decent luck might have won for him much kudos in high places-the Victoria Cross itself, had the noble Lady who knows how to honour what is noble learnt of it in time. But now as of old the melancholy refrain repeats itself:— It sounds like stories from the land of spirits If any man obtain that which he merits, Or any merit that which which he obtains. Yet one cannot somehow wish very much that it had been otherwise with Alister. He is happier than the run of men; he has got out of this huge tragic whirl which we call life on the easiest available terms. A soldier's death on the battlefield is possibly the best bargain that any of us could make; and it is the choice, I verily believe, which Alister would have made-had there been any choice for him in the matter. This is the brief résumé of his life : When yet almost a boy he served in the Maori War, where he greatly distinguished himself, and was wounded. No sooner was this over than he joined a dangerous expedition to the interior of Australia in search of Leithardt. After this he went to the Diamond Fields in South Africa, but not finding this hard life sufficiently exciting, he left his claim to explore the wild country to the north. On returning, after two years' exploration, he heard that the Ashantee War was going on, and at once hurried off, but, unfortunately, arrived when it was over. However, determined not to be baulked, he actually went up, alone, beyond Coomassie, after all the troops had left the country; and for a considerable time was kept a close prisoner by the Queen, who treated him with the greatest kindness, but would never allow him to go out even a short distance without a guard. He at length managed to get away, to his great delight. After this he had no further opportunity of gratifying his spirit for adventure until the Turkish War broke out, when he went to Constantinople, and with great difficulty succeeded in obtaining a commission. He joined the army at Schipka, rightly thinking that there would be the hardest fighting. Here he lived in a small tent by himself, the only English officer among the Turks. He made himself very useful in many ways, especially in laying down the difficult roads to the various positions on the mountains. At last the opportunity he longed for came, and he volunteered to lead the assault on the impregnable heights of St. Nicholas. How he led this forlorn hope, which would have succeeded had they not found on reaching the topmost rock, after fearful loss, that there was a chasm between them and another redoubt beyond; and how Suleiman Pasha, seeing the Turkish flag waving on the heights, telegraphed to Constantinople that the Turks had taken the Schipka Pass, is a matter of history. For many hours, under a piercing autumn sun, Campbell kept together his devoted band, only protected from the galling fire of the Russians by the bodies of their own slain, waiting for the reinforcements which never came, till at last, all their ammunition gone, the few who remained had to retreat down the mountain sides to the camp below. For this service Suleiman Pasha offered him the command of a battalion, but this honour he refused, as he considered that his knowledge of the language was not sufficient to justify him in accepting it. In November, thinking that all chance of fighting had ceased, he went to join the army under Mehemet Ali assembled at Orchanie for the relief of Plevna; and with this he remained during all the hard winter's fighting at Kamasli, subsequently accompanying it in its disastrous retreat to the Egean Sea. All the Turkish soldiers who knew Campbell were devoted to him; he not only endeared himself to them by his bravery and marvellous coolness in times of danger, but also by his invariable kindness and cheerfulness under the most trying circumstances; and those who did not know him personally were always ready to follow him anywhere, when they heard he was the Englishman who led the big assault on the heights of Schipka. 'He was in Ceylon when the Zulu war broke out, and unable to go there owing to an accident to his leg; but even before he was convalescent he started, and arrived in time to lead the Swazies in the attack, where he met that soldier's death he had so keenly courted. Perhaps, owing to his not having been in the regular army, in reading the list of the killed, the name of this Scotch volunteer may have been passed over; but no more chivalric spirit has passed away during the late war; and the many who knew him, both at home and abroad, on hearing of the death of Campbell, will feel that they have lost a friend and comrade in arms whom they can never replace.' NOW CONTESTING THE COUNTIES. [OW that the Dissolution is upon us, it is gratifying to think that a vigorous attempt is to be made to reclaim from Tory possession some of the larger counties both in England and Scotland. Not long ago, Mr. Adam, the energetic Liberal Whip, made public confession that a feeling akin to despair came over him when he looked at the political map of the counties, and the small specks of yellow by which the Liberal share in the representation was indicated. This despair, we trust, is beginning to disappear. The inspiriting example set by Mr. Gladstone and Lord Hartington in attacking Tory strongholds is certainly full of encouragement, as it has already spread alarm in the ranks of the enemy. We may be certain that if the Tory leaders had felt their