THE POWER, USE, AND PROSPECTS OF THE GREAT GOVERNING FAMILIES.

WITH the Vanes concludes our list of the great English fami- lies. During the publication of the series, a period extend- ing over more than twelve months, we have received but three letters complaining of any statements of fact,—one to correct our ac- count of the descent of the property-right over the Scilly Isles, two others rectifying errors in the involved and troublesome pedigree of the Herberts. It is clear, however, from other letters that the design of the series has been in some quarters mistaken, at least a dozen families having demurred more or less openly against their own exclusion. The writers of those letters, generally cadets of great houses, forget that we never proposed to edit a peerage, or give a popular history of English dignities, or play the rile of kings-at-arms in any way whatever. Under our scheme no family however old was included unless it was now also great, no family however great could be reckoned unless it had also a great political history. The first rule struck out, as to our own surprise it proved, every commoner with the doubtful exception of the Wynne of Wynnstay, the second left us dubious only as to the claims of the clergyman-peer who now represents the mighty family of the Kingmaker, and whose descendants if they continue to manage their wide but poor estates as he is doing may yet claim a place among the most powerful in the land. Our object was to elucidate the half-forgotten but cardinal fact of British constitutional history,the existence in the empire of a few great fami- lies who have exercised from age to age an unbroken influence upon its policy, who have occasionally been powerful enough to govern the country as if it were their property, and who even now, when the feudal regime has disappeared, when opinion has become an mom-

tive force, when ultimate power has been legally transferred to the whole middle class, are stronger than any other single interest, and if united could resist almost any combination of interests. The origin of these families has been varions—conquest, service, Court favour, or high business ability—the single uniform fact being that they can survive everything except the loss of their lands ; but from the time of the Reformation they have been leading in- fluences in the State, the fixed data with which every Government and party and political genius has had sooner or later to reckon. They wrested from the people the spoils of the monasteries, and they defended the people against the policy of the Stuarts ; they built up the constitutional throne under William the Dutchman, and saved it under George the German ; they fought Europe through the great struggle which lasted our fathers' lives, defied the people in 1831, were beaten by them in 1832, and have, as we shall speedily show, in the succeeding thirty-two years once more rebuilt their power. That power, as our series shows, has rested on many circumstances; but it has always been connected in- separably with the possession of land. Daring the feudal times the class ruled naturally, for the great owners of land were by the feudal system the only men in command of military force. When the wars of the Roses, the cruelly subtle policy of the House of York, and the extraordinary personal qualities of the House of Tudor appeared to have shattered their strength, they and their dependents contrived to seize the third of England which belonged to the Church, and when the last Tudor died they retained under the Stuart dynasty the only consistent power. Could Cromwell but have conciliated them we should still in all human probability be living under the shadow of a national dynasty, English in lineage and speech and habit of thought, English, too, in all likelihood, in its narrow insu- larity. As it was, the steady abstinence of the nobles pre- vented the necessary enthronement, gave time for the reaction, and enabled the people once more to recall the evil Scotch House who in England never entertained a policy their people approved, who never built aught, or founded aught, or reformed aught, to whom power brought nothing so sweet as the opportunity of tyranny, and adversity no lesson so keenly felt as the value of dissimulation. When the re-action had become intolerable the great families called in a Stuart who was also a Dutchman, and when the curse which in all ages has, fortunately for Englishmen, rested on the race, had spoiled even that experiment, when half- Stuart William, and Stuart Mary, and Stuart Anne had died childless, they summoned the German House under whose reigu we and they alike have flourished beyond historic precedent.

From the Act of Settlement to 1831 English history is but the record of the intrigues of the governing families, and when in 1832 the people deprived them of their legal autocracy, they and their cousins possessed a clear majority in Parliament, they bided their time, secure that in "the long run the influence of property was sure to tell." It did tell. Daring the long peace which followed 1832 their property increased enormously, the ability the class has always displayed led them to take the lead in all productive enterprise, they reformed agriculture, opened mines, built great harbours, planted forests, cut canals, accepted and profited by the railway system, and built the fau- bourgs of the great cities. Able and audacious, still regarded with curious liking by the people, and full of that individuality, that sense of personal right which is the strength of an aristocracy, they again threw themselves into politics, and speedily regained nearly their ancient monopoly of power. They alone could afford to follow politics from boyhood as a profession, and that fact gave and gives them a twenty years' start of all competitors. They alone have as a class that instinct of control given to able indivi- duals in all classes, and they therefore speedily monopolized high administrative office. Above all they alone had as a class not to be made known to the people. Smith must serve before a consti- tuency knows who Smith is, but a Seymour's name tells the same constituency all about him, his antecedents and his connections, his fortune and his tone. Hence a preference on the hustings almost ludicrously strong, so strong that in the counties a bad specimen of the class, some red-eyed, knock-kneed, gawky lad of twenty-one has often a better chance of public favour than the man who has all his life been the guiding mind of the locality. So powerful has been the action of these circumstances, so en- grained is in England the preference for these houses, that the thirty-one families whose histories we have related supply at this moment one clear fourth of the English House of Commons, the ultimate power in the State. We are not talking of so-called "in- fluence." We have compiled a list of the boroughs and counties Over which these houses in quiet times exercise a direct ascendancy, but we decline to rest our argument upon such disputable ground. " Influence" may be interpreted anyhow, and we haves better test. Here is a list of seventy members now sitting in the Lower House, and unmistakeably belonging to the Thirty-one.

