momentary flicker by the contemplation of two great causes. The success of the Northern States of the American Union had proved the stability of the American Republic, and had established the ability of democracy to wage a long and victorious war. Indeed, the transatlantic republican system had been substantially strengthened by the ordeal. On the other hand, Imperial France had gone down before the invaders of 1870, and the corrupt machinery of a pinchbeck Empire had given place to a republic. English democrats applauded the struggles of the French republicans, and talked loudly of their meritorious example. They thought that sentiment would become a principle, that theory would develop into practice. A prominent writer of the day-Mr. Frederick Harrison-declared that "the adoption by the English people of the republican form of Government at some time or

other was as certain as the rising of tomorrow's sun."

had

At home there were special and contributory causes upon which the republican evangelists relied. The prolonged mourning of Queen Victoria for her German consort had been associated with Her Majesty's withdrawal from nearly every public appearance of sovereignty, and involved her in a widespread unpopularity. The masses were easily led to inquire for what purpose the stately symbols of royalty existed when the throne was deserted. Their attention was directed to the magnitude of the Civil List and to the multiplication of palaces that were never used, and of Court officials who were never seen. Inverting the neat language of Voltaire's letter to Madame Necker, it might have been said: "Il ne fallait aux Romains que panem et circenses: il nous suffit de panem, nous avons retranché circenses."

In due course a motion appeared on the order paper of the House of Commons, inquiring into the manner in which the income and allowances of the Crown were expended. The debate on this was at once a farce and a tumult. Mr. Gladstone was copious and vehement, and the Speaker impotent: while the subject itself never attained even the decent hearing of a purely speculative and abstract question. Ultimately, the wild excesses in Paris and the nation's anxiety over the Prince of Wales' illness combined to bring the movement to a standstill.

By degrees Queen Victoria recovered her popularity. Slowly emerging from her retirements in the Highlands and the Isle of Wight, she at length reappeared in her capital, and from the date of her first Jubilee until her death in the second winter of the South African War she enjoyed such universal love and admiration as made her the cynosure of every European Power.

The development of a sovereign's character in maintaining an influence on Government within the limits of the Constitution is of extraordinary interest. When that character expands and deepens, as it is slowly trained by the experience of responsibility and the size and bearing of political problems, it becomes a force with which Ministers may expect to reckon in every department of their official labors. Such a sovereign as Queen Victoria, endowed as she was with a vigorous and active temperament, a retentive memory and an abiding sense of her lofty situation, grew to be as shrewd an interpreter of her people's wishes and her country's necessities as the transient Minister of the day. Understanding the root principles of Constitutional Monarchy, and with a keen appreciation of the equipoise of the various parts of the machinery of Government, she knew when to settle a crisis by compromise, and when to withstand the temper and dictation of a persistent councilor.

The historian records frequent instances of the Queen's power. She secured the dismissal of Lord Palmerston from office. She refused to sanction the appointment of an undesirable individual to a post in Mr. Gladstone's Administration. She more than once withheld her approval of certain recommendations to ecclesiastical preferment. She always insisted upon her right to be consulted upon the appointment to the office of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. When Mr. Gladstone's final resignation became known, her Private Secretary ventured to ask her whether the outgoing Minister would recommend a name for his successor. "Not unless I ask him to do so," was the firm reply. Nor did she. No more informing document of the Queen's power of decision and of her knowledge of her own authority can be quoted than the Memorandum of

March 3, 1894, in which Mr. Gladstone described his last audience as a Minister of the Crown. The aged statesman went down to Windsor prepared to advise that Lord Spencer should be sent for by the Queen. His biography dryly observes, "As it happened his advice was not sought," or, as Mr. Gladstone wrote in his Memorandum, "Then came the conversation which may be called neither here nor there. Its only material feature was negative." In plainer terms it meant that the Queen was not to be browbeaten by the politician. She had decided to choose her own Prime Minister.

The reign of Edward VII, though brief, has supplied a good deal of eviIdence of the active influence of the Crown. The King succeeded to the full measure of his mother's popularity, and his personal character increased it. To his high station he brought a temperament which charmed, and a tact which shone in all relations of public and private life. His sympathies were cosmopolitan, and his interests extended to all lands. He possessed and exerted a strong influence abroad which grew out of his industry in the study of European politics, and out of his acquaintance with statesmen of every nationality. Controversy has arisen concerning his reputed share in the Anglo-French agreement. English politicians have characteristically denied their sovereign's responsibility; but abroad the scheme has always been assigned to his credit. Indeed, in the department of Foreign Affairs the King's interest was keen and active, and with great advantage Ministers learned to take account of his views. It is true that domestic politics did not attract him. At the outset of his reign he displayed a lively sympathy with measures for the advancement of social reform, and he desired through the channel of the King's Speech to