is a stain which will not "out"; not even printer's ink can erase or
cover it; and the attorney of Arras must remain the Raw-Head and
Bloody-Bones of history. Benedict Arnold has found no direct defender
or apologist; but those readers who are unable to see how forcibly
recent writers have dwelt upon the better points of his character and
career, while they have not been insensible to the provocations he
received, must have read very carelessly and uncritically indeed. Mr.
Paget has all but whitewashed Marlborough, and has shaken many men's
faith in the justice of Lord Macauley's judgement and in the accuracy
of his assertions. Richard III., by all who can look through the clouds
raised by Shakespeare over English history of the fifteenth century, is
admitted to have been a much better man and ruler than were the average
of British monarchs from the Conquest to the Revolution, thanks to the
labors of Horace Walpole and Caroline Halsted, who, however, have only
followed in the path struck out by Sir George Buck at a much earlier
period. The case of Mary Stuart still remains unsettled, and bids fair
to be the Jarndyce and Jarndyce case of history; but this is owing to
the circumstance that that unfortunate queen is so closely associated
with the origin of our modern parties that justice where her reputation
is concerned is scarcely to be looked for. Little has been said for
King John; and Mr. Woolryche's kind attempt to reconcile men to the
name of Jeffreys has proved a total failure. Strafford has about as
many admirers as enemies among those who know his history, but this is
due more to the manner of his death than to any love of his life: of so
much more importance is it that men should die well than live well, so
far as the judgement of posterity is concerned with their actions.

Strafford's master, who so scandalously abandoned him to the headsman,
owes the existence of the party that still upholds his conduct to the
dignified manner in which he faced death, a death at which the whole