A SUNDAY IN CHEYNE ROW 241 



beauties of universal suffrage was simply immense. 

 Without disputing the facts here, we may ask if 

 they really bear upon the question of popular gov- 

 ernment, of a free ballot ? If so, then the ground 

 is clean shot away from under it. The world is 

 really governed and led by minorities, and always 

 will be. The many, sooner or later, follow the 

 one. We have all become abolitionists in this 

 country, some of us much to our surprise and be- 

 wilderment; we hardly know yet how it happened; 

 but the time was when abolitionists were hunted 

 by the multitude. Marvelous to relate, also, civil 

 service reform has become popular among our poli- 

 ticians. Something has happened; the tide has 

 risen while we slept, or while we mocked and 

 laughed, and away we all go on the current. Yet 

 it is equally true that, under any form of govern- 

 ment, nothing short of events themselves, nothing 

 short of that combination of circumstances which 

 we name fate or fortune, can place that exceptional 

 man, the hero, at the head of affairs. If there are 

 no heroes, then woe to the people who have lost 

 the secret of producing great men. 



The worthiest man usually has other work to do, 

 and avoids politics. Carlyle himself could not be 

 induced to stand for Parliament. "Who would 

 govern," he says, "that can get along without gov- 

 erning 1 He that is fittest for it is of all men the 

 unwillingest unless constrained." But constrained 

 he cannot be, yet he is our only hope. What shall 

 we do? A government by the fittest can alone 



