of the faith. No Lama, no priest of the mysteries, no passionate pilgrim, wearied with long travel on the painful way from China or India, ever entered those courts in a spirit of more profound reverence than did this Englishman. There is a passionate curiosity which is the deepest form of reverence; and it is this quality, inherent in himself with regard to Buddhism, which he excites and satisfies in his readers. The beautiful illustrations in colour and photogravure which adorn his book cluster round these two treasures of lamaism in delightful and satisfying profusion, and when we lay it down we feel that we too have looked upon the mild and comprehending eyes of the great Buddha, that we have walked round the Ling-Kor, or sacred way, that encircles the city, that we have filled our eyes with the grandeur and beauty of the Potala, and with the tears that the last glimpse of it quickened as we turned our faces homewards and took our way back to the modern world.

Mr. Landon's book contains appendices by all the principal persons connected with the Mission, each on his own subject; and perhaps the most interesting of these is a monograph by Captain O'Connor, who acted as secretary to the Mission, on the present condition of the Government of Tibet. He draws a very striking parallel between the Tibetans and the Irish-a parallel which must have been suggested to many people by the religious, pastoral, and semi-feudal conditions of the country, but which it is interesting to have confirmed by so expert an authority. Such matters as the natural history of the country, the habits and customs of the people, and the civil and religious government are dealt with also at great length, both in the text and in appendices contributed by authorities accompanying the Mission. One of the most curious and interesting things in the book is an appendix in which four or five Tibetan fables are translated-peculiar and fascinating narratives which seem to point to the existence of a really rich literary field in this remote and unlikely quarter.

But however interesting all these things may be, there remains one pertinent question which most people will put even after reading so full a narrative as that of Mr. Landon. It will be asked: What is the net political result of our expedition to Tibet, and what justification have we not only for the cost and risk of the expedition but for the invasion of a peaceful country and the killing of several thousands of its inhabitants? This is a grave question and one which is not too easily answered. One cannot count archæological

knowledge and discovery, however interesting and important they may be, as furnishing the least justification for the expedition; and there remains the question as to the net political result. We are inclined to think that just because it is of a somewhat intangible character there is danger of its being underestimated by many who have not been able to go fully into the intricate story of our dealings with Tibet. One very important result that has been achieved is the overthrow of the excessive civil authority acquired by the Dalai Lama, and his complete dethronement from the position of civil and political authority which he had attained. His rule has been entirely discredited among the Tibetans, and as he represented the ambitious party, willing to intrigue with foreign Powers and to tamper with foreign influences, it is entirely to the good that an end should have been put to his political influence. The rule of Tibet has now devolved upon the Three Monasteries, which represent the ancient conservative order of things, which cherish an extreme distrust of foreigners and foreign Powers, and wish nothing better than to resume the policy of isolation and exclusion, and to apply it indiscriminately to all non-Buddhist nations and individuals. If we have accomplished this-and there seems every reason to believe that we have-and if the result of our interference has been to double-lock the doors of Tibet upon ourselves and every one else, we are inclined to think that our action will have been fully justified; while our presence in the Chumbi Valley is a guarantee that this time, at any rate, our agreements with the Tibetans cannot be treated with absolute contempt.

The flight of the Dalai Lama of course robbed Lhasa of one of its most unique attractions, and all the appendices in the world on the subject of his religious and political position would not compensate us for the loss of an actual account of the man himself and his doings. Yet it was left to Mr. Candler to convey in one crude but incomparable quotation the whole tragedy and comedy contained in the presence of a British soldier in the holy city of Lhasa. He describes him parading the streets of the forbidden city as 'indifferently as if they were the New Cut or Lambeth 'Palace Road. He looks up at the Potala and says: "The ""old bloke's done a bunk; wish we'd got 'im, we might get """ome then.' Could anything be more monstrous and impertinent, more improper, ribald, and even criminal in its irreverence than this? Yet it sums up the whole of the

wonder and half of the interest of this strange penetrating march of a handful of the most highly civilised people into a territory which even Time would seem to have forgotten, where the world is a thousand years younger than it is with us, and where the mind of man is seen to be primitive and childish and dark, clouded by mists once tender and beautiful, but now becoming heartless and corrupt, through which it must fight to attain self-consciousness, to cleanse itself from the stain of slavery, and to attain the upper air of freedom.

