ONE:Sir Mark Isambard Brunel, a hero of mechanical science, made a great step in advance by the invention of self-acting machinery to supersede the work of artisans, by which a new epoch was created in art. The greatest effort of Brunel was the Thames Tunnel, a structure of perfect firmness and solidity laid on a quicksand, and forced through a quaking mass of mud, which will endure like the cloac? of regal Rome, when the palace and the cathedral have crumbled to dust. He was enabled to accomplish this prodigious work by means of "the shield"a movable vertical frame of cast iron, provided with thirty-six cells, in each of which a man was placed with a pick to excavate the area, this frame or shield being moved bodily forward by powerful screws, while the bricklayers brought up the arched masonry behind, which was then beyond the power of injury. The works, however, were several times "drowned" during their progress by the irruptions of the Thames, but every fresh difficulty was met successfully by the heroic engineer. The tunnel was commenced on the 2nd of March, 1825, and finished on the 25th of March, 1843. Brunel survived the completion of this, his greatest work, above six years, dying on the 12th of December, 1849.The new arrangements for the care of the king's person came on first for discussion. On the 25th of January Lord Liverpool introduced a Bill to make the Duke of York guardian of his Majesty's person in place of the late queen. This question was decided with little debate. On the 4th of February a message was brought down from the Regent informing the House of Commons that, in consequence of the demise of her Majesty, fifty-eight thousand pounds became disposable for the general purposes of the Civil List; and recommending that the claims of her late Majesty's servants to the liberality of the House should be considered. Lord Castlereagh moved that the House should go into committee on this subject, as, besides the fifty-eight thousand pounds, there was another sum of one hundred thousand pounds, which had been appropriated to the maintenance of the establishment at Windsor. It was understood that Ministers would propose to reduce the sum for the establishment at Windsor to fifty thousand pounds, but that they would recommend that ten thousand pounds, which her Majesty had received in consideration of her charge of the king, should be transferred to the Duke of York. Mr. Tierney objected to the charge of fifty thousand pounds for the maintenance of the establishment at Windsor. He said he could not conceive how this money was to be spent, or on whom, for certainly it could not be on the king, who, he understood, was in that state of mental and bodily debility which made it necessary that as few persons as possible should be about him, and that his regimen was so very simple that it could cost next to nothing.
ONE:Napoleon, finding Blucher gone, turned his attentions to Wellington, expecting to find him still at Quatre Bras; but, as we have said, the Duke was now on his retreat to Waterloo. Buonaparte dispatched his cavalry in hot haste after him, and they came up with his rear at Genappe, where the British had to pass through a narrow street, and over a narrow bridge across the Dyle. There the French came with such impetus that they threw the light cavalry into confusion; but the heavy dragoons soon rode back, and drove the French with such effect before them, that they made no further interruption of the march. Without an enemy at their rear the march was repugnant enough to the soldiers. British soldiers abominate anything like a retreat. They had heard of the defeat of the Prussians at Ligny; and this retrograde movement looked too much of the same character to please them. Besides, it was raining torrents all the way; and they had to tramp across fields up to the knees in mud. At five in the evening, however, the Duke commanded a halt, and took up his position on ground which thenceforth was to be immortal. He was on the field of Waterloo! Long before this the position had attracted his attention, and he had thought that had he to fight a battle anywhere in that part of the country, it should be on that ground. About two miles beyond the village of Waterloo, which has been chosen to bear the name of this famous battle, and about a mile beyond the hamlet of Mont St. Jean, there stretches across the Charleroi road a ridge of some elevation. On this Wellington posted his army, his left extending to a hamlet called La Haye, and his right across the Nivelles road, to a village and ravine called Braine Merbes. These two roads united in the highway to Brussels, just behind the hamlet of Mont St. Jean, and close behind the centre of Wellington's position was the farm of Mont St. Jean; a little below his centre, on the Charleroi road or causeway, leading through Genappe to Quatre Bras, whence they had come, was another farmhouse, called La Haye Sainte. On Wellington's right, but down in the valley near the Nivelles road, lay an old chateau, with its walled orchard, and a wood beyond it, called Hougomonta contraction of Chateau-Gomont. Below this[98] position ran a valley, and from it ascended opposite other rising grounds, chiefly open cornfields; and along this ascent, at about half a mile distant, Buonaparte posted his army, shutting in by his right the chateau of Hougomont, and commanding it from the high ground. Nearly opposite to Wellington's centre stood a farmhouse, enclosed in its orchards, called La Belle Alliance. There Buonaparte took his stand, and kept it during all the fighteach commander being able to view the whole field. Close behind Wellington the ground again descended towards Mont St. Jean, which gave a considerable protection to his reserves, and kept them wholly out of the observation of the French. To make the situation of Wellington's army clear, we have only to say that behind the village of Waterloo extended the beech wood of Soigne along the road to Brussels for the greater part of the way.