H. J. Means J Grandson of 1st Lord Stanley Cambridgeshire. 1 of Alderley Viscount Andover Fidest son of Earl of Suffolk .... Malmesbnry.

Hon. A. H. Son of 3rd Lord Ashburton .... Thetford.

"Nephew of 1st I,. Ashburton Sir F. Baring Sou-in-law 11st E. Effingham} Portsmouth. of...... 1 Sir G. Grey .... T. Baring Nephew of 1st Lord Ashburton... Huntingdon.

T. G Baring 1I Cousins of and and fird Lords 1 j Penryn. H. Bingham Baring 1 Ashburton I 1 Marlborough. Cavendish Bentlnck oGrandsrur D. of t Portlay. Taunton. G. W. P. Bentinck West Norfolk.

F. H. F. Berkeley F. W. F. Berkeley .... 1 Son of 5th Earl Berkeley........ BristoL Cheltenham. C. P. F. Berkeley Sons of Lord Fitzhardinge { Gloucester. .

Sir Richard Bulkeley f Sozine-rliaewy of Lord Stanley of Anglesey. J. B. Wentworth Buller Married niece of .17M-ita. of Ki.3;itik North Devon.

Lord Burghley Son of Marquis of Exeter North Northampton.. Hon. F. H. Calthorpe.... Grandson of 6th D. of Beaufort East Worcester. Lord G. Cavendish Brother to Doke of Devonshire.. North Derby. Lord R. peen Lord A. Churchill Son of Marquis of Salisbury Stamford.

WwNorthdst*k.

Lord R. Clinton Notts linton Bon of Duke of Newcastle Son of 5th Duke of Marlborough G. Clive Hereford. Hon. G. H. Clive Grandson of Earl of Fowls Ludlow.

Rgurtitsi:ndlaughter of 5th Bonito..

A. Baillie Cochrane Lord Enfield Married

Grandson of 1st M. of Anglesey.. Middlesex.

nom C. W. Fitzwilliam Son of 3rd Earl Fitzwilliam Mato Lord F. Fitzroy Son of Duke of Grafton Thetford..

Colonel G. C. Forester .. Grandson of 4th Duke of Rutland Wenlook. mum F./Amami-Bower Son of 1st E- Granville; eon- 1 Bodes1 in-law of D. of Devonshire j

Granville Leveson•Gower Reigate. Lord Montagu Graham.. Grandson of Duke of Manchester Herefordshire.

Sir George Grey Nephew of 2nd Earl Gray liforpeth.

Lord Grey de Wilton.... Cousin to Earl Derby Weymouth. Earl Grosvenor Son-in-law of and Duke of Sutherland Chester. Sonof Marquis of Westminster

Lord R. Grosvenor. ..... Son of Marquis of Westminster Flintahire. Marquis of Harlington .. Trna:ifflakt1 galtr=1 a I Null' Dulcalhfre* Robert Harvey { Brother-in-law of D. of Buck- Bucks.

1 ingluun Right Hon. J. Henley .. Grandson of E. of Westmoreland Oxfordshire. Viscount Hobnesdale• • Grandson of Earl of Beverley.... West Kent. Hon. C. W Howard .... Son of 6th Earl of Carlisle ...... East Cumberland. Lord Edward Howard .. Sou of lath Duke of Norfolk .... Arundel. Lord Ingeatre Son of Earl of Shrewsbury North Stafford. Earl Jermyn Grandson of Duke of Rutland—. West Suffolk. Fitzhardinge N.Kingscote Grandson of Duke of Beaufort .. West Gloucester. W. H. P. Gore-Langton Son-in-law of and D. Buckingham West Somerset. Sir Baldwin Leighton Nephew to Ld. Stanley of Alderley South Salop.

Lord George Lenuox.. Lminton. Lord Henry Lennox .. Sons of 5th Duke of Riohmond cnyickesgter.