ART. V.-LORD CHIEF JUSTICE COLERIDGE.

Life and Correspondence of John Duke Lord Coleridge, Lord Chief Justice of England. By ERNEST HARTLEY COLERIDGE. In two volumes. With illustrations. London: William Heinemann, 1904.

A LIFE of the Lord Chief Justice Coleridge has long been looked for both by the public and by the legal profession. It has now been written by his cousin, Mr. Ernest Hartley Coleridge, a grandson of the poet, as Lord Coleridge himself was the grandnephew of that illustrious man. The life is therefore naturally sympathetic, though by no means undiscriminating in its estimate of the Chief Justice. Indeed, the book is based upon a plan which is generally conducive to truth, that of allowing the subject of the biography to reveal himself in his own letters, journals, and speeches. It may be said, indeed, that only selections from these are given, and that in this way an unreal view may be presented to posterity. To some extent this is and must always be true. But, in spite of some notable instances to the contrary, mankind in general have long ago given their approval to the salutary rule 'de mortuis 'nil nisi bonum.' It is a rule, no doubt, which does not apply to the public acts of public men and women. Living or dead, they must face the publicity which they have themselves courted. Their private lives, however, concern their countrymen only so far as they bear upon character; and it is difficult to think of any better way of getting at a man's real character than by a study of his letters written during a long lifetime. Lord Coleridge's published letters extend over a period beginning in April 1829, when he was nine years old, and are carried on to April 1894 to within a fortnight of his death. The story so told is likely to be truer on the whole, and fairer, than any picture drawn by a biographer, however brilliant, however blind, or however biassed. Mr. Coleridge tells us of the admiration felt by the Chief Justice for Cicero. Where in the whole world of literature is such a revelation of character to be found as in that great man's correspondence with his familiars'?

The Lord Chief Justice was born in 1820 and died in 1894. His parentage, boyhood, and youth are dwelt on at considerable and pious length by his kinsman. It is sufficient here to say that his family belonged to Devonshire,

that his great-grandfather was the vicar of Ottery St. Mary, in which place the family have been settled for upwards of a hundred years. The Chief Justice's grandfather was a soldier, Colonel James Coleridge, and his father was the wellknown judge, Sir John Taylor Coleridge, the close friend and the biographer of Keble. Many men have owed their character and qualities to their mothers. The late Chief Justice lived always on the fondest terms with his mother, and when she died he wrote in his diary, 'Her 'affection, her generosity, her kindness in a thousand ways, were wonderful. To me she poured out for more than fifty years a stream of love always fresh, always the same, always abounding.' But it was not from her that his great qualities came. It was his father who during a large part of both their lives guided the son's steps, moulded his character, and influenced his career. It is not, perhaps, too much to say, that if it had not been for the wise counsel and unremitting care of his father, the Chief Justice might, in the enthusiasm of youth, have chosen a different profession from that of the law, and another creed than that of the Anglican Church. No one was more aware than he was of all he owed to his father, and he has recorded it in terms of eloquent affection in his letters and diary. Sir John was a sound lawyer, a good judge, and an ardent Churchman, who sat at the feet of Keble. He was respected by all who knew him, and beloved by his intimates. In politics he began by being a Peelite, and finished by being a moderate Gladstonian. He was made a judge by Sir Robert Peel, a Privy Councillor by Lord Derby, and was offered a peerage by Mr. Gladstone, a distinction which, at his son's instigation, he declined. He died in 1876 at the age of eightyfive, to the great grief of his whole family. His son's letters to him are full of love and reverence, and after his death he put on record his feeling for him in a striking passage which contains the following sentences:

'In the character of my father the difficulty is for anyone who knew him well, to find fault. . . . I never knew so good a man-not one who seemed to me so entirely to live by principle and in the presence of Almighty God as he. . . . Intellectually his journal does him injustice. He was an abler man than anyone who read only his journal would believe. . . . But of his intellect, though very considerable, I hardly ever think: nor of the form of his religion, which was narrow and bigoted enough. His character was, I really think, perfect, his princely generosity, his large boundless charity, his tenderness which was never weakness, his noble trust in others, his severity

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