It would be utterly wrong to fancy that he entered upon these heavy
responsibilities with any sense of triumph or elation, and inspired by any
pride of power. This would have been singularly out of harmony with his
character and disposition. Though he was ready to assume the burden of
administration from a sense of duty, we shall look in vain, throughout all
the critical epochs of his life, for any grasping after the prizes of
ambition. No letter and no utterance of Hyde's can be adduced in which he
put forward a claim for advancement or bargained for any office for
himself. The political arena had strong attractions for him, and his
principles, or, if we please to call them so, his prejudices, were
definite and keen. He was willing to spend his strength in the effort to
realize these, and success in that effort brought him rich satisfaction.
But he was too proud to make them aids in his own personal advancement.
Greatness was thrust upon him; and if disaster chafed him, it was not
because of the loss of personal advantages, but because the spirit of the
combatant felt defeat to be irksome, and because it involved a suspicion
of disgrace. The cause for which he fought was always more to him than his
own fortunes; and to plead on his behalf the excuse of natural elation at
his triumphal return to power is a singular ineptitude. [Footnote:
Strangely enough, this plea is advanced with little sense of proportion by
that most luke-warm of all biographers, Mr. Lister. Hyde's fame owes
little to such misplaced apologies.]

Apart from Hyde's own history, and from the character which stands out so
clearly at once from his actions and his own record, such a conception is
unsupported by the actual facts of the case. Severe as had been the
hardships of his exile, tangled as had been the mazes through which he had
to steer his course, and baffling as had been his difficulties, we may
well doubt if Hyde did not, in the years that now follow, look back with
regret on the days when he had to fight against heavy odds with an ever-