reform, and identified with the agitations in its favor.

The old Tory ministers who had ruled the country for fifty years went
out of office, and the Whigs came into power under the premiership of
Lord Grey. Although he was pledged to parliamentary reform, his cabinet
was composed entirely of noblemen, with only one exception. There was no
greater aristocrat in all England than this leader of reform,--a cold,
reticent, proud man. Lord Russell was also an aristocrat, being a
brother of the Duke of Bedford; so was Althorp, the son and heir of Earl
Spencer. The only man in the new cabinet of fearless liberality of
views, the idol of the people, a man of real genius and power, was
Brougham; but after he was made Lord Chancellor, the presiding officer
of the Chamber of Peers, he could no longer be relied upon as the
mouthpiece of the people, as he had been for years in the House of
Commons. It would almost seem that the new ministry thought more and
cared more for the dominion of the Whigs than they did for a redress of
the evils under which the nation groaned. But the Whigs were pledged to
parliamentary reform, and therefore were returned to Parliament. More at
least was expected of them by the middle classes, who formed the
electoral body, than of the Tories, who were hostile to all
reforms,--men like Wellington and Eldon, both political bigots,
great as were their talents and services. In politics the Tories
resembled the extreme Right in the French Chamber of Deputies,--the
ultra-conservatives, who sustained the throne of Charles X. The Whigs
bore more resemblance to the Centre of the Chamber of Deputies, led by
such men as Guizot, Broglie, and Thiers, favorable to a constitutional
monarchy, but by no means radicals and democrats like Louis Blanc, Ledru
Rollin, and Lamartine. The Whigs, at the best, were as yet inclined only
to such measures as would appease popular tumults, create an intelligent
support to the throne, and favor _necessary_ reform. It was, with them,