Hon. H. G. Liddell.... Great•grandson of D. of Somerset South Northumberland' Lord Lovaine Heir of Duke of Northumberland North Northumberland.. H. Lowther . ...... Grandson of let Earl of Lansdale. West Cumberland. Hon. H. Lowther Son of 1st Earl of Lansdale...... Westmoreland. Leicestershire. Lord John Manners .. } Sons of 8th Duke of Rutland . Lord George Manners { Cambridgeshire..

H. F. Budmay aliguonodosonstiofjprlde tiihvbeumrton, Herefordshire. Lord R. Montagu .... Son of 6th Duke of Manchester Huntingdonshire..

Lord A. Paget 1 Lord Clarence Paget .. J Sons cf lot Marquis of Anglesey Lichfield. { Sandwich. Cot Douglas Pennant Son-in-law of Duke of Grafton .. Carnarvonshire. Hon. W. Portman Bon-in-law of Earl Fitzwllliam .. Dorset. Arthur Russell Nephew to Duke of Bedford .... Tavistook. F. C. Hastings Russell Nephew to Duke of Bedford Bedfordshire. Alfred Seymour ..... Totness. H. Danby Seymour Poole. Poulett Somerset Grandson of Deka of Beaufort .. Monmouthshire: Lord Stanhope.... Son of Earl of Chesterfield South Notts. Lord Stanley Son of Earl of Darby- .......... King's Lynn.

Hon. W. O. Stanley Lord Stanley of Alderley........ Beaumaris.

Grandson of 1st L. Ashburton Lord Henry Thyme and married daughter of 1- South Wilts. Duke of Somerset Right Hon. C. P. Villiers Brother to Earl of Clarendon .... Wolverhampton.

Sir Charles Wool Son-in-law of and Earl Grey . Halifax.

This list might be expanded greatly by a careful search through the alliances of the members, but we prefer to keep beyond cavil or dispute, and it is sufficiently long. Add to it those connections,. the dependent boroughs like Caine, in which the proprietor does. not seat a relative, the counties in which the magnate holds a prac- tical balance of power, and therefore though he cannot appoint can veto any appointment, and d we shall find that the thirty-one- families at this moment supply one hundred and ten members, or a clear working fourth of the English section of the representation, have in fact as great a direct power as the whole kingdom of Ireland, double that of Scotland, five times that of London, as much as that of London and the forty next greatest cities. And then we are told by silly Radicals that in considering the origin and history of these houses we are pandering to the flunkeyism of the British. People. Why we believe it to be beyond all shadow of doubt that when we have added the great Irish and the great Scotch proprie- tors, it will be found that sixty families supply, and for genera- tions have supplied, one-fourth of the House of Commons, one- fourth of the ultimate governing power for an Empire which in- cludes a fourth of the human race.

The political signification of a fact like this needs little expositiorr, but we may in a few words just point to the main advantage and disadvantage which the Empire has derived from its existence. The great houses have been and to a large extent still are to our political system what bones are to the body. Unseen they have given strength and firmness to what might else have been a gelatinous mass. No king, or demagogue, or soldier has been able to mould the mass according to his own fancies because of these hard substances. They have frequently resisted even the apparently irresistible current of events, once in the great Continental war, decidedly and very unwisely turned it back. Slow, like all oligarchies, to admit the necessity of change, tenacious of ideas once received, daring in experiment when a need has once become patent to them, they have given to our policy consistency, courage, and above all that faculty which all democracies without exception lack—an almost asinine patience. Seymours or Percies, Russells or Herberts expect to be great next century as now, plan for next century as well as this, reckon immediate advantage light when compared with the great objects, the permanent grandeur, and rank, and power which they desire England to hold, because with the greatness of England their own is indissolubly bound up. It is the element of resistance, the breeze in the brick, the hair in the mortar, the fibre in the wood, the bone in the body, which they contribute to our social fabric, the quality of permanence which they add to our institutions. They are the trees in the hedge, and that simile also expresses the one great disadvantage of their existence. They shade the field too much. Corn must be very good and the sunshine very bright for it to ripen under them. Or to quit metaphor, it is the disadvantage of aristocracy that all political ability not immediately connected with rank has a double task to perform—first to rise to the aristocratic level, then to persuade the people. It takes an able man twenty years to obtain from the nation the consideration these families obtain from birth, to put Jones at forty-five on a level with Cavendish at twenty-one. This is true not only of Parliament but of the services, and the consequence is that three-fourths of the ability and courage and genius of the people is lost to the service of the State. A Wellesley is a general at thirty, a Havelock or Camp- bell wastes his life in rising to the point at which men think of making him a general. The consequence is that unless England hap- pens at any one moment to find a genius in the highest rank, she must either do without one, or content herself with one who comes from the mass and has wasted half his power in raising himself above them. But for the fact that the great families sometimes adopt a man of striking ability, as they adopted Burke, Pitt, Peel in part, Sir Cornewall Lewis, and may yet adopt Mr. Gladstone, this evil would in the long run outweigh all the advantages of their power, for if in the cloudy lesson of history there be one maxim clear, it is that nations in their hour of trial are saved by men and not by systems, that though a patriciat may govern Rome it is the individual dictator who must in emergency preserve it. Even as it is this mischief is most marked, and will before long call for some strong remedy, if we would not acknowledge to all the world that England is becoming effete. Strength and exclusiveness are the good and the evil of the oligarchical element in the British Constitution. Fortunately for the country the division into parties while it leaves the strength intact diminishes the exclusiveness ; Whigs and Tories maintain on all grand points, such as the necessity of power at sea, the same traditional policy, but as neither Whig nor Tory can rely on the whole of the aristocratic strength each is thrown back on the people, and Lord Derby stands sur- rounded by a Cabinet of commoners, and even Whig magnates angrily doubt whether the son of a West Indian merchant can be prevented from becoming Premier. But for this and the total inaptitude of the class for journalism, the only political function they have never attempted, the exclusiveness might yet make our history resemble too nearly that of Venice. The Republican oligarchy ruled ably a thousand years and died, while the little dukedom which was once its feeble rival has expanded into a sixth great Power.