position in the counties to be impregnable, they would have left the farmers to their satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the Agricultural Holdings Act and the Agricultural Commission with its generous promises of inquiry. They would not have considered it necessary to remodel that land system which Lord Beaconsfield spoke of last year as the perfection of human wisdom, fitting the unchanging and unchangeable conditions of agricultural production with the same accommodating elasticity with which the skin adapts itself to the enlarging dimensions of a prize ox. Less than a year ago the leaders of the party now in office would have deemed it as reasonable on the part of the farmers to call upon the Legislature to invent a new sort of integument for their cattle, giving them new scope for expansion, as to ask for relief from the pinching pressure of the existing land system. But the danger of losing the counties has produced a wonderful alteration in their views. Last session Lord Beaconsfield preached, as Mr. Grant Duff said, the divine inspiration of the land system. Since then, he and his colleagues have persuaded themselves that they can improve upon the arrangements of Providence for the distribution of the profits of the English soil. The inspired articles of the land creed are to be revised. They and their supporters may account as they please for their change of attitude, but nothing can disguise the plain significance of the fact. They do not feel as secure of the support of the agricultural constituencies as they did six months ago. They are apprehensive that the revolt of the farmers in Scotland. will spread to the counties of England. The change of ground is a sign of misgiving which should encourage the attacking party to redouble their exertions. The Tory leaders are moving their troops down from the heights into the plains, and their opponents may repeat the pious exclamation of Cromwell when he saw General Leslie What has been done once may be done again. The conquest of the counties to Liberalism, the deliverance of the agricultural constituencies from the domination of Tory landowners, might with more reason be regarded as a forlorn hope if that domination had not been shaken off before when it was adverse to the national interest at a moment of grave crisis. The counties had to be won in 1830, before the Reform Bill and other useful measures which it brought in its train could be carried. The strength and prosperity of England, the welfare of her population, have never since then been so seriously endangered as they are now, and the counties must be won again if the rocks which lie across the path of the nation are to be effectually removed. The circumstances are different, but the peril is equally great, and demands efforts not less strenuous to force it out of the way. At the time when Mr. Gladstone was bearding' the bold Buccleuch in Midlothian, preparations were being made for a contest in another county, which was one of the first assailed in the campaigns against the Tory strongholds conducted with such vigour when the fathers of some of the present race of combatants were boys at school. If county seats are forlorn hopes for Liberals now, the chances of success were fainter still when Henry Brougham announced his intention in 1818 of contesting Westmoreland. Brougham did not succeed in wresting Westmoreland from the Lowthers, but he gave them an ugly scare, and the good fights that he fought on three successive occasions probably did more than any other circumstance to encourage the general attack upon the counties in which the battle for Reform was won. Brougham's first contest in Westmoreland is a landmark in the history of the struggle between enlightenment and privileged obstinacy, and few of the bloodless combats of politics have borne a closer resemblance to actual war. In his History of the Whigs and the Reform Bill,' Mr. Roebuck tells a story of a foreigner who was present with him at a stormy electoral meeting about the Reform Bill time. After listening for a time to the violent speeches, the foreigner earnestly asked when the revolution would begin. The audience was wrought up to such a pitch of excitement that he supposed it could have but one issue. An armed collision, a civil war in the kingdom of the Lowthers, would have seemed much more inevitable to this stranger as the outcome of Brougham's invasion, with its bands, banners, party processions, swarms of inflammatory pamphlets and broad sheets, stirring speeches, rousing proclamations of challenge and defiance. the only blood that is recorded to have been shed flowed from the nose of the old town-crier of Kendal, who one evening in a pothouse provoked one of the Yellow' solicitors to assault him, and obtained five shillings damages at the next Westmoreland Assizes. Yet The Westmoreland election attracted an immense deal of interest at the time, and its incidents were chronicled at great length in the Times, which lent Brougham its powerful support. A special CONTESTING THE COUNTIES. Now that the Diet is to be made to reclaim from Tory posses OW that the Dissolution is upon us, it is gratifying to think that a sion some of the larger counties both in England and Scotland. Not long ago, Mr. Adam, the energetic Liberal Whip, made public confession that a feeling akin to despair came over him when he looked at the political map of the counties, and