ONE:The king, in the first instance, applied to Lord Shelburne to form a Ministry; but he was bound by engagements to Wentworth House, and honourably refused to take the lead. George then tried Lord Gower as ineffectually, and so was compelled to send for Lord Rockingham, who accepted office, on the condition that peace should be made with America, including the acknowledgment of its independence, if unavoidable; administrative reform, on the basis of Mr. Burke's three Bills; and the expulsion of contractors from Parliament, and revenue officers from the exercise of the elective franchise. The king stood strongly on the retention of Lord Chancellor Thurlow and Lord Stormont in their offices. Rockingham, with reluctance, conceded the retention of Thurlow, but refused that of Stormont. The choice of Lord Rockingham was such as could only have been made where family influence and party cliques had more weight than the proper object of a Ministerthe able management of national affairs. Rockingham, though a very honourable man, was never a man of any ability, and though now only[288] fifty-two, his health and faculties, such as they were, were fast failing. Besides this, there was a violent jealousy between him and Lord Shelburne, who became his colleague, and brought in half of the Cabinet. The shape which the Ministry eventually assumed was this:Lord Rockingham became First Lord of the Treasury and Premier; the Earl of Shelburne and Charles Fox, Secretaries of State; Thurlow, Lord Chancellor; Camden, notwithstanding his age, President of the Council; Duke of Grafton, Privy Seal; Lord John Cavendish, Chancellor of the Exchequer; Keppelmade a viscountFirst Lord of the Admiralty; General Conway, Commander of the Forces; the Duke of Richmond, Master-General of Ordnance; Dunningas Lord AshburtonChancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Burke was not admitted to the Cabinet, for the Whigs were too great sticklers for birth and family; but his indispensable ability insured him the Paymastership of the Forcesby far the most lucrative office in the hands of Government, but the salary of which he was pledged to reduce by his Bill. Pitt was offered a place as Lord of the Treasury; but he had already declared, on the 8th of March, on the debate on Lord John Cavendish's motion, that he would never accept a subordinate situation. Dundas remained in office, as Lord Advocate, and John Lee was made Solicitor-General. Such was the new Administration: it embraced, as leaders, five Rockinghamites and five Shelburnites. The eleventh member of the Cabinet, Thurlow, belonged to neither side, but was the king's man. Fox saw himself in office with him with great repugnance, and Burke felt the slight put upon him in excluding him from the Cabinet.The Wesleyan Methodists were next in number to the members of the Established Church. The progress of this society was very rapid after 1820. In that year the number of its ministers was 718, and of its members or communicants in Great Britain, 191,000. In 1830 the numbers were respectively 824 and 248,000; and so largely did they increase in the next ten years, that in 1840 the ministers were 1,167, and the members 323,000. The 1851 census returns showed 6,579 chapels belonging to this connexion in England and Wales, containing accommodation for 1,447,580 persons. The Society of Friends, on the other hand, was declining. The Roman Catholics made considerable progress in England during the last two reigns. In 1829 they had 394 chapels, which[428] in 1840 had increased to 463, and in 1852 they reached 600. They had at the same time 11 colleges, 88 religious houses, and 875 priests. Their chapels at the time of the census furnished accommodation for 186,000, and the number of attendants on the morning of census Sunday of 1851 was 252,983.