Will the influence of these great families endure? The answer of most thinkers is that it will not, that the steady growth of the democratic idea has pulverized influences greater than theirs, and must ultimately pulverize them. We cannot feel so certain, cannot blind ourselves to the facts that after Cresarism had crushed the Roman world to one uniform level of slavery the patriciat had still a monopoly of regular administration, that in modern France the Faubourg St. Germain still rules society, that in modern America it is a real help to a man to be born Adams, or Randolph, or Winthrop, that in this England of ours the abolition of the Upper House would instantly fill the lower one with great Peers. Let the suffrage be universal and Earl Derby stand for Lancashire, does any one know any Hodgson who would have a chance ? The re-division of property may ultimately shatter their power, but short of that their dignity and consideration will probably for a century steadily increase. We are probably but on the threshold of commer- cial success, and of that vast enterprise it is they who always reap the first-fruits. No trade can flourish that for every pound does not pour a shilling into the treasury of a Grosvenor or a Ben- tinck, a Russell or a Stanley, a Neville or a Gower. They own the soil, and rental rises with wealth as the surface of a field rises from successive deposits of guano. Every year, too, the pedestal on which they stand, the greatness of the Anglo-Saxon race, rises and spreads wider. In another hundred years these thirty-one families will be the marked and ticketed families among two hundred millions of English-speaking men, the only persons possessed of advantages to which ordinary men cannot attain, the only figures higher than that increasing crowd. A Percy, say, was great under the Tudors, that is, among two millions of half-civilized men. He is less now comparatively, but positively he stands socially above sixty millions of wholly civilized men, who are racking nature to find him means of gratification. His political power may decline, but his social power must increase. A Scott might once have taken the field at the head of four thousand followers, the Duke of Buccleugh could not rely on the swords of four ; but then 190 members of Parliament would not have voted that a road should be turned lest the House of Scott should be compelled to look on coaches. Every year, too, adds to the number of the nouveaux riches, precipitates into, society some four or five men, each with his million, with the power which belongs to a million, and with a sovereign reverence for the few families which have millions too, and something else they themselves can neither pretend nor buy, a direct connection with the past history of an imperial race. Dukedoms may be abolished by the year 2000,—we pretend to no opinion on that point, perhaps no man save John Stuart Mill could give us even a reasonable prophecy,—but of this we feel assured, that if they are not abolished an English dukedom will in that year be a prize beyond all social compare, a prize such as a throne is now, a position the ultimate goal of all that is great, or ambitious, or rich, among a race which will by that time be ruling directly or indirectly over half the world. The increase of intelli- gence, the new rapidity of intercommunication, the terrible publi- city under which all our children will be doomed to live will only increase thls tendency, as telescopes make the boulders on a plain more and not less prominent to the eye. The political power may depart, though we do not think it will, for wealth grows stronger instead of weaker, and the great houses more conscious of their position and therefore more careful for its maintenance ; but the social power must increase, and unless we greatly mistake a hundred and thirty years hence a popular journalist will still find in this series materials which will interest a far larger and more widely scattered audience. Mankind is more conservative than enthusiasts dream, and remembering that after all the long and weary struggles of the nations the descendants of Henry the Fow- ler still move all the armies of Europe, we cannot feel certain that our great-grandchildren will have lost the help or escaped the influence of the Great Governing Families