the small specks of yellow by which the Liberal share in the representation was indicated. This despair, we trust, is beginning to disappear. The inspiriting example set by Mr. Gladstone and Lord Hartington in attacking Tory strongholds is certainly full of encouragement, as it has already spread alarm in the ranks of the enemy. We may be certain that if the Tory leaders had felt their position in the counties to be impregnable, they would have left the farmers to their satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the Agricultural Holdings Act and the Agricultural Commission with its generous promises of inquiry. They would not have considered it necessary to remodel that land system which Lord Beaconsfield spoke of last year as the perfection of human wisdom, fitting the unchanging and unchangeable conditions of agricultural production with the same accommodating elasticity with which the skin adapts itself to the enlarging dimensions of a prize ox. Less than a year ago the leaders of the party now in office would have deemed it as reasonable on the part of the farmers to call upon the Legislature to invent a new sort of integument for their cattle, giving them new scope for expansion, as to ask for relief from the pinching pressure of the existing land system. But the danger of losing the counties has produced a wonderful alteration in their views. Last session Lord Beaconsfield preached, as Mr. Grant Duff said, the divine inspiration of the land system. Since then, he and his colleagues have persuaded themselves that they can improve upon the arrangements of Providence for the distribution of the profits of the English soil. The inspired articles of the land creed are to be revised. They and their supporters may account as they please for their change of attitude, but nothing can disguise the plain significance of the fact. They do not feel as secure of the support of the agricultural constituencies as they did six months ago. They are apprehensive that the revolt of the farmers in Scotland will spread to the counties of England. The change of ground is a sign of misgiving which should encourage the attacking party to redouble their exertions. The Tory leaders are moving their troops down from the heights into the plains, and their opponents may repeat the pious exclamation of Cromwell when he saw General Leslie What has been done once may be done again. The conquest of the counties to Liberalism, the deliverance of the agricultural constituencies from the domination of Tory landowners, might with more reason be regarded as a forlorn hope if that domination had not been shaken off before when it was adverse to the national interest at a moment of grave crisis. The counties had to be won in 1830, before the Reform Bill and other useful measures which it brought in its train could be carried. The strength and prosperity of England, the welfare of her population, have never since then been so seriously endangered as they are now, and the counties must be won again if the rocks which lie across the path of the nation are to be effectually removed. The circumstances are different, but the peril is equally great, and demands efforts not less strenuous to force it out of the way. At the time when Mr. Gladstone was bearding 'the bold Buccleuch ' in Midlothian, preparations were being made for a contest in another county, which was one of the first assailed in the campaigns against the Tory strongholds conducted with such vigour when the fathers of some of the present race of combatants were boys at school. If county seats are forlorn hopes for Liberals now, the chances of success were fainter still when Henry Brougham announced his intention in 1818 of contesting Westmoreland. Brougham did not succeed in wresting Westmoreland from the Lowthers, but he gave them an ugly scare, and the good fights that he fought on three successive occasions probably did more than any other circumstance to encourage the general attack upon the counties in which the battle for Reform was won. Brougham's first contest in Westmoreland is a landmark in the history of the struggle between enlightenment and privileged obstinacy, and few of the bloodless combats of politics have borne a closer resemblance to actual war. In his History of the Whigs and the Reform Bill,' Mr. Roebuck tells a story of a foreigner who was present with him at a stormy electoral meeting about the Reform Bill time. After listening for a time to the violent speeches, the foreigner earnestly asked when the revolution would begin. The audience was wrought up to such a pitch of excitement that he supposed it could have but one issue. An armed collision, a civil war in the kingdom of the Lowthers, would have seemed much more inevitable to this stranger as the outcome of Brougham's invasion, with its bands, banners, party processions, swarms of inflammatory pamphlets and broad sheets, stirring speeches, rousing proclamations of challenge and defiance. the only blood that is recorded to have been shed flowed from the nose of the old town-crier of Kendal, who one evening in a pothouse provoked one of the 'Yellow' solicitors to assault him, and obtained five shillings damages at the next Westmoreland Assizes. Yet The Westmoreland election attracted an immense deal of interest at the time, and its incidents were chronicled at great length in the Times, which lent Brougham its powerful support. A special |