GREAT BRITAIN. 







endeavored, but in vain, to restrain the rash- 

 ness of Lopez, and effect a perfect internal or- 

 ..tii.n bi'turu invading the island. After 

 :it!i of Lopez, Goicouria applied himself 



organization of a now expedition on a 

 l.ir^-r scale, and General Quitmau was chosen 



leader. Quitman entered into the scheme 

 with great enthusiasm, and organized a staff 

 e:nl>raeinij the names of Gustavus W. Smith, 

 Mansfield Lovell, and George B. McOlellan. 



>uria was business manager and treasurer 



enterprise, and proved a very efficient 

 man in that position. Among the contribu- 

 tions to the cause, was a hall-bushel of Jew- 

 dry, given by the patriotic ladies of Cuba. 

 1'n.m some reason never made public, this, the 

 most respectable of the expeditions gotten up 

 for the benefit of Cuba, was suddenly aban- 

 doned. After the failure of this scheme, Gen- 

 eral (loicouria became associated with Gen- 

 eral Walker in his noted Nicaraguan expe- 

 dition; but they did not long agree, and 

 Goicouria returned to the United States and 

 engaged in mercantile pursuits, while the head- 

 strong Walker perished like his filibustering 

 predecessor Lopez. During the late civil war, 

 Goicouria came to Louisiana and engaged in 

 trade and transportation, not taknig part in 

 tho war. When the Cuban revolution broke 

 out, he became prominent in the movement, 

 acting principally as an organizer and man- 

 ager of expeditions from this country ; but in 

 an evil hour he was led to visit the camp of 

 the insurgents, and was taken prisoner near 

 Nuevitas. He was treated with great cruelty 

 by his captors, sent at once to prison, and his 

 trial by court-martial took place the same day. 

 He was executed at eight o'clock the next 

 morning, and compelled at three A. M. to march 

 two and a half miles to the place of execution. 



GREAT BRITAIN, OK THE UNITED KING- 

 DOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. Area, 

 120,879 English square miles, or 62,443,127 

 statute acres. Estimated population in 1870, 

 30,838,210. Government, a constitutional mon- 

 archy, in which the greater measure of actual 

 power resides in the ministry, who represent 

 the views of the majority of the House of 

 Commons for the time being. Queen, Victoria 

 I., who succeeded to the throne June 20, 1837, 

 and was crowned June 28, 1838. Heir-appar- 

 ent to the throne, her eldest son, Albert Ed- 

 ward, Prince of Wales. The Cabinet formed 

 December 9, 1868, under the premiership of 

 I Jr. Hon. W. E. Gladstone, was partially 

 changed in July, 1870, in consequence of the 

 death of the Earl of Clarendon. (See CLAR- 

 ENDON, in this volume.) Earl Granville, who 

 had been Secretary of State for the Colonies, 

 was transferred to the Foreign Office ; Earl 

 Kiuiberley, who had been Lord Privy Seal, 

 was made Secretary for the Colonies; Vis- 

 count Halifax, who had been Secretary of 

 State for India in the last Palraerston Admin- 

 i^tration, was made Lord Privy Seal; and Rt. 

 Hon. W. E. Forster, Vice-President of the 



Committee of Privy Council on Education, 

 was admitted a member of the Cabinet. The 

 other members of tho Cabinet were tho same 

 as in 1869. (See AJJWUAL CYCLOPAEDIA for 

 1869, art. GREAT BRITAIN.) Tho number of 

 members of the House of Commons had been 

 reduced to 652 by the disfranchising of two 

 English and two Irish boroughs. The Glad- 

 stone Cabinet continued in power throughout 

 the year, though with a slightly-waning ma- 

 jority in the House of Commons in conse- 

 quence of its stringent measures for carrying 

 the Irish Peace-Preservation Bill, and the al- 

 leged incompleteness and somewhat objection- 

 able features of the Irish Land-Reform Bill. 

 These bills, which were the most important 

 measures of the session, were not passed with- 

 out material amendments some of them ef- 

 fecting considerable changes in their character. 

 They were finally enacted by a large majority 

 in the House of Commons, and a small one in 

 the House of Lords. An act for the promo- 

 tion of elementary education in England was 

 also passed, which, while defective in many 

 of its provisions, as will be found on trial, was 

 yet a long step in advance on that important 

 subject. The measure is only tentative, and 

 is based, though with considerable differences, 

 on the district-school laws in New England 

 and New York. Elementary education, es- 

 pecially among the poorer classes in England, 

 has been painfully neglected. By the new act 

 the rate-bill system is maintained, but the lo- 

 cal school-boards have the power to pay the 

 whole or any part of the school-fees payable 

 at any public elementary school by any child 

 whose parents are in their opinion too poor to 

 pay the same. W r hether they will avail them- 

 selves of this option remains to be seen. The 

 aversion of the tax-payers to be assessed for 

 the benefit of others in this way, which has 

 always been an obstacle to the success of pub- 

 lic elementary education in England, will, we 

 fear, lead the local boards to be very slow in 

 coming to the conclusion that parents are too 

 poor to pay the school-fees. They will be 

 likely to incline to the other alternative, that 

 the child can go without the instruction. The 

 provision should have been made peremptory, 

 not optional. 



The course of the administration in regard 

 to tho Continental war, and the proposition 

 of Russia in regard to the abrogation of a 

 portion of the treaty of 1856, occasioned 

 some animadversion ; but, though not marked 

 by tho boldness and decision which character- 

 ized her Government in tho times when she 

 was the leading power in Europe, it is difficult 

 to say that, under her present circumstances, 

 she could have taken any other course without 

 involving herself in a costly and protracted 

 war. Discretion is, sometimes, the better part 

 of valor. 



The relations of Great Britain to tho United 

 States were not materially changed during tho 

 year. The Alabama claims were held in abey- 



